Santiago knows more sharks will come. At first, he can think of nothing he can do against them. Then suddenly he realizes that he can lash his knife to one of the oars. That way, though he is an old man, he won't be unarmed. He considers it silly, even a sin not to have hope. For a moment, he claims not to want to think about sin because he doesn't understand it and doesn't believe in it. Yet he wonders if it was a sin to kill the fish, even though he did so to keep himself alive and to feed many people. He also recognizes that he killed the fish out of pride and because he was born to be a fisherman — like San Pedro (St. Peter) and the great DiMaggio's father — just as the fish was born to be a fish. He wonders whether killing the marlin was not a sin because he loved it — or whether that made killing it even more of a sin. He admits that he enjoyed killing the mako shark, which lives on live fish as he does and is not a scavenger, but beautiful, noble, and fearless. Eventually, Santiago decides that he killed the shark in self-defense and killed it well, that all animals kill one another, and that fishing kills him even as it keeps him alive. Then he reminds himself that the boy keeps him alive and that he mustn't deceive himself too much.
Santiago pulls off a piece of the marlin's meat, where the shark cut it. He tastes it, noticing the quality and noting that it would bring the highest price in the market. Yet he cannot keep the scent out of the water, so he knows more sharks will come. For two hours he sails, occasionally resting and chewing a bit more of the marlin to be strong. When he sees the first of the two shovel-nosed sharks, he says, "Ay," an involuntary noise that a man might make "feeling the nail go through his hands and into the wood."
