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He will start circling soon and then I must work on him.

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. "You're holding him again but you cannot get line. But soon he has to circle."

The old man held him with his left hand and his shoulders now and stooped down and scooped up water in his right hand to get the crushed dolphin flesh off of his face.

He was afraid that it might nauseate him and he would vomit and lose his strength.

When his face was cleaned he washed his right hand in the water over the side 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 that one properly. But God knows he has had enough chances to learn. He did not do so badly in the night, though, and he has only cramped once. If he cramps again let the line cut him off.

When he thought that he knew that he was not being clear-headed and he thought he should chew some more of the dolphin.

But I can't, he told himself.

It is better to be light-headed than to lose your strength from nausea.

And I know I cannot keep it if I eat it since my face was in it.

I will keep it for an emergency until it goes bad.

But it is too late to try for strength now through nourishment.

You're stupid, he told himself.

Eat the other flying fish.

It was there, cleaned and ready, and he picked it up with his left hand and ate it chewing the bones carefully and eating all of it down to the tail.

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