She thought that she could not live any longer in the same house with the woman who was carrying Ashley’s child. But, as they sat at the table, Scarlett silent and gloomy, Pitty bewildered and Melanie miserable, a telegram came.

It was to Melanie from Ashley’s body servant, Mose.

“I have looked everywhere and I can’t find him. Must I come home?”

No one knew what it meant but the eyes of the three women went to one another, wide with terror, and Scarlett forgot all thoughts of going home. Without finishing their breakfasts they drove down to telegraph Ashley’s colonel, but even as they entered the office, there was a telegram from him.

“Regret to inform you Major Wilkes missing since scouting expedition three days ago. Will keep you informed.”

It was a ghastly trip home, with Aunt Pitty crying into her handkerchief, Melanie sitting erect and white and Scarlett slumped, stunned in the corner of the carriage. Once in the house, Scarlett stumbled up the stairs to her bedroom and, clutching her Rosary from the table, dropped to her knees and tried to pray. But the prayers would not come. There only fell on her an abysmal fear, a certain knowledge that God had turned His face from her for her sin. She had loved a married man and tried to take him from his wife, and God had punished her by killing him. She wanted to pray but she could not raise her eyes to Heaven. She wanted to cry but the tears would not come. They seemed to flood her chest, and they were hot tears that burned under her bosom, but they would not flow.

Her door opened and Melanie entered. Her face was like a heart cut from white paper, framed against black hair, and her eyes were wide, like those of a frightened child lost in the dark.

“Scarlett,” she said, putting out her hands. “You must forgive me for what I said yesterday, for you’re — all I’ve got now. Oh, Scarlett, I know my darling is dead!”

Somehow, she was in Scarlett’s arms, her small breasts heaving with sobs, and somehow they were lying on the bed, holding each other close, and Scarlett was crying too, crying with her face pressed close against Melanie’s, the tears of one wetting the cheeks of the other. It hurt so terribly to cry, but not so much as not being able to cry. Ashley is dead — dead, she thought, and I have killed him by loving him! Fresh sobs broke from her, and Melanie somehow feeling comfort in her tears tightened her arms about her neck.

“At least,” she whispered, “at least — I’ve got his baby.”

“And I,” thought Scarlett, too stricken now for anything so petty as jealousy, “I’ve got nothing — nothing — nothing except the look on his face when he told me good-by.”

Oh, Captain Butler, isn’t there some way — Can’t you use your influence and have him exchanged?” cried Melanie.

“Mr. Lincoln, the merciful and just, who cries large tears over Mrs. Bixby’s five boys, hasn’t any tears to shed about the thousands of Yankees dying at Andersonville,” said Rhett, his mouth twisting. “He doesn’t care if they all die. The order is out. No exchanges. I— I hadn’t told you before, Mrs. Wilkes, but your husband had a chance to get out and refused it.”

“Oh, no!” cried Melanie in disbelief.

“Yes, indeed. The Yankees are recruiting men for frontier service to fight the Indians, recruiting them from among Confederate prisoners. Any prisoner who will take the oath of allegiance and enlist for Indian service for two years will be released and sent West. Mr. Wilkes refused.”

“Oh, how could he?” cried Scarlett. “Why didn’t he take the oath and then desert and come home as soon as he got out of jail?”

Melanie turned on her like a small fury.

“How can you even suggest that he would do such a thing? Betray his own Confederacy by taking that vile oath and then betray his word to the Yankees! I would rather know he was dead at Rock Island than hear he had taken that oath. I’d be proud of him if he died in prison. But if he did THAT, I would never look on his face again. Never! Of course, he refused.”

When Scarlett was seeing Rhett to the door, she asked indignantly: “If it were you, wouldn’t you enlist with the Yankees to keep from dying in that place and then desert?”

“Of course,” said Rhett, his teeth showing beneath his mustache.

“Then why didn’t Ashley do it?”

“He’s a gentleman,” said Rhett, and Scarlett wondered how it was possible to convey such cynicism and contempt in that one honorable word.

