GONE WITH THE WIND
This story is set during the American Civil War, and therefore contains characters and their language of the period, and other outdated cultural depictions. If you feel you are likely to be offended by these, do not read any further.
PART 54
CHAPTER LVI
Rhett was gone for three months and during that time Scarlett had no word from him. She did not know where he was or how long he would be gone. Indeed, she had no idea if he would ever return. During this time, she went about her business with her head high and her heart sick. She did not feel well physically but, forced by Melanie, she went to the store every day and tried to keep up a superficial interest in the mills. But the store palled on her for the first time and, although the business was treble what it had been the year before and the money rolling in, she could take no interest in it and was sharp and cross with the clerks. Johnnie Gallegher's mill was thriving and the lumber yard selling all his supply easily, but nothing Johnnie did or said pleased her. Johnnie, as Irish as she, finally erupted into rage at her naggings and threatened to quit, after a long tirade which ended with "and the back of both me hands to you, Ma'm, and the curse of Cromwell on you." She had to appease him with the most abject of apologies.
She never went to Ashley's mill. Nor did she go to the lumber-yard office when she thought he would be there. She knew he was avoiding her, knew that her constant presence in his house, at Melanie's inescapable invitations, was a torment to him. They never spoke alone and she was desperate to question him. She wanted to know whether he now hated her and exactly what he had told Melanie, but he held her at arm's length and silently pleaded with her not to speak. The sight of his face, old, haggard with remorse, added to her load, and the fact that his mill lost money every week was an extra irritant which she could not voice.
His helplessness in the face of the present situation irked her. She did not know what he could do to better matters but she felt that he should do something. Rhett would have done something. Rhett always did something, even if it was the wrong thing, and she unwillingly respected him for it.
Now that her first rage at Rhett and his insults had passed, she began to miss him and she missed him more and more as days went by without news of him. Out of the welter of rapture and anger and heartbreak and hurt pride that he had left, depression emerged to sit upon her shoulder like a carrion crow. She missed him, missed his light flippant touch in anecdotes that made her shout with laughter, his sardonic grin that reduced troubles to their proper proportions, missed even his jeers that stung her to angry retort. Most of all she missed having him to tell things to. Rhett was so satisfactory in that respect. She could recount shamelessly and with pride how she had skinned people out of their eyeteeth and he would applaud. And if she even mentioned such things to other people they were shocked.
She was lonely without him and Bonnie. She missed the child more than she had thought possible. Remembering the last harsh words Rhett had hurled at her about Wade and Ella, she tried to fill in some of her empty hours with them. But it was no use. Rhett's words and the children's reactions opened her eyes to a startling, a galling truth. During the babyhood of each child she had been too busy, too worried with money matters, too sharp and easily vexed, to win their confidence or affection. And now, it was either too late or she did not have the patience or the wisdom to penetrate their small secretive hearts.
Ella! It annoyed Scarlett to realize that Ella was a silly child but she undoubtedly was. She couldn't keep her little mind on one subject any longer than a bird could stay on one twig and even when Scarlett tried to tell her stories, Ella went off at childish tangents, interrupting with questions about matters that had nothing to do with the story and forgetting what she had asked long before Scarlett could get the explanation out of her mouth. And as for Wade--perhaps Rhett was right. Perhaps he was afraid of her. That was odd and it hurt her. Why should her own boy, her only boy, be afraid of her? When she tried to draw him out in talk, he looked at her with Charles' soft brown eyes and squirmed and twisted his feet in embarrassment. But with Melanie, he bubbled over with talk and brought from his pocket everything from fishing worms to old strings to show her.
Melanie had a way with brats. There was no getting around it. Her own little Beau was the best behaved and most lovable child in Atlanta. Scarlett got on better with him than she did with her own son because little Beau had no self-consciousness where grown people were concerned and climbed on her knee, uninvited, whenever he saw her. What a beautiful blond boy he was, just like Ashley! Now if only Wade were like Beau-- Of course, the reason Melanie could do so much with him was that she had only one child and she hadn't had to worry and work as Scarlett had. At least, Scarlett tried to excuse herself that way but honesty forced her to admit that Melanie loved children and would have welcomed a dozen. And the over-brimming affection she had was poured out on Wade and the neighbors' broods.
Scarlett would never forget the shock of the day she drove by Melanie's house to pick up Wade and heard, as she came up the front walk, the sound of her son's voice raised in a very fair imitation of the Rebel Yell--Wade who was always as still as a mouse at home. And manfully seconding Wade's yell was the shrill piping of Beau. When she had walked into the sitting room she had found the two charging at the sofa with wooden swords. They had hushed abashed as she entered and Melanie had arisen, laughing and clutching at hairpins and flying curls from where she was crouching behind the sofa.
"It's Gettysburg," she explained. "And I'm the Yankees and I've gotten the worst of it. This is General Lee," pointing to Beau, "and this is General Pickett," putting an arm about Wade's shoulder.
Yes, Melanie had a way with children that Scarlett could never fathom.
"At least," she thought, "Bonnie loves me and likes to play with me." But honesty forced her to admit that Bonnie infinitely preferred Rhett to her. And perhaps she would never see Bonnie again. For all she knew, Rhett might be in Perisa or Egypt and intending to stay there forever.
When Dr. Meade told her she was pregnant, she was astounded, for she had been expecting a diagnosis of biliousness and over-wrought nerves. Then her mind fled back to that wild night and her face went crimson at the memory. So a child was coming from those moments of high rapture--even if the memory of the rapture was dimmed by what followed. And for the first time she was glad that she was going to have a child. If it were only a boy! A fine boy, not a spiritless little creature like Wade. How she would care for him! Now that she had the leisure to devote to a baby and the money to smooth his path, how happy she would be! She had an impulse to write to Rhett in care of his mother in Charleston and tell him. Good Heavens, he must come home now! Suppose he stayed away till after the baby was born! She could never explain that! But if she wrote him he'd think she wanted him to come home and he would be amused. And he mustn't ever think she wanted him or needed him.
