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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 back 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 northwest.
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 northwest.
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 unstepped 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 porpoise 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 he will 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 clubbing her across the top of her head until her color turned to a color 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.