by Ron Roy
Dink’s father introduced himself, Dink, Josh, and Ruth Rose.
“Great, six kids and three adults, a nice small group,” Sylvia said. “Let’s go get your sleeping bags and stuff. We’ll be sleeping right here in this room. Then we’ll have supper and watch a movie.”
“Can we sleep in the room with Spino?” Ruby asked. “I love dinosaurs!”
“Sorry, that room is off-limits,” Sylvia said. “But we’ll be very close! You can see Spino from this room, right through the door!”
Sylvia was wearing a bracelet made out of beads, colored stones, and chunks of metal. She pushed a tiny button, making the top of one of the pieces of metal pop open. Inside was a watch face. “It’s six o’clock,” she said. “After the movie, you can choose an exhibit you’d like to see before bedtime.”
“I love your bracelet!” Ruth Rose said.
Sylvia held her wrist out so Ruth Rose could get a better look. “I made it myself,” she said. “I create jewelry in my spare time. Someday I hope to sell my things online.”
“I’d buy one!” Ruth Rose said.
All five chaperones led their kids out to retrieve their sleeping bags and backpacks. Everyone came back in to choose spots on the floor.
“Pick a space for your sleeping bags,” Sylvia told her nine charges. “If you need the bathrooms, they’re right outside the door.”
She pointed up at the exit sign above the door. “The exit sign is lit, so no one should have a problem finding the door. And those small lights on the walls stay on all night. I’ll dim them low when we go to sleep.”
She dropped her own sleeping bag next to the door.
“Let’s go over by that wall,” Dink’s father suggested. “I can read under the lights.”
The kids dragged their backpacks and sleeping bags to the back of the room. Mr. Davis and Alex did the same. Ms. Walker and the twins laid down their sleeping bags about twenty feet away.
Dink’s father chose a spot under a light. He pulled a book of crossword puzzles from his backpack.
Dink, Josh, and Ruth Rose unrolled their sleeping bags in a row. They were about thirty feet from the exit door, where Sylvia was getting settled on her bag.
“Cool,” Ruth Rose said. “We can see Spino from here.”
Dink grinned at Josh. “I hope he doesn’t get hungry during the night for Josh ice cream!” he said.
“Or Dink soup,” Josh said.
Dink’s father was talking with Mr. Davis. Alex was a few feet away, reading a book.
“I think Alex would rather read than eat,” Mr. Davis said. “His backpack is filled with books!”
Mr. Davis looked at Mr. Duncan’s book. “I see you like doing crosswords,” he said. He pulled a paperback book from his pack. “Ever do any anagrams?”
“I do like anagrams, but I never seem to have the time,” Dink’s father said.
“And I like crosswords, too,” Mr. Davis said. “Why don’t we swap books for tonight?”
The two dads exchanged books, and Mr. Davis went over to join his son.
Dink pointed to the book his father was holding. “What’s an anagram?” he asked.
“An anagram is a word or phrase made from rearranging the letters in another word or phrase,” he said. “For example, look at the word ANAGRAM on this book cover. If you rearrange those seven letters, you can make NAG A RAM.”
“Cool!” Josh said.
Dink’s father turned to Ruth Rose. “The eight letters in your name can become REST HOUR or HERO RUST,” he told her.
The three kids laughed.
“Can you do my name?” Josh asked.
“Sorry, JOSH doesn’t work,” Mr. Duncan said. “But your last name, PINTO, can make POINT, IN POT, or TOP IN.”
“How about my name?” Dink asked.
His father handed the book to him. “See if you can figure it out yourself,” he said. “Don’t lose the book—I have to return it to Alex’s dad in the morning.”
Just then Sylvia rang a little bell. “Who’s hungry?” she called out.
Everyone yelled back, “Me!”
“That’s great! Now make a line and help yourselves,” Sylvia said. “Be sure to take a dino cookie!”
The platters held hamburgers and veggie burgers. There was a bowl of salad, and another holding fresh fruit. Next to the fruit was a plate of cookies shaped like little dinosaurs.