She was very glad she had stifled this impulse when her first news of Rhett came in a letter from Aunt Pauline in Charleston where, it seemed, Rhett was visiting his mother. What a relief to know he was still in the United States, even if Aunt Pauline's letter was infuriating. Rhett had brought Bonnie to see her and Aunt Eulalie and the letter was full of praise.
"Such a little beauty! When she grows up she will certainly be a belle. But I suppose you know that any man who courts her will have a tussle with Captain Butler, for I never saw such a devoted father. Now, my dear, I wish to confess something. Until I met Captain Butler, I felt that your marriage with him had been a dreadful mesalliance for, of course, no one in Charleston hears anything good about him and everyone is so sorry for his family. In fact, Eulalie and I were uncertain as to whether or not we should receive him--but, after all, the dear child is our great- niece. When he came, we were pleasantly surprised, most pleasantly, and realized how un-Christian it is to credit idle gossip. For he is most charming. Quite handsome, too, we thought, and so very grave and courteous. And so devoted to you and the child.
"And now, my dear, I must write you of something that has come to our ears--something Eulalie and I were loath to believe at first. We had heard, of course, that you sometimes did help out at the store that Mr. Kennedy had left you. We had heard rumors but, of course, we denied them. We realized that in those first dreadful days after the war, it was perhaps necessary, conditions being what they were. But there is no necessity now for such conduct on your part, as I know Captain Butler is in quite comfortable circumstances and is, moreover, fully capable of managing for you any business and property you may own. We had to know the truth of these rumors and were forced to ask Captain Butler point-blank questions which was most distressing to all of us.
"With reluctance he told us that you spent your mornings at the store and would permit no one else to do the bookkeeping. He also admitted that you had some interest in a mill or mills (we did not press him on this, being most upset at this information which was news to us) that necessitated your riding about alone, or attended by a ruffian who, Captain Butler assures us, is a murderer. We could see how this wrung his heart and think he must be a most indulgent--in fact, a far too indulgent husband. Scarlett, this must stop. Your mother is not here to command you and I must do it in her place. Think how your little children will feel when they grow older and realize that you were in trade! How mortified they will be to know that you exposed yourself to the insults of rude men and the dangers of careless gossip in attending to mills. Such unwomanly--"
Scarlett flung down the letter unfinished, with an oath. She could just see Aunt Pauline and Aunt Eulalie sitting in judgment on her in the crumbling house on the Battery with little between them and starvation except what she, Scarlett, sent them every month. Unwomanly? By God, if she hadn't been unwomanly Aunt Pauline and Aunt Eulalie probably wouldn't have a roof over their heads this very moment. And damn Rhett for telling them about the store and the bookkeeping and the mills! Reluctant, was he? She knew very well the joy he took in palming himself off on the old ladies as grave, courteous and charming, the devoted husband and father. How he must have loved harrowing them with descriptions of her activities with the store, the mills, the saloon. What a devil he was. Why did such perverse things give him such pleasure?
But soon, even this rage passed into apathy. So much of the keen zest had gone out of life recently. If only she could recapture the thrill and the glow of Ashley--if only Rhett would come home and make her laugh.
They were home again, without warning. The first intimation of their return was the sound of luggage being thumped on the front- hall floor and Bonnie's voice crying, "Mother!"
Scarlett hurried from her room to the top of the stairs and saw her daughter stretching her short plump legs in an effort to climb the steps. A resigned striped kitten was clutched to her breast.
"Gran'ma gave him to me," she cried excitedly, holding the kitten out by the scruff.
Scarlett swept her up into her arms and kissed her, thankful that the child's presence spared her her first meeting alone with Rhett. Looking over Bonnie's head, she saw him in the hall below, paying the cab driver. He looked up, saw her and swept off his hat in a wide gesture, bowing as he did. When she met his dark eyes, her heart leaped. No matter what he was, no matter what he had done, he was home and she was glad.
"Where's Mammy?" asked Bonnie, wriggling in Scarlett's grasp and she reluctantly set the child on her feet.
It was going to be more difficult than she anticipated, greeting Rhett with just the proper degree of casualness and, as for telling him about the new baby! She looked at his face as he came up the steps, that dark nonchalant face, so impervious, so blank. No, she'd wait to tell him. She couldn't tell him right away. And yet, such tidings as these belonged first to a husband, for a husband was always happy to hear them. But she did not think he would be happy about it.
She stood on the landing, leaning against the banisters and wondered if he would kiss her. But he did not. He said only: "You are looking pale, Mrs. Butler. Is there a rouge shortage?"
No word of missing her, even if he didn't mean it. And he might have at least kissed her in front of Mammy who, after bobbing a curtsy, was leading Bonnie away down the hall to the nursery. He stood beside her on the landing, his eyes appraising her carelessly.
"Can this wanness mean that you've been missing me?" he questioned and though his lips smiled, his eyes did not.
So that was going to be his attitude. He was going to be as hateful as ever. Suddenly the child she was carrying became a nauseating burden instead of something she had gladly carried, and this man before her, standing carelessly with his wide Panama hat upon his hip, her bitterest foe, the cause of all her troubles. There was venom in her eyes as she answered, venom that was too unmistakable to be missed, and the smile went from his face.
"If I'm pale it's your fault and not because I've missed you, you conceited thing. It's because--" Oh, she hadn't intended to tell him like this but the hot words rushed to her lips and she flung them at him, careless of the servants who might hear. "It's because I'm going to have a baby!"
He sucked in his breath suddenly and his eyes went rapidly over her. He took a quick step toward her as though to put a hand on her arm but she twisted away from him, and before the hate in her eyes his face hardened.
"Indeed!" he said coolly. "Well, who's the happy father? Ashley?"
She clutched the newel post until the ears of the carved lion dug with sudden pain into her palm. Even she who knew him so well had not anticipated this insult. Of course, he was joking but there were some jokes too monstrous to be borne. She wanted to rake her sharp nails across his eyes and blot out that queer light in them.
