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In an instant, something electric went through the air. The men sprang from benches and chairs, voices raised to be heard above other voices. There had been no talk of politics or war all during the morning, because of Mr. Wilkes’ request that the ladies should not be bored. But now Gerald had bawled the words “Fort Sumter,” and every man forgot his host’s request.
“Of course we’ll fight —”
“Yankee thieves —”
“We could lick them in a month —”
“Why, one Southerner can lick twenty Yankees —”
“Teach them a lesson they won’t soon forget —”
“No, look how Mr. Lincoln insulted our Commissioners!”
“They want war; we’ll make them sick of war —”
And above all the voices, Gerald’s boomed. All Scarlett could hear was “States’ rights, by God!” shouted over and over. Gerald was having an excellent time, but not his daughter.
Secession, war – these words had become boring to Scarlett, but now she hated the sound of them, for they meant that the men would stand there for hours and she would have no chance to corner Ashley. Of course there would be no war and the men all knew it. They just loved to talk and hear themselves talk.
Charles Hamilton, finding himself alone with Scarlett, leaned closer and whispered a confession.
“Miss O’Hara – I – I had already decided that if we did fight, I’d go over to South Carolina and join a troop there.”
She could think of nothing to say and so merely looked at him, wondering why men were such fools as to think women interested in such matters.
“If I went – would – would you be sorry, Miss O’Hara?”
“I should cry into my pillow every night,” said Scarlett, meaning to be joking, but he took the statement at face value[19 - он принял сказанное за чистую монету] and went red with pleasure.
“Would you pray for me?”
“What a fool!” thought Scarlett.
“Would you?”
“Oh – yes, indeed, Mr. Hamilton. Three Rosaries a night, at least!”
“Miss O’Hara – I must tell you something. I – I love you!”
“Um?” said Scarlett absently, trying to peer through the crowd of men to where Ashley still sat talking at Melanie’s feet.
“Yes!” whispered Charles. “I love you! You are the most – the most beautiful girl I’ve ever known and the sweetest and the kindest and I love you with all my heart. I cannot hope that you could love anyone like me but, my dear Miss O’Hara, I will do anything in the world to make you love me. I will —”
Charles stopped, for he couldn’t think of anything difficult enough to really prove his love to Scarlett, so he said simply: “I want to marry you.”
Scarlett came back to earth at the sound of the word “marry.” She had been thinking of marriage and of Ashley, and she looked at Charles with irritation. She was used to men asking her to marry them, men much more attractive than Charles Hamilton. She only saw a boy of twenty, red as a beet and looking very silly. She wished that she could tell him how silly he looked. But automatically, the words Ellen had taught her to say rose to her lips and she murmured: “Mr. Hamilton, this is all so sudden that I do not know what to say.”
And Charles swallowed the bait[20 - попался на крючок] eagerly: “I would wait forever! Please, Miss O’Hara, tell me that I may hope!”
Scarlett could hear Ashley and Melanie discussing Mr. Thackeray’s and Mr. Dickens’s works and it was so boring that the prospect looked bright to Scarlett and she turned beaming eyes on Charles and smiled.
“Ashley, you have not favored us with your opinion,” said Jim Tarleton, turning from the group of shouting men. There was no one there so handsome, thought Scarlett. Even the older men stopped to listen to his words.
“Why, gentlemen, if Georgia fights, I’ll go with her. Why else would I have joined the Troop?” he said. “But, like Father, I hope the Yankees will let us go in peace and that there will be no fighting.”
Of all the group there was only one who seemed calm. Scarlett’s eyes turned to Rhett Butler, who leaned against a tree, his hands shoved deep in his trouser pockets. He stood alone and had uttered no word as the conversation grew hotter. There was contempt in his black eyes – contempt, as if he listened to the braggings of children. He listened quietly until Stuart Tarleton repeated: “Why, we could lick them in a month! A month – why, one battle —”
“Gentlemen,” said Rhett Butler, not moving from his position against the tree or taking his hands from his pockets, “may I say a word?”
The group turned toward him.
“Has any one of you gentlemen ever thought that there’s not a cannon factory south of the Mason-Dixon Line? Or how few iron foundries there are in the South? Or woolen mills or cotton factories? Have you thought that we would not have a single warship and that the Yankee fleet could bottle up our harbors in a week, so that we could not sell our cotton abroad?”
