The Tale of the Unknown Island by José Saramago

Senhor José got cold during the night. After having uttered those redundant, useless words, Here she is, he wasn't sure what else he should do.

It was true that, after long and arduous labours, he had managed, at last, to find the unknown woman, or rather, the place where she lay, a good six feet beneath an earth that still sustained him, but, he thought to himself, the normal response would be to feel afraid, fearful of the place, the hour, the rustling trees, the mysterious moonlight, and, in particular, of the strange cemetery surrounding him, an assembly of suicides, a gathering of silences that, from one moment to the next, might begin to scream, We came before our time was due, our own will brought us here, but what he felt inside him seemed more like indecision, doubt, as if, just when he thought he had reached the end of everything, he realised that his search was not yet finished, as if having come here were merely another point on the journey, of no more importance than the ground-floor apartment belonging to the elderly lady, or the school, or the chemist's where he had gone to ask questions,