"Damn you!" she began, her voice shaking with sick rage. "You--you know it's yours. And I don't want it any more than you do. No--no woman would want the children of a cad like you. I wish-- Oh, God, I wish it was anybody's baby but yours!"
She saw his swarthy face change suddenly, anger and something she could not analyze making it twitch as though stung.
"There!" she thought in a hot rage of pleasure. "There! I've hurt him now!"
But the old impassive mask was back across his face and he stroked one side of his mustache.
"Cheer up," he said, turning from her and starting up the stairs, "maybe you'll have a miscarriage."
For a dizzy moment she thought what childbearing meant, the nausea that tore her, the tedious waiting, the thickening of her figure, the hours of pain. Things no man could ever realize. And he dared to joke. She would claw him. Nothing but the sight of blood upon his dark face would ease this pain in her heart. She lunged for him, swift as a cat, but with a light startled movement, he sidestepped, throwing up his arm to ward her off. She was standing on the edge of the freshly waxed top step, and as her arm with the whole weight of her body behind it, struck his out-thrust arm, she lost her balance. She made a wild clutch for the newel post and missed it. She went down the stairs backwards, feeling a sickening dart of pain in her ribs as she landed. And, too dazed to catch herself, she rolled over and over to the bottom of the flight.
It was the first time Scarlett had ever been ill, except when she had her babies, and somehow those times did not count. She had not been forlorn and frightened then, as she was now, weak and pain racked and bewildered. She knew she was sicker than they dared tell her, feebly realized that she might die. The broken rib stabbed when she breathed, her bruised face and head ached and her whole body was given over to demons who plucked at her with hot pinchers and sawed on her with dull knives and left her, for short intervals, so drained of strength that she could not regain grip on herself before they returned. No, childbirth had not been like this. She had been able to eat hearty meals two hours after Wade and Ella and Bonnie had been born, but now the thought of anything but cool water brought on feeble nausea.
How easy it was to have a child and how painful not to have one! Strange, what a pang it had been even in her pain, to know that she would not have this child. Stranger still that it should have been the first child she really wanted. She tried to think why she wanted it but her mind was too tired. Her mind was too tired to think of anything except fear of death. Death was in the room and she had no strength to confront it, to fight it back and she was frightened. She wanted someone strong to stand by her and hold her hand and fight off death until enough strength came back for her to do her own fighting.
Rage had been swallowed up in pain and she wanted Rhett. But he was not there and she could not bring herself to ask for him.
Her last memory of him was how he looked as he picked her up in the dark hall at the bottom of the steps, his face white and wiped clean of all save hideous fear, his voice hoarsely calling for Mammy. And then there was a faint memory of being carried upstairs, before darkness came over her mind. And then pain and more pain and the room full of buzzing voices and Aunt Pittypat's sobs and Dr. Meade's brusque orders and feet that hurried on the stairs and tiptoes in the upper hall. And then like a blinding ray of lightning, the knowledge of death and fear that suddenly made her try to scream a name and the scream was only a whisper.
But that forlorn whisper brought instant response from somewhere in the darkness beside the bed and the soft voice of the one she called made answer in lullaby tones: "I'm here, dear. I've been right here all the time."
Death and fear receded gently as Melanie took her hand and laid it quietly against her cool cheek. Scarlett tried to turn to see her face and could not. Melly was having a baby and the Yankees were coming. The town was afire and she must hurry, hurry. But Melly was having a baby and she couldn't hurry. She must stay with her till the baby came and be strong because Melly needed her strength. Melly was hurting so bad--there were hot pinchers at her and dull knives and recurrent waves of pain. She must hold Melly's hand.
But Dr. Meade was there after all, he had come, even if the soldiers at the depot did need him for she heard him say: "Delirious. Where's Captain Butler?"
The night was dark and then light and sometimes she was having a baby and sometimes it was Melanie who cried out, but through it all Melly was there and her hands were cool and she did not make futile anxious gestures or sob like Aunt Pitty. Whenever Scarlett opened her eyes, she said "Melly?" and the voice answered. And usually she started to whisper: "Rhett--I want Rhett" and remembered, as from a dream, that Rhett didn't want her, that Rhett's face was dark as an Indian's and his teeth were white in a jeer. She wanted him and he didn't want her.
Once she said "Melly?" and Mammy's voice said: "S'me, chile," and put a cold rag on her forehead and she cried fretfully: "Melly-- Melanie" over and over but for a long time Melanie did not come. For Melanie was sitting on the edge of Rhett's bed and Rhett, drunk and sobbing, was sprawled on the floor, crying, his head in her lap.
Every time she had come out of Scarlett's room she had seen him, sitting on his bed, his door wide, watching the door across the hall. The room was untidy, littered with cigar butts and dishes of untouched food. The bed was tumbled and unmade and he sat on it, unshaven and suddenly gaunt, endlessly smoking. He never asked questions when he saw her. She always stood in the doorway for a minute, giving the news: "I'm sorry, she's worse," or "No, she hasn't asked for you yet. You see, she's delirious" or "You mustn't give up hope, Captain Butler. Let me fix you some hot coffee and something to eat. You'll make yourself ill."
Her heart always ached with pity for him, although she was almost too tired and sleepy to feel anything. How could people say such mean things about him--say he was heartless and wicked and unfaithful to Scarlett, when she could see him getting thin before her eyes, see the torment in his face? Tired as she was, she always tried to be kinder than usual when she gave bulletins from the sick room. He looked so like a damned soul waiting judgment-- so like a child in a suddenly hostile world. But everyone was like a child to Melanie.
But when, at last, she went joyfully to his door to tell him that Scarlett was better, she was unprepared for what she found. There was a half-empty bottle of whisky on the table by the bed and the room reeked with the odor. He looked at her with bright glazed eyes and his jaw muscles trembled despite his efforts to set his teeth.
"She's dead?"
"Oh, no. She's much better."
