On Agate Hill Read Online Free PDF

Junius . . .
    Their voices fade as the front door opens and now I peep out the other side to see them climb up into the carriage. Washington stands holding the horses heads. Nora waves and Mister Gwyn whips up those nice gray horses harder than he has to as they trot off down the lane.
    Dust hangs in the air a long time after they are gone.
    Uncle Junius watches them out of sight. He puts out a hand to steady himself on one of the urns which sit on either side of the steps, two great urns where Fannies flowers used to grow but now they are full of weeds and ivy which is taking over everything. I think Uncle Junius does not see any of this. I think perhaps he goes back in his mind to see things as they used to be, this busy house where everyone had a place including me and all things turned around Aunt Fannie like the earth and the moon and the planets turn around the sun. I know Uncle Junius is sick but it is more than that. Look how he stands on the steps with his hands hanging down by his sides in that curious way he has now, like he does not know what to do with them.
    Or perhaps the circle makes him think of that scary night that happened here before we came. Mamma told it to me, as she told me everything.
    It was a summer evening and the house at Agate Hill was jam packed full of visitors as always, little children already asleep on a pallet upstairs while the others were finishing supper such as it was, Mamma always said when she told this story. For of course there was never enough to eat in those days but that night as there was company it was hopping john which Mamma herself always scorned as negro food. At the table there was Aunt Fannie and a big bunch of Ravenels from Charleston who were passing through and a funny little Quaker schoolteacher Elizabeth Lott who stayed for a while, Uncle Junius thought highly of Quakers, and the big girls,Rachel and Julia, and Mamma Marie and Aunt Mitty who had come in from the country to see the Ravenels. Mamma Marie and Aunt Mitty never come in from the country now, we have to go out there to see them which I love to do. Uncle Junius was not present that evening having gone to Raleigh to the Legislature, or maybe to court, he was very important then. There was even dessert, a Confederate cake as Aunt Fannie called it because they had to use sorghum instead of sugar.
    The big girls were excused to run outside while the grown ups lingered on to talk of the War and those that were dead and gone. The Ravenels told a terrible story of a widow smothered to death in her sleep by her slaves who left wearing her clothes and taking all her valuables.
    But what else can we expect? asked Miss Olivia Ravenel the tall thin maiden aunt with frizzy black hair and a head shaped like an egg, according to Mamma.
    But Miss Lott said, I beg to differ Olivia, there are criminals and killers among all people of every race, why look at what our very own home guard did to that boy who would not tell where his father was hid . . . Miss Lott was very insistent in manner, and without Uncle Junius there to guide it, the conversation would surely have taken a turn for the worse, but just then Julia and Rachel came running in from the piazza crying, Mamma! Mamma! Come quick!
    Why who could it possibly be, at this time of night? Aunt Fannie wondered, but jumped up and ran out with the rest onto the piazza and into the warm windy night, a night in the dark of the moon. Olivia Ravenel said she felt funny out there immediately and did not like it. The wind jerked at her skirts and pulled at her hair, threatening to pull it loose from her ivory combs.
    I am going back inside, she said but Fannie said, O stay Olivia, the air is good for you, you ate scarcely any supper, now this will brace you up. Here, take my shawl and stay just a moment longer.
    So Miss Ravenel agreed.
    I dont hear a thing silly girls, Aunt Mitty said. She is bossy and very severe.
    We heard it, we heard it! Be quiet, the girls implored, for truly