alone or not, lost or not, i was thirsty and hungry. i pulledon the rope. there was a slight tension. as soon as i lessenedmy grip on it, it slid out, and the distance between the lifeboatand the raft increased. so the lifeboat drifted faster than theraft, pulling it along. i noted the fact without thinking anythingof it. my mind was more focused on the doings of richardparker.

by the looks of it, he was under the tarpaulin.

i pulled the rope till i was right next to the bow. i reachedup to the gunnel. as i was crouched, preparing myself for aquick raid on the locker, a series of waves got me thinking. inoticed that with the raft next to it, the lifeboat had changeddirections. it was no longer perpendicular to the waves butbroadside to them and was beginning to roll from side to side,that rolling that was so unsettling for the stomach. the reasonfor this change became clear to me: the raft, when let out,was acting as a sea anchor, as a drag that pulled on thelifeboat and turned its bow to face the waves. you see, wavesand steady winds are usually perpendicular to each other. so, ifa boat is pushed by a wind but held back by a sea anchor, itwill turn until it offers the least resistance to the wind – that is,until it is in line with it and at right angles to the waves, whichmakes for a front-to-back pitching that is much morecomfortable than a side-to-side rolling. with the raft next to theboat, the dragging effect was gone, and there was nothing tosteer the boat head into the wind. therefore it turnedbroadside and rolled.

what may seem like a detail to you was something whichwould save my life and which richard parker would come toregret.

as if to confirm my fresh insight, i heard him growl. it wasa disconsolate growl, with something indefinably green andqueasy in its tone. he was maybe a good swimmer, but hewas not much of a sailor.

i had a chance yet.

lest i got cocky about my abilities to manipulate him, ireceived at that moment a quiet but sinister warning aboutwhat i was up against. it seemed richard parker was such amagnetic pole of life, so charismatic in his vitality, that otherexpressions of life found it intolerable. i was on the point ofraising myself over the bow when i heard a gentle thrashingbuzz. i saw something small land in the water next to me.

it was a cockroach. it floated for a second or two beforebeing swallowed by an underwater mouth. another cockroachlanded in the water. in the next minute, ten or so cockroachesplopped into the water on either side of the bow. each wasclaimed by a fish.

the last of the foreign life forms was abandoning ship.

i carefully brought my eyes over the gunnel. the first thingi saw, lying in a fold of the tarpaulin above the bow bench,was a large cockroach, perhaps the patriarch of the clan. iwatched it, strangely interested. when it decided it was time, itdeployed its wings, rose in the air with a minute clattering,hovered above the lifeboat momentarily, as if making sure noone had been left behind, and then veered overboard to itsdeath.

now we were two. in five days the populations oforang-utans, zebras, hyenas, rats, flies and cockroaches hadbeen wiped out. except for the bacteria and worms that mightstill be alive in the remains of the animals, there was no otherlife left on the lifeboat but richard parker and me.

it was not a comforting thought.

i lifted myself and breathlessly opened the locker lid. ideliberately did not look under the tarpaulin for fear thatlooking would be like shouting and would attract richardparker's attention. only once the lid was leaning against thetarpaulin did i dare let my senses consider what was beyondit.

a smell came to my nose, a musky smell of urine, quitesharp, what every cat cage in a zoo smells of. tigers are highlyterritorial, and it is with their urine that they mark theboundaries of their territory. here was good news wearing afoul dress: the odour was coming exclusively from below thetarpaulin. richard parker's territorial claims seemed to belimited to the floor of the boat. this held promise. if i couldmake the tarpaulin mine, we might get along.

i held my breath, lowered my head and cocked it to theside to see beyond the edge of the lid. there was rainwater,about four inches of it, sloshing about the floor of the lifeboat– richard parker's own freshwater pond. he was doing exactlywhat i would be doing in his place: cooling off in the shade.

the day was getting beastly hot. he was flat on the floor ofthe boat, facing away from me, his hind legs sticking straightback and splayed out, back paws facing up, and stomach andinner thighs lying directly against the floor. the position lookedsilly but was no doubt very pleasant.

