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smithereens.
    The blank side of a used store receipt lay beside me (weighted down with an old brick). I’d written “For Journey” at the top and underlined it. But my mind was elsewhere. Memories pressed in on me, so I had set the pencil down and picked up the Springfield rifle.
    The first thing I remembered was the fight in November. I heard Agatha’s raised voice, and then Grandfather Bolte’s coming from the proximity of his study. By this time I was in our bedroom, tucked in bed and, because of the cold, eagerly awaiting Agatha’s warm body beside me.
    Though I tried to hear, I couldn’t make out a word of the fight. Ma stepped into the hallway, knocked on the study door, and called their names. Hinges creaked. Ma and Agatha spoke. “Ask
him
,” I heard Agatha say. Next thing I knew, Agatha was in our room and closing the door behind her.
    She spoke rapidly. Agatha told me she’d asked for tuition money for the University of Wisconsin at Madison as her Christmas present. She explained how she had offered to spend her savings, which she said was enough for the first year’s tuition. But still, Grandfather Bolte had turned her down flat, saying the only thing she’d get at the universitywas a
husband
, and
that
could be found in Placid, Wisconsin, for
free
.
    She wouldn’t answer any of my questions. Instead, she lay down. I knew she wasn’t asleep—she was gripping her pillow like it was a log saving her from submersion.
    When I was sure she wouldn’t say more, I lay back upset. It was no surprise that Agatha wanted to study the natural sciences, but I’d never thought that meant more than reading books and rambling through the woods to observe and sketch. I’d never considered that she’d want to learn from a teacher, or to formalize it with an official piece of paper. It was a lot of effort, and for what? It would not lead to work. Grandfather Bolte was right.
    That she had enough money to go to university for one year was another thing altogether. Agatha was good at making money. She gave tours to ladies wanting to explore the river and its caves, and she sold seeds and seedlings in our store. But I had no idea she’d saved up so much money. Was it
all
in that tin box under the closet floorboard? I had never dared to look. The one time I happened to
step
on that particular board (and I swear that’s all I did), Agatha questioned me for an hour.
    No, I was not in favor of Agatha’s going to university, because it meant Agatha would leave Placid and me. Happily, Agatha did not speak of going again. I thought her craving for education was cured.
    *  *  *
    On Christmas Day, Grandfather Bolte gave me a present that made me yelp happily and hang on his neck. He told me I could take whatever ammunition I needed from the store as long as I showed him what I shot. Agatha wasn’t so lucky. Her present was a set of embroidery hoops, small to large. I do not know how she did it, but Agatha acted genuinely thankful.
    Then Ma gave Agatha the blue-green ball gown, and everything passed away in the presence of that lovely, lovely gown. The color in that silk was so subtle and shifting we carried the dress all around the house to see it in different light. “You can wear it at the New Year’s ball,” Ma said.
    Agatha did wear it to the Olmstead Hotel New Year’s ball. She made turn after turn around the ballroom in Billy McCabe’s arms while wearing that dress. Agatha’s auburn hair shimmered, and the crystal from the chandelier flecked Billy and Agatha in light. And that dress? The blue-green color caught your eye the way a hummingbird does: flicking in front of you, capturing your attention, then—suddenly—disappearing. As I watched Agatha spin around the ballroom, I heard my neighbors bet that by the end of January, Agatha Burkhardt would be engaged to marry Billy McCabe. I hated that idea. Marrying Billy was worse than attending the University of Wisconsin because Billy planned to homestead in