短編 July Fourthを読んでいます。
On June twenty-seventh they got their first muskie in a shallow shoal on a Rapala they had run through that water fifty times or more. It was big, probably thirty-five inches, with faded green gills and mahogany fins. The Americans cheered, brained it with the butt of a wine bottle and resumed their angling with a renewed verve.
上に出てきた "brained" は文脈からワインのビンで魚の頭を打ったのだと分かりますが、 "brain" にそんな怖い意味・用法があるのか辞書で確認します。
・Oxford English Dictionary: Hit (someone) hard on the head with an object: she brained me with a rolling pin
・Collins English Dictionary: to smash the skull of
ありましたね。