Chapter Twenty-Eight
TWENTY-EIGHT
THE SNAPPING TURTLE
The Bean River ran crisp and clear, except for one stretch that merged into a swamp just north of the Gallagher fields and barn.
There, the river all but disappeared, becoming wide and shallow, its waters creeping through a quagmire of trees and grass and muddy puddles, before spilling out on the other side and once again finding its course through the Flats.
The four of them set out that morning looking for a great new frontier, unknown and ripe for exploration.
In just a few days, Nate was leaving for college. For weeks now, he had been talking about the dorm he’d been assigned and the classes he was registered for and how much packing he still had to do.
But that afternoon, he didn’t speak of it. As if even Nate could be nervous about the big changes to come.
Marlowe was relieved. Nora had recently become sulky whenever the subject of college came up.
“He’ll go and he won’t ever come back here anymore,” Nora said to Marlowe the night before. “And then in a few years it’ll be you. You’ll leave too.”
Marlowe reassured Nora it wouldn’t be like that, but Marlowe couldn’t deny that college students didn’t leave campus every single weekend.
And her father was already talking about the best art programs. In faraway states, and in other countries.
It was awkward to share this with Nora, who had no clear plans.
Her options were limited to the community college or maybe an in-state, four-year university, if she could get financial aid.
Marlowe had taken to giving Nora small knickknacks from around the Gray House every so often so she could sell them to the pawnshop one town over.
The cash would never be enough for college tuition, but it was something.
They marched past the Gallagher barn, but instead of climbing the Rise, they veered toward the soft mud along the edge of the swamp, cutting into the murky terrain when they were even with the gully. The sun was directly overhead, and the afternoon felt like it could stretch on forever.
Nate led them in a twisting trail along the scant solid ground and toward the site of a beaver dam they’d discovered earlier in the year.
“I’m sure it’s still there,” Nate assured them. “Beavers stick to one place.”
“How do you know that? You watch a nature documentary or something?” Marlowe chided, getting a laugh out of Henry.
But sure enough, they soon reached the area where the water pooled around a thick dam, sturdy enough for them to walk across and continue exploring the wetlands on the other side.
Giant green ferns that reached up to Marlowe’s waist, tangled reeds, and thick rows of cattails crowded in the shallow, cloudy water.
Lily pads and duckweed blanketed the surfaces of every small pond.
Marlowe was fascinated by how a place could produce so much vibrant green plant life while also containing so much sticky brown muck and so many gnarled branches.
She wanted to illustrate the wildness of the swamp, the way the trees were spaced out, unlike in the woods, each one staking a solitary claim to a patch of the marsh.
Her fingers itched to depict how water pooled in every divot, but she didn’t know how to begin such an endeavor.
She had dozens of half-finished sketches of the Gray House and its surroundings scattered across her bedroom floor.
The house itself was easy to replicate on paper, with its neat edges.
But whenever she tried to draw the surrounding woods, the rolling field beyond the gully, or the Gallagher barn, they never came out right.
She could capture the shape of the barn and the precise dimensions of the field well enough, but she couldn’t capture what they were to her, the spirit of the landscape. Not entirely.
“Hey!” Nate’s shout rang out from another pool up ahead.
Marlowe and Nora ran through the weeds to keep up, trying not to look down at their feet as they sloshed through the muck, for fear of seeing a snake or something else slimy and unsavory.
They pulled up short where Nate crouched down at the edge of the water, Henry standing tense behind him.
And then they saw it: a massive, hideous snapping turtle pulling itself through the mud.
Long ago, Tom Gallagher had warned them about snapping turtles.
He had joked that they ought to be careful while swimming in the Bend—a snapper might swim up and bite off their little white toes.
Marlowe had been scared at the time, but Nate had dismissed the stories of country children with missing fingers.
“Look at it.” Henry turned toward the girls, keeping one eye on the snapper. “He’s enormous.”
His size was notable; the brown shell alone was over a foot wide, far bigger than any turtle Marlowe had ever seen before. And just as the stories claimed, his jaw was large and lethal. His spiked tail was leaving a line in the mud as the snapper dragged himself out of the water.
