Rivers of Time

"Hey, Reggie!" said Hubert. "Come on, or they'll all be out of sight!"

"Okay," I said. "We shall finish the argument later, Reverend. Better let Spence and me go ahead this time." Ordinarily I put the clients in front and follow them so that, first, they shall get the first shot; and second, so that if one of them stumbles he won't blow the guide's head off. Since Hubert had no gun, there was no point in this procedure on this occasion.

We had covered about half the distance to the herd of stegosaurs when a couple of them noticed us. They peered in a dimwitted way and resumed browsing; perhaps they took us for a herd of camptosaurs.

I waved Hubert forward. McMurtrie was already clicking away; he had his gun slung over his back to free his hands. Soon Hubert's video camera was whirring away.

Then the nearest stegosaur snorted. At once the rest of the herd looked around and gave similar snorts. They then all faced toward the center of the herd and plodded forward until they formed a tight circle, heads inward, with the two muskoxen in reverse.

"What's up?" asked Hubert, turning off his machine and looking back at me.

I was peering about pretty lively, too; for I had a suspicion of the meaning of this maneuver. I sniffed the air, trying to detect the rank reptilian odor of carnosaur.

"We'd better start back, sports," I said. "Something tells me this soon won't be a healthy place. Spence, sling your camera and bring your rifle round to where you can see it!"

McMurtrie and I began backing toward the camp, gripping our guns and looking about. Hubert was so involved in his picture taking that he stayed where he was.

"Come on back, Paul!" I shouted.

But Hubert continued photographing, shifting from one of his three cameras to another. Beside me, McMurtrie muttered: "Oh, my God!"

I looked in the direction he did, and here came the biggest Epanterias I've ever seen; must have been over fifteen meters long. It's built much like the tyrannosaur, except that it has much bigger forelimbs, with grasping claws.

This theropod's attention was currently on the circle of stegosaurs, and it strode towards them with the direct approach of a hungry man to dinner.

As it came closer and seemed about to take a bite, the stegosaurs all began to lash their tails right and left. Each tail is armed with four big spikes, like horns. When the carnosaur leaned over to bite, one of these tails struck him in the belly with an impact like that of a bass drum. The sound almost made me say "Ouch!" in sympathy.

The theropod backed up with a grunt. After a few seconds of appraising the situation, it started round the circle. From my experience with animals, I suspected that it was really after, not one of the full-grown stegosaurs, but one of the smaller young ones in the center. I let out a full bellow:

"Paul Hubert! God damn it, come on back!"

He gave us a vague wave and kept on filming. The theropod marched clear around the circle of stegosaurs, now and then making a tentative snap at their hindquarters; but the lashing tails kept him away. At last he came around to the side of the circle where Hubert stood, buzzing and clicking away. It turned toward him as if to say: Well, what have we here?

"Get your gun ready!" I told McMurtrie, and then loudly to Hubert: "Come on, you idiot galah!"

Hubert seemed at last to have got the idea. He slung his cameras and started to run toward us. The theropod came after him with long strides.

"Better shoot," I said. "Don't hit the Reverend by mistake. Aim for the heart."

We hoisted up our .600s and let fly, one barrel, then the other. At that range I'm sure all four shots hit. The impact knocked the theropod back on its haunches—or rather, back on its tail, which it uses as a prop when standing. Hubert ran past us, the cameras slung round his neck swinging this way and that and banging one another.

"Reload!" I said, hauling two more rounds out of my vest as I broke the gun.

McMurtrie was reloading when something took our attention and the theropod's too. It neared the place where lay the camptosaur that McMurtrie had shot earlier. Unexpectedly, the camptosaur rolled to its feet, took one look at the theropod towering over it, and ran off. The theropod swiveled its head, following the fleeing camptosaur, and then started after it. In seconds, both were out of sight, though we could hear the crashing of their passage.

"Damn!" said McMurtrie. "I should have done as you advised."

"Why, what did you do?" I asked.

"Tried for a brain shot instead of a heart shot."

"And doubtless the bullet glanced off the skull and stunned the animal. With dinosaur, the brain is so small in proportion to the skull that you have only an outside chance of hitting it."

"I've always heard they were pretty stupid," said McMurtrie.

"No stupider than modern reptiles. They're all equipped with instincts that take care of all the contingencies they're likely to meet, like that circle the stegosaur formed. And these blokes lasted a couple of hundred million years, compared to a mere couple of million for our own land. So don't snoot the dinosaur!"