یک نبرد برابر

CHAPTER FOUR

An Even Eight

As the sun set, to give himself more confidence, he remembered the time in the tavern at Casablanca when he had played the hand game with the great negro from Cienfuegos, who was the strongest man on the docks.

They had gone one day and one night with their elbows on a chalk line on the table. Each one was trying to force the other’s hand down onto the table. They changed the referee every four hours so that the referees could sleep.

The odds would change back and forth all night. Once the negro had the old man, who was not an old man then but was Santiago El Campeon, nearly three inches off balance. But the old man had raised his hand again. He was sure then that he had the negro, who was a fine man and a great athlete, beaten. And at daylight he had forced the hand of the negro down and down until it rested on the table. The match had started on a Sunday morning and ended on a Monday morning.

For a long time everyone had called him “the Champion.” After that he had a few matches and then no more. He decided that he could beat anyone if he wanted to badly enough and he decided that it was bad for his right hand for fishing.

Just before it was dark, as they passed a great island of Sargasso weed, his small line was taken by a dolphin. He saw it first when it jumped in the air, bending and flapping wildly. When it was at the stern the old man leaned over and lifted the burnished gold fish with its purple spots over the stem. Its jaws were working convulsively in quick bites against the hook. It pounded the bottom of the skiff with its long flat body, its tail and its head until he clubbed it. Then it shivered and was still.

The old man watched the sun go into the ocean and the slant of the big cord.

“He hasn’t changed at all,” he said. But watching the movement of the water against his hand he noted that it was a bit slower.

“I’ll lash the two oars together across the stern and that will slow him in the night,” he said. “He’s good for the night and so am I.”

I’m learning how to do it, he thought. This part of it anyway. Then, too, remember he hasn’t eaten since he took the bait and he is huge and needs much food. I have eaten the whole tuna. tomorrow I will eat the dolphin.

“How do you feel, fish?” he asked aloud. “I feel good and my left hand is better and I have food for a night and a day. Pull the boat, fish.”

He did not truly feel good because the pain from the cord across his back had almost passed pain and gone into a dullness that worried him.

But I have had worse things than that, he thought. My hand is only cut a little and the cramp is gone from the other. My legs are all right.

It was dark now as it becomes dark quickly after the sun sets in September. The first stars were out. He did not know the name of Rigel but he saw it and knew that soon they would all be out and he would have all his distant friends.

“The fish is my friend too,” he said aloud. “I have never seen or heard of such a fish. But I must kill him. I am glad we do not have to try to kill the stars.”

Then he was sorry for the great fish that had nothing to eat and his determination to kill him never relaxed in his sorrow for him. How many people will he feed, he thought. But are they worthy to eat him? No, of course not. There is no one worthy of eating a fish with such great dignity.

The old man rested for what he believed to be two hours. The moon did not rise until late now and he had no way of judging the time. He was still bearing the pull of the fish across his shoulders.

“But you have not slept yet, old man. It is half a day and a night and now another day and you have not slept,” he said aloud. “I must devise a way so that you sleep a little if he is quiet and steady. If you do not sleep you might become unclear in the head.”

I could go without sleeping, he told himself. But it would be too dangerous.

He worked his way back to the stern. The stars were bright now and he saw the dolphin clearly and he pushed the blade of his knife into his head and pulled him out from under the stern. The dolphin was cold and gray-white now in the starlight and the old man skinned one side of him while he held his right foot on the fish’s head. Then he skinned the other side and cut fillets. He leaned over the side and put his hand in the water. The flow of the water against it was less strong.

“He is tired or he is resting. Now let me eat this dolphin and get some rest and a little sleep.”

Under the stars he ate half of one of the dolphin fillets.

“What an excellent fish dolphin is to eat cooked,” he said. “And what a miserable fish raw. I will never go in a boat again without salt or limes.”

The sky was clouding over to the east and one after another the stars he knew were gone. It looked now as though he were moving into a great canyon of clouds and the wind had dropped.

“There will be bad weather in three or four days,” he said. “But not tonight or tomorrow. Right now to get some sleep, old man, while the fish is calm and steady.”

The moon had been up for a long time but he slept on and the fish pulled on steadily and the boat moved into the tunnel of clouds. He woke with the jerk of his right fist coming up against his face and the line burning out through his right hand. He could not feel the line with his left hand but he braked all he could with his right and the line rushed out.

Finally his left hand found the line and he leaned back against it and now it burned his back and his left hand. His left hand was taking all the strain and it was cutting badly.

Just then the fish jumped making a great bursting of the ocean and then a heavy fall. Then he jumped again and again and the boat was going fast although line was still racing out and the old man was raising the strain to the breaking point. He had been pulled down tight onto the bow and his face was in the cut slice of dolphin and he could not move.

This is what we waited for, he thought. So now let us take it.

Make him pay for the line. Make him pay for it.

He could not see the fish’s jumps but only heard the breaking of the ocean and the heavy splash as he fell. The speed of the line was cutting his hands badly but he had always known this would happen.

If the boy were here he would wet the coils of line, he thought. Yes. If the boy were here.

The line went out but it was slowing now and he was making the fish earn each inch of it. Now he got his head up from the wood and out of the slice of fish that his cheek had crushed. He was on his knees and then he rose to his feet.

He was giving line but more slowly all the time.

I wonder what started him so suddenly? Could it have been hunger that made him desperate, or was he frightened by something in the night?

