The following morning, on the pretext of doing research for his Civil War novel-in-progress, Harold Who drove over to the Manassas National Battlefield Park at Bull Run. Where, almost a century and a half ago, his great-great-great-grandfather, one Padraig Mosher, fresh from County Cork and newly enlisted in the preening New York Zouaves, took to his heels at the first volley, leaped Bull Run Creek in a single bound, and skedaddled back to Washington in record time.
I drove around the battlefield with an eye out for anything that might work its way into my story. Should my Vermont hero come this way? Should he participate in the Battle of Bull Run? Catch a glimpse of fiery old Stonewall harrying my fleet-footed ancestor back to the Union capital? On that sunny June morning nothing jumped out at me as potential material. Until, that is, I approached the creek my forebear reportedly had vaulted—a feat no gazelle could accomplish—and noticed a dozen or so cars backed up before the bridge. Was this a historical reenactment? I detest historical reenactments.
On the bridge, basking in the sunshine, sat a monstrous snapping turtle.
“Go ahead,” said my uncle. “Show these city slickers how to handle this situation.”
I got out of the car and walked up to the reptile, which must have weighed a good thirty-five pounds. She was covered with moss and creek scum and had wise, courageous, no-nonsense eyes. “Good morning, turtle,” I said.
Mrs. Snapper was unimpressed. So unimpressed that she opened her cotton-white mouth and gave out a hiss like a steam kettle. I sprang back, in the grand old tradition of Grandpa Padraig, to considerable laughter from the occupants of the nearby cars.
Approaching the turtle again, I distracted her with my left hand and, as I’d seen my uncle do any number of times, lifted her by the tail with my right hand. Holding her well away from my legs, I started off down the bank toward a sandy little spit along the creek.
I don’t know if you’ve ever tried to pick up an irascible snapper weighing thirty-five pounds, hold the thing out so it can’t take a fist-sized chunk of your calf, and walk a hundred feet with it. But suddenly, from a Hummer on the bridge, came a woman’s angry voice. “Put that animal down. I’m going to report you on my cell phone to the Humane Society.”
Oh, gladly, madam, gladly. Gingerly, I released the now-furious snapper on the nice warm sand beside the stream and started back toward my car. Why were the spectators laughing and honking their horns? They were laughing and honking because, posting along behind me hell-bent for election, came Mrs. Turtle, determined to get back to the road, where she’d wanted to lay her eggs in the first place.
Once again I distracted her with my left hand. Once again the Samaritan in the Hummer shrieked at me. This time it was something about the SPCA.
I ran, yes, ran with the hissing, snapping, washtub-size turtle—how Reg would have laughed—toward a reedy swale upstream, where I deposited my reptilian friend for better or for worse, then bolted for the Loser Cruiser. Horns, mock applause, more threats from Mrs. Battle-ax Armstrong’s sister up on the bridge. Padraig Mosher probably ran faster, spurred on as he was by the Rebel cries. But he was no more relieved to reach the safety of our embattled nation’s capital than I was to pile into the Cruiser and move on down the line on my Great American Book Tour.