It was a princely feast. Carey Ashburn had brought a little tea, which he had found in the tobacco pouch of a captured Yankee en route to Andersonville, and everyone had a cup, faintly flavored with tobacco. There was a nibble of the tough old bird for each, an adequate amount of dressing made of corn meal and seasoned with onions, a bowl of dried peas, and plenty of rice and gravy, the latter somewhat watery, for there was no flour with which to thicken it. For dessert, there was a sweet potato pie followed by Rhett’s bonbons, and when Rhett produced real Havana cigars for the gentlemen to enjoy over their glass of blackberry wine, everyone agreed it was indeed a Lucullan banquet.

Dr. Meade hastily bridged over the uncomfortable pause, his voice cold: “Captain Butler, the numerical difference between our troops and those of the Yankees has never mattered. One Confederate is worth a dozen Yankees.”

The ladies nodded. Everyone knew that.

“That was true at the first of the war,” said Rhett. “Perhaps it’s still true, provided the Confederate soldier has bullets for his gun and shoes on his feet and food in his stomach. Eh, Captain Ashburn?”

His voice was still soft and filled with specious humility. Carey Ashburn looked unhappy, for it was obvious that he, too, disliked Rhett intensely. He gladly would have sided with the doctor but he could not lie. The reason he had applied for transfer to the front, despite his useless arm, was that he realized, as the civilian population did not, the seriousness of the situation. There were many other men, stumping on wooden pegs, blind in one eye, fingers blown away, one arm gone, who were quietly transferring from the commissariat, hospital duties, mail and railroad service back to their old fighting units. They knew Old Joe needed every man.

He did not speak and Dr. Meade thundered, losing his temper: “Our men have fought without shoes before and without food and won victories. And they will fight again and win! I tell you General Johnston cannot be dislodged! The mountain fastnesses have always been the refuge and the strong forts of invaded peoples from ancient times. Think of — think of Thermopylae!”

Scarlett thought hard but Thermopylae meant nothing to her.

“They died to the last man at Thermopylae, didn’t they, Doctor?” Rhett asked, and his lips twitched with suppressed laughter.

“Are you being insulting, young man?”

“Doctor! I beg of you! You misunderstood me! I merely asked for information. My memory of ancient history is poor.”

“If need be, our army will die to the last man before they permit the Yankees to advance farther into Georgia,” snapped the doctor. “But it will not be. They will drive them out of Georgia in one skirmish.”

Aunt Pittypat rose hastily and asked Scarlett to favor them with a piano selection and a song. She saw that the conversation was rapidly getting into deep and stormy water

On the day when the first wounded from Kennesaw Mountain were coming in, Mrs. Merriwether’s carriage was at Aunt Pitty’s house at the unheard-of hour of seven in the morning, and black Uncle Levi sent up word that Scarlett must dress immediately and come to the hospital. Fanny Elsing and the Bonnell girls, roused early from slumber, were yawning on the back seat and the Elsings’ mammy sat grumpily on the box, a basket of freshly laundered bandages on her lap. Off Scarlett went, unwillingly for she had danced till dawn the night before at the Home Guard’s party and her feet were tired. She silently cursed the efficient and indefatigable Mrs. Merriwether, the wounded and the whole Southern Confederacy, as Prissy buttoned her in her oldest and raggedest calico frock which she used for hospital work. Gulping down the bitter brew of parched corn and dried sweet potatoes that passed for coffee, she went out to join the girls.

She was sick of all this nursing. This very day she would tell Mrs. Merriwether that Ellen had written her to come home for a visit. Much good this did her, for that worthy matron, her sleeves rolled up, her stout figure swathed in a large apron, gave her one sharp look and said: “Don’t let me hear any more such foolishness, Scarlett Hamilton. I’ll write your mother today and tell her how much we need you, and I’m sure she’ll understand and let you stay. Now, put on your apron and trot over to Dr. Meade. He needs someone to help with the dressings.”

“Oh, God,” thought Scarlett drearily, “that’s just the trouble. Mother will make me stay here and I shall die if I have to smell these stinks any longer! I wish I was an old lady so I could bully the young ones, instead of getting bullied — and tell old cats like Mrs. Merriwether to go to Halifax!”

Yes, she was sick of the hospital, the foul smells, the lice, the aching, unwashed bodies. Besides, these men wounded in the retreat were not so attractive as the earlier ones had been. They didn’t show the slightest interest in her and they had very little to say beyond: “How’s the fightin’ goin’? What’s Old Joe doin’ now?

