Gone with the Wind (85 page)

He started to speak, a stricken look on his face, but she stemmed his words with a torrent of her own.

“You told me you loved me better than her that day—oh, you remember that day! And I know you haven't changed! I can tell you haven't changed! And you've just said she was nothing but a dream— Oh, Ashley, let's go away! I could make you so happy. And anyway,” she added venomously, “Melanie can't—Dr. Fontaine said she couldn't ever have any more children and I could give you—”

His hands were on her shoulders so tightly that they hurt and she stopped, breathless.

“We were to forget that day at Twelve Oaks.”

“Do you think I could ever forget it? Have you forgotten it? Can you honestly say you don't love me?”

He drew a deep breath and answered quickly.

“No. I don't love you.”

“That's a lie.”

“Even if it is a lie,” said Ashley and his voice was deadly quiet, “it is not something which can be discussed.”

“You mean—”

“Do you think I could go off and leave Melanie and the baby, even if I hated them both? Break Melanie's heart? Leave them both to the charity of friends? Scarlett, are you mad? Isn't there any sense of loyalty in you? You couldn't leave your father and the girls. They're your responsibility, just as Melanie and Beau are mine, and whether you are tired or not, they are here and you've got to bear them.”

“I could leave them— I'm sick of them—tired of them—”

He leaned toward her and, for a moment, she thought with a catch at her heart that he was going to take her in
his arms. But instead, he patted her arm and spoke as one comforting a child.

“I know you're sick and tired. That's why you are talking this way. You've carried the load of three men. But I'm going to help you—I won't always be so awkward—”

“There's only one way you can help me,” she said dully, “and that's to take me away from here and give us a new start somewhere, with a chance for happiness. There's nothing to keep us here.”

“Nothing,” he said quietly, “nothing—except honor.”

She looked at him with baffled longing and saw, as if for the first time, how the crescents of his lashes were the thick rich gold of ripe wheat, how proudly his head sat upon his bared neck and how the look of race and dignity persisted in his slim erect body, even through its grotesque rags. Her eyes met his, hers naked with pleading, his remote as mountain lakes under gray skies.

She saw in them defeat of her wild dream, her mad desires.

Heartbreak and weariness sweeping over her, she dropped her head in her hands and cried. He had never seen her cry. He had never thought that women of her strong mettle had tears, and a flood of tenderness and remorse swept him. He came to her swiftly and in a moment had her in his arms, cradling her comfortingly, pressing her black head to his heart, whispering: “Dear! My brave dear—don't! You mustn't cry!”

At his touch, he felt her change within his grip and there was madness and magic in the slim body he held and a hot soft glow in the green eyes which looked up at him. Of a sudden, it was no longer bleak winter. For Ashley, spring was back again, that half-forgotten balmy
spring of green rustlings and murmurings, a spring of ease and indolence, careless days when the desires of youth were warm in his body. The bitter years since then fell away and he saw that the lips turned up to his were red and trembling and he kissed her.

There was a curious low roaring sound in her ears as of sea shells held against them and through the sound she dimly heard the swift thudding of her heart. Her body seemed to melt into his and, for a timeless time, they stood fused together as his lips took hers hungrily as if he could never have enough.

When he suddenly released her she felt that she could not stand alone and gripped the fence for support. She raised eyes blazing with love and triumph to him.

“You do love me! You do love me! Say it—say it!”

His hands still rested on her shoulders and she felt them tremble and loved their trembling. She leaned toward him ardently but he held her away from him, looking at her with eyes from which all remoteness had fled, eyes tormented with struggle and despair.

“Don't!” he said. “Don't! If you do, I shall take you now, here.”

She smiled a bright hot smile which was forgetful of time or place or anything but the memory of his mouth on hers.

Suddenly he shook her, shook her until her black hair tumbled down about her shoulders, shook her as if in a mad rage at her—and at himself.

“We won't do this!” he said. “I tell you we won't do it!”

