Old Man and the Sea (4 page)

  
The tuna, the fishermen called all the fish
of that species tuna and only distinguished among them by their proper names
when they came to sell them or to trade them for baits, were down again. The
sun was hot now and the old man felt it on the back of his neck and felt the
sweat trickle down his back as he rowed.

  
I could just drift, he thought, and sleep
and put a bight of line around my toe to wake me. But today is eighty-five days
and I should fish the day well.

  
Just then, watching his lines, he saw one of
the projecting green sticks dip sharply.

  
“Yes,” he said. “Yes,” and shipped his oars
without bumping the boat. He reached out for the line and held it softly
between the thumb and forefinger of his right hand. He felt
no
strain nor
weight and he held the line lightly. Then it came again. This
time it was a tentative pull,
not solid nor
heavy, and
he knew exactly what it was. One hundred fathoms down a marlin was eating the
sardines that covered the point and the shank of the hook where the hand-forged
hook projected from the head of the small tuna.

  
The old man held the line delicately, and
softly, with his left hand, unleashed it from the stick. Now he could let it
run through his fingers without the fish feeling any tension.

  
This far out, he must be huge in this month,
he thought. Eat them, fish. Eat them. Please eat them.

  
How fresh they are and you down there six
hundred feet in that cold water in the dark. Make another turn in the dark and
come back and eat them.

  
He felt the light delicate pulling and then
a harder pull when a sardine’s head must have been more difficult to break from
the hook. Then there was nothing.

  
“Come on,” the old man said aloud. “Make
another turn. Just smell them. Aren’t they lovely? Eat them good now and then
there is the tuna.
Hard and cold and lovely.
Don’t be
shy, fish. Eat them.”

  
He waited with the line between his thumb
and his finger, watching it and the other lines at the same time for the fish
might have swum up or down. Then
came
the same
delicate pulling touch again.

  
“He’ll take it,” the old man said aloud.
“God help him to take it.”

  
He did not take it though. He was gone and
the old man felt nothing.

  
“He can’t have gone,” he said. “Christ knows
he can’t have gone. He’s making a turn. Maybe he has been hooked before and he
remembers something of it.

  
Then he felt the gentle touch on the line
and he was happy.

  
“It was only his turn,” he said. “He’ll take
it.”

  
He was happy feeling the gentle pulling and
then he felt something hard and unbelievably heavy. It was the weight of the
fish and he let the line slip down, down, down, unrolling off the first of the
two reserve coils. As it went down, slipping lightly through the old man’s
fingers, he still could feel the great weight, though the pressure of his thumb
and finger were almost imperceptible.

  
“What a fish,” he said. “He has it sideways
in his mouth now and he is moving off with it.”

  
Then he will turn and swallow it, he
thought. He did not say that because he knew that if you said a good thing it
might not happen. He knew what a huge fish this was and he thought of him
moving away in the darkness with the tuna held crosswise in his mouth. At that
moment he felt him stop moving but the weight was still there. Then the weight
increased and he gave more line. He tightened the pressure of his thumb and
finger for a moment and the weight increased and was going straight down.

  
“He’s taken it,” he said. “Now I’ll let him
eat it well.”

  
He let the line slip through his fingers
while he reached down with his left hand and made fast the free end of the two
reserve coils to the loop of the two reserve coils of the next line. Now he was
ready. He had three forty-fathom coils of line in reserve now, as well as the
coil he was using.

  
“Eat it a little more,” he said. “Eat it
well.”

  
Eat it so that the point of the hook goes
into your heart and kills you, he thought. Come up easy and let me put the
harpoon into you.
All right.
Are you ready? Have you
been long enough at table?

  
“Now!” he said aloud and struck hard with
both hands, gained a yard of line and then struck again and again, swinging
with each arm alternately on the cord with all the strength of his arms and the
pivoted weight of his body.

  
Nothing happened. The fish just moved away
slowly and the old man could not raise him an inch. His line was strong and
made for heavy fish and he held it against his hack until it was so taut that
beads of water were jumping from it. Then it began to make a slow hissing sound
in the water and he still held it, bracing himself against the thwart and
leaning back against the pull. The boat began to move slowly off toward the
north-west.

  
The fish moved steadily and they travelled
slowly on the calm water. The other baits were still in the water but there was
nothing to be done.

  
“I wish I had the boy” the old man said
aloud. “I’m being towed by a fish and I’m the towing bitt. I could make the
line fast. But then he could break it. I must hold him all I can and give him
line when he must have it. Thank God he is travelling and not going down.”

  
What I will do if he decides to go down, I
don’t know. What I’ll do if he sounds and dies I don’t know. But I’ll do
something. There are plenty of things I can do.

  
He held the line against his back and
watched its slant in the water and the skiff moving steadily to the north-west.

  
This will kill him, the old man thought. He
can’t do this forever. But four hours later the fish was still swimming
steadily out to sea, towing the skiff, and the old man was still braced solidly
with the line across his back.

  
“It was noon when I hooked him,” he said.
“And I have never seen him.”

  
He had pushed his straw hat hard down on his
head before he hooked the fish and it was cutting his forehead. He was thirsty
too and he got down on his knees and, being careful not to jerk on the line,
moved as far into the bow as he could get and reached the water bottle with one
hand. He opened it and drank a little. Then he rested against the bow. He
rested sitting on the un-stepped mast and sail and tried not to think but only
to endure.