“The trouble with most of us Southerners,” continued Rhett Butler, “is that we either don’t travel enough or we don’t profit enough by our travels. Now, of course, all you gentlemen are well traveled. But what have you seen? You’ve seen the hotels and the museums and the balls and the gambling houses. And you’ve come home believing that there’s no place like the South. As for me, I was Charleston born, but I have spent the last few years in the North. I have seen many things that you all have not seen. The thousands of immigrants who’d be glad to fight for the Yankees for food and a few dollars, the factories, the foundries, the shipyards, the iron and coal mines – all the things we haven’t got. Why, all we have is cotton and slaves and arrogance. They’d lick us in a month.”
For a tense moment, there was silence.
“Sir,” said Stuart Tarleton heavily, “what do you mean?”
Rhett looked at him with polite but mocking eyes.
“I mean,” he answered, “what Napoleon – perhaps you’ve heard of him? – remarked once, ‘God is on the side of the strongest battalion!’” and, turning to John Wilkes, he said with courtesy: “You promised to show me your library, sir. I fear I must go back to Jonesboro early this afternoon where a bit of business calls me.”
He faced the crowd, clicked his heels together and bowed like a dancing master. Then he walked across the lawn with John Wilkes, his black head in the air, and the sound of his laughter floated back to the group.
There was a startled silence and then the buzzing broke out again.
Ashley went over to where Scarlett and Charles sat, a thoughtful and amused smile on his face.
“Arrogant devil, isn’t he?” he observed, looking after Butler. “He looks like one of the Borgias[21 - Борджиа, испано-итальянский дворянский род. Это имя стало синонимом распущенности и вероломства.].”
Scarlett thought quickly but could remember no family in the County or Atlanta or Savannah by that name.
“I don’t know them. Is he kin to them? Who are they?”
An odd look came over Charles’ face, shame struggling with love. Love triumphed as he realized that it was enough for a girl to be sweet and beautiful, without having an education and he made swift answer: “The Borgias were Italians.”
“Oh,” said Scarlett, losing interest, “foreigners.”
She turned her prettiest smile on Ashley, but for some reason he was not looking at her. He was looking at Charles, and there was understanding in his face and a little pity.
Scarlett stood on the landing and looked over the banisters into the hall below. It was empty. From the bedrooms on the floor above came low voices, laughter and, “Now, you didn’t, really!” and “What did he say then?” From the window on the landing, she could see the group of men, drinking from tall glasses, and she knew they would remain there until late afternoon. Ashley was not among them. Then she listened and heard his voice. He was still in the front driveway saying good-by to leaving matrons and children.
Her heart in her throat, she went swiftly down the stairs. What if she should meet Mr. Wilkes? What excuse could she give for walking about the house when all the other girls were getting their beauty naps? Well, that had to be risked.
Across the wide hall was the open door of the library and she entered it noiselessly. She could wait there until Ashley finished his adieux and then call to him when he came into the house.
The library was in semidarkness. Large numbers of books always depressed her, as did people who liked to read them. That is – all people except Ashley. She closed the door except for a crack and tried to make her heart beat more slowly. She tried to remember just exactly what she had planned last night to say to Ashley, but she couldn’t recall anything. All she could think of was that she loved him. Oh, if only he would walk in on her now and take her in his arms, so she wouldn’t have to say anything. He must love her – “Perhaps if I prayed —” She squeezed her eyes tightly[22 - Она крепко зажмурила глаза] and began saying to herself “Hail Mary, full of grace —”
“Why, Scarlett!” said Ashley’s voice. He stood in the hall looking at her through the partly opened door, a smile on his face.
“Who are you hiding from – Charles or the Tarletons?”
He entered, puzzled but interested. Automatically he closed the door behind him and took her hand.
“What is it?” he said, almost in a whisper.
At the touch of his hand, she began to tremble. It was going to happen now, just as she had dreamed it.
“What is it?” he repeated. “A secret to tell me?”
Suddenly she found her tongue and just as suddenly all the years of Ellen’s teachings fell away, and the Irish blood of Gerald spoke from his daughter’s lips.
“Yes – a secret. I love you.”
For an instance there was a silence. And then her eyes sought his.
There was a look of surprise in them and something more – what was it? Then something like a well-trained mask came down over his face and he smiled gallantly.
“Isn’t it enough that you’ve collected every other man’s heart here today?” he said, with the old, teasing note in his voice. “Well, you’ve always had my heart, you know.”
