Nevada Barr - Anna Pigeon 05 Endangered Species

ENDANGERED SPECIES BY NEVADA BARR Water slammed into Anna's back, Brushing over her shoulders and down the front of her shirt. Closing her eyes against the salt sting, she clung to the turtle's carapace and concentrated on keeping her footing as the wave dragged against her legs, sucked the sand from beneath her sneakers. The loggerhead wouldn't be washed unwillingly back into the Atlantic. There was little the turtle couldn't handle in the sea. It was land, that unfamiliar and ever-changing universe, that had baffled her. For miles she'd swum from God knew where to lay her eggs on the beach of Cumberland Island, one of the Golden Isles off the coast of Georgia.

In her tiny brain-or perhaps her great heartinstinct had programmed a map with such precision that out of thousands of miles of coastline she'd found her way back to this narrow ribbon of sand. Anna ducked as another wave broke across her shoulders, and embraced the animal hard against her. The ripples of the loggerhead's armored back, nearly a yard across, dug into her cheek where flesh thinned over bone. She could feel the powerful scrape of the creature's back flipper against the sodden fabric of her trousered thigh. Water flooded around her, warmer on the back of her neck than the mild summer air, and Anna wondered how turtles thought, how this turtle thought. On the chart that instinct tattooed on her soul, was there a picture? In whatever passed for a loggerhead's mind's eye, had she seen, remembered the flat welcoming beaches? " Sorry, old girl," Anna muttered as she heaved against several hundred pounds of sea beast.

A capricious tide had trenched out a four-foot-high sand and shell escarpment along fifty yards of ocean front. A week ago the sand had been flat; two weeks hence it would be again. Tonight it was proving impassable. Still, with the eternal patience that seemed endemic to turtles, rocks, and other longlived, slow-moving creatures, the loggerhead had beached herself and started her trek inland. Loggerheads coming ashore north and south of the ephemeral cliff were making their appointed rounds. Between drenchings, Anna could hear the delighted cries of park rangers, volunteers, and researchers celebrating the renewed cycle of this threatened species.

Over the past hour, since she'd been drafted into the turtlemidwifing business, Anna had received a crash course in the reproductive habits of the loggerhead. In an ideal world, they made their way up onto the beach, above high tide, dug a nest, laid the eggs, and buried them. Their role in the universe completed, they returned to the sea, and, it was presumed, never looked back until four or five years rolled by and they again felt the urge to come home to nest. The Turtle Anna danced with in the crashing surf could not negotiate the sand cliff and was exhausting herself with the effort. Too tired to fight any longer, she was giving up. "Dear Lord, she's laying.

Give me your hat," came an exasperated cry near Anna's ear. The words were carried on a gust of foulsmelling air. For an instant Anna thought she'd shoved her face too near the east end of the westbound turtle. When she realized it was Marty Schlessinver's breath, she began to believe the rumors that the biologist ate roadkill. The Atlantic drew back and the full weight of the loggerhead was laid again in Anna's and Marty's arms ." Don't hurt her," the biologist warned as Anna felt the little muscles in her sacroiliac stretch and complain. "Fat chance," she grumbled, but she braced herself, forearms on thighs, shoulder against shell, and held on.

In a sudden peace left behind by the receding waters, the moon pushed over an inky horizon to paint a path in silver over the ocean and onto the back of turtle under Anna's chin. By the clear light she could see Marty Schlessinger's face inches from her own. Fifty years were etched in the lines of determination carved on either side of an uncompromising mouth. Long hair, worn in pigtails like an aging Pippi Longstocking's, fell in white ropes across the loggerhead's shell. The returning ocean forced Anna to her knees. "Hat, hat, hat," Schlessinger growled. "Hat, hat, hat," Schlessinger growled.

Anna snatched off her baseball cap and poked it into the biologist's groping fingers. "Hold her," Schiessinger ordered. "Christ!" Anna breathed as the other woman relinquished her grip on the turtle to gather the eggs. Unlike many sea turtles, the loggerhead's egg-laying machinery was recessed beneath the rear of its shell, and Anna could not see the eggs. By the ecstatic chirps percolating from the biologist, she guessed the laying was a success. "No!" Schlessinger cried suddenly.

Such was the pain in her voice that Anna was unpleasantly reminded that the coast of Georgia was the breeding grounds for the great white shark. "What?" she demanded. "Lost a baby." Anna was relieved but had the good sense to keep quiet. Schlessinger would consider the loss of a ranger's leg somewhat less heartrending than that of an embryonic loggerhead. Minutes ticked by. Waves banged at Anna's back, tried to buckle her knees.

Sand gritted between her teeth and salt sealed her eyes. The muscles in her arms and shoulders had progressed from ache, to jelly, to constant torturous throb. All sense of glamour. and adventure was long since gone. "This is getting to be work," she grunted. "Quiet," Marty said.

Anna \wedged her knee more firmly under the loggerhead's shell and began counting back from one hundred. When she reached zero, she decided, Marty and the little loggers were on their own. Time came and went and still she held on. Numbers blurred . "I'm losing it," she said. " No.

Not yet." Various retorts bottled up behind Anna's teeth but she lacked breath to voice them. A wave rushed between her knees, buoyed up the turtle, and gave her shoulders some respite. When the water receded and the weight settled again, she cried out. "Hold her still," Schlessinger snapped. Anna tried ." In my next life I'm gog to be bigger," she hissed. Quiet Schlessinger said again.

Then: "Okay. I guess that's the lot. Let her down. Gently. Gently." Anna couldn't unlock any part of her body ." Can't," she said finally. "Oh for Christ sake." With the next wave Schlessinger eased the weight of the turtle from the tripod Anna had made of her body ." At least you can hold these." The biologist proffered Anna her National Park Service cap.

It was full of leathery orbs a little larger than golf balls ." Careful," she warned as Anna stretched stiff arms to receive them ." I counted." There was no mistaking the threat. Marty knew how many eggs were there. Should one turn up missing on Anna's watch, there would be hell to pay. She held the cap between her hands as if it were the Holy Grail. Cooing, the biologist turned the massive turtle back toward the sea and watched her shining shell till the ocean took her ." Fun's over," she said curtly ." Time to get to work." Oddly, Anna felt invigorated. The magic of the turtle eggs she carried was seeping into her tired bones.

The glory of the loggerhead's fight and her part in it filled her with a sense of accomplishment that diminished the ache in her back and legs. Slopping sand and water with every step, she squished up the darkened beach after Marty Schlessinger. just above the high-tide line Schlessinger stopped, locked folded arms across her chest, and surveyed the dunes between the water and the tangle of oak and palmetto that choked the interior of the island. A three-quarter moon, free now of the sea, cast its light over the sand. Each twig and blade of grass was etched on one side with unnatural clarity, and on the other plunged into impenetrable shadow. " This'll do," Schlessinger said, and dropping on all fours, began to dig like a dog after a particularly tasty bone. " This'll do," Schlessinger said, and dropping on all fours, began to dig like a dog after a particularly tasty bone.