The Great Snapping Turtle Adventure Read online

  CHAPTER 8

  THE RIDE OUT FROM THE End of the World seemed faster than the ride there. Fred and the boys passed watermen headed home from the markets. Each time they met a truck, they would pull over, and in each case such courtesy was met with a friendly wave or shout of “Thank-ee kindly!”

  Back in the town of Vienna, Fred checked into the Vienna Inn. It was a tall, old brick house right on the Nanticoke River. Wild geese and mallard ducks swam down the river and white swans rested with their black bills tucked deeply into their long-feathered wings.

  “This is great!” Max announced as he peered out the third-floor window to the water below. “Can we explore?”

  “Sure. Miss Marie, the owner, said for you to check around by the water. All kinds of interesting things wash up there. She also said it would be ‘just fine’ for you to place Cinderella in her basket down where the waves can lap over her and keep her cool.”

  “Good. We don’t want her to get sun stroke or anything,” said Charles.

  “Well, it’s pretty late in the day for that. She’s more liable to get moon struck,” said Fred. “Better tie her up before you get cleaned up for dinner, as it’s probably rather muddy down there. I’ll take my shower while you’re gone.”

  “Yeah! ’Cause I’m starved!” yelled Charles, running from their room and heading for the steps.

  “Shhhhh!” Fred stage-whispered after him.

  Outside, Charles and Max placed Cinderella and her basket-coach under the tall marsh reeds. The waves lapped up against the bottom of the basket, making a shhh-shhh sound.

  “I think she’ll like it here, don’t you? asked Charles.

  “Yeah. Say Charles, I’ve been thinking,” said Max slowly. “We’re not going to eat this turtle.”

  “No, I don’t think we could. She’s gotten to be a friend.”

  The boys watched the basket sway from left to right as Cinderella adjusted to her new environment.

  “Definitely mean,” Charles agreed.

  “Yeah, but you know, you’d act mean too if someone scooped you up, hung you upside down, by your tail, the way ol’ Hattie Harriston did. Then someone else locks you in a basket with a lid tied down on it. Geez, that’s no fun.”

  “Yeah, well, we can turn her loose in the garden at Turkey Legs Toni’s house like we talked about. She’ll like it there where there’s a garden to lay her eggs and a pond to swim around in,” said Charles.

  “But there’s also the road. It’s not far from the pond, you know. And nobody stops for anything on that road. You know how many little chipmunks, rabbits and squirrels get killed there. Not to mention big animals like opossum and raccoon,” said Max sadly.

  “I know. It’s like some drivers are just trying to kill the animals. They don’t even brake,” said Charles, feeling angry and sad for all the little creatures he’d seen dead not far from his house.

  “But down here, it’s different. The roads are different. They’re small and nobody can drive fast or else they might end up upside down in the marsh,” said Max.

  “Except for Route 50, that’s a fast road,” said Charles.

  “Except for Route 50,” agreed Max. “But we’re pretty far from 50 here by the Vienna Inn. Cinderella would really have to travel a long way to get near it. Why would she want to, when there’s all this marsh to slip into, plus the Nanticoke River?”

  “So, what are you suggesting?” asked Charles. But he was pretty sure he already knew.

  “Well, we might turn her loose right here. But not now. I mean, Miss Marie might not like it if she knew we let a snapping turtle loose so close to her tomato plants and flower garden. Not good PR, so to speak.”

  “Yeah, stay at the Vienna Inn and be entertained by a Snapping Turtle Solo,” quipped Charles.

  “And we don’t want Fred to know either. After all, no matter how ‘with it’ he is, he’s still a grownup.”

  “And we know how grownups can be,” added Charles.

  “So, tonight, after we get back from dinner, you and I will ask to go out—like we want to take just one more walk down by the water, or something—and we’ll let Cinderella go.”

  “Good plan, except if Fred wants to take a walk with us, then we’ll have to divide and conquer or sneak out later when he’s in dreamland.”

  “Yep, so that’s the plan,” said Max.

  Charles went over to the basket. “I’d hate to see her get all homesick for the Eastern Shore up our way,” he said.

  “Or smashed on the road,” added Max.

  “Or smashed on the road,” repeated Charles.

