Coming down the slope, a quarter-mile or so from us, heading for the herd, was a monstrosity that made me catch my breath: no other than old rex himself.
There was no mistaking him. He didn’t look exactly as our twentieth-century artists had depicted him, but he was close enough that there was no mistaking him.
The pitifully shrunken, ridiculous little forelegs dangled on his chest. The huge, muscular hind legs, ending in wide clawed feet, moved with elaborate deliberation, eating up the ground, driving the ponderous, vicious creature forward with a grim sense of unstoppable power. It was the head, however, that provided the real horror. Close to twenty feet above the ground, it was mostly jaws, the six-inch fangs gleaming in the early sunlight. Below the lower jaw hung an elaborate dewlap that no artist could have been aware of — a dewlap that displayed an awful, iridescent beauty. It shone in the sunlight with colors that seemed to ripple across its surface — purple, yellow, blue, red and green — ever-changing colors that reminded me momentarily of the stained glass windows I had seen at one time in an ancient church, and, in that moment, I was annoyed that I could not remember where I’d seen the church.
Rila’s camera was making its purring noise and I took a step or two forward so I’d be between her and this great monstrosity. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw that Ben also was walking forward.
“A tyrannosaur,” Rila was saying to herself, speaking in a prayerful whisper. “A real honest-to-God old tyrannosaur.”
Down in the valley, the triceratops had stopped their feeding. Ringed in the forefront of the herd was a line of big bulls, almost shoulder to shoulder, facing the oncoming carnivore, forming a fence of flaring bony frills and outthrust horns.
The tyrannosaur was angling toward us and by this time was considerably less than the quarter of a mile away he had been when we first had sighted him. He halted and stood for a moment, hesitant. It must be apparent to him, I thought, that he’d find no easy picking in this herd of triceratops. While the big bulls stood considerably less than half his height, their horns would reach well up into his gut. While he just possibly might be able to mangle one or two of them with his powerful jaws, they’d have him disemboweled before he could reach any of the others.
He stood poised on those powerful hind legs, the massive tail sticking out behind him, barely clearing the ground, swinging his heavy head from side to side, as if he might be seeking a safer angle of attack.
Then he must have caught sight of us, for suddenly he pivoted around on one of his legs, thrusting himself around to face us with a powerful stroke of the second leg. He started for us even as he pivoted, and with every step he made, he was twelve feet closer. I had the gun on my shoulder and was surprised to find that there wasn’t even a quiver in the barrels. When you have to get a job done, you often do it better than you think you can. I had it sighted just about the place where those tiny forelegs sprouted from the body, and I dropped the gun a little so it was aimed about the point where I thought the heart should be. The gun hammered at my shoulder, but I didn’t really hear it go off, and my finger slipped off the first trigger and found the second one. But there was no need to fire again.
Out in front of me, the tyrannosaur was rearing back and falling over. At the edge of my vision, I caught sight of Ben and saw that a small trickle of smoke was issuing from one of the barrels of his gun. The two of us, I knew, had fired almost simultaneously, and two of those big bullets were more than the huge dinosaur could take.
“Look out!” yelled Rila, and even as she yelled, I heard a crashing to my left.
I swung in that direction and saw another tyrannosaur bearing down upon us. He was far too close for comfort and was coming fast. Ben’s gun roared and, for a moment, the beast was thrown off its stride, sliding down the slope, but it recovered and came on.
And now something inside of me said, it is up to you.
Ben’s gun was empty and I had just the one cartridge left. The tyrannosaur’s head was coming down and the jaws began to open wide and there was no chance at a decent body shot. I don’t know how I did it.
There was no time to think. What I did, I’m sure, was simple reflex, a natural and instinctive protective action. I aimed the gun right in the middle of that gaping mouth and pulled the trigger and out in front of and above me, the dinosaur’s head exploded and his body went tumbling to one side. I distinctly heard the thump and felt the vibrations in my feet when eight tons of flesh hit the ground not more than thirty feet away.
Ben, who had thrown himself aside to escape the charge, was scrambling to his feet, clicking cartridges into the barrels. Behind me, the camera was running.
“Well,” said Ben, “we know something now. The damn things hunt in pairs.”
The second dinosaur was dead, its head torn from its body. It still twitched and kicked, striking out viciously with one clawed hind leg. The first one was trying to get to its feet, but tipping over and falling back each time it did. Ben walked down the slope toward it, fired another bullet into its chest, and it slumped into a mound of flesh.
Rila walked slowly down the hill taking close-ups of the two dead beasts from several angles, then shut off the camera and lowered it. I opened my gun and reloaded, then tucked it under my arm.
Ben came up the hill toward me. “I don’t mind telling you,” he said, “that I’m a bit shook up. That second one damn near ran me down. You got him in the head. You blew his fool head off.”
“It was the only thing I could do,” I said. I didn’t mean to sound smug about it, but I couldn’t explain to him that some primitive sense of self-preservation had taken over for me — that it was not I who had blown off the dinosaur’s head, but some instinct that took over. I couldn’t explain it even to myself.
“The other one, however, still has a head,” said Ben. “We ought to chop it off and haul it back. Just as proof.”
“We have the proof,” I said. “Rila has the proof.”
“I suppose so,” said Ben, “but it’s a shame. If you ever wanted to part with it, that head, mounted, would bring a lot of money.”
“It probably weighs several hundred pounds,” I pointed out.
“The two of us …”
“No,” I said. “We have a couple of miles or more to go to find the stakes. We’d better start getting out of here.”
“I don’t see why.”
I gestured at the two dead dinosaurs. “Fifteen tons of meat,” I said. “All the scavengers will start flocking in. Every stinking meat-eater from miles around.
By nightfall, their skeletons will be picked clean. I want to be out of here before they start arriving.”
“It would give us some good film.”
I said to Rila, “You have enough film? You are satisfied?”
She nodded. “I never missed a lick — the killing of those two beasts. If that doesn’t convince Safari, Inc., nothing ever will.”
“All right,” I said, in a tone of voice that told them I meant it, “we’re heading out for home.”
“You’re chicken,” Ben told me.
“So, I’m chicken. We have what we came for.
We’re leaving while we can.”
“I really think,” said Rila, “we should leave. I’m scared down to my toenails.”
SEVENTEEN
We had returned from the Cretaceous early Monday morning. It was Friday. A great deal had been going on in those four days. A start had been made on building the fence around the forty — high steel posts set in concrete, heavy wire fencing installed upon them and welded into place. Trenches were being dug along the interior perimeter of the fence to lay electric cable for the floodlights. Foundations had been poured for the administration building and lumber was being delivered. Ben’s motel was going up. Rila had left the day before for New York with the film that she had taken. Courtney McCallahan, the Washington attorney, was flying into New York to sit in with Safari, Inc., on the showing of the films. The films were to be developed in Safari’s laboratory, making it unnecessary to take them outside the organization.