Everyone filled a plate, grabbed a bottle of water, and headed back to their sleeping bags. The room got pretty noisy with people eating, talking, and laughing.
“That was great,” Josh said twenty minutes later. His plate was empty.
“Looks like there are plenty of cookies left,” Dink’s father said. He gave Josh a nudge. “Why don’t you go over and get more?”
“I guess I could eat one more cookie,” Josh said as he headed toward the long table.
“The movie will start in five minutes!” Sylvia called out to the room. “Toss your trash, please, and be sure to put your water bottles in the recycling barrel.”
All around the room, the groups of kids and chaperones made themselves comfortable on their sleeping bags. Some of the parents were chatting with each other.
Sylvia flipped a wall switch and the room went dark. Everyone got quiet.
Josh came back with some dinosaur cookies on a paper plate. The three kids sat on their sleeping bags and munched cookies.
The movie was about a young dinosaur who got lost. He escaped some meat-eating dinosaurs and fell into a rushing river. But his mother found him, so there was a happy ending.
Everyone clapped and yelled when the movie was over.
Sylvia turned up the lights. “Okay, who’s ready for some more fun?” she called out.
Lots of voices shouted, “Yay!”
“Your chaperones are going to take you all on a secret adventure!” Sylvia said. “Tyler, Sandy, Trish, and Otto, are you ready?”
“We’re ready!” the four chaperones called back. They led their groups of kids and parents out of the room. There was lots of giggling and chattering. Some of the kids were in stocking feet.
“Where are we going?” Alex asked Sylvia when the others had left.
“Secret,” Sylvia said. She led her group of nine out of the room, past Spino and the River Diamond. Fred and Ruby Walker carried their teddy bears with them.
“How about a hint?” Mr. Davis asked Sylvia.
“Okay,” Sylvia said. “Think wet but also dry, big and small, colorful and plain!”
“No fair!” Josh said. “That could be anything!”
Sylvia just smiled. They all followed her up a set of stairs and down a corridor, and stopped at a black door. “Everyone needs to stay quiet,” she said in a low voice. “We don’t want to scare our friends!”
“What friends?” Alex asked.
“Frogs!” Sylvia said. She opened the door and ushered in her charges.
“Oh my gosh!” Ruth Rose said. All around them were pools, aquariums, and cages filled with frogs. There were tiny green ones, huge brown ones, and even bright blue ones.
They made different sounds, from chirping to what sounded like burping. One variety let out low whistles. Some of the frogs swam in water, and others sat on rocks or lily pads.
“They come from all over the world,” Sylvia said. “The little blue ones are from Japan!”
She showed them a pool where a bunch of different frogs lived. “You can put your hands in there,” she said. “These frogs don’t mind being held—just do it gently.”
Everyone gathered around the pool and stuck their hands in. “Ooh, I touched one!” Ruby said.
Dink picked up a giant bullfrog. It was dark green with a soft white belly. The frog’s long back legs wiggled around, tickling Dink’s hands.
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After about twenty minutes, Sylvia said, “Okay, bedtime for frogs and kids! Let’s head back.”
They followed her past darkened rooms. One had a sign on the door that read LET’S PLANT A GARDEN! Through the window, Dink saw Sandy and her group.
Back in the sleeping room, almost everyone had returned from their adventure. Kids and adults were getting into their sleeping bags. Most of the kids wore their regular clothes, but Fred and Ruby were wearing jammies.
Soon the room was quiet.
Dink’s dad and Mr. Davis were talking softly, leaning against the wall under one of the dimmed lights.
Josh and Ruth Rose kicked off their shoes and crawled inside their sleeping bags.
“Josh?” Dink whispered.
“What?”
“I don’t mean to scare you,” he said, “but I think I saw an enormous spider crawling into your sleeping bag.”
“Very unfunny, sonny,” Josh said. Then he rolled over and pretended to snore.
Dink snuggled into his sleeping bag. A few minutes later he was asleep. He dreamed that he was a cave boy. His blond hair was long and tangled. He wore an animal skin and no shoes. He slept in a cave and made pets out of baby wild animals.
