Jurassic Park: A Novel (39 page)

“Forget it,” Lex said. “I’m not staying
here
.” She started to climb down the branches. At her movement, the hadrosaur trumpeted in fresh alarm.

Grant was amazed. He thought, It really can’t see us when we don’t move. And after a minute it literally forgets that we’re here.
This was just like the tyrannosaur—another classic example of an amphibian visual cortex. Studies of frogs had shown that amphibians only saw moving things, like insects. If something didn’t move, they literally didn’t see it. The same thing seemed to be true of dinosaurs.

In any case, the maiasaur now seemed to find these strange creatures climbing down the tree too upsetting. With a final honk, she nudged her baby, and lumbered slowly away. She paused once, and looked back at them, then continued on.

They reached the ground. Lex shook herself off. Both children were covered in a layer of fine dust. All around them, the grass had been flattened. There were streaks of blood, and a sour smell.

Grant looked at his watch. “We better get going, kids,” he said.

“Not me,” Lex said. “I’m not walking out there
any more.”

“We have to.”

“Why?”

“Because,” Grant said, “we have to tell them about the boat. Since they can’t seem to see us on the motion sensors, we have to go all the way back ourselves. It’s the only way.”

“Why can’t we take the raft?” Tim said.

“What raft?”

Tim pointed to the low concrete maintenance building with the bars, where they had spent the night. It was twenty yards away, across the field. “I saw a raft back there,” he said.

Grant immediately understood the advantages. It was now seven o’clock in the morning. They had at least eight miles to go. If they could take a raft along the river, they would make much faster progress than going overland. “Let’s do it,” Grant said.

Arnold punched the visual search mode and watched as the monitors began to scan throughout the park, the images changing every two seconds. It was tiring to watch, but it was the fastest way to find Nedry’s Jeep, and Muldoon had been adamant about that. He had gone out with Gennaro to look at the stampede, but now that it was daylight, he wanted the car found. He wanted the weapons.

His intercom clicked. “Mr. Arnold, may I have a word with you, please?”

It was Hammond. He sounded like the voice of God.

“You want to come here, Mr. Hammond?”

“No, Mr. Arnold,” Hammond said. “Come to me. I’m in the genetics lab with Dr. Wu. We’ll be waiting for you.”

Arnold sighed, and stepped away from the screens.

Grant stumbled deep in the gloomy recesses of the building. He pushed past five-gallon containers of herbicide, tree-pruning equipment, spare tires for a Jeep, coils of cyclone fencing, hundred-pound fertilizer bags, stacks of brown ceramic insulators, empty motor-oil cans, work lights and cables.

“I don’t see any raft.”

“Keep going.”

Bags of cement, lengths of copper pipe, green mesh … and two plastic oars hung on clips on the concrete wall.

“Okay,” he said, “but where’s the raft?”

“It must be here somewhere,” Tim said.

“You never saw a raft?”

“No, I just assumed it was here.”

Poking among the junk, Grant found no raft. But he did find a set of plans, rolled up and speckled with mold from humidity, stuck back in a metal cabinet on the wall. He spread the plans on the floor, brushing away a big spider. He looked at them for a long time.

“I’m hungry.…”

“Just a minute.”

They were detailed topographical charts for the main area of the island, where they now were. According to this, the lagoon narrowed into the river they had seen earlier, which twisted northward … right through the aviary … and on to within a half-mile of the visitor lodge.

He flipped back through the pages. How to get to the lagoon? According to the plans, there should be a door at the back of the building they were in. Grant looked up, and saw it, recessed back in the concrete wall. The door was wide enough for a car. Opening it, he saw a paved road running straight down toward the lagoon. The road was dug below ground level, so it couldn’t be seen from above. It must be another service road. And it led to a dock at the edge of the lagoon. And clearly stenciled on the dock was
RAFT STORAGE.

“Hey,” Tim said, “look at this.” He held out a metal case to Grant.

Opening it, Grant found a compressed-air pistol and a cloth belt
that held darts. There were six darts in all, each as thick as his finger. Labeled
MORO-
709.

“Good work, Tim.” He slung the belt around his shoulder, and stuck the gun in his trousers.

“Is it a tranquilizer gun?”

“I’d say so.”

“What about the boat?” Lex said.

