Discovery of the boat

The discovery of the boat, a wrecked sailboat named Pájaro de Esperanza, provides the man and the boy with a crucial cache of supplies and tools, including a flare gun, but also deepens the boy's existential questions about survival and the fate of others.

Discovery and Approach

After reaching the coast, the man and the boy trekked along the beach and came upon a headland. Below them, half over and awash, lay the shape of a sailboat's hull. They crouched in the dry tufts of grass and watched for a while, the boy asking if there were people on the boat. The man thought not, as the boat was all tilted over. They saw no tracks. From the end of the spit to the boat was about a hundred feet of open water. The boat, some sixty feet long, was stripped to the deck, keeled over in ten or twelve feet of water. It had been a twin-masted rig, but the masts were broken off close to the deck. The only things remaining topside were some brass cleats, a few rail stanchions, and the steel hoop of the wheel sticking up out of the cockpit aft.

The Man Swims to the Boat

The man handed the boy the pistol and sat in the sand to unlace his shoes. The boy wanted to go with him, but the man said he had to stand guard and that the water was deep. He folded his clothes into a pile, bent and kissed the boy on his forehead, and waded naked into the water. He swam the length of the steel hull, gasping with the cold. Amidships, the sheer-rail was just awash. He pulled himself along to the transom, where he could make out the worn gilt lettering: Pájaro de Esperanza, Tenerife. He got hold of the rail and pulled himself aboard, crouching on the slant of the wood deck, shivering. He waved at the boy, but the boy did not wave back.

Searching the Cabin and Finding Supplies

The cabin was low with a vaulted roof and portholes. He tried the low teak door, but it was locked. He gave it a shove with his bony shoulder, and the jamb finally gave way. He pushed the door open and stepped down the companionway into the cabin. A stagnant bilge filled with wet papers and trash lined the lower bulkhead. The locker doors hung open, and all the brasswork was a dull green. He went through to the forward cabins, past the galley where flour and coffee lay in the floor alongside half-crushed and rusting canned goods. In the cabins, mattress pads had been slung into the floor, and bedding and clothing were piled against the wall. He ducked his head into the locker in the bow and felt about. He dragged everything out and piled it on the tilted bed, finding a damp sweater, a pair of yellow rubber seaboots, a nylon jacket, and stiff yellow breeches from sou'wester gear. He put them on and went back up on the deck. The boy stood up in alarm, and the man realized that in his new clothes he made an uncertain figure. He called out, "It's me," but the boy only stood there, so he waved to him and went below again.

The Sextant and the Flare Gun

In the second stateroom, he found drawers under the berth containing manuals and papers in Spanish, bars of soap, and a black leather valise covered in mold. He found a rubberized canvas seabag and filled it with odds and ends of clothing, a pair of women's sneakers he thought would fit the boy, a folding knife with a wooden handle, and a pair of sunglasses. He went into the galley and turned on the stove, then turned it off again. He unlatched and raised the hatch to the engine compartment, which was half flooded and pitch dark. In a locker behind the wheel pedestal, he found coils of nylon rope, steel bottles of gas, and a fiberglass toolbox containing rusty but serviceable tools. He carried the toolbox and one of the bottles of gas into the galley. The last thing he found was a square oak box with dovetailed corners and a brass plate let into the lid. He unsnapped the corroding latches and opened it. Inside was a brass sextant, possibly a hundred years old. He lifted it from the fitted case and held it in his hand, struck by its beauty. The brass was dull with patches of green, but otherwise it was perfect. He wiped the verdigris from the plate at the base, which read "Hezzaninth, London." He held it to his eye and turned the wheel. It was the first thing he had seen in a long time that stirred him. He fitted it back into the blue baize lining of the case, closed the lid, and set it back in the locker.

Salvaging and Returning to Shore

He went back up on deck to look for the boy, but the boy was not there. A moment of panic seized him before he saw the boy walking along the bench downshore with the pistol hanging in his hand, his head down. He felt the hull of the ship lift and slide slightly as the tide came in. He went back down into the cabin and collected everything, stacking it against the table. He found a half-full plastic jug of water and drank from it. He sorted through the cans in the galley floor, many of which were badly rusted or bulging, their labels stripped and contents written in Spanish. He stacked the salvageable ones on the counter. He found a can of olive oil, some cans of milk, tea in a rusted metal caddy, and a half-empty can of coffee. He went methodically through the shelves, sorting what to take from what to leave. He removed one of the burners from the little gimballed stove, disconnecting the braided flexline and fitting the hose to a gas bottle. He made a bindle in a plastic tarp of some cans of juice, fruit, and vegetables, tied it with a cord, and then stripped out of his clothes. He went up onto the deck naked and slid down to the railing with the tarp, swinging over the side and dropping into the gray and freezing sea. He waded ashore in the last of the light, swinging the tarp down and palming the water off his arms and chest. The boy followed him, asking about his shoulder, which was blue and discolored from where he had slammed it against the hatch door. The man said it was all right. They hurried down the beach against the light, the boy asking if the boat would wash away. The man said it would not. They then realized the pistol had been left behind, and the boy was terrified. The man said it was his fault for forgetting, and they went back to retrieve it. The pistol was where he had left it in the sand. He picked it up, shook it, and reassembled it. They hurried on, the dark catching them, but they eventually found their camp and slept.