The day was hot and the flies came in the open windows in swarms, fat lazy flies that broke the spirits of the men as pain could not. The tide of smells and pain rose and rose about her. Perspiration soaked through her freshly starched dress as she followed Dr. Meade about, a basin in her hand.

He touched up the mare with the whip and she trotted briskly across Five Points and across the railroad tracks that cut the town in two.

“I’m just sick and tired of that old hospital,” she said, settling her billowing skirts and tying her bonnet bow more firmly under her chin. “And every day more and more wounded come in. It’s all General Johnston’s fault. If he’d just stood up to the Yankees at Dalton, they’d have —”

“But he did stand up to the Yankees, you ignorant child. And if he’d kept on standing there, Sherman would have flanked him and crushed him between the two wings of his army. And he’d have lost the railroad and the railroad is what Johnston is fighting for.”

“Oh, well,” said Scarlett, on whom military strategy was utterly lost. “It’s his fault anyway. He ought to have done something about it and I think he ought to be removed. Why doesn’t he stand and fight instead of retreating?”

“You are like everyone else, screaming ‘Off with his head’ because he can’t do the impossible. He was Jesus the Savior at Dalton, and now he’s Judas the Betrayer at Kennesaw Mountain, all in six weeks. Yet, just let him drive the Yankees back twenty miles and he’ll be Jesus again. My child, Sherman has twice as many men as Johnston, and he can afford to lose two men for every one of our gallant laddies. And Johnston can’t afford to lose a single man. He needs reinforcements badly and what is he getting? ‘Joe Brown’s Pets.’ What a help they’ll be!”

“Is the militia really going to be called out? The Home Guard, too? I hadn’t heard. How do you know?”

“There’s a rumor floating about to that effect. The rumor arrived on the train from Milledgeville this morning. Both the militia and the Home Guards are going to be sent in to reinforce General Johnston. Yes, Governor Brown’s darlings are likely to smell powder at last, and I imagine most of them will be much surprised. Certainly they never expected to see action. The Governor as good as promised them they wouldn’t. Well, that’s a good joke on them. They thought they had bomb proofs because the Governor stood up to even Jeff Davis and refused to send them to Virginia. Said they were needed for the defense of their state. Who’d have ever thought the war would come to their own back yard and they’d really have to defend their state?”

“Oh, how can you laugh, you cruel thing! Think of the old gentlemen and the little boys in the Home Guard! Why, little Phil Meade will have to go and Grandpa Merriwether and Uncle Henry Hamilton.”

“I’m not talking about the little boys and the Mexican War veterans. I’m talking about brave young men like Willie Guinan who like to wear pretty uniforms and wave swords —”

“And yourself!”

(Big Sam. )

What on earth . . . ?" she began again.

Then her eyes lighted on a singing black buck in the front rank.
He stood nearly six and a half feet tall, a giant of a man,  Surely there wasn't a negro on earth as tall and loud voiced as this one except Big Sam.

As she half rose from her seat to look closer, the giant caught sight of her and his black face split in a grin of delighted recognition. He halted, dropped his shovel and started toward her, calling to the negroes nearest him: "Gawdlmighty! It's Miss Scarlett!

"Get back in line, you fellows! Get back, I tell you or I'll-- Why it's Mrs. Hamilton. Good morning, Ma'm, and you, too, sir.

"What are you boys doing so far from Tara? You've run away, I'll be bound. Don't you know the patterollers will get you sure?"  They bellowed pleasedly at the badinage.
"Runned away?" answered Big Sam. "No'm, us ain' runned away. Dey done sont an' tuck us, kase us wuz de fo' bigges' an' stronges' han's at Tara." His white teeth showed proudly. " Us is ter dig de ditches fer de wite gempmums ter hide in w'en de Yankees comes."  Captain Randall and the occupants of the carriage smothered smiles at this naive explanation of rifle pits.
" "What does it all mean, Captain Randall?"  "Oh, it's quite simple. We have to strengthen the fortifications of Atlanta with more miles of rifle pits, and the General can't spare any men from the front to do it. So we've been impressing the strongest bucks in the countryside for the work."  "But--"  A cold little fear was beginning to throb in Scarlett's breast.
More miles of rifle pits! Why should they need more? Within the last year, a series of huge earth redoubts with battery emplacements had been built all around Atlanta, one mile from the center of town. These great earth-works were connected with rifle pits and they ran, mile after mile, completely encircling the city.
More rifle pits!
"But--why should we be fortified any more than we are already fortified? We won't need what we've got. Surely, the General won't let--"  "Our present fortifications are only a mile from town," said Captain Randall shortly.