He said: "Oh, my God," and put his head in his hands. She saw his wide shoulders shake as with a nervous chill and, as she watched him pityingly, her pity changed to horror for she saw that he was crying. Melanie had never seen a man cry and of all men, Rhett, so suave, so mocking, so eternally sure of himself.
It frightened her, the desperate choking sound he made. She had a terrified thought that he was drunk and Melanie was afraid of drunkenness. But when he raised his head and she caught one glimpse of his eyes, she stepped swiftly into the room, closed the door softly behind her and went to him. She had never seen a man cry but she had comforted the tears of many children. When she put a soft hand on his shoulder, his arms went suddenly around her skirts. Before she knew how it happened she was sitting on the bed and he was on the floor, his head in her lap and his arms and hands clutching her in a frantic clasp that hurt her.
She stroked the black head gently and said: "There! There!" soothingly. "There! She's going to get well."
At her words, his grip tightened and he began speaking rapidly, hoarsely, babbling as though to a grave which would never give up its secrets, babbling the truth for the first time in his life, baring himself mercilessly to Melanie who was at first, utterly uncomprehending, utterly maternal. He talked brokenly, burrowing his head in her lap, tugging at the folds of her skirt. Sometimes his words were blurred, muffled, sometimes they came far too clearly to her ears, harsh, bitter words of confession and abasement, speaking of things she had never heard even a woman mention, secret things that brought the hot blood of modesty to her cheeks and made her grateful for his bowed head.
She patted his head as she did little Beau's and said: "Hush! Captain Butler! You must not tell me these things! You are not yourself. Hush!" But his voice went on in a wild torrent of outpouring and he held to her dress as though it were his hope of life.
He accused himself of deeds she did not understand; he mumbled the name of Belle Watling and then he shook her with his violence as he cried: "I've killed Scarlett, I've killed her. You don't understand. She didn't want this baby and--"
"You must hush! You are beside yourself! Not want a baby? Why every woman wants--"
"No! No! You want babies. But she doesn't. Not my babies--"
"You must stop!"
"You don't understand. She didn't want a baby and I made her. This--this baby--it's all my damned fault. We hadn't been sleeping together--"
"Hush, Captain Butler! It is not fit--"
"And I was drunk and insane and I wanted to hurt her--because she had hurt me. I wanted to--and I did--but she didn't want me. She's never wanted me. She never has and I tried--I tried so hard and--"
"Oh, please!"
"And I didn't know about this baby till the other day--when she fell. She didn't know where I was to write to me and tell me--but she wouldn't have written me if she had known. I tell you--I tell you I'd have come straight home--if I'd only known--whether she wanted me home or not. . . ."
"Oh, yes, I know you would!"
"God, I've been crazy these weeks, crazy and drunk! And when she told me, there on the steps--what did I do? What did I say? I laughed and said: 'Cheer up. Maybe you'll have a miscarriage.' And she--"
Melanie suddenly went white and her eyes widened with horror as she looked down at the black tormented head writhing in her lap. The afternoon sun streamed in through the open window and suddenly she saw, as for the first time, how large and brown and strong his hands were and how thickly the black hairs grew along the backs of them. Involuntarily, she recoiled from them. They seemed so predatory, so ruthless and yet, twined in her skirt, so broken, so helpless.
Could it be possible that he had heard and believed the preposterous lie about Scarlett and Ashley and become jealous? True, he had left town immediately after the scandal broke but-- No, it couldn't be that. Captain Butler was always going off abruptly on journeys. He couldn't have believed the gossip. He was too sensible. If that had been the cause of the trouble, wouldn't he have tried to shoot Ashley? Or at least demanded an explanation?
No, it couldn't be that. It was only that he was drunk and sick from strain and his mind was running wild, like a man delirious, babbling wild fantasies. Men couldn't stand strains as well as women. Something had upset him, perhaps he had had a small quarrel with Scarlett and magnified it. Perhaps some of the awful things he said were true. But all of them could not be true. Oh, not that last, certainly! No man could say such a thing to a woman he loved as passionately as this man loved Scarlett. Melanie had never seen evil, never seen cruelty, and now that she looked on them for the first time she found them too inconceivable to believe. He was drunk and sick. And sick children must be humored.
"There! There!" she said crooningly. "Hush, now. I understand."
He raised his head violently and looked up at her with bloodshot eyes, fiercely throwing off her hands.
"No, by God, you don't understand! You can't understand! You're-- you're too good to understand. You don't believe me but it's all true and I'm a dog. Do you know why I did it? I was mad, crazy with jealousy. She never cared for me and I thought I could make her care. But she never cared. She doesn't love me. She never has. She loves--"
His passionate, drunken gaze met hers and he stopped, mouth open, as though for the first time he realized to whom he was speaking. Her face was white and strained but her eyes were steady and sweet and full of pity and unbelief. There was a luminous serenity in them and the innocence in the soft brown depths struck him like a blow in the face, clearing some of the alcohol out of his brain, halting his mad, careering words in mid-flight. He trailed off into a mumble, his eyes dropping away from hers, his lids batting rapidly as he fought back to sanity.
"I'm a cad," he muttered, dropping his head tiredly back into her lap. "But not that big a cad. And if I did tell you, you wouldn't believe me, would you? You're too good to believe me. I never before knew anybody who was really good. You wouldn't believe me, would you?"
"No, I wouldn't believe you," said Melanie soothingly, beginning to stroke his hair again. "She's going to get well. There, Captain Butler! Don't cry! She's going to get well."
CHAPTER LVII
It was a pale, thin woman that Rhett put on the Jonesboro train a month later. Wade and Ella, who were to make the trip with her, were silent and uneasy at their mother's still, white face. They clung close to Prissy, for even to their childish minds there was something frightening in the cold, impersonal atmosphere between their mother and their stepfather.
Weak as she was, Scarlett was going home to Tara. She felt that she would stifle if she stayed in Atlanta another day, with her tired mind forcing itself round and round the deeply worn circle of futile thoughts about the mess she was in. She was sick in body and weary in mind and she was standing like a lost child in a nightmare country in which there was no familiar landmark to guide her.
