“What’s that alley over there, under the poplars?”

The old man squints at the column of trees and says, “Actors’ Row. When it warms up, the young ladies’ll come with their keepsakes, and heaps of flowers, and read aloud to one another from little books: not grand-like, but with respect.”

“And over there?” I cast an eye further down the wall.

“That’s for penmen: ‘Writers’ Impasse,’ they call it.”

The old gravedigger wants to go into greater detail, but I interrupt and shift my gaze to the joint of two walls: the graves there are shielded by a long crenelated shadow, the rust-yellow mounds interspersed with the odd patches of unmelted snow.

“Speakers’ Corner,” the voice from the pit explains. “Best keep away from there at night.”

“Why?”

“Mighty restless. Speakers, you know: soon as it begins to get dark, they all start talking at once. Sometimes you walk past that corner of theirs and the ground’s just whispering away. Best keep your distance.”

“I guess it’s true what they say about you, old man: you’re out of your head. Who’s ever seen a buried man start to whisper?”

“I’m not talking about seeing,” the old man balks, “I’m talking about hearing, and it’s so. Something happened just the other day. They were burying the deputy chairman of some… right here, in Speakers’ Corner, down the end on the left. Got another cigarette? A red coffin, more wreaths than you could count, and slews of people. A great speaker, so they said. Well now, they lowered the coffin into the pit, pulled up the ropes, and launched into the usual speeches. They went on and on, and then we, that’s me and Mitka (my helper), we fetched our spades. I spat on my palms—and suddenly, what do you know: from under the lid: ‘May I have the floor. Having heard out the previous…” But then—oh my lord! —them previous ones, and all the rest, they took to their heels. Even Mitka, the fool, threw down his shovel and turned tail. I looked about me: nothing but two or three galoshes sticking up out of the snow and some forgetful body’s briefcase swinging from a crosspiece. But that deputy chairman—he couldn’t see anything, of course, being in a pit and under a lid—he was talking a mile a minute: ‘Citizens and comrades, don’t bury me in the next world—whatever happens, when the trumpets of judgment sound I’ll pull the lid to and refuse to be recalled; as a recallist, I’ll…’ —is that a real word, or did I dream it? I’m not educated—”

“It’s a real word. Now go on.”

“Go on? Not likely! He wanted to go on, but I was so nettled I grabbed my spade and without waiting for Mitka I buried that driveler and his speech in one swoop. Only imagine how restless people have become. Have you ever heard of such a thing happening before?”

“Oh, grandfather, neither before nor not before. You’re raving. You should see a doctor. Have you been to the local clinic?”

“The earth will cure me, son. I don’t have much longer to live. But if you don’t believe me, come on and I’ll show you the grave.”

Setting aside his shovel, the old man starts to hoist himself out of the pit by his elbows, but I restrain him.

“Oh, all right, I believe you, I do.”

“There now” —reassured, he goes on with his tangled tales. “Now that one who swallowed the good earth from my shovel, he shuts up. But with another of them undecendents, I had an awful wrangle. I live out that way, just beyond the gates—the hut with two windows by the wasteland. The hearses, they all go past me, one after another. One day about dusk I lit my night lamp and set down to the table to have my supper when suddenly I heard a sound at the door: knock. ‘Who could it be?” I wondered. I went to the door and hallooed, and again I heard it: knock. I undid the latch and peered out. Well now, I’ve seen a lot of them, so I knew right away who it was: he was standing there, arms all rigid and pressed to his chest, tall and yellow. ‘You keep away!’ I says. ‘Where’d you come from?’ ‘From a hearse,’ he says. ‘I saw your light. Let me in.’

“‘Well,’ I thinks, ‘Not likely!’ I barred the way with my arm: ‘It’s not right: dropping dead the dropping in—besides, they’ll catch on to the fact they’re burying nothing. How’d you manage it?’ ‘Well,’ he says, ‘as soon as we began to bump to bump over the potholes, the lid slid sideways—and through the crack a light winked at me: my last light, I thought, my last. I looked back: some were lagging behind and straggling (it’s a long way to your cemetery, grandfather), others were still trudging along, but with their eyes then closed it again and quietly… Let me in, grandfather.’ ‘But your funeral?’ ‘I’ll make it, the hearse can barely turn its wheels, don’t refuse me this last light before the eternal darkness.’ He pleaded with me so, I begun to feel sorry for him. ‘Come in,’ I says ‘only make it quick—then into the pit.’