It seemed as if her neck would snap if he shook her again. She was blinded by her hair and stunned by his action. She wrenched herself away and stared at him. There were small beads of moisture on his forehead and
his fists were curled into claws as if in pain. He looked at her directly, his gray eyes piercing.

“It's all my fault—none of yours and it will never happen again, because I am going to take Melanie and the baby and go.”

“Go?” she cried in anguish. “Oh, no!”

“Yes, by God! Do you think I'll stay here after this? When this might happen again—”

“But, Ashley, you can't go. Why should you go? You love me—”

“You want me to say it? All right, I'll say it. I love you.”

He leaned over her with a sudden savagery which made her shrink back against the fence.

“I love you, your courage and your stubbornness and your fire and your utter ruthlessness. How much do I love you? So much that a moment ago I would have outraged the hospitality of the house which has sheltered me and my family, forgotten the best wife any man ever had—enough to take you here in the mud like a—”

She struggled with a chaos of thoughts and there was a cold pain in her heart as if an icicle had pierced it. She said haltingly: “If you felt like that—and didn't take me—then you don't love me.”

“I can never make you understand.”

They fell silent and looked at each other. Suddenly Scarlett shivered and saw, as if coming back from a long journey, that it was winter and the fields were bare and harsh with stubble and she was very cold. She saw too that the old aloof face of Ashley, the one she knew so well, had come back and it was wintry too, and harsh with hurt and remorse.

She would have turned and left him then, seeking the
shelter of the house to hide herself, but she was too tired to move. Even speech was a labor and a weariness.

“There is nothing left,” she said at last. “Nothing left for me. Nothing to love. Nothing to fight for. You are gone and Tara is going.”

He looked at her for a long space and then, leaning, scooped up a small wad of red clay from the ground.

“Yes, there is something left,” he said, and the ghost of his old smile came back, the smile which mocked himself as well as her. “Something you love better than me, though you may not know it. You've still got Tara.”

He took her limp hand and pressed the damp clay into it and closed her fingers about it. There was no fever in his hands now, nor in hers. She looked at the red soil for a moment and it meant nothing to her. She looked at him and realized dimly that there was an integrity of spirit in him which was not to be torn apart by her passionate hands, nor by any hands.

If it killed him, he would never leave Melanie. If he burned for Scarlett until the end of his days, he would never take her and he would fight to keep her at a distance. She would never again get through that armor. The words, hospitality and loyalty and honor, meant more to him than she did.

The clay was cold in her hand and she looked at it again.

“Yes,” she said, “I've still got this.”

At first, the words meant nothing and the clay was only red clay. But unbidden came the thought of the sea of red dirt which surrounded Tara and how very dear it was and how hard she had fought to keep it—how hard she was going to have to fight if she wished to keep it hereafter. She looked at him again and wondered where
the hot flood of feeling had gone. She could think but could not feel, not about him nor Tara either, for she was drained of all emotion.

“You need not go,” she said clearly. “I won't have you all starve, simply because I've thrown myself at your head. It will never happen again.”

She turned away and started back toward the house across the rough fields, twisting her hair into a knot upon her neck. Ashley watched her go and saw her square her small thin shoulders as she went. And that gesture went to his heart, more than any words she had spoken.

S
HE WAS STILL CLUTCHING THE BALL
of red clay when she went up the front steps. She had carefully avoided the back entrance, for Mammy's sharp eyes would certainly have seen that something was greatly amiss. Scarlett did not want to see Mammy or anyone else. She did not feel that she could endure disappointment or bitterness now, only a weakness of the knees and a great emptiness of heart. She squeezed the clay so tightly it ran out from her clenched fist and she said over and over, parrot-like: “I've still got this. Yes, I've still got this.”