In his dream, Dink was fishing in a river when a big black creature rose out of the water. It had sharp teeth and long black hair. The monster grabbed Dink and began licking his face. Its breath smelled like rotten fish.
Dink woke up. His heart was beating fast, and he felt too warm inside the sleeping bag. He unzipped it and peeled off his sweatshirt. Everyone else was asleep. Snoring sounds came from his dad’s sleeping bag.
I’m safe, he told himself. No hairy monsters.
Closing his eyes again, Dink drifted into sleep.
Suddenly a loud crash made him sit up. Then an alarm went off, like the ones Dink had heard on ambulances. The sound wailed through the room, waking everyone. Fred and Ruby began to cry. Dink heard their mother trying to comfort them.
Everyone was sitting up, climbing out of their sleeping bags. The chaperones and parents were yelling back and forth. Nobody knew what was happening, or what made the alarm continue to shriek.
“What’s going on?” Josh asked as his head popped out of his sleeping bag. His hair was spiky and his eyes were big.
The alarm sound was coming from the Spinosaurus room. Dink looked toward the door. Sylvia wasn’t there. Her sleeping bag was empty.
The Walker kids were still crying. The alarm kept bleating. “Is it a fire drill?” Mr. Davis yelled. “Should we get out of here?”
The alarm suddenly stopped, and Sylvia appeared in the doorway. She looked scared. “Sorry about the racket,” she said with a shaky voice. “There’s been an accident!”
“What happened, Sylvia?” Dink’s father asked.
“It’s Spino,” she said. “Something fell. I’m going to call Dr. Wurst.” She turned and hurried out.
The sleeping room got very loud. Everyone was talking or yelling. The twins cuddled with their mom on her sleeping bag. Alex and his dad came over and began talking with Dink’s father.
“Let’s go check it out,” Josh said.
Dink, Josh, and Ruth Rose walked over and peeked through the door. The Spino skeleton was still standing, but one of the long planks had fallen away. One end of the heavy plank had landed on the painting of Spino, smashing it. A tall ladder was also flat on the floor.
Eight feet away, the other end of the plank had knocked over the River Diamond display case. The pedestal was broken, and the dome was on the floor.
In their socks, Dink, Josh, and Ruth Rose stepped around splinters of wood. Dink walked over to the dome and peeked inside. It was empty. “Where’s the River Diamond?” he asked.
“It probably just rolled somewhere when the dome fell over,” Ruth Rose said. “Let’s look around.”
The three kids searched the floor between Spino’s massive legs. Some of the fake plants had also been squashed under the heavy board. Dink looked among the plants and artificial rocks. He didn’t see anything that looked like the River Diamond.
“Is that it?” Ruth Rose asked. She ran over to one end of the long plank. The River Diamond was on the floor under the board, wedged tight. She tried to pull the diamond out from under it.
“It’s stuck under the board, and the board is real heavy,” Ruth Rose said.
Dink put a hand on the wood plank and tried to shove it aside. “This thing weighs a ton, but we can probably move it together,” he said.
The three kids knelt down and placed their hands on the plank. “SHOVE!” Dink said. It barely moved.
“Try again,” Dink said. This time he leaned his shoulder against the rough wood as they shoved. The plank slid a few inches, and the diamond was free.
As Dink reached for it, a loud voice yelled, “WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU’RE DOING?”
The kids whipped around and looked into the angry face of Dr. Wurst. Sylvia was standing next to him, looking worried.
Dink tried to swallow, but his mouth was dry.
“We were just trying to get the River Diamond,” Ruth Rose said, pointing to the plank. “When the board crashed down, it got stuck un—”
“Yes, I can see that,” Dr. Wurst said. He was wearing a purple tracksuit and sneakers that weren’t tied. His gray hair spiked out on one side, like he’d just gotten out of bed.
By now, everyone else was crowded around Spino and the fallen plank. They looked sleepy and surprised and scared. Dink felt his father’s hand on his shoulder.
