"When his eyes had got used to the deep-sea light he discerned a Negro the size of Carnera, naked to the waist and shining with iron-colored sweat, decapitating snapping turtles with silvered precision. / Now the trouble with turtles is that they believe all things come to him who will but struggle. There's always room at the top for one more, they think. And in this strange faith the snapping kind is of all the most devout. For it's precisely that that makes them the snapping kind. Though the way be steep and bloody, that doesn't matter so long as you reach the top of the bleeding heap. / [...] / Dove didn't hesitate. ‘I'll take the tarpon soup.’ / He didn't yet know that there was also room for one more at the bottom."
Unknown

January 1, 1970

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Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Added on April 10, 2026
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Original Language: English

Sources

Includes the last two lines of the chapter.

https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/A_Walk_on_the_Wild_Side