Maybe he suddenly felt fear. But he was such a calm, strong fish and he seemed so fearless and so confident. It is strange.

“You better be fearless and confident yourself, old man,” he said.

The old man held him with his left hand and stooped down and scooped up water in his right hand to get the crushed dolphin flesh off his face. He was afraid that it might nauseate him and cause him to vomit and lose his strength. He washed his right hand in the water and then let it stay in the salt water while he watched the first light come before the sunrise. He’s headed almost east, he thought. That means he is tired and going with the current. Soon he will have to circle. Then our true work begins.

After he judged that his right hand had been in the water long enough he took it out and looked at it.

“It is not bad,” he said. “And pain does not matter to a man.”

He took hold of the line carefully so that it did not fit into any of the fresh line cuts and shifted his weight so that he could put his left hand into the sea on the other side of the skiff.

“You did not do so badly for something worthless,” he said to his left hand. ‘But there was a moment when I could not find you.”

Why was I not born with two good hands? he thought. Perhaps it was my fault in not training the left one properly. But God knows he had enough chances to leant. He did not do so badly in the night, though, and he has cramped only once. If he cramps again let the line cut him off.

The sun was rising for the third time since he had got out to sea when the fish started to circle.

“It is a very big circle,” he said. “But he is circling.”

I must hold all I can, he thought. The strain will shorten his circle each lime. Perhaps in an hour I will see him. Now I must convince him and then I must kill him.

But the fish kept on circling slowly and the old man was wet with sweat and tired deep into his bones two hours later. But the circles were much shorter now and from the way the line slanted he could tell the fish had risen steadily while he swam.

For an hour the old man had been seeing black spots before his eyes and the sweat salted his eyes and salted the cut under his eye and on his forehead. He was not afraid of the black spots. Twice, though, he had felt faint and dizzy and that had worried him.

“I cannot fail and die on a fish like this,” he said. “Now that I have him coming so beautifully. God help me endure. I’ll say a hundred Our Fathers and a hundred Hail Marys. But I cannot say them now.” Consider them said, he thought. I’ll say them later. Just then he felt a sudden banging and jerking on the line he held with his two hands. It was sharp and heavy.

He is hitting the wire with his sword, he thought. He may jump and I would rather he circled now. The jumps wore necessary for him to take air. But after that each jump can widen the opening of the hook wound and he can throw the hook.

“Don’t jump, fish,” he said. “Don’t jump. The fish hit the wire several times more, and each time the old man gave up a little line.

After a while the fish stopped beating at the wire and started circling slowly again. The old man was gaining line steadily now. But he felt faint again. He lifted some sea water with his left hand and put it on his head. Then he put more on and rubbed the back of his neck.

“I have no cramps,” ho said. “He’ll go up soon and I can last. You have to last. Don’t oven speak of it.” He kneeled against the bow and, for a moment, slipped the line over his back again. I’ll rest now while he circles and then stand up and work on him when he comes in, he decided.

I’m more tired than I have ever been, he thought, and now the trade wind is rising. But that will be good to take him in with. The sea had risen considerably. But it was a fair weather breeze and he had to have it to get home.

“I’ll just steer south and west,” he said. “A man is never lost at sea and it is a long island.”

It was on the third turn that he saw the fish for the first time. He saw him first as a dark shadow that took so long to pass under the boat that he could not believe its length.

“No,” he said. “He can’t be that big.” But he was that big and at the end of this circle he came to the surface only thirty yards away and the man saw his tail out of the water. It was higher than a big scythe blade and a very pale lavender above the dark blue water.

As the fish swam just below the surface the old man could see his huge bulk and purple stripes. His dorsal fin was down and his huge pectorals were spread wide. Then the old man could see the fish’s eye.

The old man was sweating now but from something else besides the sun. On each placid turn the fish made he was gaining line and he was sure that in two turns he would have a chance to get the harpoon in.

But I must get him close, close, close, he thought. I mustn’t try for the head. I must get the heart.

“Be calm and strong, old man,” he said.

The fish was coming in on his circle now, calm and beautiful with only his great tail moving. The old man pulled on him to bring him closer. For just a moment the fish turned a little on his side. Then he straightened himself and began another circle.

“I moved him” the old man said. “I moved him then.”

He felt faint again but he held on to the great fish with all his strength. I moved him, he thought. Maybe this time I can get him over. Pull, hands, he thought. Hold up, legs. Last for me, head. Last for me. You never went. This time I’ll pull him over.

But when he put forth, all of his effort, the fish righted himself and swam away.

“Fish” the old man said. “Fish, you are going to have to die anyway. Do you have to kill me too?”

That way nothing is accomplished, he thought. His mouth was too dry to speak but he could not reach for the water now. I must get him alongside this time, he thought. I am not good for many more turns. Yes, you are, he told himself. You’re good forever.

On the next turn, he nearly had him. But again the fish righted himself and swam away slowly.

You are killing me, fish, the old man thought. But you have a right to. Never have I seen a greater or more beautiful or a calmer or more noble thing than you, brother. Come on and kill me. I do not care who kills who. Now you are getting confused in the head, he thought. You must keep your head clear and know how to suffer like a man or a fish.

“Clear up, head” he said in a voice he could hardly hear. “Clear up.”

He tried it once more and he felt himself going when he turned the fish. The fish righted himself and swam off again slowly with the great tail moving in the air.

I’ll try it again, the old man promised, although his hands were mushy now and he could only see well in flashes.