“Thank you, but we’ll take care of this,” Dr. Wurst announced. “Sylvia, would you mind?”
She stepped forward and scooped up the River Diamond, and she and Dr. Wurst walked into his office. The door closed, and Dink heard the lock click into place.
Two men in gray uniforms entered the room. One had a cell phone to his ear. He listened, nodded, and said, “Yes, sir!”
The other guard said, “Looks like the ladder fell against that plank, and the plank came loose and hit the floor. Okay, folks, you can go back to sleep now. We’ll get our crew to clean up this mess.”
Everyone left the room and returned to their sleeping bags. Alex held his father’s hand. “I’m glad Spino didn’t get broken!” he said.
“I’m glad, too,” his father said.
Dink, Josh, and Ruth Rose sat on Ruth Rose’s sleeping bag. She turned on her flashlight and stood it between them. The light turned their faces into Halloween masks.
“Try to get some sleep,” Dink’s father called quietly as he lay on his sleeping bag. He checked his watch. “It’s three in the morning!”
“Okay, Dad,” Dink said. “Good night.”
“What’s that on your shirt?” Josh asked Dink.
“Where?” Dink asked, looking down.
“On your shoulder, dude.” Josh leaned over and plucked something off Dink’s T-shirt. He held his fingers over the flashlight beam. “Gross, it looks like hair!”
“Let me see,” Dink said, reaching for Josh’s fingers. “You’re right. It’s hair. Three hairs.”
Dink suddenly remembered his nightmare about the hairy black monster. He swallowed hard. If I was just dreaming, how did those hairs get on my shirt? he wondered.
“The hairs didn’t come from you,” Josh said. “They’re black.”
“It’s probably my hair,” Ruth Rose said. “When we were shoving that plank, I must have rubbed against you, Dink.”
Dink shone the flashlight on the hairs. “But these are straight,” he said. “Your hair is curly.”
Ruth Rose crawled into her sleeping bag. “Then it’s a hairy mystery,” she said. “Good night, guys.”
“You mean good night again,” Josh said from inside his bag.
Dink stared at the hairs for a minute.
They were real, not from a monster. Who has straight black hair? he asked himself. And how did they get on my shirt?
Too sleepy to think clearly, Dink tucked the hairs inside the cover of the anagram book. He’d think about it tomorrow. Yawning, he shut off the flashlight and burrowed into his bag.
Before he closed his eyes, Dink saw Sylvia step back into the sleeping room. She kicked off her shoes before crawling inside her sleeping bag.
Under the glow from the exit light, Dink noticed that Sylvia’s hair was straight and black. He fell asleep thinking about that.
“Good morning, everyone!” Sylvia called out. She was standing behind the food table, holding a glass of orange juice.
Dink opened his eyes and blinked. The lights were bright, and he smelled something that made his stomach rumble. He sat up and stretched. The anagram book slid off his sleeping bag to the carpet.
Dink reached over and poked Josh’s sleeping bag. “Josh, wake up! Someone stole all the food!” he whispered.
Josh’s head popped out of the bag. “You’d better be teasing,” he growled.
“Would I tease you?” Dink asked. He grabbed his backpack and headed for the bathroom. Mr. Davis and Alex were just coming out. Alex had toothpaste on his lips.
“Quite a night, wasn’t it?” Mr. Davis said to Dink. Alex walked over to the River Diamond, which was back inside the dome on top of the pedestal. The fence was in place, and someone had swept the floor.
“I’m glad no one was standing near Spino when that board fell,” Dink said.
“Righto,” Mr. Davis said.
In the bathroom, Dink was surprised to see a man combing his hair at one of the sinks.
The guy noticed Dink and smiled. “Hi!” he said. “You must be with the sleepover. Enjoying it?”
“It’s been great,” Dink said. “Until the alarm went off last night.”
“Yeah, bummer,” the man said. “Oh, I’m Trevor. I’m the museum paleontologist, which means I study fossils. I started out as a police detective, then decided I’d rather look for dinosaur clues than crooks.”
