People seemed to be standing at my grave.
"Much I care about you," I said, and was about to continue to reflect on my epoch-making invention which is to be called: Helminothanatos,' that is to say, 'Death by Worms' and which, so soon as it is completed is to be registered in the patent office as number 156,763. But my desire to know what was thought of me after my death left me no rest. Hence I did not hesitate long to press my ear to the inner roof of the coffin in order that the sound might better reach me thus.
Now I recognised the voices at once.
They belonged to two men to whom I had always been united by bonds of the tenderest sympathy and whom I was proud to call my friends. They had always assured me of the high value which they set upon me and that their blame—with which they had often driven me to secret despair—proceeded wholly from helpful and unselfish love.
"Poor devil," one of them said, in a tone of such humiliating compassion that I was ashamed of myself in the very grave.
"He had to bite the dust pretty early," the other sighed. "But it was better so both for him and for myself. I could not have held him above water much longer." …
From sheer astonishment I knocked my head so hard against the side of the coffin that a bump remained.
"When did you ever hold me above water?" I wanted to cry out but I considered that they could not hear me.
Then the first one spoke again.
"I often found it hard enough to aid him with my counsel without wounding his vanity. For we know how vain he was and how taken with himself."