Chapter IX

Scarlett sat in the window of her bedroom that midsummer morning and watched the wagons and carriages full of girls, soldiers and chaperons ride gaily out Peachtree road in search of decorations for the bazaar which was to be held that evening for the benefit of the hospitals. Girls in flowered cotton dresses, elderly ladies smiling in carriages, convalescents from the hospitals, officers on horseback – everybody was going to have a picnic. Everybody, thought Scarlett, sadly, except me.

It simply wasn’t fair. She had worked twice as hard as any girl in town, getting things ready for the bazaar. She had knitted socks and afghans and mufflers. And she had embroidered half a dozen sofa-pillow cases with the Confederate flag on them. Yesterday she had worked until she was worn out. Under the supervision of the Committee, this was hard work and no fun at all. Oh, it wasn’t fair that she should have a dead husband and be out of everything that was pleasant. She tried not to smile and wave too enthusiastically to the men she knew best, but it was hard to hide her dimples, hard to look as though her heart were in the grave – when it wasn’t.

Pittypat entered the room and jerked her away from the window unceremoniously.

“Have you lost your mind, honey, waving at men out of your bedroom window? I declare, Scarlett, I’m shocked! What would your mother say?”

“Well, they didn’t know it was my bedroom.”

“Honey, you mustn’t do things like that. Everybody will be talking about you and saying you are fast.”

“Well, I’m sorry, Auntie! I forgot it was my bedroom window.

I won’t do it again – I – I just wanted to see them go by. I wish I was going.”

“Honey!”

“Well, I do. I’m so tired of sitting at home.”

“Scarlett, promise me you won’t say things like that. People would talk so. They’d say you didn’t have the proper respect for poor Charlie —”

“Oh, Auntie, don’t cry!” And Scarlett wailed out loud – not, as Pittypat thought, for poor Charlie but because the last sounds of the wheels and the laughter were dying away.

“Oh, now I’ve made you cry, too,” sobbed Pittypat, in a pleased way, fumbling for her handkerchief.

Melanie came running from her room: “Darlings! What is the matter?”

“Charlie!” sobbed Pittypat.

“Oh,” said Melly, “Be brave, dear. Don’t cry. Oh, Scarlett!”

Scarlett had thrown herself on the bed and was sobbing at the top of her voice, sobbing for her lost youth and the pleasures of youth.

“I might as well be dead!” she sobbed passionately.

“Dear, don’t cry! Try to think how much Charlie loved you and let that comfort you!”

“Oh, do go away and leave me alone!”

She sank her face into the pillow, and the two standing over her tiptoed out. She heard Melanie say to Pittypat:

“Aunt Pitty, I wish you wouldn’t speak of Charles to her. You know how it always affects her. We mustn’t make it harder for her.”

Scarlett kicked the coverlet in impotent rage.

She remained gloomily in her room until afternoon and then the sight of the returning picnickers did not cheer her. Life was a hopeless affair and certainly not worth living.

Good riddance came in the form she least expected when, during the after-dinner-nap period, Mrs. Merriwether and Mrs. Elsing drove up.

“Mrs. Bonnell’s children have the measles,” said Mrs. Merriwether abruptly.

“And the McLure girls have been called to Virginia,” said Mrs. Elsing, “for Dallas McLure is wounded.”

“So, Pitty, we need you and Melly tonight to take Mrs. Bonnell’s and the McLure girls’ places,” said Mrs. Merriwether.

“Oh, we just couldn’t – with poor Charlie dead only a —”

“I know how you feel but there isn’t any sacrifice too great for the Cause,” broke in Mrs. Elsing.

“I think we should go,” said Scarlett. “It is the least we can do for the hospital.”

Neither of the visiting ladies had even mentioned her name, and they turned and looked sharply at her. Scarlett’s face kept a childlike expression.

“I think we should go and help to make it a success, all of us. I think I should go in the booth with Melly because – well, I think it would look better for us both. Don’t you think so, Melly?”

“Well,” began Melly helplessly. The idea of appearing publicly at a social gathering while in mourning was so unheard of she was bewildered.

“Scarlett’s right,” said Mrs. Merriwether. “And I know Charlie would like you to help the Cause he died for.”

