“This next part’s quite dramatic,” Dad assured us, while Dr. Blake beamed. The picture switched to Dr. Blake, crouching beside a ramshackle building, explaining in hushed tones how dangerous the upcoming raid could be.

“The smuggling of animals and animal products generates billions of dollars in profit every year,” Blake was saying. “It’s second only to the illegal drug trade—and very often, the same ruthless criminals are responsible for both. Which means that the turtle smugglers we’re after today are probably also smuggling drugs using the same routes, the same carriers, and the same modus operandi. As a result, both the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and Drug Enforcement Administration agents have a keen interest in apprehending these dangerous lawbreakers—lawbreakers who have no scruples about turning their Uzis on the law enforcement officials who attempt to arrest them.”

He glanced over his shoulder as if to make sure the Uzi-toting smugglers hadn’t sneaked up on him while he was talking to us. I suddenly realized that the ramshackle building looked remarkably familiar.

“That’s one of our sheds,” I said. “What’s our shed doing in your documentary?”

“It was while you were on your honeymoon,” Dad said.

“You found armed turtle-egg smugglers in our shed while we were on our honeymoon?”

“No, but the raid took place at night,” Dr. Blake explained, pointing to the screen, where blurred and out-of-focus shapes were dashing around haphazardly, accompanied by the occasional burst of gunfire. “We didn’t get good footage.”

“So you faked it using our shed!”

“We just needed a plausible-looking exterior for the intro. We don’t actually say we’re at the site of the raid.”

“And our shed makes a plausible-looking smuggler’s den? Didn’t I hear something earlier about the squalid and filthy conditions the smuggled turtles were found in? Do you mean plausibly squalid and filthy?”

On screen, the picture cut to a DEA agent talking about a raid in which they had seized hundreds of kilos of cocaine along with other contraband, resulting in indictments of dozens of members of a major drug cartel.

“Oh, great,” I said. “Now everyone in town’s going to think we’re part of a drug cartel.”

“Don’t be silly,” Dr. Blake said. “Shh!”

“Other contraband,” the on-screen Blake said, shaking his head. “Sea turtle eggs may be only an afterthought to the DEA. But to these magnificent giants of the ocean, their eggs represent the future, and the illegal trade in these eggs threatens the survival of one of the planet’s most unique inhabitants.”

The documentary cut to some footage of several turtles swimming across the screen with ponderous grace. The background music was more than a little reminiscent of the shark theme in Jaws and managed to give the impression that a pack of dastardly egg smugglers was lurking off camera, ready to pounce. Then, the music swelled to the sort of tragically doomed theme that usually means the movie’s hero is walking off, chin high, to sacrifice himself for something or other. The turtles continued to swim stoically into the distance as the closing credits rolled in front of them.