"Barry N. Malzberg - Major League Triceratops" - читать интересную книгу автора (Malzberg Barry N)

dusk. They were no different than all of the others. In that first expedition, his fragile hold upon evolution
had disintegrated, theTriceratops had fallen from its distant height to the deserts of inanition and stupidity
with all the rest of them. In a sense, Robles felt he had never survived that knowledge. There was no
evolution then, no discrimination, only accident and the huge, dark, scuttling forms.

Robles continued to write:An enlarged fragment of shell mounted in the Crete Mus├йe des Beaux Arts,
tyrannosaur suspected as keeper, the outer surface not smooth but stucco-like, brought from the
Wyoming wastes, one of eighteen preserved for the new and refurbished Mus├йe. Nothing within, the
most sophisticated radiology had indicated, but of course it was early in cycle. What would one do with a
tyrannosaur? Lady Carter, I seem to have a tyrannosaur on the premises, he is consuming the wallpaper
and has most discomfited the butler. What would we do, Lady Carter? Oh never mind, James, the little
creature will find its way back to the nest at last. Let us have some stucco.

He struggled to put it down, relying upon primitive implements and means otherwise unacceptable. Oh, to
stroll those wastes, to go egg-gathering in the weak Cretaceous sun, return then to Paradox, on what
careful and exquisite omelette we could dine. To dine on unhatchedTriceratops, essence ofoeuf, to curl
with Muffy amongst the dogwood and magnolia, concealed from the prowlings of Dix, safe from his
scatterings, to chow down this thrifty forerunner of our modern rhinoceros and ostrich. This is not merely
a prize but an opportunity unafforded byTriceratops who granted no such leavings. Joint by joint, inch
by inch, one can surely chow down this unspeakable history.

And so he continuedтАФ

THE NEST
It had been a stunt, in fact. Rig a contest, get someone like Dix to win, bring him to Camp Paradox with
appropriate publicity, let equipment film good times here. A television personality, Dix carried his own
equipment and crew. It had seemed acceptable at the start, had in fact seemed a brilliant plan. Robles
had no objection. Robles, knowledgeable, was all for it. Something had to be done and soon, otherwise
they would lose the post.

It was time to alter the situation. Business in Cretaceous Montana had collapsed, Camp Paradox was no
longer pulling its new millennial weight. Sour clumps of travelers drifted amongst the chuck wagons and
the anachronistically styled riding enclosures, looking grim. The dinosaurs, shy even in better times, could
hardly be prevailed upon to circle the ranch and were often unavailable for days while the travelers stared
glumly at one another and disdained the holes. Bring back a celebrity to go track the dinosaurs in habitat,
it had seemed an audacious conception, yes, but what else was there? There were simply very few new
ideas and administration had its own problems, had left them more or less to deal with themselves.

Ultimately, the idea had come from Robles. He could fix responsibility at no other point, it had to be his.
What wouldnтАЩt work as vista might if it were given some aspect of plot: the quest of a celebrity figure to
unravel the secrets of his past. Of course Dix could not be enlisted straight off, that would not work, he
would have to be taken in the guise of a contest winner but contests themselves were easy enough to
manage. Robles had rigged more than his share in another profession, at another time. And Dix had
looked good, he had seemed at the start to be precisely what they had needed, personable, jaunty, a
quizzical tilt to the head that bespoke intelligence, irony, and a serious interest in the problem of Camp
Paradox. Because it is both there and not there, am I right? Dix had said. Because it exists both in and
out of time, the only millionaire tourist trap in Montana that is ecologically sound, is that right? They had
laughed. Dix had seemed quite reasonable at the start, it had been a pleasure to tilt the contest toward
him, make the business of a celebrity winner credible, test things out then.