"And that's too close for comfort--or safety. These new ones are going to be farther away. You see, another retreat may bring our men into Atlanta."  Immediately he regretted his last remark, as her eyes widened with fear.

But, of course there won't be another retreat," he added hastily.
"The lines around Kennesaw Mountain are impregnable. The batteries are planted all up the mountain sides and they command the roads, and the Yankees can't possibly get by."  But Scarlett saw him drop his eyes before the lazy, penetrating look Rhett gave him, and she was frightened.

She remembered Rhett's remark: "When the Yankees push him out of the mountains and onto the flatter land, he'll be butchered."  "Oh, Captain, do you think--"  "Why, of course not! Don't fret your mind one minute. Old Joe just believes in taking precautions. That's the only reason we're digging more entrenchments. . . . But I must be going now. It's been pleasant, talking to you. . . . Say good-by to your mistress, boys, and let's get going."

  "Good-by, boys. Now, if you get sick or hurt or in trouble, let me know. I live right down Peachtree Street, down there in almost the last house at the end of town. Wait a minute--" She fumbled in her reticule. "Oh, dear, I haven't a cent. Rhett, give me a few shinplasters. Here, Big Sam, buy some tobacco for yourself and the boys. And be good and do what Captain Randall tells you."  The straggling line re-formed, the dust arose again in a red cloud as they moved off and Big Sam started up the singing again.

Don’t say that, Scarlett! Think of it, if you like, but never, never say it to a man. That’s the trouble with Yankee girls. They’d be most charming if they weren’t always telling you that they can take care of themselves, thank you. Generally they are telling the truth, God help them. And so men let them take care of themselves.”

“How you do run on,” she said coldly, for there was no insult worse than being likened to a Yankee girl. “I believe you’re lying about a siege. You know the Yankees will never get to Atlanta.”

“I’ll bet you they will be here within the month. I’ll bet you a box of bonbons against —” His dark eyes wandered to her lips. “Against a kiss.”

For a last brief moment, fear of a Yankee invasion clutched her heart but at the word “kiss,” she forgot about it. This was familiar ground and far more interesting than military operations. With difficulty she restrained a smile of glee. Since the day when he gave her the green bonnet, Rhett had made no advances which could in any way be construed as those of a lover. He could never be inveigled into personal conversations, try though she might, but now with no angling on her part, he was talking about kissing.

“I don’t care for such personal conversation,” she said coolly and managed a frown. “Besides, I’d just as soon kiss a pig.”

“There’s no accounting for tastes and I’ve always heard the Irish were partial to pigs — kept them under their beds, in fact. But, Scarlett, you need kissing badly. That’s what’s wrong with you. All your beaux have respected you too much, though God knows why, or they have been too afraid of you to really do right by you. The result is that you are unendurably uppity. You should be kissed and by someone who knows how.”

The conversation was not going the way she wanted it. It never did when she was with him. Always, it was a duel in which she was worsted.

“And I suppose you think you are the proper person?” she asked with sarcasm, holding her temper in check with difficulty.

“Oh, yes, if I cared to take the trouble,” he said carelessly. “They say I kiss very well.”

“Oh,” she began, indignant at the slight to her charms. “Why, you . . .” But her eyes fell in sudden confusion. He was smiling, but in the dark depths of his eyes a tiny light flickered for a brief moment, like a small raw flame.

“Of course, you’ve probably wondered why I never tried to follow up that chaste peck I gave you, the day I brought you that bonnet —”

“I have never —”

“Then you aren’t a nice girl, Scarlett, and I’m sorry to hear it. All really nice girls wonder when men don’t try to kiss them. They know they shouldn’t want them to and they know they must act insulted if they do, but just the same, they wish the men would try. . . . Well, my dear, take heart. Some day, I will kiss you and you will like it. But not now, so I beg you not to be too impatient.”