i returned to the business of survival. i opened a carton ofemergency ration and ate my fill, about one-third of thepackage. it was remarkable how little it took to make mystomach feel full. i was about to drink from the rain-catcherpouch slung across my shoulder when my eyes fell upon thegraduated drinking beakers. if i couldn't go for a dip, could iat least have a sip? my own supplies of water would not lastforever. i took hold of one of the beakers, leaned over, loweredthe lid just as much as i needed to and tremulously dippedthe beaker into parker's pond, four feet from his back paws.

his upturned pads with their wet fur looked like little desertislands surrounded by seaweed.

i brought back a good 500 millilitres. it was a littlediscoloured. specks were floating in it. did i worry aboutingesting some horrid bacteria? i didn't even think about it. alli had on my mind was my thirst. i drained that beaker to thedregs with great satisfaction.

nature is preoccupied with balance, so it did not surprise methat nearly right away i felt the urge to urinate. i relievedmyself in the beaker. i produced so exactly the amount i hadjust downed that it was as if a minute hadn't passed and iwere still considering richard parker's rainwater. i hesitated. ifelt the urge to tilt the beaker into my mouth once more. iresisted the temptation. but it was hard. mockery be damned,my urine looked delicious! i was not suffering yet fromdehydration, so the liquid was pale in colour. it glowed in thesunlight, looking like a glass of apple juice. and it wasguaranteed fresh, which certainly couldn't be said of the cannedwater that was my staple. but i heeded my better judgment. isplashed my urine on the tarpaulin and over the locker lid tostake my claim.

i stole another two beakers of water from richard parker,without urinating this time. i felt as freshly watered as a pottedplant.

now it was time to improve my situation. i turned to thecontents of the locker and the many promises they held.

i brought out a second rope and tethered the raft to thelifeboat with it.

i discovered what a solar still is. a solar still is a device toproduce fresh water from salt water. it consists of an inflatabletransparent cone set upon a round lifebuoy-like buoyancychamber that has a surface of black rubberized canvasstretched across its centre. the still operates on the principle ofdistillation: sea water lying beneath the sealed cone on theblack canvas is heated by the sun and evaporates, gathering onthe inside surface of the cone. this salt-free water trickles downand collects in a gully on the perimeter of the cone, fromwhich it drains into a pouch. the lifeboat came equipped withtwelve solar stills. i read the instructions carefully, as thesurvival manual told me to. i inflated all twelve cones with airand i filled each buoyancy chamber with the requisite ten litresof sea water. i strung the stills together, tying one end of theflotilla to the lifeboat and the other to the raft, which meantthat not only would i not lose any stills should one of myknots become loose, but also that i had, in effect, a secondemergency rope to keep me tethered to the lifeboat. the stillslooked pretty and very technological as they floated on thewater, but they also looked flimsy, and i was doubtful of theircapacity to produce fresh water.

i directed my attention to improving the raft. i examinedevery knot that held it together, making sure each was tightand secure. after some thought, i decided to transform thefifth oar, the footrest oar, into a mast of sorts. i undid the oar.

with the sawtoothed edge of the hunting knife i painstakinglycut a notch into it, about halfway down, and with the knife'spoint i drilled three holes through its flat part. work was slowbut satisfying. it kept my mind busy. when i had finished ilashed the oar in a vertical position to the inside of one of thecorners of the raft, flat part, the masthead, rising in the air,handle disappearing underwater. i ran the rope tightly into thenotch, to prevent the oar from slipping down. next, to ensurethat the mast would stand straight, and to give myself linesfrom which to hang a canopy and supplies, i threaded ropesthrough the holes i had drilled in the masthead and tied themto the tips of the horizontal oars. i strapped the life jacket thathad been attached to the footrest oar to the base of the mast.

it would play a double role: it would provide extra flotation tocompensate for the vertical weight of the mast, and it wouldmake for a slightly raised seat for me.

i threw a blanket over the lines. it slid down. the angle ofthe lines was too steep. i folded the lengthwise edge of theblanket over once, cut two holes midway down, about a footapart, and linked the holes with a piece of string, which imade by unweaving a length of rope. i threw the blanket overthe lines again, with the new girdle string going around themasthead. i now had a canopy.

it took me a good part of the day to fix up the raft. therewere so many details to look after. the constant motion of thesea, though gentle, didn't make my work any easier. and ihad to keep an eye on richard parker. the result was nogalleon. the mast, so called, ended hardly a few inches abovemy head. as for the deck, it was just big enough to sit oncross-legged or to lie on in a tight, nearly-to-term fetal position.

