The strong old man woke up from the dream about the penguins. It was always the same dream, with the old man drunk in the old way with the rum, and the boy holding the tether of the mule while the old man climbed through snow. In his waking life, he had only once seen snow. He had been in the merchant marine, and his ship had put in at Baltimore in a blizzard. The snow had been wet and cold and had formed a sort of skull cap on the old man's head as he walked through it. He had never seen penguins except in cartoons. This was the reason that the penguins in his dream all resembled Chilly Willy. In the dream he had a meeting with the Emperor Penguin, who had been dressed in a waistcoat and top hat and wearing a monocle, but when the penguin opened its beak to address him, he had awakened.

The old man sat quietly, feeling the wooden boat creak in the calm water. He smelled the odor of the decaying marlin before he saw the big fin sticking up above the gunwale of the fishing boat. During the night, the sharks had been very busy, and little was left of the marlin but the great fin, the snout, tail, and the ribs which held several empty tin cans and a rubber tire, part of the steering gear from a 39 Hudson, and an umbrella handle. The old man wept for the loss of the great fish, and wondered about the Hudson steering gear.

It was nearly dark when the old man entered the harbor at Nuestra Madonna de las Agonias Sacrosancta. The boy had been waiting for him, and had helped him to tie up the skiff. The boy did not mention the skeleton of the Great Fish, and once again the old man wondered what was wrong with the boy. Why he had not mentioned the fish, and why he had been waiting for 3 days in the same spot for the old man to return. He supposed the boy had never entirely recovered from the incident with the rabid cat. The old man had not bothered to remove his salt crusted clothing, but had fallen onto the wooden pallet where he slept for several hours. This time he dreamed about thumb wrestling with the arrogant Tunisian hardware merchant, which was not a significant dream, but at least was a welcome break from the penguins.