Nancy offered her hand to shake on it. Remo hesitated.
"Too rich for your blood?" Nancy asked sweetly.
"I have to think this through," Remo muttered.
"I thought so."
"Thought what?"
"All talk and balk, that's you."
Remo frowned. "Little Father, what do you think?"
"Only a fool would wager against a woman who owns a dragon," the Master of Sinanju said thinly.
Behind them, the train was rattling along, getting closer. The steam whistle blew one long blast when it rounded a shallow turn and the engineer sighted them.
"Unless you're looking forward to abandoning ship," Nancy suggested, "I suggest you start us rattling along again."
Fuming, Remo got the Land Rover going. He was silent a while, then he asked, "Triceratops didn't have feathers, did they?"
"No."
"Good."
Nancy couldn't resist. "But you know, Pterodactyls had hair," she said in a bright voice.
"They did not!"
"Sorry to pop your bubble, but you should really read up on these things."
"You are both talking nonsense," snapped Chiun.
"Why would we do that?" Nancy wanted to know.
"To dissuade me from living to the fullest span of my years."
Nancy frowned. "Say again?"
"I'll tell it," Remo said. "One of his ancestors had a close encounter of the dragon kind a few centuries ago, and made off with a whole skeleton."
Nancy perked up. "Do you still have it, Mr. Chiun?"
"The proper form of address is Master, and no, Yong consumed it to the last finger bone and wing rib," Chiun said flatly.
"Your ancestor ate a fossil skeleton?"
"No, he drank it."
"Chiun's ancestor supposedly slew a dragon," Remo explained.
"A true Chinese dragon," Chiun sniffed. "Not like your ugly thing."
"Thank you," said Nancy.
"And he ground up the bones to make some kind of medicine, so he could live forever, or something," Remo added.
"In the East, dinosaur bones are sometimes ground up and mixed in philters," Nancy said thoughtfully. "They are believed to be very beneficial. How far along did your ancestor get, Master Chiun?"
"He squandered one hundred forty-eight winters," said Chiun.
"Squandered?"
"Chiun thinks he should have saved a few bones for his descendants," Remo added.
"Oh. "
They drove along in silence. The sun was climbing the sky, turning it the color of brass. The jungle birds were screeching and calling. Somewhere a hippo bellowed. And Nancy began to sweat profusely.
She noticed that Remo and the old Oriental named Chiun were not sweating and wondered why.
"We don't sweat," Remo said unconcernedly.
"Nonsense. All mammals sweat. Or pant."
"We don't pant either."
"What is a mammal?" asked Chiun.
"A dinosaur is a reptile and we're mammals," Remo explained.
"Does that mean monkey?"
"A monkey is a mammal, just like us," Nancy said.
"Just like you. I am Korean."
"What does that mean?" Nancy asked Remo.
"I am not like whites," Chiun said stiffly, "who believe they are the offspring of monkeys."
"That's a fallacy," said Nancy.
Chiun indicated Remo with a long-nailed finger. "Tell this baboon."
"Hey! I resent that."