but i wasn't complaining. it was seaworthy and it would saveme from richard parker.

by the time i had finished my work, the afternoon wasnearing its end. i gathered a can of water, a can opener, fourbiscuits of survival ration and four blankets. i closed the locker(very softly this time), sat down on the raft and let out therope. the lifeboat drifted away. the main rope tensed, whilethe security rope, which i had deliberately measured out longer,hung limply. i laid two blankets beneath me, carefully foldingthem so that they didn't touch the water. i wrapped the othertwo around my shoulders and rested my back against themast. i enjoyed the slight elevation i gained from sitting on theextra life jacket. i was hardly higher up from the water thanone would be from a floor sitting on a thick cushion; still, ihoped not to get wet so much.

i enjoyed my meal as i watched the sun's descent in acloudless sky. it was a relaxing moment. the vault of the worldwas magnificently tinted. the stars were eager to participate;hardly had the blanket of colour been pulled a little than theystarted to shine through the deep blue. the wind blew with afaint, warm breeze and the sea moved about kindly, the waterpeaking and troughing like people dancing in a circle who cometogether and raise their hands and move apart and cometogether again, over and over.

richard parker sat up. only his head and a little of hisshoulders showed above the gunnel. he looked out. i shouted,"hello, richard parker!" and i waved. he looked at me. hesnorted or sneezed, neither word quite captures it. prustenagain. what a stunning creature. such a noble mien. how aptthat in full it is a royal bengal tiger. i counted myself lucky ina way. what if i had ended up with a creature that lookedsilly or ugly, a tapir or an ostrich or a flock of turkeys? thatwould have been a more trying companionship in some ways.

i heard a splash. i looked down at the water. i gasped. ithought i was alone. the stillness in the air, the glory of thelight, the feeling of comparative safety – all had made me thinkso. there is commonly an element of silence and solitude topeace, isn't there? it's hard to imagine being at peace in abusy subway station, isn't it? so what was all this commotion?

with just one glance i discovered that the sea is a city. justbelow me, all around, unsuspected by me, were highways,boulevards, streets and roundabouts bustling with submarinetraffic. in water that was dense, glassy and flecked by millionsof lit-up specks of plankton, fish like trucks and buses and carsand bicycles and pedestrians were madly racing about, nodoubt honking and hollering at each other. the predominantcolour was green. at multiple depths, as far as i could see,there were evanescent trails of phosphorescent green bubbles,the wake of speeding fish. as soon as one trail faded, anotherappeared. these trails came from all directions and disappearedin all directions. they were like those time-exposurephotographs you see of cities at night, with the long redstreaks made by the tail lights of cars. except that here thecars were driving above and under each other as if they wereon interchanges that were stacked ten storeys high. and herethe cars were of the craziest colours. the dorados – theremust have been over fifty patrolling beneath the raft – showedoff their bright gold, blue and green as they whisked by. otherfish that i could not identify were yellow, brown, silver, blue,red, pink, green, white, in all kinds of combinations, solid,streaked and speckled. only the sharks stubbornly refused tobe colourful. but whatever the size or colour of a vehicle, onething was constant: the furious driving. there were manycollisions – all involving fatalities, i'm afraid – and a number ofcars spun wildly out of control and collided against barriers,bursting above the surface of the water and splashing down inshowers of luminescence. i gazed upon this urban hurly-burlylike someone observing a city from a hot-air balloon. it was aspectacle wondrous and awe-inspiring. this is surely whattokyo must look like at rush hour.

i looked on until the lights went out in the city.

from the tsimtsum all i had seen were dolphins. i hadassumed that the pacific, but for passing schools of fish, was asparsely inhabited waste of water. i have learned since thatcargo ships travel too quickly for fish. you are as likely to seesea life from a ship as you are to see wildlife in a forest froma car on a highway. dolphins, very fast swimmers, play aboutboats and ships much like dogs chase cars: they race alonguntil they can no longer keep up. if you want to see wildlife, itis on foot, and quietly, that you must explore a forest. it is thesame with the sea. you must stroll through the pacific at awalking pace, so to speak, to see the wealth and abundancethat it holds.

i settled on my side. for the first time in five days i felt ameasure of calm. a little bit of hope – hard earned, welldeserved, reasonable – glowed in me. i fell asleep.