“You mean to tell me you’ve been corresponding with the Canadian Geographical Society about that mountain of bones?” inquired the other wonderingly.
“Yes, Sandy, that’s what I’ve been doing.”
The next question was a very natural one:
“But why?”
“To prove the old saying that the man who laughs last laughs best,” answered Dick enigmatically.
“What do you mean by that?”
“I mean just this: Up until the time we encountered the dinosaur, we never tackled any task we didn’t successfully finish. But that dinosaur stuck us. We didn’t know how we’d get the brute out of the country. We lost a certain amount of prestige when we set out upon that undertaking. It made us look like fools. With the exception of Corporal Rand, everybody had a good laugh over it.”
“But it was our first experience of the kind,” Sandy expostulated. “We knew nothing about fossil hunting. Except in a hazy way, we didn’t even know what a dinosaur was. The mistake was natural. I’ll admit that the joke was on us, but almost anyone else, even an older person, might have been taken in by it.”
“True enough, Sandy.” Dick’s hand rested lightly on his friend’s shoulder. “Still I think you’ll agree with me that if we succeed in getting the dinosaur away from the island, we can feel more like facing the world again.”
“Well, what have you done about it? What does the letter say?”