  “Ok! We’re on!” Charles put his hand up and together the boys slapped high five.

  “Let’s go in and get ready to eat!” said Max.

  “Race you!” yelled Charles, taking off at a sprint.

  CHAPTER 9

  FINALLY, CLEANED UP, ready to find a place to eat, but where? After all, it had to be a special Eastern Shore sort of place. A place where the menu had a real Shore flare. A place that was unusual and homey. But most of all, it had to be a place that would appeal to boys.

  Fred wasn’t sure where to go. While the boys waited anxiously in the truck, he went to discuss the matter with Miss Marie.

  Miss Marie stood on the porch. her blue jeans covered with all shades of paint. Her long red hair, pulled back in a “bopper”-style ponytail, was also paint-flecked with blue, yellow and pink splotches. She held a paint brush in one hand and a roller in the other.

  The boys could hear her big booming voice from where they sat.

  “I can tell ya, if you’re looking for fancy, you go up to Suicide Bridge Restaurant in Secretary, but it’s a bit of a trek from here and sure to be crowded. They get tourists and local folk both. Good food, though, and pretty with all those ducks and geese swimming about. It looks down Secretary Creek and at sunset it’s lovely.” She rubbed the back of her hand across her forehead and a few more drops of paint landed in her hair. “Good thing it’s water base,” she chuckled.

  “Yes, that’s true,” agreed Fred. “The boys are pretty hungry. I don’t think they’ll hold quiet if the ride’s too long.”

  “No way!” yelled Charles from the truck.

  “Course not,” said Miss Marie. “When you been working hard all day long pulling crabs in, you need to eat. Look, I know a locals’ place where the food is cheap, bountiful, and tasty. But if I tell you where it is, you must swear you won’t tell a soul I told you about it. The lady who owns it tries to keep out the tourists, or ‘foreigners,’ as folk from the ‘wrong side’ of the Bay Bridge are sometimes called. But you boys are like home folk, so I don’t think she’ll have you thrown out,” she said with a twinkle.

  “Good to know we don’t look like tourists,” smiled Fred.

  “It’s called Miss Ruby’s Place. Out on Route 50 about 10 miles west of here. She’ll put food down in front of you faster than McDonald’s and it’ll be the best durn food you ever ate. She makes it all herself. Real Shore cooking.”

  “Sounds good,” said Fred.

  In the truck, the boys were furiously nodding their heads “yes!”

  “Ok…this is what you do,” said Miss Marie. “Go down Route 50. Go past a log cabin house and then start looking. There ain’t no sign. It looks like a gas station with old fashioned pumps. Only thing is, they’re dried up. Miss Ruby’s got yellow curtains at the windows and there’ll be local-looking cars pulling into most of the parking spaces.”

  “No sign?”

  “Nope. Like I said, she likes to keep it a secret,” said Miss Marie. “You tell them in there about how you have family from the Shore, just like you told me.”

  “On my mom’s side,” said Fred.

  “That’s right. You tell ’em your mom’s name was Truitt. That’s a good Shore name. That’ll make it alright for you to eat there.” She sighed. “I’d like to come with you just to get a taste of one of her pies. She makes the best pies that ever crossed your lips!”

 
; “How about if we bring one back with us?” suggested Fred. “It’s the least we could do to return the favor of you telling us about the place.”

  “Well now, I know better than to say no to a gift like that!” said Miss Marie, and her eyes gleamed like stars. “Coconut cream is my favorite. If she don’t have that, make it a chocolate mousse. Tell ya what, bring it back here and we’ll eat it together. By then I’ll be ready and needing to break from my work for the day. I’ll fix us up some cold icy lemonade and we can sit out on the porch and feast on river smells, marsh sounds, and the moon.”

  “Sounds great,” said Fred.

  “And I can tell you boys about our ghost,” added Miss Marie.

  “Wild!” shouted Charles.

  “Yeah,” added Max, but he was wondering how he and Charles would be able to turn Cinderella loose after a ghost story. He was wondering about how brave Charles would be then. And, since he was just wondering and not saying anything aloud, Max also wondered how brave he might be after hearing a ghost story.

  “So, I’ll see you all in a couple of hours,” said Miss Marie. She waved her paint brush goodbye and headed back to her work.