“Too good to be true!^[32]” said Scarlett’s joyful heart. Actually she was at a party! After a year’s seclusion, she was at the biggest party Atlanta had ever seen. And she could see people and many lights and hear music.

She sat down on one of the little stools behind the counter of the booth and looked up and down the long hall. It looked lovely. And everywhere among the greenery, on flags, blazed the bright stars of the Confederacy.

The musicians got on the platform, black, grinning, their fat cheeks already shining with sweat, and began tuning their fiddles. Scarlett felt her heart beat faster as the sweet melancholy of the waltz came to her:

“The years creep slowly by, Lorena! The snow is on the grass again. The sun’s far down the sky, Lorena…”

One-two-three, one-two-three. What a beautiful waltz!

Suddenly the hall burst into life. It was full of girls, who floated in bright dresses; round little white shoulders bare; lace shawls carelessly hanging from arms; girls with masses of golden curls about their necks.

There were so many uniforms in the crowd on so many men whom Scarlett knew, men she had met on hospital cots, on the streets, at the drill ground. All of them were so young looking, so handsome, so reckless, with their arms in slings, with head bandages white across sun-browned faces. Some of them were on crutches and how proud were the girls who slowed their steps to their escorts’ hopping pace! The whole hospital must have turned out, at least everybody who could walk. The hospital should make a lot of money tonight.

There was a sound of drums from the street below, the tramp of feet. In a moment, the Home Guard and the militia unit in their bright uniforms crowded into the room, bowing, saluting, shaking hands.

The orchestra burst into “Bonnie Blue Flag^[33].”

A hundred voices took it up, sang it, shouted it like a cheer.

“Hurrah! Hurrah! For the Southern Rights, hurrah! Hurrah for the Bonnie Blue Flag that bears a single star!”

They started the second verse and Scarlett, singing with the rest, heard the high sweet soprano of Melanie behind her. Turning, she saw that Melly was standing with her hands clasped to her breast, her eyes closed, and tiny tears oozing from the corners. She smiled at Scarlett, as the music ended.

“I’m so happy,” she whispered, “and so proud of the soldiers that I just can’t help crying about it.”

The same look was on the faces of all the women as the song ended, tears of pride on cheeks, pink or wrinkled, smiles on lips, as they turned to their men, sweetheart to lover, mother to son, wife to husband. They were all beautiful with the beauty that transfigures even the plainest woman when she is utterly protected and loved and is giving back that love a thousand times.

They loved their men, they believed in them, they trusted them to the last breaths of their bodies. It was devotion to and pride in the Confederacy, for final victory was at hand. Stonewall Jackson^[34]’s triumphs in the Valley and the defeat of the Yankees in the Seven Days’ Battle around Richmond showed that clearly. How could it be otherwise with such leaders as Lee^[35] and Jackson? One more victory and the Yankees would be on their knees asking for peace and the men would be riding home and there would be kissing and laughter. One more victory and the war was over!

But then Scarlett’s joy began to evaporate as she didn’t feel any such emotion. It bewildered and depressed her. Somehow, the ball did not seem so pretty nor the girls so dashing, and the devotion to the Cause – why, it just seemed silly!

The Cause didn’t seem sacred to her. The war didn’t seem to be a holy affair, but a nuisance that killed men and cost money and made luxuries hard to get. She saw that she was tired of the endless knitting and the endless bandage rolling. And oh, she was so tired of the hospital! Tired and bored and nauseated with the sickening gangrene smells and the endless moaning, frightened by the look of coming death.

Oh, why was she different? She could never love anything or anyone so selflessly as they did. She was trying to justify herself to herself – a task which she seldom found difficult.

The other women were simply silly and hysterical with their talk of patriotism and the Cause, and the men were almost as bad with their talk of States’ Rights. She, Scarlett O’Hara Hamilton, alone had good hard-headed Irish sense. She wasn’t going to make a fool out of herself about the Cause, but neither was she going to make a fool out of herself by admitting her true feelings. She was hard-headed enough to be practical about the situation, and no one would ever know how she felt.

She looked about the hall with distaste. The McLure girls’ booth was inconspicuous and there were long intervals when no one came to their corner and Scarlett had nothing to do but look enviously on the happy crowd.

