The burial ground at Hollow End is opened one night a year, and the men of FantasyWorld open it themselves, with spades, with hooded lanterns, without speaking.

There are two rules at the gate.

You are weighed on what you carry out. Whatever stays in the ground stays in the ground, and by first light the holes have closed again from underneath.

Ten men went over the wall.

Gabes went in first, because Gabes has been the best of them at this all season.

He put his spade into the softest plot in the yard and James Cook came up out of it.

On an ordinary night Cook is worth 15.87. He came up out of Hollow End with 41.6 in him, and he came up alone.

Gabes worked the rest of the row and the rest of the row was thin. Bone dust. Split boxes. Things not worth the lifting.

He reached the gate at grey light with 95.26 across his shoulders and the sexton did not trouble with the scale, because there was not one man in the county who had not out-carried him.

Nought for nine.

The lightest load in FantasyWorld, taken out of the ground by the team that went in ranked ahead of everybody.

He had also left 20.52 down there. That is the third week running he has uncovered something with his own hands and walked away from it, and by the time he looked back the earth was already moving.

At the far wall, alone, digging badly, was Bolek.

Bolek is the worst of them at this and has been since the season opened: fourteen nights ahead of the field, fifty-eight behind.

He found 104.08 at Hollow End. That is nothing. That is a bad night in a bad year.

He carried out 104.08.

All of it. Not a rag, not a knuckle, not a coin left under the clay — one empty hole and one man walking down to the gate with everything the ground had offered him strapped to his back. Sixty-five times in 1010 nights has anybody come out of that yard clean.

The sexton weighed them both.

8.82.

Three years ago Gabes met this same man on this same night and out-carried him by 82.9.

He went into Hollow End first in FantasyWorld and came out of it fourth.

Bill had two lids in front of him and one crowbar.

Under the first was Rico Dowdle, who had come up out of the ground three times this autumn averaging 28.97, and who was, on all the evidence available at the graveside, the safest body in the yard.

Bill went to Dowdle. He got him open and found 6.4 in him.

The second lid he never touched. RJ Harvey was lying under it with 23.1.

Bill left 26.84 at Hollow End, more than any man in the league, and the ground had taken it before he was over the wall. At the gate the sexton had the belt waiting for him. Bolek unbuckled it and handed it across, having for once nothing whatsoever to answer for.

Nate opened only what he meant to open.

He carried 143.96 out of that yard and left an empty hole behind him, and he beat Bill by 28.56. Last time out every single man in the county dug more than Nate did. This time he went 6-3 against the field and stood at the gate with clean hands.

Set into the church wall at Hollow End there is a stone the sexton cuts, and two men in this league are one name short of a hundred.

Daniel came in needing it.

Bryan met him in the dark.

For four weeks Bryan has been the man the others carried out of this yard — the tidiest work in FantasyWorld, and a hole waiting for him at the end of every night. He climbed out of this one himself. 149.52, and 4.28 left behind, which is near enough to nothing.

Daniel went back down the road with ninety-nine still against his name. Bryan is 2-6 against him lifetime, and it took a hundredth win to make one of those two matter.

Jack came in needing it as well.

Mario was waiting at the top of the yard with 158.16 on his back, the heaviest load anyone took out of Hollow End this year, and 9-0 against the field, which is the plain statement that there was no man in the county he would have lost to.

Jack left 23.3 in the ground and went home on ninety-nine.

Two men. One number. The stone unchanged.

Justin took the second-heaviest load of the night, 152.02, left the yard almost bare and holds first place in FantasyWorld on 6-2. Eric/Blakey were beaten by 39.08 and are 1-7, and their only comfort is that they have taken more out of this season than Bolek has and will not be thanked for it.

By first light every hole in the yard had closed. Not been filled. Closed.

Bill's 26.84 was gone. So was the twenty Gabes had stood over and decided against, and whatever Jack had thought he could come back for.

The ground at Hollow End keeps what you leave in it.

It has never once cared who found it first.