But it was his age that struck Marlowe most. She couldn’t say how she could tell the snapping turtle was old, but she somehow knew that this one was ancient. It was something in the way he moved, as if every push of his clawed front legs required tremendous effort.
The snapper didn’t look at them. He was done. Done with biting off toes and gulping down frogs. He was done with life.
Nate inched closer, and the snapper swung his head toward him, not to attack, but as if in some sort of obligatory gesture of toughness.
When it was clear that the snapping turtle was in no state to do any harm, Nate reached out and skimmed his hand over the shell and spiked tail.
“Don’t,” Marlowe said.
“Don’t worry, he’s too old to bite,” Nate said.
“We should just leave it alone.” Marlowe stepped backward. “To die.”
Henry, emboldened by the fact that Nate had touched the turtle and suffered no consequences, bent down and wrapped his hand around the snapper’s thick ash-colored tail.
This the snapper could not abide. He turned and opened his gaping maw, making a strange, wheezing groan that sounded so much like an old man that it sent a frisson of panic through Marlowe’s gut.
Henry wheeled backward, his foot slipping in the mud.
He held tight to the one thing he could, the snapper’s tail, as he crashed into the shallow water with a resounding splash, dragging the snapper in after him.
Nora let out a cry when the snapper’s soft belly caught on a stone that ripped into his flesh.
Henry released the tail, clambering through the reedy water, his eyes wide with fear as he tried to get away from the turtle.
It was Nora who reached out and grabbed Henry’s hand and hauled him to his feet.
Nora who didn’t let go of his hand as Henry leaned against her shoulder, dripping swamp water down onto her shirt.
Marlowe frowned in annoyance over her brother’s antics.
Henry had injured the turtle, and he was getting too old to cling like a baby to Nora for comfort.
Nate’s eyes were fixed on the snapper, which was lying still, half in and half out of the water. Bright red blood oozed from beneath his body. He didn’t strain; he just blinked up at the children, as if to ask, What have you done?
“Henry, you idiot.” Nate’s words were sharp, but no one disagreed. It was clear they were watching the turtle suck in his last heavy breath.
“I’m sorry.” It sounded like Henry might cry, but his eyes were hollow and dry.
“It—it was dying anyway.” Nora sounded only half convinced by her words.
Marlowe glared at Nate. “Why did you have to touch it? It could have died in peace.”
They slipped away then, as quietly as they could. As if they didn’t want the other creatures to hear what they had done.
They walked back through the trees, Henry’s sopping-wet clothing making a squelching noise with his every step. Each of them exhaled as they approached the edge of the swamp and saw their stone wall up ahead, the pale green and gentle grasses of the Flats stretching beyond it.
“You’re gonna have to check yourself for leeches, you know.” Nora shook her head and smiled up at Henry. “I bet you’re covered.”
Henry made a sound of disgust and tore off his shirt to inspect himself. “I’m jumping in the Bend to wash off this muck,” he said and took off jogging across the Flats.
They all followed, suddenly eager for a swim, a new adventure to erase the one they’d just had.
Henry ran straight into the river’s crystal clear water, splashing it into the air as if trying to resurrect the levity of the day.
Nate waded in after him, letting the water inch higher and higher.
He was quiet, and Marlowe wondered if he was thinking that this could be the last swim of the summer.
He’d return to the city the day after tomorrow to finish packing for college.
Marlowe lifted off her shirt and discarded her shorts. She and Nora wore their simple one-piece bathing suits underneath their clothes in the summer. One way or another, they always wound up swimming.
Nora shouted at Nate to pass her the rope. She let out a little squeal as she swung out and let go where it was deepest, her arms outstretched above her head.
For a moment, Marlowe stood still, watching the three of them.
Nora and Henry twirled around each other like otters, their limbs flashing and rippling beneath the water.
Nora dove beneath the surface, and a few seconds later Nate shouted and laughed as she grabbed his ankle, yanking him under. Nora popped up next to him.
They should have buried that snapping turtle, Marlowe thought. They shouldn’t have just left him there to die in agony. They should have dug a hole and covered him with the mud he had lived in his whole life.
“Marlowe!” Nora’s voice was clear as a bell, ringing out above the water. “Come in already!”
Marlowe sprinted toward the bank, splashing into the water at full speed. She ducked her head under, letting the pristine river water swallow her whole.