She knew he was teasing but, as always, his teasing maddened her. There was always too much truth in the things he said. Well, this finished him. If ever, ever he should be so ill bred as to try to take any liberties with her, she would show him.

For the first time since the war began, Atlanta could hear the sound of battle. In the early morning hours before the noises of the town awoke, the cannon at Kennesaw Mountain could be heard faintly, far away, a low dim booming that might have passed for summer thunder.
Sherman was at the very doors of Atlanta. Another retreat might bring the Confederates into the town.

Uncle Henry Hamilton marched in the rank behind Grandpa Merriwether, the collar of his long black coat turned up about his ears, two Mexican War pistols in his belt and a small carpetbag in his hand. Beside him marched his black valet who was nearly as old as Uncle Henry, with an open umbrella held over them both. Shoulder to shoulder with their elders came the young boys, none of them looking over sixteen. Many of them had run away from school to join the army.

As the artillery rumbled by, splashing mud into the watching crowds, a negro on a mule, riding close to a cannon caught her eye. He was a young, saddle-colored negro with a serious face, and when Scarlett saw him

she cried: “It’s Mose! Ashley’s Mose! Whatever is he doing here?” She fought her way through the crowd to the curb and called: “Mose! Stop!”

The boy seeing her, drew rein, smiled delightedly and started to dismount. A soaking sergeant, riding behind him, called: “Stay on that mule, boy, or I’ll light a fire under you! We got to git to the mountain some time.”
Uncertainly, Mose looked from the sergeant to Scarlett and she, splashing through the mud, close to the passing wheels, caught at Moses’ stirrup strap.
“Oh, just a minute, Sergeant! Don’t get down, Mose. What on earth are you doing here?”
“Ah’s off ter de war, agin, Miss Scarlett. Dis time wid Ole Mist’ John ‘stead ob Mist’ Ashley.”
“Mr. Wilkes!” Scarlett was stunned. Mr. Wilkes was nearly seventy. “Where is he?”
“Back wid de las’ cannon, Miss Scarlett. Back dar!”
“Sorry, lady. Move on, boy!”
Scarlett stood for a moment, ankle deep in mud as the guns lurched by. Oh, no! She thought. It can’t be. He’s too old. And he doesn’t like war any more than Ashley did!

When he saw her standing in the mud, Mr. Wilkes drew rein with a smile of pleasure and, dismounting, came toward her.

“I had hoped to see you, Scarlett. I was charged with so many messages from your people. But there was no time. We just got in this morning and they are rushing us out immediately, as you see.”

“Oh, Mr. Wilkes,” she cried desperately, holding his hand. “Don’t go! Why must you go?”
“Ah, so you think I’m too old!” he smiled, and it was Ashley’s smile in an older face. “Perhaps I am too old to march but not to ride and shoot. And Mrs. Tarleton so kindly lent me Nellie, so I am well mounted. I hope nothing happens to Nellie, for if something should happen to her, I could never go home and face Mrs. Tarleton. Nellie was the last horse she had left.” He was laughing now, turning away her fears. “Your mother and father and the girls are well and they sent you their love. Your father nearly came up with us today!”

“Oh, not Pa!” cried Scarlett in terror. “Not Pa! He isn’t going to the war, is he?”
“No, but he was. Of course, he can’t walk far with his stiff knee, but he was all for riding away with us. Your mother agreed, providing he was able to jump the pasture fence, for, she said, there would be a lot of rough riding to be done in the army. Your father thought that easy, but — would you believe it? When his horse came to the fence, he stopped dead and over his head went your father! It’s a wonder it didn’t break his neck! You know how obstinate he is. He got right up and tried it again. Well, Scarlett, he came off three times before Mrs. O’Hara and Pork assisted him to bed. He was in a taking about it, swearing that your mother had ‘spoken a wee word in the beast’s ear.’ He just isn’t up to active service, Scarlett. You need have no shame about it. After all, someone must stay home and raise crops for the army.”
Scarlett had no shame at all, only an active feeling of relief.
“I’ve sent India and Honey to Macon to stay with the Burrs and Mr. O’Hara is looking after Twelve Oaks as well as Tara. . . . I must go, my dear. Let me kiss your pretty face.”
Scarlett turned up her lips and there was a choking pain in her throat. She was so fond of Mr. Wilkes. Once, long ago, she had hoped to be his daughter-inlaw.
“And you must deliver this kiss to Pittypat and this to Melanie,” he said, kissing her lightly two more times. “And how is Melanie?”
“She is well.”
“Ah!” His eyes looked at her but through her, past her as Ashley’s had done, remote gray eyes looking on another world. “I should have liked to see my first grandchild. Good-by, my dear.”
He swung onto Nellie and cantered off, his hat in his hand, his silver hair bare to the rain. Scarlett had rejoined Maybelle and Mrs. Meade before the import of his last words broke upon her. Then in superstitious terror she crossed herself and tried to say a prayer. He had spoken of death, just as Ashley had done, and now Ashley — No one should ever speak of death! It was tempting Providence to mention death. As the three women started silently back to the hospital in the rain, Scarlett was praying: “Not him, too, God. Not him and Ashley, too!”

