Jacob Two-Two and the Dinosaur by Mordecai Richler Read Free Book Online Page A

a pizza parlor and took off with fifty all-dressed L’Abbondanzas. The cash register was left undisturbed. Nothing else was taken. This was the twentieth such L’Abbondanzarobbery in the Rockies over the past two months. Each robbery is followed by a baffling windstorm. The wind, residents claim, reeks of garlic sausage, green peppers, olives, and cheese. Sometimes it is filled with flying trees.
    Police are puzzled, but they are continuing with their investigations and promise to capture the pizza parlor pilferers soon.
    Two days later there was another disturbing news story out of B.C. Mountain climbers, scaling a peak in the Rockies, had decided to camp for the night on an enormous green boulder. But as they hammered in their tent pegs the boulder had suddenly cried “Ouch!” and then actually shaken off the climbers and tent. Interviewed by reporters, one of the climbers claimed that not only had the boulder moved, but also that it had two large blinking red eyes. But further questioning revealed that this poor climber had fallen on his head.
    That very evening there was something even curiouser on the TV news. Paleontologists scaling a hitherto unexplored Rocky Mountain peak had been awakened in the middle of the night by a perfectlyappalling noise, seemingly coming from an adjoining peak. Had they not known better, they would have sworn that it sounded like two voices, one male and the other female, harmonizing. In fact, one of the paleontologists claimed that he could make out the words. According to him, they were:
    Daisy
,
Daisy
,
give me your answer
,
do
,
I’m half crazy
,
all for the love of you
.
It won’t be a stylish marriage
,
I can’t afford a carriage
,
But you’ll look sweet
,
on the seat
,
Of a bicycle built for two
.
    Jacob Two-Two, his eyes glued to the TV set, suddenly began to rock with laughter.
    “Jacob,” his mother exclaimed, delighted, “are you feeling better?”
    Everybody raced off to the kitchen to bring Jacob Two-Two his favorite foods.
    “Good old Jake,” Daniel said.
    “Hurray for my little brother,” Noah said.
    “Am I ever relieved,” Emma said.
    “Me too,” Marfa said.
    But there was even more to come on TV the next morning. “Sssh,” Jacob Two-Two said, watchful.
    Further investigation of the hitherto unexplored Rocky Mountain peak had revealed a huge winding trench dug in a hidden valley. Paleontologists were convinced that this was evidence of an earlier civilization, most likely Indian, maybe fifty thousand years old. It would, however, take them years of research to decipher the coded message of the winding trench, obviously an appeal to ancient gods, composed in a language no longer known to man. For if it was read in English it just didn’t make sense. It was gibberish. Then they showed a picture of the winding trench taken from a helicopter. The message looked like this:

    Some dinosaur, Jacob Two-Two thought, laughing out loud again. Some dumb dinosaur. “Yippee for Dippy!” he cried out.

From Jacob Two-Two on the High Seas
By Cary Fagan, illustrated by Dušan Petričić
    “‘What’s that out there?’ Cindy pointed past the rail of the ship. ‘There’s something there in the mist.’
    Jacob could just make out the carved figurehead of a mermaid. ‘It’s a ship, it’s a ship!’ he cried. As it became more visible, Jacob could see that it was a very old ship, the kind with three tall masts and big sails. He could also see cannons – dozens of them – lined up along the ship’s side….”

First published by McClelland & Stewart, 1987
Published in this edition by Tundra Books, 2009
    Text copyright © 1987 by Mordecai Richler
Illustrations copyright © 2009 by Dušan Petričić
    Published in Canada by Tundra Books
75 Sherbourne Street, Toronto, Ontario M5A 2P9
    Published in the United States by Tundra Books of Northern New York, P.O. Box 1030, Plattsburgh, New York 12901
    Library of Congress Catalogue Number: 2008911578
    All rights reserved.