“I think it’s on the dock,” Grant said. They started down the road. Grant carried the oars on his shoulder. “I hope it’s a big raft,” Lex said, “because I can’t swim.”

“Don’t worry,” he said.

“Maybe we can catch some fish,” she said.

They walked down the road with the sloping embankment rising up on both sides of them. They heard a deep rhythmic snorting sound, but Grant could not see where it was coming from.

“Are you sure there’s a raft down here?” Lex said, wrinkling her nose.

“Probably,” Grant said.

The rhythmic snorting became louder as they walked, but they also heard a steady droning, buzzing sound. When they reached the end of the road, at the edge of the small concrete dock, Grant froze in shock.

The tyrannosaur was
right there
.

It was sitting upright in the shade of a tree, its hind legs stretched out in front. Its eyes were open but it was not moving, except for its head, which lifted and fell gently with each snorting sound. The buzzing came from the clouds of flies that surrounded it, crawling over its face and slack jaws, its bloody fangs, and the red haunch of a killed hadrosaur that lay on its side behind the tyrannosaur.

The tyrannosaur was only twenty yards away. Grant felt sure it must have seen him, but the big animal did not respond. It just sat there. It took him a moment to realize: the tyrannosaur was asleep. Sitting up, but asleep.

He signaled to Tim and Lex to stay where they were. Grant walked slowly forward onto the dock, in full view of the tyrannosaur. The big animal continued to sleep, snoring softly.

Near the end of the dock, a wooden shed was painted green to blend with the foliage. Grant quietly unlatched the door and looked inside. He saw a half-dozen orange life vests hanging on the wall, several rolls of wire-mesh fencing, some coils of rope, and two big
rubber cubes sitting on the floor. The cubes were strapped tight with flat rubber belts.

Rafts.

He looked back at Lex.

She mouthed:
No boat.

He nodded,
Yes.

The tyrannosaur raised its forelimb to swipe at the flies buzzing around its snout. But otherwise it did not move. Grant pulled one of the cubes out onto the dock. It was surprisingly heavy. He freed the straps, found the inflation cylinder. With a loud hiss, the rubber began to expand, and then with a
hiss-whap!
it popped fully open on the dock. The sound was fearfully loud in their ears.

Grant turned, stared up at the dinosaur.

The tyrannosaur grunted, and snorted. It began to move. Grant braced himself to run, but the animal shifted its ponderous bulk and then it settled back against the tree trunk and gave a long, growling belch.

Lex looked disgusted, waving her hand in front of her face.

Grant was soaked in sweat from the tension. He dragged the rubber raft across the dock. It flopped into the water with a loud splash.

The dinosaur continued to sleep.

Grant tied the boat up to the dock, and returned to the shed to take out two life preservers. He put these in the boat, and then waved for the kids to come out onto the dock.

Pale with fear, Lex waved back,
No.

He gestured:
Yes
.

The tyrannosaur continued to sleep.

Grant stabbed in the air with an emphatic finger. Lex came silently, and he gestured for her to get into the raft; then Tim got in, and they both put on their life vests. Grant got in and pushed off. The raft drifted silently out into the lagoon. Grant picked up his paddles and fitted them into the oarlocks. They moved farther from the dock.

Lex sat back, and sighed loudly with relief. Then she looked stricken, and put her hand over her mouth. Her body shook, with muffled sounds: she was suppressing a cough.

She
always
coughed at the wrong times!

“Lex,” Tim whispered fiercely, looking back toward the shore.

She shook her head miserably, and pointed to her throat. He knew what she meant: a tickle in her throat. What she needed was
a drink of water. Grant was rowing, and Tim leaned over the side of the raft and scooped his hand in the lagoon, holding his cupped hand toward her.

Lex coughed loudly, explosively. In Tim’s ears, the sound echoed across the water like a gunshot.

The tyrannosaur yawned lazily, and scratched behind its ear with its hind foot, just like a dog. It yawned again. It was groggy after its big meal, and it woke up slowly.

On the boat, Lex was making little gargling sounds.

“Lex,
shut up!”
Tim said.

“I can’t help it,” she whispered, and then she coughed again. Grant rowed hard, moving the raft powerfully into the center of the lagoon.