  
Then he looked behind him and saw that no
land was visible. That makes no difference, he thought. I can always come in on
the glow from Havana. There are two more hours before the sun sets and maybe he
will come up before that. If he doesn’t maybe he will come up with the moon.
If he does not do that maybe he will come up with the sunrise.
I have no cramps and I feel strong. It is he that has the hook in his mouth.
But what a fish to pull like that.
He must have his mouth
shut tight on the wire. I wish I could see him. I wish I could see him only
once to know what I have against me.

  
The fish never changed his course nor
his direction all that night as far as the man could
tell
from watching the stars. It was cold after the sun went down and the old man’s
sweat dried cold on his back and his arms and his old legs. During the day he
had taken the sack that covered the bait box and spread it in the sun to dry.
After the sun went down he tied it around his neck so that it hung down over
his back and he cautiously worked it down under the line that was across his
shoulders now. The sack cushioned the line and he had found a way of leaning
forward against the bow so that he was almost comfortable. The position
actually was only somewhat less intolerable; but he thought of it as almost
comfortable.

  
I can do nothing with him and he can do
nothing with me, he thought. Not as long as he keeps this up.

  
Once he stood up and urinated over the side
of the skiff and looked at the stars and checked his course. The line showed
like a phosphorescent streak in the water straight out from his shoulders. They
were moving more slowly now and the glow of Havana was not so strong, so that
he knew the current must be carrying them to the eastward. If I lose the glare
of Havana we must be going more to the eastward, he thought. For if the fish’s
course held true I must see it for many more hours. I wonder how the baseball
came out in the grand leagues today, he thought. It would be wonderful to do
this with a radio. Then he thought, think of it always. Think of what you are
doing. You must do nothing stupid.

  
Then he said aloud, “I wish I had the boy.
To help me and to see this.”

  
No one should be alone in their old age, he
thought. But it is unavoidable. I must remember to eat the tuna before he
spoils in order to keep strong. Remember, no matter how little you want to,
that you must eat him in the morning. Remember, he said to himself.

  
During the night two porpoises came around
the boat and he could hear them rolling and blowing. He could tell the
difference between the blowing noise the male made and the sighing blow of the
female.

  
“They are good,” he said. “They play and
make jokes and love one another. They are our brothers like the flying fish.”

  
Then he began to pity the great fish that he
had hooked. He is wonderful and strange and who knows how old he is, he
thought. Never have I had such a strong fish
nor
one
who acted so strangely. Perhaps he is too wise to jump. He could ruin me by
jumping or by a wild rush. But perhaps he has been hooked many times before and
he knows that this is how he should make his fight. He cannot know that it is
only one man against him,
nor
that it is an old man.
But what a great fish he is and what will he bring in the market if the flesh
is good. He took the bait like a male and he pulls like a male and his fight
has no panic in it. I wonder if he has any plans or if he is just as desperate
as I
am?

  
He remembered the time he had hooked one of
a pair of marlin. The male fish always let the female fish feed first and the
hooked fish, the female, made a wild, panic-stricken, despairing fight that
soon exhausted her, and all the time the male had stayed with her, crossing the
line and circling with her on the surface. He had stayed so close that the old
man was afraid he would cut the line with his tail which was sharp as a scythe
and almost of that size and shape. When the old man had gaffed her and clubbed
her, holding the rapier bill with its sandpaper edge and dubbing her across the
top of her head until her colour turned to a colour almost like the backing of
mirrors, and then, with the boy’s aid, hoisted her aboard, the male fish had
stayed by the side of the boat. Then, while the old man was clearing the lines
and preparing the harpoon, the male fish jumped high into the air beside the
boat to see where the female was and then went down deep, his lavender wings,
that were his pectoral fins, spread wide and all his wide lavender stripes
showing. He was beautiful, the old man remembered, and he had stayed.

  
That was the saddest thing I ever saw with
them, the old man thought. The boy was sad too and we begged her pardon and
butchered her promptly.

  
“I wish the boy was here,” he said aloud and
settled himself against the rounded planks of the bow and felt the strength of
the great fish through the line he held across his shoulders moving steadily
toward whatever he had chosen.

  
When once, through my
treachery, it had been necessary to him to make a choice, the old man thought.

  
His choice had been to stay in the deep dark
water far out beyond all snares and traps and treacheries. My choice was to go
there to find him beyond all people. Beyond all people in the world. Now we are
joined together and have been since noon.
And no one to help
either one of us.

  
Perhaps I should not have been a fisherman,
he thought. But that was the thing that I was born for. I must surely remember
to eat the tuna after it gets light.

  
Some time before daylight something took one
of the baits that were behind him. He heard the stick break and the line begin
to rush out over the gunwale of the skiff. In the darkness he loosened his
sheath knife and taking all the strain of the fish on his left shoulder he
leaned back and cut the line against the wood of the gunwale. Then he cut the
other line closest to him and in the dark made the loose ends of the reserve
coils fast. He worked skillfully with the one hand and put his foot on the
coils to hold them as he drew his knots tight. Now he had six reserve coils of
line. There were two
from each bait
he had severed and
the two from the bait the fish had taken and they were all connected.