Returning to Shore by Corinne Demas

heading towards you.”
    It happened so quickly that Clare didn’t know how she actually did it. Some instinct had taken over and in a second she’d spotted the turtle, reached out with her net, and the next thing she knew she was struggling to hold on to the weight at the end of her net and keep her kayak from tipping over. Richard’s kayak was beside hers in an instant.
    â€œGreat job!” he said.
    The turtle was a clawing, thrashing creature, big as a dinner plate and heavy as a rock. It scratched Clare’sarm and she almost dropped it, net and all. Richard got it out of the net and held it for her to see. Clare stared at it and it stared right back at her. It had a wild, prehistoric look, like a dinosaur or a dragon.
    â€œIsn’t she a beauty?” Richard asked.
    They brought the terrapin back to shore and Richard got out his equipment for measuring and marking them.
    â€œYours is a female,” he told Clare. “They’re always bigger than the males. And she’s one who’s never been captured before. We’ll do her first.” Richard showed Clare how to hold the turtle so it couldn’t claw her, but it was difficult to hold on to that heavy weight and keep her hands free of the sharp claws.
    â€œSteady, Sweetheart,” he said to the turtle.
    â€œWhat happened to her shell here?” asked Clare.
    Richard rubbed the damaged spot with his thumb. “Got hit by something,” he said. “Probably a boat propeller, but it’s healed up fine. It isn’t slowing her down.”
    The turtle didn’t like to be weighed. She didn’t like to be measured with calipers. And she did not like having the edge of her shell notched with a file.It seemed like a cruel procedure to Clare, but Richard assured her it didn’t actually hurt the turtle. Every turtle had a different series of notches that stood for numbers, this was #1430 and it would be entered in the database.
    â€œThis little lady’s gravid,” said Richard.
    â€œWhat’s that?” asked Clare.
    â€œFull of eggs. She’s going to be coming up on the shore any day now to lay them. Here, you can feel them inside her.”
    Richard held the turtle and showed Clare where to slip her fingers in the back, between the shells. It seemed like too intimate a thing, an invasion of the turtle’s privacy, but Clare didn’t want to say so. And it was miraculous, after all, to reach in among the folds of turtle skin and feel something like marbles, which were the eggs the turtle would be laying, future baby turtles.
    â€œCould we give her a name?” asked Clare. “I know she has a number, but wouldn’t it be nice for her to have a name, too?”
    â€œCertainly. What do you want to name her?” asked Richard.
    Clare looked at the turtle. The turtle’s eyes were bright and intelligent looking. She looked a bit like a photograph of Eleanor Roosevelt in Clare’s social studies textbook.
    â€œHow about Eleanor?” she asked.
    â€œThat’s fine by me,” said Richard.
    When they were done recording all the information about the turtle, Richard handed her over to Clare to take back down to the water to release.
    â€œSo, she’s going to have to swim all the way out into the bay, and around Blackfish Island, watching out for boats, lobster traps, fishing nets, and all sorts of dangers, then climb across the beach and up to the dunes and find a place to lay her eggs?”
    â€œThat’s the way it is,” said Richard.
    â€œCouldn’t we just find a nice spot for her and take her there?”
    Richard shook his head.
    Clare held the turtle out at a safe distance and walked down the beach looking for the best place to put her down. She waded out into the water and picked a spot where there was nice eel grass to slither away into.
    â€œOK, Eleanor,” she said. “You’re on your own.”
    She set the turtle down in