On the shore, the tyrannosaur stumbled to its feet.

“I couldn’t help it, Timmy!” Lex shrieked miserably. “I couldn’t help it!”

“Shhhh!”

Grant was rowing as fast as he could.

“Anyway, it doesn’t matter,” she said. “We’re far enough away. He can’t swim.”

“
Of course he can swim, you little idiot!
” Tim shouted at her. On the shore, the tyrannosaur stepped off the dock and plunged into the water. It moved strongly into the lagoon after them.

“Well, how should I know?” she said.

“Everybody knows tyrannosaurs can swim! It’s in all the books! Anyway, all reptiles can swim!”

“Snakes can’t.”

“
Of course
snakes can. You
idiot
!”

“Settle down,” Grant said. “Hold on to something!” Grant was watching the tyrannosaur, noticing how the animal swam. The tyrannosaur was now chest-deep in the water, but it could hold its big head high above the surface. Then Grant realized the animal wasn’t swimming, it was walking, because moments later only the very top of the head—the eyes and nostrils—protruded above the surface. By then it looked like a crocodile, and it swam like a crocodile, swinging its big tail back and forth, so the water churned behind it. Behind the head, Grant saw the hump of the back, and the ridges along the length of tail, as it occasionally broke the surface.

Exactly like a crocodile, he thought unhappily. The biggest crocodile in the world.

“I’m sorry, Dr. Grant!” Lex wailed. “I didn’t mean it!”

Grant glanced over his shoulder. The lagoon was no more than a hundred yards wide here, and they had almost reached the center. If he continued, the water would become shallow again. The tyrannosaur would be able to walk again, and he would move faster in shallow water. Grant swung the boat around, and began to row north.

“What are you
doing
?”

The tyrannosaur was now just a few yards away. Grant could hear its sharp snorting breaths as it came closer. Grant looked at the paddles in his hands, but they were light plastic—not weapons at all.

The tyrannosaur threw its head back and opened its jaws wide, showing rows of curved teeth, and then in a great muscular spasm lunged forward to the raft, just missing the rubber gunwale, the huge skull slapping down, the raft rocking away on the crest of the splash.

The tyrannosaur sank below the surface, leaving gurgling bubbles. The lagoon was still. Lex gripped the gunwale handles and looked back.

“Did he drown?”

“No,” Grant said. He saw bubbles—then a faint ripple along the surface—coming toward the boat—

“Hang on!” he shouted, as the head bucked up beneath the rubber, bending the boat and lifting it into the air, spinning them crazily before it splashed down again.

“Do something!” Alexis screamed. “Do something!”

Grant pulled the air pistol out of his belt. It looked pitifully small in his hands, but there was the chance that, if he shot the animal in a sensitive spot, in the eye or the nose—

The tyrannosaur surfaced beside the boat, opened its jaws, and roared. Grant aimed, and fired. The dart flashed in the light, and smacked into the cheek. The tyrannosaur shook its head, and roared again.

And suddenly they heard an answering roar, floating across the water toward them.

Looking back, Grant saw the juvenile T-rex on the shore, crouched over the killed sauropod, claiming the kill as its own. The juvenile slashed at the carcass, then raised its head high and bellowed. The big tyrannosaur saw it, too, and the response was immediate—it
turned back to protect its kill, swimming strongly toward the shore.

“He’s going away!” Lex squealed, clapping her hands. “He’s going away! Naah-naah-na-na-naah! Stupid dinosaur!”

From the shore, the juvenile roared defiantly. Enraged, the big tyrannosaur burst from the lagoon at full speed, water streaming from its enormous body as it raced up the hill past the dock. The juvenile ducked its head and fled, its jaws still filled with ragged flesh.

The big tyrannosaur chased it, racing past the dead sauropod, disappearing over the hill. They heard its final threatening bellow, and then the raft moved to the north, around a bend in the lagoon, to the river.

Exhausted from rowing, Grant collapsed back, his chest heaving. He couldn’t catch his breath. He lay gasping in the raft.

“Are you okay, Dr. Grant?” Lex asked.

“From now on, will you just do what I tell you?”

“Oh-
kay,
” she sighed, as if he had just made the most unreasonable demand in the world. She trailed her arm in the water for a while. “You stopped rowing,” she said.