第1章 The Old Mans Hard Life (2/2)

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we can come to your aid.”

    “He does not like to work too far out.”

    “No,”the boy said.“But I will see something that he cannot see such as a bird working and get him to come out after dolphin.”

    “Are his eyes that bad?”

    “He is almost blind.”

    “It is strange,”the old man said.“He never went turtle-ing.That is what kills the eyes.”

    “But you went turtle-ing for years off the Mosquito Coast and your eyes are good.

    “I am a strange old man.”

    “But are you strong enough now for a truly big fish?”

    “I think so.And there are many tricks.”

    “Let us take the stuff home,”the boy said.“ So I can get the cast net and go after the sardines.”

    They picked up the gear from the boat.The old man carried the mast on his shoulder and the boy carried the wooden box with the coiled,hard-braided brown lines,the gaff and the harpoon with its shaft.The box with the baits was under the stern of the skiff along with the club that was used to subdue the big fish when they were brought alongside.No one would steal from the old man but it was better to take the sail and the heavy lines home as the dew was bad for them and,though he was quite sure no local people would steal from him,the old man thought that a gaff and a harpoon were needless temptations to leave in a boat.

    They walked up the road together to the old man's shack and went in through its open door.The old man leaned the mast with its wrapped sail against the wall and the boy put the box and the other gear beside it.The mast was nearly as long as the one room of the shack.The shack was made of the tough bud-shields of the royal palm which are called guano and in it there was a bed,a table,one chair,and a place on the dirt floor to cook with charcoal.On the brown walls of the flattened,overlapping leaves of the sturdy fibered guano there was a picture in color of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and another of the Virgin of Cobre.These were relics of his wife. Once there had been a tinted photograph of his wife on the wall but he had taken it down because it made him too lonely to see it and it was on the shelf in the corner under his clean shirt.

    “What do you have to eat?”the boy asked.

    “A pot of yellow rice with fish.Do you want some?”

    “No,I will eat at home.Do you want me to make the fire?”

    “No.I will make it later on.Or I may eat the rice cold.”

    “May I take the cast net?”

    “Of course.”

    There was no cast net and the boy remembered when they had sold it.But they went through this fiction every day. There was no pot of yellow rice and fish and the boy knew this too.

    “Eighty-five is a lucky number,”the old man said.“ How would you like to see me bring one in that dressed out over a thousand pounds?”

    “I'll get the cast net and go for sardines.Will you sit in the sun in the doorway?”

    “Yes. I have yesterday's paper and I will read the baseball.”

    The boy did not know whether yesterday's paper was a fiction too.But the old man brought it out from under the bed.

    “Perico gave it to me at the bodega,”he explained.

    “I'll be back when I have the sardines.I'll keep yours and mine together on ice and we can share them in the morning. When I come back you can tell me about the baseball.”

    “The Yankees cannot lose.”

    “But I fear the Indians of Cleveland.”

    “Have faith in the Yankees my son.Think of the great DiMaggio.”

    “I fear both the Tigers of Detroit and the Indians of Cleveland.

    “Be careful or you will fear even the Reds of Cincinnati and the White Sox of Chicago.”

    “You study it and tell me when I come back.”

    “Do you think we should buy a terminal of the lottery with an eighty-five?Tomorrow is the eighty-fifth day.”

    “We can do that,”the boy said.“But what about the eighty-seven of your great record?”

    “It could not happen twice.Do you think you can find an eighty-five?”

    “I can order one.”

    “One sheet.That's two dollars and a half.Who can we borrow that from?”

    “That's easy. I can always borrow two dollars and a half.”

    “I think perhaps I can too.But I try not to borrow.First you borrow.Then you beg.”

    “Keep warm old man,”the boy said.“ Remember we are in September.”

    “The month when the great fish come,”the old man said.“ Anyone can be a fisherman in May.”

    “I go now for the sardines,”the boy said.

    When the boy came back the old man was asleep in the chair and the sun was down.The boy took the old army blanket off the bed and spread it over the back of the chair and over the old man's shoulders.They were strange shoulders,still powerful although very old,and the neck was still strong too and the creases did not show so much when the old man was asleep and his head fallen forward.His shirt had been patched so many times that it was like the sail and the patches were faded to many different shades by the sun.The old man's head was very old though and with his eyes closed there was no life in his face.The newspaper lay across his knees and the weight of his arm held it there in the evening breeze. He was barefooted.

    The boy left him there and when he came back the old man was still asleep.