p. 28
^^^^^

I arrived there one evening, my two suitcases of green cardboard at the
ends of my arms.

I was told: "You will find lodging at number 7, at Madame
Wallenbergs's.... It's modest but very clean."

"Above, on the second floor... with a window that opens on the street.
You will see, you will do very well there."

...

p. 29
^^^^^

"Chez Noël" was a very narrow and deep bistrot squeezed between two
houses.

...

Something too heavy weighed on all of the old people.

At the door, there was that little incident with the old woman...

That evening I thought about leaving again...

p. 30
^^^^^

Five years of my life passed in that nameless street.
Five years over that yellow-haloed streetlamp.

The malaise that I sensed at the beginning was little by little
softened.  I felt comfortable in that street... Like being part of a
strange family.

At number 3, there was the workshop of Père Flouard, the retired
blacksmith.

At 9 was Madame Kadouch's hardware store, where you could find
EVERYTHING.

All the inhabitants of my street were past 80 years.  All of them.  The
street without name was their world and the center was Noël's café,
behind the streetlamp.

At number 5 lived Gustave the cobbler.

And the dean of the old folks was the poet Sylvain Bleuet, aged some 110
years...

p. 31
^^^^^

All that didn't last.  The fourth year of isolation saw death arrive.

One bright morning in February, we found Gustave the cobbler dead,
frozen at the foot of the streetlamp.

Two months later, it was the turn of Noël whose heart stopped working...

The third to disseapear was Père Flouard, whose shed collapsed, burying
the old man.

A little later, the hardware store of Madame Kadouch closed for good.

Madame Wallenberg grew somber.  "You see, Tibor, the end is near...
We're beginning to leave..."

That lasted a year... A year of mourning and of a cemetery where the
fewer and fewer survivors went to breathe in their nearby end.

It happened at last one day.  The poet Sylvain Bleuet rested in his
coffin.  The street was all walled up, and Madame Wallenberg was in her
death throes.

She was able to leave me one final message: "The moment has come.  Pack
your suitcases and leave the street... Quickly... Quickly!"

...

I believed her final words, and brought down my suitcases of green
cardboard in which I'd packed my few belongings.

Outside, the light darkened suddenly.  Cracks ran across the façades.

There was a cracking noise, then a roar.

The streetlamp went out.  Behind me, I sensed the final death rattle of
the nameless street...

And, without turning around, I left for the station to take the first
train that went anywhere.