a hand in the grave

I read "A Hand in the Grave," a story about two young men who attempt to rob a grave in order to get a body to use in their medical class. The story is told in the first person by Nabil, who was told by someone in his class that he needed to bring a corpse for them to study. Nabil and his friend Suhail need seventy-five lire to buy a corpse, and neither has that kind of money. So they set out for a graveyard very early in the morning with the intent of digging up a body to bring to their class.

Nabil's father tries to make him feel guilty for what he is about to do by saying that he is a "Godless sinner" and that he must never have read the Koran. Suhail also shows some doubts, and as they walk to the grave, the two men are terrified. Neither wants to admit that they are scared, so they continue on. When they finally get to the graveyard, the full reality of what they're about to do hits them and they are more hesitant than ever. But Nabil eventually begins digging up a body.

When they get to the casket, Nabil tries to reach his hand in to make sure the body is in there before they continue on. His arm is too big, so Suhail gives it a try. Suddenly, Suhail wrenches his arm out of the grave, screaming with fright. After several minutes of screaming, Suhail finally says:

"My fingers! My fingers! I stuck them in its eyes!"
I was trembling, but more out of fear of Suhail than anything else. I gripped him
by the shoulders and shook him fiercely, shouting:
"You idiot! This is an old grave... it's more than 50 years old!"
He gave me a stupid look; clearly he had not heard me. He started repeating:
"His eyes... I stuck my fingers in his eyes!" (75)

The story goes on to tell us that Suhail was kicked out of the medical faculty, and that it was actually NOT necessary that the first year medical students acquire a skeleton - these men simply wanted to feel like a part of the group. At the very end of the story, Nabil discovers after seven years that the graveyard they were attempting to rob from was actually not even a real graveyard. Therefore there weren't even any corpses in it, and Suhail never did stick his fingers in one's eyeballs.

The main theme of this story, in my opinion, has to do with guilt. These two men feel very guilty for what they have done, and because of it, Suhail imagines that he has done something very disgusting. The whole time the two me were walking to the graveyard, Suhail was probably imagining what could be the worst possible thing that could happen. He was so disgusted with himself and what he was doing, he fabricated a story in his mind. The two couldn't see what was in the grave; they had no way of knowing that that was actually an eyeball that Suhail stuck his finger in. However, they let their guilty consciouses get the best of them and they assumed something terrible had happened.

I think that the moral of this story is something like that of Poe's "Tell-Tale Heart." Guilt will get the best of any man - in this case, it was enough to fabricate an entire story that cost Suhail his job. You will not get away with committing a crime as terrible as grave robbing, because even if you don't get caught, your guilty conscious will get the best of you.