Tortoise tattle

When Shelley, a pet tortoise, breathed his last, as was wont, my neighbour's notoriously naughty son, Joy, was blamed for it. He took the blame upon himself stoically, without a word of protest, because he never was categorically sure about his innocence. So he thought it futile to take a stand on it against six hollering adults.

He just put on a "closed" sort of impossible fence around himself and ran away to climb the guava tree where he stayed all day, out of harm's way, until emotions and tempers were brought under control.

Let me tell you a little more about Shelley. He was picked up from a dirty pond when he was a few weeks old by Joy's mother on the boy's insistence. They had gone for a picnic to a nearby hill-station and came across this little creature all by himself, near a cove, almost mistaken for the numerous pebbles around the scummy water body. He had a beautiful top cover, a shell flecked with small grey, green and brown patterns and that is why he was instantly named Shelley.

New era

The creature looked elegant, like a blob of freckled moss on Joy's palm. He ushered in a new era in Joy's home.

Shelley was placed in a small glass trough, with water and small aquatic plants and shells added to it to make him feel at home. Tortoise food was added to his abode, but Shelley was a lazy little fellow who continued to be bored with the business of living. If it suited him, he would wiggle out a little arm and turn his head around a little bit, eat his food. But that was all; most of the time, Shelley preferred to retreat into his hard-as-nuts abode and have prolonged siestas. Shelley was a star for all kids, who would throng around his glass trough, trying to make him move or just watch as he lay still as a rock in his aquatic home.

Sluggish behaviour

Joy could not be blamed for Shelley's sluggish behaviour. Like all other kids, he too wanted to attract the attention of his little mollusk friend and felt a proprietary sense of power over him.

Shelley must have been in Joy's home for a little more than a month when he gave up moving all together. He had grown a bit, but he must have had some sort of bacterial infection that went undetected. Probably, the infection must have come from the scum of the pond that was his first home. As the infection raged, the little tortoise retired deeper into his home and became a recluse. The stake out lasted for a week, after which Shelley gave up and passed on peacefully. Since Joy was the last person at his trough, trying to probe the tortoise to alertness, it was assumed that he had a hand in this unfortunate turn of circumstances.

Shelley's death momentarily took the cheer out of Joy's life, but he climbed down the tree, a bit more mature and emotionally stable boy, who resolved never to hurt any animal after that.

One will never know if illness or Joy's prank took Shelley's life, but the incident nurtured a life-long love for animals in the little boy's life.