The curtain of willow branches parts, and Dala joins us. "Oh, don't stop," she says, crossing her arms, "go on. There is more, isn't there?"

"You bet, absolutely." I'm unabashed. "Well, there's a little more."

"Well, tell," she says, "tell."

"Ahem. When the sun finally rose, we saw no sign of the monsters or Doctor Russell. They must've torn him completely to pieces. Our boat, however, had come to rest against the shore during the night. I told Doctor Vrastil that we were going to be okay, but I don't think he heard me. The experience had been too much for him. He could only gibber and drool—his mind had snapped. But I managed to get him into the boat. I was about to start the motor when something hit the side of the boat. Bump, bump-bump, bump, like that. Behind me, Vrastil suddenly screamed. I whirled about, and there, pulling itself up over the side of the boat, was a sea scorpion as big as a bear! It grabbed at me—" I dart my hand at Ethan and make a clutching gesture, and he recoils sharply "—but I dodged, picked up the boat hook, and knocked the claw aside. I tried to stab the creature, but the point of the boat hook only glanced off its armored skin. As the monster reared back from the blow, however, I saw that it was off balance, so I drove the boat hook hard against its underside. It clutched frantically at the air as it started to topple, and then, with a roar of frustration, it fell back into the water. I didn't wait to see if it would try again but gunned the motor and got us out of there as fast as the boat would take us. A few hours later, poor mad Doctor Vrastil and I were safely back in Stinktown, but nobody there believed my story—"

"Imagine that," Dala says. I recognize the look on her face, the tone of her voice.

"Mah-um," says Ethan, "shh."

"Nobody believed my story until I showed them what I'd found in the bottom of the boat." I put my hand into the right pocket of my jacket and pull out an object encased in clear polyurethane. It looks somewhat like a crab claw but isn't. It's slightly longer than my hand, whitish with blue mottling, and impressively spiky. "The boat hook caught it at just the right angle," I say as I present it to Ethan, who makes a soft vowel sound as he accepts it.

While he sits turning it over and over in his fingers, Dala says, "I came to tell you it's eats in just five short minutes."

"Where's Little Bit?"

"I've got to go round her up, too. She ran next door to show her friend Amy the trilobites you gave her. Ethan, go wash."

Still unable to see anything but the claw, he gets to his feet and disappears through the willow branches.

I stand and dust off my butt. Dala says, dryly, "Thank you for not telling Alesha that story."

"Well, I'd've toned it down considerably for her. She'd've gotten the Disney version. Ethan got the classic pulp version. Three men go out. One gets eaten by things. One goes mad. And I only am escaped alone to tell thee."

She glances down, notices my drawing in the dirt.

"That's what the monsters looked like," I say.

She laughs softly and shakes her head. "Tell the truth now, did you actually see anything remotely resembling this the whole time you were back there?"

"Sure. Saw one from a glass-bottomed boat."

"Only one?"

"They're solitary creatures. According to my friend Russell, they mostly root around in the mud for worms and stuff."

"Ah! So there is a Doctor Russell. And did things eat him?"

"Yes, there is, and no, they didn't." We move out from under the willow and walk slowly toward the house. Ethan is showing the claw to Tim, who's trying to look at it and take chicken off the grill at the same time. "There's a Doctor Vrastil, too, who hasn't been driven mad by terror."

"And that evil-looking animal part you gave Ethan?"

"Part of an exoskeleton shed by a large, indeed evil-looking animal whose path never crossed mine, I'm happy to say. Russell found it and Alesha's trilobites for me."

"Let's hope Ethan never finds out his favorite uncle's thrilling prehistoric adventure is just a tissue of lies."

I stop walking, and she has to wait as I recite:

"Here about the beach I wander,
Nourishing a youth sublime
With the fairy tales of science,
And the long results of time."

"Is that one of yours?"

"Alfred Tennyson. Oh, Dala, Ethan doesn't really believe my story any more than Little Bit believes I'm going to gobble her up when I turn into a dinosaur and chase her. She screams when I catch her, but she knows it's make-believe. And it's not like I ever had to explain make-believe to these kids. So give Ethan some credit. He's already smarter than you and me put together."

"Ha," Dala says. "You wreck the bell curve."

"Ha yourself."

"Still, aren't you worried he's going to resent you for telling him a string of whoppers?"

"Not if they're entertaining whoppers. He'll save his resentment for the kind of lies that're meant to cheat him. Politicians' lies, used-car salesmen's lies. The kind of lie that says drinking such and such a brand of soft drink will not only get you laid, but by the kind of slim, leggy, busty gal who doesn't occur in nature. Look. He knows you can't leap out a window and fly away, but he still likes Peter Pan and Superman. He knows outer space is a vacuum, and sound doesn't travel in a vacuum—he figured this out over a year ago—but he didn't stop watching those sci-fi shows where you can hear explosions in space. An hour from now, he'll turn to me all of a sudden and say, Hey, wait a minute, how can an animal that breathes through gills roar?"

"And your answer will be—?"

"My answer will be, Like this—roww-ar!"

The five of us seat ourselves at the table and hold hands as Tim says grace. I look up from my barbecued chicken and across the table at Alesha. "I'm not sure which I'd rather have for dinner, chicken or—" I draw my arms against my chest, curl my fingers into claws, growl "—Little Bit!"

Over the rim of her glass, Alesha says, "Not at the table, Uncle Roge," and Dala laughs.