The fish hit the wire several times more and each time he shook his head the old man gave up a little line.
“I need a pencil for that,”he said.“My head is not that clear.But I think the great DiMaggio would be proud of me today.I had no bone spurs.But the hands and the back hurt truly.”I wonder what a bone spur is,he thought.Maybe we have them without knowing of it.
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.
“Fish,”the old man said.“ Fish,you are going to have to die anyway.Do you have to kill me too?”
“It is a very big circle,”he said.“ But he is circling.”
“Keep my head clear,”he said against the wood of the bow.“ I am a tired old man.But I have killed this fish which is my brother and now I must do the slave work.”
Then the line would not come in any more and he held it until he saw the drops jumping from it in the sun. Then it started out and the old man knelt down and let it go grudgingly back into the dark water.
“I'll just steer south and west.”he said.“A man is never lost at sea and it is a long island.”
Twice more it was the same on the turns.
He started to pull the fish in to have him alongside so that he could pass a line through his gills and out his mouth and make his head fast alongside the bow.I want to see him, he thought,and to touch and to feel him.He is my fortune, he thought.But that is not why I wish to feel him.I think I felt his heart,he thought.When I pushed on the harpoon shaft the second time.Bring him in now and make him fast and get the noose around his tail and another around his middle to bind him to the skiff.