Cam Jansen & Mystery of the Dinosaur Bon

Table of Contents

 

Then the guide led the class to another dinosaur skeleton.

“This is the skeleton of a Coelophysis,” the guide said. “Seel-o-fy-sis,” she said again slowly.

Cam was busy studying the dinosaur’s tail.

“Something is wrong,” she whispered to Eric.

Cam closed her eyes and said,
“Click.”
She kept them closed for a while. Then she looked again at the dinosaur’s tail.

“I was right,” Cam said to Eric. “Something is wrong. Three of the dinosaur’s bones are missing.”

DON’T FORGET ABOUT THE YOUNG CAM JANSEN SERIES FOR YOUNGER READERS!

PUFFIN BOOKS
Published by Penguin Group
Penguin Young Readers Group,
345 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, U.S.A.
Penguin Books Ltd, 80 Strand, London WC2R ORL, England
Penguin Books Australia Ltd, 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124, Australia
Penguin Books Canada Ltd, 10 Alcorn Avenue, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4V 3B2
Penguin Books (N.Z.) Ltd, 182-190 Wairau Road, Auckland 10, New Zealand

First published in the United States of America by The Viking Press, 1981
Published by Puffin Books, 1991
Reissued 1997
This edition published by Puffin Books,
a division of Penguin Young Readers Group, 2004

Text copyright © David A. Adler, 1981

Illustrations copyright © Susanna Natti, 1981
All rights reserved

THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS HAS CATALOGED THE 1991 PUFFIN BOOKS EDITION
UNDER CATALOG CARD NUMBER: 90-53367

 

eISBN : 978-1-101-07600-2

 

 

RL: 2.4

“Slurp.
”

Cam Jansen was drinking milk through a straw. She tilted the container to get the last few drops.

Cam was eating lunch in the cafeteria of the Kurt Daub Museum. She was there with her fifth-grade class. Her friend Eric Shelton was sitting next to her.

Cam pointed to the teacher. The teacher was standing on a chair with a finger over her mouth.

“Look,” Cam said to Eric. “Ms. Benson is waiting for us to be quiet.”

“Our tour will begin in twenty minutes,” Ms. Benson said. “But first I must ask those of you who brought cameras along to keep your cameras in their cases. The taking of photographs in the museum is not allowed.”

Ms. Benson got down from the chair.

“See,” Cam said to Eric, “I told you not to bring your camera. Last time I was here someone was told to leave the museum because he was taking pictures.”

“Well,” Eric said, “maybe I can’t take pictures, but you can. Take a picture of me now with your mental camera.”

Cam’s mental camera is her memory. She can take one look at a page in a book, close her eyes, and remember every word on the page. “It’s easy for me,” Cam often explained. “I have a photograph of the page stored in my brain. When I want to remember what I saw, I just look at the photograph.”

When people found out about Cam’s amazing photographic memory, they stopped using her real name, Jennifer. They started calling her “The Camera.” Soon “The Camera” was shortened to “Cam.”

Cam looked straight at Eric and said,
“Click.”
She always said,
“Click,”
when she wanted to remember something. Cam says that
“Click”
is the sound her mental camera makes when it takes a picture.

“Close your eyes,” Eric said. “Now what do you remember?”

Cam thought for a moment. Then she said, “There’s a drop of mustard on your collar. You should wipe it off!”

Eric looked down. There
was
a drop of mustard on his collar. He took a napkin and wiped it off.

“On the side of the milk container you just bought,” Cam went on, “it says, ‘Edna’s. Our cows send you their love and their milk.’

“You’re wearing a blue shirt. The top button of the shirt once came off and someone sewed it back on.”

“You’re right,” Eric said. “But how did you know about the button?”

Cam opened her eyes. “It’s the thread,” she said. “I remembered that the top button was sewn on with white thread. The other buttons have light blue thread.”

Ms. Benson was standing on a chair again. She said to the class, “Clean your tables and then get into a double line.”

Cam and Eric quickly threw away the empty milk containers and the wrappings from their lunches. Then they got in line.

Ms. Benson led the class up the stairs to the museum lobby. They were met there by a young woman in a purple dress.

“I’m Janet Tyler,” the woman in the purple dress said. “I will be your guide. Please stay together and follow me.”

The guide led the class to the Air Travel room. She pointed out the models of the earliest flying machines. There was a full-size model of the 1903 Wright brothers’ airplane.

Ms. Tyler took the class to a weather station room with a solar energy exhibit. Then she led the class into a large room with a very high ceiling.

“This next exhibit is my favorite,” the guide told the class.

“Mine, too,” Cam whispered to Eric.

The class followed the guide into the room. Glass cases filled with old tools, bones, rocks, and photographs lined the walls. On a platform, in the center of the room, was part of the skeleton of a very large dinosaur, the Brachiosaurus. Some of the bones from the skeleton were lying on the platform. The wires had come loose and the skeleton was being repaired.

“This is the skeleton of a Brachiosaurus. Brake-e-o-sawr-us,” Janet Tyler said again slowly so everyone could hear how the word was pronounced. “The Brachiosaurus was the biggest dinosaur. It weighed over fifty tons. That’s more, I’m sure, than all the children in your whole school weigh together.”

Then the guide led the class to another dinosaur skeleton. It was much smaller than the Brachiosaurus. Its mouth was open and its hands were stretched out as if it were ready to grab something to eat.

“Look at those teeth,” someone in the class said.

“And look at that tail. It’s so long and pointy.”

“This is the skeleton of a Coelophysis,” the guide said. “Seel-o-fy-sis,” she said again slowly. “Now you may know about some dinosaurs, but I’m sure no one knows anything about the Coelophysis.”

“I do,” Cam said.

Everyone turned to look at Cam. They were surprised that she knew about the Coelophysis. Ms. Benson had never mentioned it when she taught the class about dinosaurs.