  After two misses, they found Miss Ruby’s. It was a small, white, one-story building back off the road. The parking lot was filled with all models and years of cars, from rusty trucks to big limos, a couple of motorcycles and one black, shiny, antique Model T Ford.

  “Quite a hot spot,” said Fred, getting out of the truck.

  “Hope they still have some food left,” said Charles in a starved voice.

  “Hope they have room for us,” added Max, also beginning to feel pretty hungry.

  Inside, Fred and the boys found two small rooms buzzing with activity. Tables for four filled each room. Each table had a blue-checkered cloth, blue paper napkins, and a jelly jar filled with marsh grass and small dried flowers. The chairs at these tables were an odd assortment of furniture you might stumble upon at a flea market. And sitting in those chairs were watermen in clean faded jeans and crisp, ironed khaki shirts, farmers with boots still sandy and dusty from the fields, lawyer-types in three-piece suits, ladies in house dresses and ladies in fine silk blouses tucked into designer skirts purchased from stores like the ones found in the Salisbury Mall.

  The rooms were filled with the sounds of forks hitting plates, the rattle of soup bowls and coffee cups, and a polite hum of people talking. People were busily eating, eating, eating…and the smells, though mixed with the odors of boat fuel and farmers’ sweat, were wonderfully, powerfully delicious.

  “I’m about to faint,” sighed Charles. “It smells like heaven in here.”

  “Can I help you boys?” came a voice immediately at their sides.

  Looking down, they saw a tiny, round lady dressed in a white dress, white apron, and white shoes. She seemed just a little taller than she really was due to the biggest chef’s hat Fred or the boys had ever seen.

  “Well, we’ve been crabbing down at End of the World all day and we’re about to drop from hunger pains,” said Fred.

  “Then you’ve come to the right place. I’m Ruby and when I’m done fillin’ you boys up, you’ll be complainin’ about another kind of pain—feelin’ too full!” Ruby said. A long, wide smile spread across her small, brown-freckled face. “You boys come right this way. I got a table somebody just got up from. The chair seats are still warm, but I reckon you’ll mind none.”

  She scooted around two tables, down a tiny jumbled hall of chairs, to a table by a candy counter just across from a window that faced a field. “How’s this?” she asked, pulling out a chair for Charles and handing Fred three menus all in the same movement. “A view to suit the younger folk,” she said, motioning toward the candy counter, “as well as older ones.” She pointed at the field.

  “Perfect,” said Fred. “Think we’ll see any wildlife?”

  “Well, just at dusk of late, I’ve been seein’ plenty of deer. They come out to feed with their little ones. Three does and four fawns, just last night.”

  “Great,” said Fred.

  “I never saw so many different kinds of candy,” exclaimed Max.

  “Oh, you can thank my grandson for that. He keeps me informed as to what kinds to sell. He’s always finding new kinds in the candy magazines I get. We try ’em all out.” She pulled out a small blue pad from under her tight belt. “Now, what would you fellas like to drink? We have fountain drinks, iced tea made the sunshine way, iced coffee and homemade sasparilla. And then, over there under that calendar,” she pointed to a side wall, “you can open that ice chest and find yourself just about any soda drink on the market.”

  “I’ll take the sasparilla,” said Fred.

  “I’m going to search in that ice chest,” said Max.

  “Me too,” chirped Charles.

  “I thought that might be what you’d say,” said Miss Ruby. “Now, we have some specials: crab soup, cream of crab soup, vegetable soup, split pea with dumplings. We have some muskrat nibbles, which are a bit like swedish meatballs, only made with one of our fine young muskrats from a local marsh. And there’s crab balls, clam strips, and country fried chicken. One of our Shore-raised chickens from Mr. Perdue’s houses, up the way. And, of course, there’s my own fluffy crab cakes with secret ingredients.”

  “Everything sounds good, except for the muskrat,” said Max, wrinkling up his nose.

  “Now, you must never judge something unless you’ve tried it,” said Miss Ruby. “Anyway, homemade rolls and a loaf of cheese bread will be right with you. Salads come with the meal, as does your soup. I’ll be back in a minute with your sasparilla, and you boys go help yourselves.”

