Free So Brave, Young, and Handsome by Leif Enger

turtle.
    “No—he’ll feed us for days.” Glendon had found the snapper with his oar and now, night-blind as he was, reached down and got it by the tail. “Here, help me block him up.”
    Quite gently he set the turtle back in the bow while I crawled forward and rebuilt the barrier.
    “Poor bugger,” Glendon said. “Poor old uncle. Listen how quiet he’s got, Becket. How awful he feels. You were never in jail, I suppose.”
    “Not yet.”
    “Well, it ain’t any good. You don’t ever wake up and say to yourself, What a pretty day, I feel good today. No,” he reflected, “a jail ain’t nothing but a collection of corners.”

5
    We struck no town that night and laid up at dawn on a sandy shore under a cottonwood tree. The tree would’ve provided superior shade, but by noon the sky turned to funeral wool and November came hissing through the grass. There are people who “predict” the weather, but on the Great Plains these are a fragile and disappointed little group. Glendon opened his kit and threw me a knitted sweater and donned an oilskin himself. We dragged the boat to high ground and knocked a few dead limbs off the cottonwood.
    “Becket, I’m hungry. Go kill the turtle.”
    I must’ve looked blank.
    “Stick this branch in front of his nose. When he takes hold, pull him out of the boat. Pull his head as far out as you can and cut it off.” He handed me his knife.
    “My hands are still pretty bad,” I said, despising my faint heart.
    “I rowed us all night, I guess you can kill an old turtle,” he replied. His voice had a grouchy rasp I hadn’t heard before.
    I returned to the johnboat. The snapper appeared relaxed. Warily I held out the stick, which he refused to notice.
    “He won’t bite,” I called out.
    “Tap his beak, that’ll fetch him.”
    I tapped away but the turtle just blinked and drew his head into his cave.
    “He isn’t coming out.”
    Glendon came over and gave the snapper an admiring look. He said, “You been reading our mail.” To me he added, “Good luck,Becket,” then off he went and started digging an earthen pit under the cottonwood tree. He had in mind to build a fire in the pit and drop in the turtle and roast him slowly in the shell, along with the squash. We’d had nothing since the bread and molasses—in this cold breeze a roasted turtle sounded like Christmas dinner.
    I laid the tip of the stick against its beak and tried to pry it open but nothing. You don’t expect restraint from these beasts, you expect reflexive violence. Instead this snapper refused to snap and in fact looked canny and patient.
    Soon enough Glendon had the pit dug and a vigorous fire inside it. He came over to watch my futile coaxings.
    “You sound impatient. Look at his face—he doesn’t like your tone,” Glendon said, amused.
    “If that was my toe instead of a stick, he wouldn’t show such control,” I complained. “Why don’t we just put him in the fire and cook him alive? That’s what they do with lobsters.”
    But Glendon was displeased. “Cook him alive? Look at him. He’s probably older than me. It would be impertinent.”
    “Well, you kill him then. I tried, and he won’t come out.”
    “Cook him alive—for shame, Becket.”
    This attitude of Glendon’s struck me as impractical and possibly priggish. We were hungry. It was cold. Nobody ever thought it was impertinent to steam a lobster.
    Climbing the riverbank I walked out onto the meadow where an upstart wind whipped the grasses into confusion. I didn’t look at the sky until a cold gust struck my face—only then did I see the black storm front riding in from the west. It rolled forth in a toppling motion. Even over the wind I could hear the sizzling noise of water striking earth.
    I turned and bolted, reaching the river with the first raindrops. They spanked the weeds, tore leaves off the cottonwood. Determined to cook something, Glendon had thrown the squash on the coals and covered the pit with dirt;