Every Hidden Thing Read Free

.”
    â€œI’m sorry,” Papa said, “to try your patience, Professor Bolt, but we are all friends here. Truth is always our common goal. Please don’t take my questions personally.”
    â€œI take them personally, sir, because you suggest my incompetence.”
    â€œNot at all, not at all.”
    The strain in the lecture hall was thick now. Someone called, “Please sit, Professor Cartland. So others can ask their questions.”
    â€œMy apologies,” said my father. “I am nearly done, but if I might just beg your indulgence one last time, Professor?”
    Bolt nodded curtly. “Go on.”
    â€œI am just yes yes wondering,” said my father, and the crowd gave a small gasp to match my own as he plucked up the elasmosaurus skull, “if the skull might just”—and he walked the thirty-five feet to the far end of the table—“fit more naturally” —and he picked up the final tail vertebra and slotted it inside the base of the skull—“right here.”
    There was a loud click. Maybe just my imagination, but it was like two puzzle pieces snapping together perfectly.
    Cartland held them high. “Which would indicate to me, Professor Bolt, that the tail is in fact the neck , and you have built your dinosaur backward , sir.”
    I felt like some important part of my chest had busted loose and plunged into my stomach. The stricken look on my father’s face confirmed my worst fear: Cartland was right.
    Father rose to his full height. “I will ask you to retract that comment, Professor Cartland.”
    The scoundrel rocked smugly on his heels. He was much shorter than my father, solid as a potbellied stove. Sparse hair began way back on his shiny head. His mustache took a sharp downward turn, obscuring the sides of his mouth, which I think was curved into a triumphant smile. I hated him. He’d come onto the stage to humiliate my father, to squash his reputation.
    â€œAlas,” Cartland said, “I cannot retract.”
    Father’s eyebrows were askew. His eyes, never pacific at the best of times, were fierce. His left eye had a slightly wayward angle to it and made you think that he wasn’t quite looking at you—or that he was possibly deranged. Right now he absolutely looked deranged.
    â€œThen, sir, I will ask you to put down my fossils and step outside with me.”
    Cartland laughed at this, but there was a pinch of alarm in his voice when he replied. “I will certainly not step outside with you.”
    â€œPut. Down. The fossils.”
    â€œThere you go,” said Cartland, placing them down. “Will you assault me here?”
    Amused titters from the audience—but only from people who’d missed certain monthly meetings in the past.
    I was already half out of my seat when Father punched Cartland. It was a good strong box to the eye—can’t say I didn’t enjoy it. I doubted Cartland was as practiced a scrapper as my father, but he was denser, and I almost shouted at Father to watch out, because he was too cocky. With a forward lunge Cartland buried his fist in my father’s stomach, doubling him over.
    I vaulted onto the stage. A chorus of disapproval rose from the audience.
    â€œGentlemen!”
    â€œShame! Shame!”
    â€œNot again , Bolt!”
    â€œSir!” someone called out to my father. “Are you not a Quaker!”
    â€œI am, sir!” my father panted. “But not a very good one today!”And he took another punch at Cartland’s face, which the other man dodged quite nimbly.
    â€œFather!” I took him by the arm, but he shook me off.
    â€œThat skull,” he panted to Cartland as the two faced off, “was found near the vertebrae I selected for the neck. My prospector was most clear in his notes!”
    â€œThat may be,” Cartland said. “Nonetheless, they were caudal vertebrae, not cervical !”
    He managed to seem