As she had once fled Atlanta before an invading army, so she was fleeing it again, pressing her worries into the back of her mind with her old defense against the world: "I won't think of it now. I can't stand it if I do. I'll think of it tomorrow at Tara. Tomorrow's another day." It seemed that if she could only get back to the stillness and the green cotton fields of home, all her troubles would fall away and she would somehow be able to mold her shattered thoughts into something she could live by.
Rhett watched the train until it was out of sight and on his face there was a look of speculative bitterness that was not pleasant. He sighed, dismissed the carriage and mounting his horse, rode down Ivy Street toward Melanie's house.
It was a warm morning and Melanie sat on the vine-shaded porch, her mending basket piled high with socks. Confusion and dismay filled her when she saw Rhett alight from his horse and toss the reins over the arm of the cast-iron negro boy who stood at the sidewalk. She had not seen him alone since that too dreadful day when Scarlett had been so ill and he had been so--well--so drunk. Melanie hated even to think the word. She had spoken to him only casually during Scarlett's convalescence and, on those occasions, she had found it difficult to meet his eyes. However, he had been his usual bland self at those times, and never by look or word showed that such a scene had taken place between them. Ashley had told her once that men frequently did not remember things said and done in drink and Melanie prayed heartily that Captain Butler's memory had failed him on that occasion. She felt she would rather die than learn that he remembered his outpourings. Timidity and embarrassment swept over her and waves of color mounted her cheeks as he came up the walk. But perhaps he had only come to ask if Beau could spend the day with Bonnie. Surely he wouldn't have the bad taste to come and thank her for what she had done that day!
She rose to meet him, noting with surprise, as always, how lightly he walked for a big man.
"Scarlett has gone?"
"Yes. Tara will do her good," he said smiling. "Sometimes I think she's like the giant Antaeus who became stronger each time he touched Mother Earth. It doesn't do for Scarlett to stay away too long from the patch of red mud she loves. The sight of cotton growing will do her more good than all Dr. Meade's tonics."
"Won't you sit down?" said Melanie, her hands fluttering. He was so very large and male, and excessively male creatures always discomposed her. They seem to radiate a force and vitality that made her feel smaller and weaker even than she was. He looked so swarthy and formidable and the heavy muscles in his shoulders swelled against his white linen coat in a way that frightened her. It seemed impossible that she had seen all this strength and insolence brought low. And she had held that black head in her lap!
"Oh, dear!" she thought in distress and blushed again.
"Miss Melly," he said gently, "does my presence annoy you? Would you rather I went away? Pray be frank."
"Oh!" she thought. "He does remember! And he knows how upset I am!"
She looked up at him, imploringly, and suddenly her embarrassment and confusion faded. His eyes were so quiet, so kind, so understanding that she wondered how she could ever have been silly enough to be flurried. His face looked tired and, she thought with surprise, more than a little sad. How could she have even thought he'd be ill bred enough to bring up subjects both would rather forget?
"Poor thing, he's been so worried about Scarlett," she thought, and managing a smile, she said: "Do sit down, Captain Butler."
He sat down heavily and watched her as she picked up her darning.
"Miss Melly, I've come to ask a very great favor of you and," he smiled and his mouth twisted down, "to enlist your aid in a deception from which I know you will shrink."
"A--deception?"
"Yes. Really, I've come to talk business to you."
"Oh, dear. Then it's Mr. Wilkes you'd better see. I'm such a goose about business. I'm not smart like Scarlett."
"I'm afraid Scarlett is too smart for her own good," he said, "and that is exactly what I want to talk to you about. You know how-- ill she's been. When she gets back from Tara she will start again hammer and tongs with the store and those mills which I wish devoutly would explode some night. I fear for her health, Miss Melly."
"Yes, she does far too much. You must make her stop and take care of herself."
He laughed.
"You know how headstrong she is. I never even try to argue with her. She's just like a willful child. She won't let me help her-- she won't let anyone help her. I've tried to get her to sell her share in the mills but she won't. And now, Miss Melly, I come to the business matter. I know Scarlett would sell the remainder of her interest in the mills to Mr. Wilkes but to no one else, and I want Mr. Wilkes to buy her out."
"Oh, dear me! That would be nice but--" Melanie stopped and bit her lip. She could not mention money matters to an outsider. Somehow, despite what he made from the mill, she and Ashley never seemed to have enough money. It worried her that they saved so little. She did not know where the money went. Ashley gave her enough to run the house on, but when it came to extra expenses they were often pinched. Of course, her doctor's bills were so much, and then the books and furniture Ashley ordered from New York did run into money. And they had fed and clothed any number of waifs who slept in their cellar. And Ashley never felt like refusing a loan to any man who'd been in the Confederate Army. And--
"Miss Melly, I want to lend you the money," said Rhett.
"That's so kind of you, but we might never repay it."
"I don't want it repaid. Don't be angry with me, Miss Melly! Please hear me through. It will repay me enough to know that Scarlett will not be exhausting herself driving miles to the mills every day. The store will be enough to keep her busy and happy. . . . Don't you see?"
"Well--yes--" said Melanie uncertainly.
"You want your boy to have a pony don't you? And want him to go to the university and to Harvard and to Europe on a Grand Tour?"
"Oh, of course," cried Melanie, her face lighting up, as always, at the mention of Beau. "I want him to have everything but--well, everyone is so poor these days that--"
"Mr. Wilkes could make a pile of money out of the mills some day," said Rhett. "And I'd like to see Beau have all the advantages he deserves."
"Oh, Captain Butler, what a crafty wretch you are!" she cried, smiling. "Appealing to a mother's pride! I can read you like a book."
"I hope not," said Rhett, and for the first time there was a gleam in his eye. "Now will you let me lend you the money?"
"But where does the deception come in?"
"We must be conspirators and deceive both Scarlett and Mr. Wilkes."
"Oh, dear! I couldn't!"
