“Well, maybe. But Scarlett must have known he was going to marry Miss Melly sometime. The Wilkes and Hamiltons always marry their own cousins.”
“But I’m sorry she didn’t ask us to supper. I swear I don’t want to go home and listen to Ma talk about us being expelled.”
Until the previous summer, Stuart had courted India Wilkes, Ashley’s sister. Both families felt that perhaps the cool India Wilkes would have a quieting eff ect on him. But Brent had not been satisfied. He liked India but he thought her plain, and he simply could not fall in love with her himself to keep Stuart company.
Then, last summer at a political speaking in a grove of oak trees at Jonesboro, they both suddenly became aware of Scarlett O’Hara. They had known her for years, and, since their childhood, she had been a favorite playmate, for she could ride horses and climb trees almost as well as they. But now to their amazement she had become a grown-up young lady and quite the most charming one in all the world.
They noticed for the first time how her green eyes danced, how deep her dimples were when she laughed, how tiny her hands and feet and what a small waist she had. Their clever remarks sent her into merry laughter. It was a memorable day in the life of the twins. Now they were both in love with her. It was a situation which interested the neighbors and annoyed their mother, who had no liking for Scarlett.
The troop of cavalry had been organized three months before, the very day that Georgia seceded from the Union, and since then the recruits had been waiting for war. Everyone had his own idea on its name, just as everyone had ideas about the color and cut of the uniforms. But to the end of this organization they were known simply as “The Troop.”
The officers were elected by the members, for no one in the County had had any military experience except a few veterans of the Mexican and Seminole wars and, besides, the Troop would have rejected a veteran as a leader if they had not personally liked him and trusted him. Ashley Wilkes was elected captain, because he was the best rider in the County and because he had a cool head and could keep order. Abel Wynder, a small farmer, was elected a lieutenant. He was a grave giant, illiterate, kindhearted, older than the other boys. There was little snobbery in the Troop. Too many of their fathers and grandfathers had come up to wealth from the small farmer class. Moreover, Abel was the best shot in the Troop, a real sharpshooter who could pick out the eye of a squirrel at seventy-five yards, and, too, he knew all about living outdoors, building fires in the rain, tracking animals and finding water. The Troop valued real worth and moreover, because they liked him, they made him an officer.
In the beginning, the Troop had been recruited exclusively from the sons of planters, each man supplying his own horse, arms, equipment, uniform and body servant. But rich planters were few in the young county of Clayton[7], and it had been necessary to raise more recruits among the sons of small farmers, hunters, trappers, and even poor whites.
These young men were as anxious to fight the Yankees, as were their richer neighbors; but the delicate question of money arose. Few small farmers owned horses. They carried on their farm operations with mules. As for the poor whites, they considered themselves well off if they owned one mule. They lived entirely off the produce of their lands and the game in the swamp, seldom seeing five dollars in cash a year, and horses and uniforms were out of their reach. But they were as proud in their poverty as the planters were in their wealth. So, to save the feelings of all and to bring the Troop up to full strength, every large planter in the County had contributed money to completely outfit the Troop. The upshot of the matter was that every planter agreed to pay for equipping his own sons and a certain number of the others.
The Troop met twice a week in Jonesboro to drill and to pray for the war to begin. There was no need to teach any of the men to shoot. Most Southerners were born with guns in their hands, and lives spent in hunting had made marksmen of them all.
Drill always ended in the saloons of Jonesboro[8], and by nightfall there were so many fights that the officers had to try hard to avoid casualties until the Yankees could inflict them.
Chapter II
When the twins left Scarlett standing on the porch of Tara, she went back to her chair like a sleepwalker. There was pain in her face, the pain of a pampered child who has always had her own way and who now, for the first time, was in contact with the unpleasantness of life.
Ashley to marry Melanie Hamilton!
Oh, it couldn’t be true! The twins were playing one of their jokes on her. Ashley couldn’t be in love with her. Nobody could, not with a mousy little person like Melanie. Scarlett recalled with contempt Melanie’s thin childish figure, her plain heart-shaped face. And Ashley couldn’t have seen her in months. He hadn’t been in Atlanta more than twice since the house party he gave last year at Twelve Oaks. No, Ashley couldn’t be in love with Melanie, because – oh, she couldn’t be mistaken! – because he was in love with her! She, Scarlett, was the one he loved – she knew it!
Mammy emerged from the hall, a huge old woman with the small, shrewd eyes of an elephant. She was shining black, pure African, devoted to her last drop of blood to the O’Haras. She had been Ellen’s mammy and had come with her from Savannah to the up-country when she married. And her love for Scarlett and her pride in her were enormous.
“Is de gempmum gone? Huccome you din’ ast dem ter stay fer supper, Miss Scarlett? Ah done tole Poke ter lay two extry plates fer dem. Whar’s yo’ manners?”[9]
“Oh, I was so tired of hearing them talk about the war that I couldn’t have endured it through supper.”
“Ah done tole you an’ tole you ’bout gittin’ fever frum settin’ in de night air wid nuthin’ on yo’ shoulders. Come on in de house, Miss Scarlett.”
Scarlett turned away from Mammy. “No, I want to sit here and watch the sunset. It’s so pretty. You run get my shawl. Please, Mammy, and I’ll sit here till Pa comes home.”
Her father had ridden over to Twelve Oaks, the Wilkes plantation, that afternoon to buy Dilcey, the wife of his valet, Pork. Dilcey was head woman and midwife at Twelve Oaks, and, since the marriage six months ago, Pork had asked his master night and day to buy Dilcey, so the two could live on the same plantation. That afternoon, Gerald had set out to make an offer for Dilcey.
Surely, thought Scarlett, Pa will know whether this awful story is true. It was past time for him to come home. Every moment she expected to hear the pounding of his horse’s hooves and see him come up the hill at his usual breakneck speed. But the minutes slipped by and Gerald did not come. She looked down the road for him, the pain in her heart starting up again.
“Oh, it can’t be true!” she thought. “Why doesn’t he come?”
Her eyes followed the winding road. In her thought she went to Twelve Oaks and saw the beautiful white-columned house on the hill where Ashley lived.
“Oh, Ashley! Ashley!” she thought, and her heart beat faster.
It seemed strange now that when she was growing up Ashley had never seemed so very attractive to her. But since that day two years ago when Ashley, back home from his three years’ Grand Tour in Europe, had called to pay his respects, she had loved him. It was as simple as that.
She had been on the front porch when he had ridden up. Even now, she could recall each detail of his dress. He had alighted and stood looking up at her. And he said, “So you’ve grown up, Scarlett.” And, coming lightly up the steps, he had kissed her hand. And his voice! She would never forget the leap of her heart as she heard it.
She had wanted him, in that first instant, wanted him as simply as she wanted food to eat, horses to ride and a soft bed on which to lay herself.
For two years he had accompanied her about the County, to balls, fish fries and picnics, never the week went by that