“When I came to Mr. Gravedigger’s place, my shattered nerves were tried yet again. I was climbing up the stairs to the fifth floor, when I heard strange, loud noises from above. A door was violently slammed and someone rushed down the stairs toward me.
“ ‘Help! Anybody!’ ‘Help!’ I heard a piercing scream. ‘Come to me! Help me, please, anybody, please come here and help me!’
“In the next second I met a figure on the stairs, dressed in a warm winter coat and with an untidy hat on.
“ ‘Mr. Gravedigger, is that you? What a surprise!’ I exclaimed, as I saw my friend. ‘What’s happened with you?’
“He came closer to me and seized my hand. His face was very pale. He was out of breath, and his body was trembling. His eyes were senselessly moving in all directions.
“ ‘Well, well … Hello, Mr. Undertaker,’ he said in a rushed voice. ‘Nice to see you here. Is it really you? You are as pale as if you had just come from grave. Are you a hallucination? Are you real? Oh my goodness! You look so terrible!’
“ ‘Better that you tell me what has happened to you! I barely recognize you. You look completely crazy.’
“‘Oh, my dear friend, wait a second. I am out of breath. I am so glad that I ran into you … if it’s really you, and not an illusion. That séance was terrible! It shattered my nerves. Do you know what I saw when I entered my room? I saw a coffin!’
“I could not believe what I had heard. I asked him to repeat it.
“‘A coffin, a real coffin!’ said the doctor, as he sat down on the stairs. ‘I am not a coward, but the devil himself would be scared, if he stumbled upon a coffin in the darkness in his house.’
“Mumbling and frequently pausing, I told the doctor the story of the coffins I had seen.
“For a moment, we just looked at each other without saying a word, our eyes bulging. Then, in order to make sure that we were not hallucinating, that it was not simply a bad dream, we lightly punched each other.
“ ‘We both felt pain,’ the doctor said. ‘Therefore, we are experiencing reality. And the coffins which we saw were not illusions, but really exist. What can we do now, dear friend?’
“We talked for almost an hour on the dark stairs, discussing what we should do. Then it became too cold to stay there, so we determined to overcome our shameful fear, and to go up to the doctor’s room. We turned on the light as soon as we entered the apartment.
“In the center of the room stood a coffin covered in a luxurious golden velvet cloth. Dr. Gravedigger, a religious man, whispered a prayer.
“ ‘Let us find out,’ said the doctor, trembling all over from fear, ‘whether this coffin is empty, or there is someone inside.’
“After a rather lengthy hesitation, the doctor bent down, pressed his lips tightly together, and resolutely snatched the cover from the coffin. I came closer, and we both saw that the coffin was empty; there was no dead body inside.
“Instead, we found a letter, which read as follows:
“My dear friend, Dr. Gravedigger,
“You are well aware of the fact that my father-in-law owns a business. Now he is completely in debt, and the time has come for him to give it up.
“Tomorrow, or at the latest, the day after tomorrow, people from the bank will come here to assess his estate. This will completely destroy his and my family; and my financial state will be in ruins. This will also destroy the good name of our family, which is most precious to me.
“ ‘Yesterday,’ we held a family council and decided to hide the most precious and expensive family valuables. As you know, my father-in-law’s major financial assets are his coffins. As the owner of a funeral home, he is well-known for making the best-quality coffins in this town. Therefore, we have decided to hide the most expensive models. I ask you, as a friend, to help us save our money and honor! I hope you will help me in saving my estate, and I am sending you one coffin, which I ask you to hide in your house for some time until we ask it back. We could be completely ruined without the help of our good friends. I hope you will not refuse me, and I promise you that this coffin will not remain in your apartment for more than one week. I have also sent coffins to several others whom I consider to be my real and closest friends. I hope that you all possess a great and noble nature.
“Sincerely yours,
“Jack Blackman.’
“After the events of that day, I spent three months in the care of psychiatrists, recovering from a serious nervous breakdown. But my friend, the coffin-maker, managed to save both his honor and his financial assets. Now he has his own business, a funeral home.
“He also has a second business, selling granite monuments and bronze markers. Actually, this business is not doing so well. Every evening, when I return to my apartment, I expect to find a white marble monument, a cemetery plaque, or a tombstone in my humble apartment.”
WILLOW
Have you ever traveled from B to C along the highway? If you have, you should remember the Andreevka mill that stands on the Kozavka River. It’s a small mill with only two millstones. It was built over a hundred years ago. It has not been operational for a long time, and reminds one of an old woman with a hunchback, who is going to fall over at any moment. This woman would have fallen to the ground a long time ago, except that an old willow tree supports her.
The willow is so old and so wide that it takes two people to embrace it. Its shining leaves fall onto the roof and the bridge, and the lower branches fall onto the water and the ground. The willow is so old that it looks like a hunchback as well. The trunk of the tree is distorted by a huge dark hole. You can put your hand into the hole, and there you will find dark, wild honey. Wild bees start flying around your head, stinging you.
How old is this tree? Arkhip, my friend, told me that the tree was already old when he was working as “a French servant” for the local landlord. After that, he served as “a black servant” for the old landlady. That means it was a very long time ago.
The willow tree supports another old creature. That is the old man, Arkhip, who sits at its trunk, fishing all day. He is old, and he also has a hunchback, like the tree. And, like the willow tree, his mouth has no teeth and looks like the hole. He fishes during the day, and at night he sits next to the tree, lost in dreams. Both of these creatures, Arkhip and the old willow, whisper day and night. They have lived for a long time, and they know many things. Just listen to them.
Thirty years ago, on a Sunday morning the old man was sitting under the tree, looking at the water and fishing. It was quiet, as usual. You could hear only the whisper of the willow tree and the jumping of the fish, splashing in the water. He fished until noon. At noon he started cooking fish soup under the tree. When the shadow from the willow left the bank of the river, it was midday. Arkhip also measured time by postal delivery. Exactly at noon, a postal carriage would cross the bridge.
On that Sunday, Arkhip heard the bells ringing. He put his fishing rod aside and looked at the bridge. The troika moved up the hill, then down, and then slowly went up to the bridge. The postman was asleep. When the troika came to the bridge, it stopped for no obvious reason. Arkhip was never surprised, but he was surprised this time. Something odd happened. The groom looked around, took the kerchief from the postman’s face and hit him with a stick. The postman did not move. There was a red spot on his blond head. The driver jumped from the cart and struck another blow. In a moment, Arkhip heard somebody’s footsteps. The driver was coming directly toward him, down to the river. His sunburned face was pale, and his eyes were glassy. He was trembling all over, and, without noticing Arkhip, he put the mailbag into the hole in the tree. Then he ran up the hill, jumped into the cart, and did something that to Arkhip seemed very strange. He hit himself on the temple; then, his face covered with blood, he whipped the horses.