"If Scarlett knew I had plotted behind her back, even for her own good--well, you know her temper! And I'm afraid Mr. Wilkes would refuse any loan I offered him. So neither of them must know where the money comes from."
"Oh, but I'm sure Mr. Wilkes wouldn't refuse, if he understood the matter. He is so fond of Scarlett."
"Yes, I'm sure he is," said Rhett smoothly. "But just the same he would refuse. You know how proud all the Wilkes are."
"Oh, dear!" cried Melanie miserably, "I wish-- Really, Captain Butler, I couldn't deceive my husband."
"Not even to help Scarlett?" Rhett looked very hurt. "And she is so fond of you!"
Tears trembled on Melanie's eyelids.
"You know I'd do anything in the world for her. I can never, never half repay her for what she's done for me. You know."
"Yes," he said shortly, "I know what she's done for you. Couldn't you tell Mr. Wilkes that the money was left you in the will of some relative?"
"Oh, Captain Butler, I haven't a relative with a penny to bless him!"
"Then, if I sent the money through the mail to Mr. Wilkes without his knowing who sent it, would you see that it was used to buy the mills and not--well, given away to destitute ex-Confederates?"
At first she looked hurt at his last words, as though they implied criticism of Ashley, but he smiled so understandingly she smiled back.
"Of course I will."
"So it's settled? It's to be our secret?"
"But I have never kept anything secret from my husband!"
"I'm sure of that, Miss Melly."
As she looked at him she thought how right she had always been about him and how wrong so many other people were. People had said he was brutal and sneering and bad mannered and even dishonest. Though many of the nicest people were now admitting they had been wrong. Well! She had known from the very beginning that he was a fine man. She had never received from him anything but the kindest treatment, thoughtfulness, utter respect and what understanding! And then, how he loved Scarlett! How sweet of him to take this roundabout way of sparing Scarlett one of the loads she carried!
In an impulsive rush of feeling, she said: "Scarlett's lucky to have a husband who's so nice to her!"
"You think so? I'm afraid she wouldn't agree with you, if she could hear you. Besides, I want to be nice to you too, Miss Melly. I'm giving you more than I'm giving Scarlett."
"Me!" she questioned, puzzled. "Oh, you mean for Beau."
He picked up his hat and rose. He stood for a moment looking down at the plain, heart-shaped face with its long widow's peak and serious dark eyes. Such an unworldly face, a face with no defenses against life.
"No, not Beau. I'm trying to give you something more than Beau, if you can imagine that."
"No, I can't," she said, bewildered again. "There's nothing in the world more precious to me than Beau except Ash--except Mr. Wilkes."
Rhett said nothing and looked down at her, his dark face still.
"You're mighty nice to want to do things for me, Captain Butler, but really, I'm so lucky. I have everything in the world any woman could want."
"That's fine," said Rhett, suddenly grim. "And I intend to see that you keep them."
When Scarlett came back from Tara, the unhealthy pallor had gone from her face and her cheeks were rounded and faintly pink. Her green eyes were alert and sparkling again, and she laughed aloud for the first time in weeks when Rhett and Bonnie met her and Wade and Ella at the depot--laughed in annoyance and amusement. Rhett had two straggling turkey feathers in the brim of his hat and Bonnie, dressed in a sadly torn dress that was her Sunday frock, had diagonal lines of indigo blue on her cheeks and a peacock feather half as long as she was in her curls. Evidently a game of Indian had been in progress when the time came to meet the train and it was obvious from the look of quizzical helplessness on Rhett's face and the lowering indignation of Mammy that Bonnie had refused to have her toilet remedied, even to meet her mother.
Scarlett said: "What a ragamuffin!" as she kissed the child and turned a cheek for Rhett's lips. There were crowds of people in the depot or she would never have invited this caress. She could not help noticing, for all her embarrassment at Bonnie's appearance, that everyone in the crowd was smiling at the figure father and daughter cut, smiling not in derision but in genuine amusement and kindness. Everyone knew that Scarlett's youngest had her father under her thumb and Atlanta was amused and approving. Rhett's great love for his child had gone far toward reinstating him in public opinion.
On the way home, Scarlett was full of County news. The hot, dry weather was making the cotton grow so fast you could almost hear it but Will said cotton prices were going to be low this fall. Suellen was going to have another baby--she spelled this out so the children would not comprehend--and Ella had shown unwonted spirit in biting Suellen's oldest girl. Though, observed Scarlett, it was no more than little Susie deserved, she being her mother all over again. But Suellen had become infuriated and they had had an invigorating quarrel that was just like old times. Wade had killed a water moccasin, all by himself. 'Randa and Camilla Tarleton were teaching school and wasn't that a joke? Not a one of the Tarletons had ever been able to spell cat! Betsy Tarleton had married a fat one-armed man from Lovejoy and they and Hetty and Jim Tarleton were raising a good cotton crop at Fairhill. Mrs. Tarleton had a brood mare and a colt and was as happy as though she had a million dollars. And there were negroes living in the old Calvert house! Swarms of them and they actually owned it! They'd bought it in at the sheriff's sale. The place was dilapidated and it made you cry to look at it. No one knew where Cathleen and her no-good husband had gone. And Alex was to marry Sally, his brother's widow! Imagine that, after them living in the same house for so many years! Everybody said it was a marriage of convenience because people were beginning to gossip about them living there alone, since both Old Miss and Young Miss had died. And it had about broken Dimity Munroe's heart. But it served her right. If she'd had any gumption she'd have caught her another man long ago, instead of waiting for Alex to get money enough to marry her.
Scarlett chattered on cheerfully but there were many things about the County which she suppressed, things that hurt to think about. She had driven over the County with Will, trying not to remember when these thousands of fertile acres had stood green with cotton. Now, plantation after plantation was going back to the forest, and dismal fields of broomsedge, scrub oak and runty pines had grown stealthily about silent ruins and over old cotton fields. Only one acre was being farmed now where once a hundred had been under the plow. It was like moving through a dead land.