  She was gone with a whirl of her apron. Her bouncing chef’s hat popped through the room, giving her the appearance of a marionette with the strings attached to her hat.

  “Wow!” said Fred, looking at the menu, “these are prices right out of the 1950s. You guys can fill up and then some. I’ll still get change back from a twenty dollar bill.”

  “But muskrat?” ughed Charles.

  “An Eastern Shore treat, but you have to be born here to really appreciate it,” said Fred. “So, ok, what are you guys ordering?”

  “Crab soup, salad, bread, and fried chicken,” said Max.

  “Me too,” said Charles.

  “And I’m here for all the crab I can eat,” said Fred.

  “Ok if we go get our drinks now?” asked Charles.

  “Sure,” said Fred. “And when Miss Ruby comes back, I’ll give her your orders. Let me see if I got it right: that was muskrat stew with chopped chicken livers for you, Charles. And calves liver with onions and sweet kidney pie for you, Max. Right?”

  “Ugh!”

  “Ugh!!”

  “But they’re here on the menu along with hog’s cheese, sauerkraut with pig’s tails, corn on the cob, and Burpee’s Big Daddy tomatoes,” teased Fred.

  “Some things we’ll skip,” said Max.

  Over by the soda chest, the boys found glass cases filled with an assortment of chewing tobacco, hunting knives, oyster shells, turkey feathers, pearls, salted sunflower seeds, old postcards, and photographs of local folk holding up anything from huge fish to giant pumpkins.

  On another wall were canned goods for sale, and farther back, on shelves above, were boxes of hunting boots, plastic bags with gray and red wool socks, and hats. Long leather shoelaces and belts hung on nails between the stacks. All for sale.

  “This place is incredible,” said Max when they finally returned to their table with two sodas: one made in Maine, one in Florida.

  “I bet you could stay here for hours and still not see everything,” added Charles.

  “Only Miss Ruby won’t let you stay hungry that long,” said Fred, gesturing with his hand toward the kitchen door, which was just opening. Out came Miss Ruby with a big tray of food carried high over her head.

  “That’s us already?” Max asked in amazement.

  “Well, you boys said you were hung
ry,” exploded Miss Ruby in a short, cough-like laugh.

  “Wow! That’s what I call service!” said Charles.

  “Great,” was all Fred could add.

  “Now, you boys eat up and if there’s anything you need, just holler and me or one of the other girls will get it for you,” said Miss Ruby.

  “I think we’ll be just fine,” said Fred.

  For a long time, nobody spoke. Fred, Max, and Charles joined in with what the rest of Miss Ruby’s customers were doing: they ate, ate, ate.

  “I never tasted chicken this good!” said Max, finally looking up from his half-empty plate.

  “Me neither,” agreed Charles.

  “And these crab cakes! Fatter than baseballs and so light they feel like they could float all the way down to your stomach,” sighed Fred.

  “I don’t know how I’ll be able to eat dessert,” said Max.

  “Well, we could walk the ten miles back to Vienna, that might help us make room for more food,” said Fred.

  “Yeah, sure. Crab all day. Eat. Then walk all night!” said Max. “We’d fall asleep on our feet after half a mile.”

  “And then we’d miss Miss Marie’s ghost stories,” said Charles.

  “Well, in that case, we better not walk home. I’m looking forward to hearing a few more ghosty Eastern Shore tales. I think every little town down here has its own ghost,” said Fred.

  “And if not a ghost, then at the very least a restaurant with a name like ‘Suicide Bridge,’” added Max.

  “Yeah, what do you know about that, Fred?” asked Charles.

  “Well, the story goes this way. The old bridge over Secretary Creek was a favorite place for people to leap, when they were feeling very, very unhappy. So, when they put up a restaurant there, about 50 years ago, they decided to name it after the bridge. It’s a nice place, though. Pretty views. New bridge, which doesn’t look more than a few feet over the water. Not really high enough to commit suicide from, I don’t think, but who knows. It’s not as unique as Miss Ruby’s.”

  “This place is terrific!” raved Charles, diving back down into his plate and coming up with a long, crunchy ear of corn. Butter flew as he bit in and pieces of corn pulp sprayed all over his face.