Read Online Prairie Ostrich by Tamai Kobayashi - Free Book Online Page B

of the volcano smoulders in the corner. Egg knows that volcanoes, like dinosaurs, can go extinct, but she has seen the pictures of Pompeii. The science room is not at all like the library. Science strips and bares but the library builds on words, like an abracadabra that becomes an adventure. Egg has read the Young Reader’s Guide to Science but that is more like a story: Galileo recanting in the face of the Inquisition. But Galileo won after all because science is like that. Facts are not lies. Facts win out in the end. It bothers Egg though, how could the Bible be wrong? She will have to ask Mrs. MacDonnell about that. Mrs. MacDonnell does not like questions. Anything less than blind faith makes a heretic and heretics burn. There is the black and white of it but Egg doesn’t understand; there is black and white and good and evil — but where does the Japanese fit in?
    Did Galileo burn?
    Egg picks her way through the chrome taps and microscopes, weaving her way through the crowd. At least with so many people about, it is easier to hide. She skulks by the beaker cabinet then dashes by the dinosaur dino-rama. A crowd of Mr. Gooch’s keeners heads her way so Egg crawls underneath the film strip table. Camouflage, like on the Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom .
    The bottom of the table holds an impressive array of chewing gum, wads of pink Bubble-Deelight and green smears of Minty Freeze. Rumour is that Bubble-Deelight is filled with spiders’ eggs so Egg scoots deeper, far from the edge. Spiders have eight legs so they are not insects. Egg knows there are rules for everything. With the Young Reader’s Guide to Science , Egg can tell you about the planets and the constellations and sometimes, at night, she can look out of her window and see Orion’s Belt. The universe is vast, this she knows. The Big Bang is so huge, you can’t even imagine it and the speed of light is the fastest thing ever.
    â€œHas anyone seen that stupid Egghead?” Martin’s voice rings out.
    Egg freezes. She can see Martin Fisken’s sneakers by the dino-rama but she is safe under the film strip table. When she peeps at the clock above the door, she knows that there are thirty more minutes until the bell rings. An eternity.
    She hugs her knees and begins her list:
    a – armadillo
    b – baboon
    c – crocodile
    d – dugong
    e – elephant
    f – flamingo
    g – giraffe
    h – hippopotamus
    i – ibis
    j – jellyfish
    k – kangaroo
    l – llama
    m – monkey
    n –
    none
    never
    no
    n n n n n n n n n
    There is no Dictionary beneath the table. Egg is stuck. Nnnnnn on her tongue. Few animals start with the letter n . N is a tricky one: knolls, knots, and gnarls try to hide the n away. Nnnnnn . She counts the passing penny loafers and sneakers, but the nnnn presses anxiously against her throat.
    The Dictionary has the answers.
    She darts from beneath the table, away from the fossilized bones of the science room, the whiteboard displays of genus and species. She rushes along the corridor, under the harsh fluorescent lights of the hallway, past the lunchroom. The staccato notes from the music room echo behind her, until at last, she reaches the library. She slips through the swing of the doors and ducks under the sight of Miss Granger, who, distracted by her Dewey decimals, does not see her shadow flit into the aisle of Afghanistan. Egg’s fingers brush the spines of the books as she tiptoes to Upper Volta.
    She taps her feet. Everything will be all right.
    A crackle fills the air. Evangeline Granger has turned on the radio to the lulling tones of the midday CBC. Now Egg knows that the library is really empty for the radio is Miss Granger’s secret indulgence. Home free, Egg sighs, but the words seem hollow.
    After an blurt of static, the CBC announces the next segment of “Babbino” and “Callas,” but Egg pays it no mind. Her thoughts are all