"This section won't come back for fifty years--if it ever comes back," Will had said. "Tara's the best farm in the County, thanks to you and me, Scarlett, but it's a farm, a two-mule farm, not a plantation. And the Fontaine place, it comes next to Tara and then the Tarletons. They ain't makin' much money but they're gettin' along and they got gumption. But most of the rest of the folks, the rest of the farms--"
No, Scarlett did not like to remember the way the deserted County looked. It seemed even sadder, in retrospect, beside the bustle and prosperity of Atlanta.
"Has anything happened here?" she asked when they were finally home and were seated on the front porch. She had talked rapidly and continuously all the way home, fearing that a silence would fall. She had not had a word alone with Rhett since that day when she fell down the steps and she was none too anxious to be alone with him now. She did not know how he felt toward her. He had been kindness itself during her miserable convalescence, but it was the kindness of an impersonal stranger. He had anticipated her wants, kept the children from bothering her and supervised the store and the mills. But he had never said: "I'm sorry." Well, perhaps he wasn't sorry. Perhaps he still thought that child that was never born was not his child. How could she tell what went on in the mind behind the bland dark face? But he had showed a disposition to be courteous, for the first time in their married life, and a desire to let life go on as though there had never been anything unpleasant between them--as though, thought Scarlett, cheerlessly, as though there had never been anything at all between them. Well, if that was what he wanted, she could act her part too.
"Is everything all right?" she repeated. "Did you get the new shingles for the store? Did you swap the mules? For Heaven's sake, Rhett, take those feathers out of your hat. You look a fool and you'll be likely to wear them downtown without remembering to take them out."
"No," said Bonnie, picking up her father's hat, defensively.
"Everything has gone very well here," replied Rhett. "Bonnie and I have had a nice time and I don't believe her hair has been combed since you left. Don't suck the feathers, darling, they may be nasty. Yes, the shingles are fixed and I got a good trade on the mules. No, there's really no news. Everything has been quite dull."
Then, as an afterthought, he added: "The honorable Ashley was over here last night. He wanted to know if I thought you would sell him your mill and the part interest you have in his."
Scarlett, who had been rocking and fanning herself with a turkey tail fan, stopped abruptly.
"Sell? Where on earth did Ashley get the money? You know they never have a cent. Melanie spends it as fast as he makes it."
Rhett shrugged. "I always thought her a frugal little person, but then I'm not as well informed about the intimate details of the Wilkes family as you seem to be."
That jab seemed in something of Rhett's old style and Scarlett grew annoyed.
"Run away, dear," she said to Bonnie. "Mother wants to talk to Father."
"No," said Bonnie positively and climbed upon Rhett's lap.
Scarlett frowned at her child and Bonnie scowled back in so complete a resemblance to Gerald O'Hara that Scarlett almost laughed.
"Let her stay," said Rhett comfortably. "As to where he got the money, it seems it was sent him by someone he nursed through a case of smallpox at Rock Island. It renews my faith in human nature to know that gratitude still exists."
"Who was it? Anyone we know?"
"The letter was unsigned and came from Washington. Ashley was at a loss to know who could have sent it. But then, one of Ashley's unselfish temperament goes about the world doing so many good deeds that you can't expect him to remember all of them."
Had she not been so surprised at Ashley's windfall, Scarlett would have taken up this gauntlet, although while at Tara she had decided that never again would she permit herself to be involved in any quarrel with Rhett about Ashley. The ground on which she stood in this matter was entirely too uncertain and, until she knew exactly where she stood with both men, she did not care to be drawn out.
"He wants to buy me out?"
"Yes. But of course, I told him you wouldn't sell."
"I wish you'd let me mind my own business."
"Well, you know you wouldn't part with the mills. I told him that he knew as well as I did that you couldn't bear not to have your finger in everybody's pie, and if you sold out to him, then you wouldn't be able to tell him how to mind his own business."
"You dared say that to him about me?"
"Why not? It's true, isn't it? I believe he heartily agreed with me but, of course, he was too much of a gentleman to come right out and say so."
"It's a lie! I will sell them to him!" cried Scarlett angrily.
Until that moment, she had had no idea of parting with the mills. She had several reasons for wanting to keep them and their monetary value was the least reason. She could have sold them for large sums any time in the last few years, but she had refused all offers. The mills were the tangible evidence of what she had done, unaided and against great odds, and she was proud of them and of herself. Most of all, she did not want to sell them because they were the only path that lay open to Ashley. If the mills went from her control it would mean that she would seldom see Ashley and probably never see him alone. And she had to see him alone. She could not go on this way any longer, wondering what his feelings toward her were now, wondering if all his love had died in shame since the dreadful night of Melanie's party. In the course of business she could find many opportune times for conversations without it appearing to anyone that she was seeking him out. And, given time, she knew she could gain back whatever ground she had lost in his heart. But if she sold the mills--
No, she did not want to sell but, goaded by the thought that Rhett had exposed her to Ashley in so truthful and so unflattering a light, she had made up her mind instantly. Ashley should have the mills and at a price so low he could not help realizing how generous she was.
"I will sell!" she cried furiously. "Now, what do you think of that?"
There was the faintest gleam of triumph in Rhett's eyes as he bent to tie Bonnie's shoe string.
"I think you'll regret it," he said.
Already she was regretting the hasty words. Had they been spoken to anyone save Rhett she would have shamelessly retracted them. Why had she burst out like that? She looked at Rhett with an angry frown and saw that he was watching her with his old keen, cat-at-a- mouse-hole look. When he saw her frown, he laughed suddenly, his white teeth flashing. Scarlett had an uncertain feeling that he had jockeyed her into this position.
"Did you have anything to do with this?" she snapped.
"I?" His brows went up in mock surprise. "You should know me better. I never go about the world doing good deeds if I can avoid it."
That night she sold the mills and all her interest in them to Ashley. She did not lose thereby for Ashley refused to take advantage of her first low offer and met the highest bid that she had ever had for them. When she had signed the papers and the mills were irrevocably gone and Melanie was passing small glasses of wine to Ashley and Rhett to celebrate the transaction, Scarlett felt bereft, as though she had sold one of her children.
