An Acquaintance with Darkness by Ann Rinaldi Read Free Book Online Page A

wrong thing coming here? Was Uncle Valentine right?
    Then, in the next instant, Annie brightened. "Who was that handsome young man who came calling this morning with your Uncle Valentine?" she asked as I went out the back door.
    "Handsome? Oh, that was a student of his, Robert deGraaf. They wanted to cut his leg off. Uncle Valentine saved it."
    "How romantic."
    "How can he be romantic? He limps."

    "He has two legs," she said simply. "Many who will be coming home will have one. Some will have one arm or one eye." She gripped my arm as I went out. "I fear for my Alex. I haven't heard from him. He's been down-country with Sherman in Georgia."
    "I'm sure Alex will be fine," I said.
    "Promise me we'll always be friends, Emily. I need a friend like you."
    I said yes, we would always be friends, and went home.

    All afternoon people came, dozens of them. They brought chicken and biscuits, cake and corn pudding, oysters in cream sauce, and sugared ham, more cake, and long faces. They brought tears and gossip. I recognized a few women who worked with Mama, and some of Mrs. Mary's boarders. But Mrs. Mary didn't come. Annie did. She came and stood and sat with me. Others wandered in and out and said how lovely Mama looked in her lead coffin, and wasn't it God's blessing that she was at peace now?
    They called me "dear." They clucked over me. They patted my head. I wondered where they all had been these last few weeks, when I'd sat here alone except for Ella May, in the rain, listening to Mama's coughing, wondering where I would get a chicken to put in the pot.
    The wake took on a life of its own. It gathered momentum. And soon it had nothing to do with Mama.

    "Who are these people?" I asked Maude.
    "Some of them are professional funeralgoers."
    "How do you know them?"
    "Oh, I've been known to go to an occasional funeral myself. There are people who have no mourners, you know. It helps when some of us show up to pay respects." She smiled and handed me a cup of tea. When I'd just about drained the cup there was a taste to it that was different, a faint bitterness about it.
    By the time the reverend arrived I was ready to agree with everyone that Mama looked beautiful. I think Maude had put something in my tea.
    "Is my Uncle Valentine coming?" I asked Maude.
    "No. You hurt his feelings. He felt it best he stay away. But he sent all the flowers."
    Hurt his feelings? Yes, I supposed I had. I would have to make it up to him somehow. I looked at the flowers. The room was awash with them. But something was wrong.
    "If he paid for the flowers he was cheated," I told Maude. "They look wilted already. They aren't blooming."
    "They will be tonight."
    "Tonight?"
    "Yes." She smiled at me. "Over your mother's grave, in the dark. They are nightflowers. My husband delivered them earlier. They are from your uncle's garden."

    Was she serious? Or was I muddleheaded from the tea? No matter, the reverend was starting prayers. I closed my eyes and sank back in the chair. Next thing I knew the reverend was saying good words about my mother, speaking about her in glowing terms. It didn't sound like my mother he was talking about, but like a stranger.
    Before we left for the cemetery Annie took me into the kitchen and gave me a glass of cold lemonade. "Who is that funny little man who came in just before prayers?" she asked.
    "I don't know. I didn't see him. I don't know half the people here, Annie."
    "He looks like a dwarf. Like he should be in a circus. And he's all done up in tweed and a cape, like it's midwinter. He's spent most of his time near the coffin."
    "My head seems fuzzy. I think Maude put something in the tea. Everything's soft around the edges."
    "It'll be hard around the edges soon enough," she said.
    They took the ironclad coffin outside. People went to the waiting carriages. Annie and Maude went upstairs to freshen up. I was alone with the funny little man in the parlor.
    "I don't believe I know you, sir."

    He couldn't have been more than