It was time to fill the trousers again.
Or drown.
"Life is hope," said Drake.
And manoeuvred himself off his trousers, meaning to slip them behind him to catch another load of air. But he was so weak that, as the last of that air-support left him, he slipped beneath the waves, losing his grip on the trousers. Which sank.
Drake sank.
Grabbing for the surface.
Something rose up beside him. He seized it. He found himself brought to the surface. By a shark. Too exhausted to scream, he lay there in the sea, lay with his cheek against the water-smooth flank of the shark, his arm over its great smooth back. Then remembered that sharks are not smooth, for their skin has more teeth than their jaws. So this must be a dolphin, yes, he had heard of such, that accounted for the whistling and all, it was a dolphin, life answering to life just as the legends claimed.
And Drake, unable to help himself, wept.
And heard someone hail him:
"Ahoy there! You with the fish!"