Detailed Summary of The Old Man And the Sea by Ernest Hemingway, Part VI
Santiago contends himself with the idea that he is a mere fisherman and not a thinker: "You were born to be a fisherman as the fish was born to be a fish. San Pedro was a fisherman as was the father of the great DiMaggio." But he also drags in DiMaggio. Then he thinks again that he, perhaps, killed the fish for "pride" and not for money. He thinks the fish is beautiful and knows no fear and he killed it well in self-defence.
Old man had hardly rested for two hours when two "shovel-nosed sharks" came and attacked marlin. Santiago took up the oar with the knife tied to it. He hit one of the sharks "into the shark's yellow cat-like eyes" and it sank while eating the marlin. Santiago hit the other shark a couple of times but it did not move and then he hit it in the eye. He says aloud: "I shouldn't have gone out so far, fish. Neither for you nor for me. I'm sorry, fish." Santiago kills the other shark.
Next came was a single shovelnose shark. It came like a pig. Santiago dealt with it. He knows that he is too old to fight but: "I am too old to club sharks to death. But I will try it as long as I have the oars and the short club and the tiller". Then a pack of sharks came at sunset. Santiago hit the first shark on its head with the rudder and after some clubbing it slid down of the fish. Santiago then sees a number of fins but he does not care because he can do nothing about them. He thinks of back home and the boy and some elderly fishermen that would be worried about him.
Santiago admits his fault of having gone far out: "I am sorry that I went too far out. I ruined us both. But we have killed many sharks, you and I, and ruined many others." Santiago talks to himself of fighting the sharks at midnight "I'll fight them until I die." When there is a sound from within that he might have some luck, he utters "I'd like to buy some if there's any place they sell it". He clubbed at heads and heard the jaws chop. Finally he reached the harbour and nobody was there to help. He lay there for some time. Then he reached his hut and slept there.
The boy came in the morning to see the old man. He found him fast asleep and his hands body all wounded. He ran out to bring something for the old man but he was weeping all the way to the market. The fishermen gathered round the skiff to measure the skeleton of the fish. It was eighteen feet long. The boy fetches him a coffee and sits by the side of the old man to serve him. The boy announced that from that day onward he shall accompany the old man. He keep on weeping for the pains of the old man.