There was nothing else she did have, nothing but this red land, this land she had been willing to throw away like a torn handkerchief only a few minutes before. Now, it was dear to her again and she wondered dully what madness had possessed her to hold it so lightly. Had Ashley yielded, she could have gone away with him and left family and friends without a backward look but, even in her emptiness, she knew it would have torn her heart to leave these dear red hills and long washed gullies and gaunt black pines. Her thoughts would have turned back to them hungrily until the day she died. Not even Ashley could have filled the empty spaces in her heart where Tara had been uprooted. How wise Ashley was and how well he knew her! He had only to press the damp earth into her hand to bring her to her senses.

She was in the hall preparing to close the door when she heard the sound of horse's hooves and turned to look down the driveway. To have visitors at this of all times
was too much. She'd hurry to her room and plead a headache.

But when the carriage came nearer, her flight was checked by her amazement. It was a new carriage, shiny with varnish, and the harness was new too, with bits of polished brass here and there. Strangers, certainly. No one she knew had the money for such a grand new turnout as this.

She stood in the doorway watching, the cold draft blowing her skirts about her damp ankles. Then the carriage stopped in front of the house and Jonas Wilkerson alighted. Scarlett was so surprised at the sight of their former overseer driving so fine a rig and in so splendid a greatcoat she could not for a moment believe her eyes. Will had told her he looked quite prosperous since he got his new job with the Freedmen's Bureau. Made a lot of money, Will said, swindling the niggers or the government, one or tuther, or confiscating folks' cotton and swearing it was Confederate government cotton. Certainly he never came by all that money honestly in these hard times.

And here he was now, stepping out of an elegant carriage and handing down a woman dressed within an inch of her life. Scarlett saw in a glance that the dress was bright in color to the point of vulgarity but nevertheless her eyes went over the outfit hungrily. It had been so long since she had even seen stylish new clothes. Well! So hoops aren't so wide this year, she thought, scanning the red plaid gown. And, as she took in the black velvet paletot, how short jackets are! And what a cunning hat! Bonnets must be out of style, for this hat was only an absurd flat red velvet affair, perched on the top of the woman's head like a stiffened pancake. The ribbons did
not tie under the chin as bonnet ribbons tied but in the back under the massive bunch of curls which fell from the rear of the hat, curls which Scarlett could not help noticing did not match the woman's hair in either color or texture.

As the woman stepped to the ground and looked toward the house, Scarlett saw there was something familiar about the rabbity face, caked with white powder.

“Why, it's Emmie Slattery!” she cried, so surprised she spoke the words aloud.

“Yes'm, it's me,” said Emmie, tossing her head with an ingratiating smile and starting toward the steps.

Emmie Slattery! The dirty tow-headed slut whose illegitimate baby Ellen had baptized, Emmie who had given typhoid to Ellen and killed her. This overdressed, common, nasty piece of poor white trash was coming up the steps of Tara, bridling and grinning as if she belonged here. Scarlett thought of Ellen and, in a rush, feeling came back into the emptiness of her mind, a murderous rage so strong it shook her like the ague.

“Get off those steps, you trashy wench!” she cried. “Get off this land! Get out!”

Emmie's jaw sagged suddenly and she glanced at Jonas who came up with lowering brows. He made an effort at dignity, despite his anger.

“You must not speak that way to my wife,” he said.

“Wife?” said Scarlett and burst into a laugh that was cutting with contempt. “High time you made her your wife. Who baptized your other brats after you killed my mother?”

Emmie said “Oh!” and retreated hastily down the steps but Jonas stopped her flight toward the carriage with a rough grip on her arm.

“We came out here to pay a call—a friendly call,” he snarled. “And talk a little business with old friends—”

“Friends?” Scarlett's voice was like a whiplash. “When were we ever friends with the like of you? The Slatterys lived on our charity and paid it back by killing Mother—and you—you— Pa discharged you about Emmie's brat and you know it. Friends? Get off this place before I call Mr. Benteen and Mr. Wilkes.”

Under the words, Emmie broke her husband's hold and fled for the carriage, scrambling in with a flash of patent-leather boots with bright-red tops and red tassels.