Something was wrong – all wrong! This was not the way she had planned it. For some reason, Ashley was acting as if he thought she was just flirting with him. But he knew differently. She knew he did.
“Ashley – Ashley – tell me – you must – oh, don’t tease me now! Have I your heart? Oh, my dear, I lo —”
His hand went across her lips, swiftly. The mask was gone.
“You must not say these things, Scarlett! You mustn’t. You don’t mean them. You’ll hate yourself for saying them, and you’ll hate me for hearing them!”
She jerked her head away. “I couldn’t ever hate you. I tell you I love you and I know you must care about me because —” She stopped. Never before had she seen so much misery in anyone’s face. “Ashley, do you care – you do, don’t you?”
“Yes,” he said dully. “I care.”
She plucked at his sleeve, speechless.
“Scarlett,” he said, “can’t we go away and forget that we have ever said these things?”
“No,” she whispered. “I can’t. What do you mean? Don’t you want to – to marry me?”
He replied, “I’m going to marry Melanie.”
Somehow she found that she was sitting on the low velvet chair and Ashley, at her feet, was holding both her hands in his, in a hard grip. He was saying things – things that made no sense. Her mind was quite blank, quite empty of all the thoughts. His words fell on unhearing ears, words that were tender and full of pity, like a father speaking to a hurt child.
“Father is to announce the engagement tonight. We are to be married soon. I should have told you, but I thought you knew. I never dreamed that you – You’ve so many beaux. I thought Stuart —”
“But you just said you cared for me.”
His warm hands hurt hers.
“My dear, must you make me say things that will hurt you? Love isn’t enough to make a successful marriage when two people are as different as we are. You would want all of a man, Scarlett, his body, his heart, his soul, his thoughts. And I couldn’t give you all of me. And I would not want all of your mind and your soul. And you would be hurt, and then you would come to hate me! You would hate the books I read and the music I loved, because they took me away from you even for a moment.”
“Do you love her?”
“She is like me, part of my blood, and we understand each other. Can’t I make you see that a marriage can’t go on unless the two people are alike?”
“But you said you cared.”
“I shouldn’t have said it.”
Somewhere in her brain, a slow fire rose and rage began to blot out everything else.
“Well, having been cad enough to say it —”
His face went white.
“I was a cad to say it, as I’m going to marry Melanie. How could I help caring for you – you who have all the passion for life that I have not?”
She thought of Melanie, her gentle silences. And then her rage broke. There was nothing in her now of the well-bred Robillards.
“Why don’t you say it, you coward! You’re afraid to marry me! You’d rather live with that stupid little fool who can’t open her mouth except to say ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ and raise brats just like her! Why —”
“You must not say these things about Melanie!”
“Who are you to tell me I mustn’t? You coward, you cad, you – You made me believe you were going to marry me —”
“Be fair,” his voice pleaded. “Did I ever —”
She did not want to be fair, although she knew what he said was true. He had never once crossed the borders of friendliness with her and, when she thought of this her anger rose, the anger of hurt pride and feminine vanity. She had run after him and he would have none of her.
She sprang to her feet, her hands clenched and he rose towering over her. “I shall hate you till I die, you cad – you lowdown – lowdown —” What was the word she wanted? She could not think of any word bad enough.
“Scarlett – please —”
He put out his hand toward her and, as he did, she slapped him across the face with all the strength she had. The noise cracked like a whip in the still room and suddenly her rage was gone, and there was emptiness in her heart.
The red mark of her hand showed plainly on his white tired face. He said nothing but lifted her hand to his lips and kissed it. Then he was gone before she could speak again, closing the door softly behind him.
She sat down again very suddenly, her knees feeling weak. He was gone and the memory of his face would haunt her till she died. She had lost him forever. Now he would hate her and every time he looked at her he would remember how she threw herself at him when he had given her no reason at all.
Her hand dropped to a little table beside her, fingering a tiny china rose-bowl. The room was so still she almost screamed to break the silence. She must do something or go mad. She picked up the bowl and threw it viciously across the room toward the fireplace.
“This,” said a voice from the depths of the sofa, “is too much.”
Nothing had ever frightened her so much, and her mouth went too dry for her to utter a sound. She caught hold of the back of the chair, her knees going weak under her, as Rhett Butler rose from the sofa where he had been lying and made her a bow of politeness.
“It is bad enough to have an afternoon nap disturbed by such a passage as I’ve been forced to hear, but why should my life be endangered?”
He was real. He wasn’t a ghost. But he had heard everything!
