Abel’s Hill cemetery is a place where people who like to keep tabs on their neighbors can do just that — for eternity, as they rest among them. From the gravestones off South Road in Chilmark you can hear the hum of cars speeding down-Island to the grocery store or up for a day at the beach. From the plot nearest the road, on tiptoe, you can just see who is in those cars. It’s a quiet cemetery, but graceful.

After a two-hour debate that weighed the future of Menemsha against the town's other priorities, Chilmark voters this week passed on an opportunity to buy the Home Port restaurant and adjoining pondfront properties for $3.9 million.