Olson was looking up, and seeing what was poking about in the tower, ran for an
ax; nor did he hesitate a moment when he returned with one, but sprang up the
ladder and commenced chopping away at that hideous face. The thing didn’t have
sufficient brainpan to entertain more than a single idea at once. Though
chopped and hacked, and with a bullethole between its eyes, it still persisted
madly in its attempt to get inside the tower and devour Olson, though its body
was many times the diameter of the hatch; nor did it cease its efforts until
after Olson had succeeded in decapitating it. Then the two men went on deck
through the main hatch, and while one kept watch, the other cut a hind quarter
off _Plesiosaurus Olsoni_, as Bradley dubbed the thing. Meantime Olson cut
off the long neck, saying that it would make fine soup. By the time we had
cleared away the blood and refuse in the tower, the cook had juicy steaks and a
steaming broth upon the electric stove, and the aroma arising from P. Olsoni
filled us all with a hitherto unfelt admiration for him and all his kind.
Chapter 5
The steaks we had that night, and they were fine; and the following morning we
tasted the broth. It seemed odd to be eating a creature that should, by all the
laws of paleontology, have been extinct for several million years. It gave one
a feeling of newness that was almost embarrassing, although it didn’t seem to
embarrass our appetites. Olson ate until I thought he would burst.
The girl ate with us that night at the little officers’ mess just back of the
torpedo compartment. The narrow table was unfolded; the four stools were set
out; and for the first time in days we sat down to eat, and for the first time
in weeks we had something to eat other than the monotony of the short rations
of an impoverished U-boat. Nobs sat between the girl and me and was fed with
morsels of the Plesiosaurus steak, at the risk of forever contaminating his
manners. He looked at me sheepishly all the time, for he knew that no well-bred
dog should eat at table; but the poor fellow was so wasted from improper food
that I couldn’t enjoy my own meal had he been denied an immediate share in it;
and anyway Lys wanted to feed him. So there you are.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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