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hearse, and said half aloud, as he rubbed his big hands:—
‘Here’s a fine farce!’
All at once the hearse halted; it had reached the gate. The
permission for interment must be exhibited. The undertak-
er’s man addressed himself to the porter of the cemetery.
During this colloquy, which always is productive of a delay
of from one to two minutes, some one, a stranger, came and
placed himself behind the hearse, beside Fauchelevent. He
was a sort of laboring man, who wore a waistcoat with large
pockets and carried a mattock under his arm.
Fauchelevent surveyed this stranger.
‘Who are you?’ he demanded.
‘The man replied:—
‘The grave-digger.’
If a man could survive the blow of a cannon-ball full in
the breast, he would make the same face that Fauchelevent
made.
‘The grave-digger?’
‘ Ye s .’
‘ Yo u? ’
‘I.’
‘Father Mestienne is the grave-digger.’
‘He was.’
‘What! He was?’
‘He is dead.’
Fauchelevent had expected anything but this, that a
grave-digger could die. It is true, nevertheless, that grave-
diggers do die themselves. By dint of excavating graves for
other people, one hollows out one’s own.