That
evening at the camp, Dirk, who was Bricko’s brother-in-law, took his tin plate
of beans to where Elaine was eating and sat down beside her on a disused
dynamite crate.
“Don’t take
it so hard,” he advised, shoveling beans directly into his mouth from the lip
of the plate. “Once we get back home all
the world will be talking about lizard-camels and giraffe-men. Old Burnstein thinks he found a picture of Lyndon
Johnson.”
Elaine,
sitting on her own dynamite crate, waited until she had taken a swig from her
bottle of Pabst Blue Ribbon (provided by the Pabst Brewing Company in the
interests of furthering Man’s intellectual development) before replying.
“I’m not
really upset about that,” she insisted.
“It’s just that I, foolishly perhaps, thought that I’d have more of an
opportunity to utilize my creative side on this expedition.”
Dirk
nodded.
“You should
have joined Dr. Abchu’s team,” he told Elaine.
“They’re designing the capital city.”
…