No, she was not happy now as just being present was not enough. She was at the bazaar but not a part of it. No one paid her any attention. And all her life she had enjoyed the center of the stage. It wasn’t fair! She was seventeen years old and her feet were patting the floor, wanting to dance.

Every girl in Atlanta could have a man. Even the plainest girls were carrying on like belles – and, oh, worst of all, they were wearing such lovely, lovely dresses!

Here she sat like a crow with black taffeta to her wrists and buttoned up to her chin, watching tacky-looking girls hanging on the arms of good-looking men. All because Charles Hamilton had had the measles. He didn’t even die in battle, so she could brag about him.

She leaned her elbows on the counter and looked at the crowd.

For a brief moment she considered the unfairness of it all. How short was the time for fun, for pretty clothes, for dancing, for coquetting! Only a few, too few years! Then you married and wore dull-colored dresses and only emerged to dance with your husband or with old gentlemen who stepped on your feet. If you didn’t do these things, the other matrons talked about you and then your reputation was ruined and your family disgraced.

How wonderful it would be never to marry but to go on being lovely in pale green dresses and forever courted by handsome men. But, if you went on too long, you got to be an old maid and everyone said “poor thing” in that hateful way. No, after all it was better to marry and keep your self-respect even if you never had any more fun.

Oh, what a mess life was! Why had she been such an idiot as to marry Charles of all people and have her life end at sixteen?

There were crowds in front of every other counter but theirs, girls chattering, men buying. The few who came to them talked about how they went to the university with Ashley and what a fine soldier he was or spoke in respectful tones of Charles and how great a loss to Atlanta his death had been.

Then the music broke into the sounds of “Johnny Booker, he’p dis Nigger!” and Scarlett thought she would scream. She wanted to dance. She looked across the floor and tapped her foot to the music and her green eyes blazed eagerly. All the way across the floor, a man, newly come and standing in the doorway, saw them and started in recognition. Then he grinned to himself as he recognized the invitation that any male could read.

He was a tall man, towering over the officers who stood near him. And he stared at Scarlett, until finally, feeling his gaze, she looked toward him.

Somewhere in her mind, the bell of recognition rang^[36], but for the moment she could not recall who he was. But he was the first man in months who had displayed an interest in her, and she threw him a gay smile. Suddenly, she knew who he was.

Thunderstruck, she stood as if paralyzed while he made his way through the crowd. Then, she tried to run away, but her skirt caught on a nail of the booth. She jerked furiously at it, tearing it and, in an instant, he was beside her.

“Permit me,” he said bending over. “I hardly hoped that you would recall me, Miss O’Hara.”

His voice was oddly pleasant to the ear. She looked up at him, her face red with the shame of their last meeting, and met his eyes, dancing in merciless merriment. Of all the people in the world to turn up here, this terrible person who had witnessed that scene with Ashley, who had said, and with good cause, that she was not a lady.

At the sound of his voice, Melanie turned and for the first time in her life Scarlett thanked God for the existence of her sister-in-law.

“Why – it’s – it’s Mr. Rhett Butler, isn’t it?” said Melanie with a little smile, putting out her hand. “I met you —”

“On the happy occasion of the announcement of your engagement,” he finished, bending over her hand. “It is kind of you to recall me.”

“And what are you doing so far from Charleston, Mr. Butler?”

“A boring matter of business, Mrs. Wilkes. I will be in and out of your town from now on^[37]. I find I must not only bring in goods but supervise the use of them.”

“Bring in —” Melly broke into a delighted smile. “Why, you – you must be the famous Captain Butler we’ve been hearing so much about – the blockade runner. Why, every girl here is wearing dresses you brought in. Scarlett, aren’t you excited – what’s the matter, dear? Are you faint? Do sit down.”

Scarlett sank to the stool. Oh, what a terrible thing to happen! She had never thought to meet this man again. He took her black fan from the counter and began fanning her, his face grave but his eyes still dancing.

“It is quite warm in here,” he said. “No wonder Miss O’Hara is faint. May I lead you to a window?”

“No,” said Scarlett, so rudely that Melly stared.

“She is not Miss O’Hara any longer,” said Melly. “She is Mrs. Hamilton. She is my sister now.”

“Your husbands are here tonight, I trust, on this happy occasion? It would be a pleasure to renew acquaintances.”