The mills had been her darlings, her pride, the fruit of her small grasping hands. She had started with one little mill in those black days when Atlanta was barely struggling up from ruin and ashes and want was staring her in the face. She had fought and schemed and nursed them through the dark times when Yankee confiscation loomed, when money was tight and smart men going to the wall. And now when Atlanta was covering its scars and buildings were going up everywhere and newcomers flocking to the town every day, she had two fine mills, two lumber yards, a dozen mule teams and convict labor to operate the business at low cost. Bidding farewell to them was like closing a door forever on a part of her life, a bitter, harsh part but one which she recalled with a nostalgic satisfaction.
She had built up this business and now she had sold it and she was oppressed with the certainty that, without her at the helm, Ashley would lose it all--everything that she had worked to build. Ashley trusted everyone and still hardly knew a two-by-four from a six-by- eight. And now she would never be able to give him the benefit of her advice--all because Rhett had told him that she liked to boss everything.
"Oh, damn Rhett!" she thought and as she watched him the conviction grew that he was at the bottom of all this. Just how and why she did not know. He was talking to Ashley and his words brought her up sharply.
"I suppose you'll turn the convicts back right away," he said.
Turn the convicts back? Why should there be any idea of turning them back? Rhett knew perfectly well that the large profits from the mills grew out of the cheap convict labor. And why did Rhett speak with such certainty about what Ashley's future actions would be? What did he know of him?
"Yes, they'll go back immediately," replied Ashley and he avoided Scarlett's dumbfounded gaze.
"Have you lost your mind?" she cried. "You'll lose all the money on the lease and what kind of labor can you get, anyway?"
"I'll use free darkies," said Ashley.
"Free darkies! Fiddle-dee-dee! You know what their wages will cost and besides you'll have the Yankees on your neck every minute to see if you're giving them chicken three times a day and tucking them to sleep under eiderdown quilts. And if you give a lazy darky a couple of licks to speed him up, you'll hear the Yankees scream from here to Dalton and you'll end up in jail. Why, convicts are the only--"
Melanie looked down into her lap at her twisted hands. Ashley looked unhappy but obdurate. For a moment he was silent. Then his gaze crossed Rhett's and it was as if he found understanding and encouragement in Rhett's eyes--a glance that was not lost on Scarlett.
"I won't work convicts, Scarlett," he said quietly.
"Well, sir!" her breath was taken away. "And why not? Are you afraid people will talk about you like they do about me?"
Ashley raised his head.
"I'm not afraid of what people say as long as I'm right. And I have never felt that convict labor was right."
"But why--"
"I can't make money from the enforced labor and misery of others."
"But you owned slaves!"
"They weren't miserable. And besides, I'd have freed them all when Father died if the war hadn't already freed them. But this is different, Scarlett. The system is open to too many abuses. Perhaps you don't know it but I do. I know very well that Johnnie Gallegher has killed at least one man at his camp. Maybe more--who cares about one convict, more or less? He said the man was killed trying to escape, but that's not what I've heard elsewhere. And I know he works men who are too sick to work. Call it superstition, but I do not believe that happiness can come from money made from the sufferings of others."
"God's nightgown! You mean--goodness, Ashley, you didn't swallow all the Reverend Wallace's bellowings about tainted money?"
"I didn't have to swallow it. I believed it long before he preached on it."
"Then, you must think all my money is tainted," cried Scarlett beginning to be angry. "Because I worked convicts and own saloon property and--" She stopped short. Both the Wilkes looked embarrassed and Rhett was grinning broadly. Damn him, thought Scarlett, vehemently. He's thinking that I'm sticking my finger in other people's pies again and so is Ashley. I'd like to crack their heads together! She swallowed her wrath and tried to assume an aloof air of dignity but with little success.
"Of course, it's immaterial to me," she said.
"Scarlett, don't think I'm criticizing you! I'm not. It's just that we look at things in different ways and what is good for you might not be good for me."
She suddenly wished that they were alone, wished ardently that Rhett and Melanie were at the end of the earth, so she could cry out: "But I want to look at things the way you look at them! Tell me just what you mean, so I can understand and be like you!"
But with Melanie present, trembling with the distress of the scene, and Rhett lounging, grinning at her, she could only say with as much coolness and offended virtue as she could muster: "I'm sure it's your own business, Ashley, and far be it from me to tell you how to run it. But, I must say, I do not understand your attitude or your remarks."
Oh, if they were only alone, so she would not be forced to say these cool things to him, these words that were making him unhappy!
"I've offended you, Scarlett, and I did not mean to. You must believe me and forgive me. There is nothing enigmatic in what I said. It is only that I believe that money which comes in certain ways seldom brings happiness."
"But you're wrong!" she cried, unable to restrain herself any longer. "Look at me! You know how my money came. You know how things were before I made my money! You remember that winter at Tara when it was so cold and we were cutting up the carpets for shoes and there wasn't enough to eat and we used to wonder how we were going to give Beau and Wade an education. You remem--"
"I remember," said Ashley tiredly, "but I'd rather forget."
"Well, you can't say any of us were happy then, can you? And look at us now! You've a nice home and a good future. And has anyone a prettier house than mine or nicer clothes or finer horses? Nobody sets as fine a table as me or gives nicer receptions and my children have everything they want. Well, how did I get the money to make it possible? Off trees? No, sir! Convicts and saloon rentals and--"
"And don't forget murdering that Yankee," said Rhett softly. "He really gave you your start."
Scarlett swung on him, furious words on her lips.
"And the money has made you very, very happy, hasn't it, darling?" he asked, poisonously sweet.
Scarlett stopped short, her mouth open, and her eyes went swiftly to the eyes of the other three. Melanie was almost crying with embarrassment, Ashley was suddenly bleak and withdrawn and Rhett was watching her over his cigar with impersonal amusement. She started to cry out: "But of course, it's made me happy!"
But somehow, she could not speak.
To be continued
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