The railroad from Atlanta to Tennessee was now in Sherman’s hands for its full length. His army was across the railroad to the east and he had cut the railroad running southwest to Alabama. Only the one railroad to the south, to Macon and Savannah, was still open.
Scarlett and many other ladies sat on the flat roofs of stores, shaded by their tiny parasols, and watched the fighting on the day of the battle of Atlanta. But when shells began falling in the streets for the first time, they fled to the cellars, and that night the exodus of women, children and old people from the city began. Macon was their destination and many of those who took the train that night had already refugeed five and six times before, as Johnston fell back from Dalton.
Mrs. Merriwether and Mrs. Elsing refused to leave. They were needed at the hospital and furthermore, they said proudly, they weren’t afraid and no Yankees were going to run them out of their homes. But Maybelle and her baby and Fanny Elsing went to Macon. Mrs. Meade was disobedient for the first time in her married life and flatly refused to yield to the doctor’s command that she take the train to safety. The doctor needed her, she said. Moreover, Phil was somewhere in the trenches and she wanted to be near by in case . . .
But Mrs. Whiting went and many other ladies of Scarlett’s circle. Aunt Pitty, who had been the first to denounce Old Joe for his policy of retreat, was among the first to pack her trunks. Her nerves, she said, were delicate and she could not endure noises. She feared she might faint at an explosion and not be able to reach the cellar. No, she was not afraid. Her baby mouth tried to set in martial lines but failed. She’d go to Macon and stay with her cousin, old Mrs. Burr, and the girls should come with her.
Scarlett did not want to go to Macon. Frightened as she was of the shells, she’d rather stay in Atlanta than go to Macon, for she hated old Mrs. Burr cordially. Years ago, Mrs. Burr had said she was “fast” after catching her kissing her son Willie at one of the Wilkes’ house parties. No, she told Aunt Pitty, I’ll go home to Tara and Melly can go to Macon with you.
At this Melanie began to cry in a frightened, heartbroken way.

When Aunt Pitty fled to get Dr. Meade, Melanie caught Scarlett’s hand in hers, pleading:
“Dear, don’t go to Tara and leave me! I’ll be so lonely without you. Oh, Scarlett, I’d just die if you weren’t with me when the baby came! Yes — Yes, I know I’ve got Aunt Pitty and she is sweet. But after all, she’s never had a baby, and sometimes she makes me so nervous I could scream. Don’t desert me, darling. You’ve been just like a sister to me, and besides,” she smiled wanly, “you promised Ashley you’d take care of me. He told me he was going to ask you.”
Yes, she had promised Ashley she would look out for Melanie. Oh, Ashley! Ashley! you must be dead, dead these many months! And now your promise reaches out and clutches me!
“Well,” she said shortly, “I did promise him that and I don’t go back on my promises. But I won’t go to Macon and stay with that old Burr cat. I’d claw her eyes out in five minutes. I’m going home to Tara and you can come with me. Mother would love to have you.”
“Oh, I’d like that! Your mother is so sweet. But you know Auntie would just die if she wasn’t with me when the baby came, and I know she won’t go to Tara. It’s too close to the fighting, and Auntie wants to be safe.”

He stamped out of the room and waited on the front porch until Scarlett joined him.
“I shall talk frankly to you, Miss Scarlett,” he began, jerking at his gray beard. “You seem to be a young woman of common sense, so spare me your blushes. I do not want to hear any further talk about Miss Melly being moved. I doubt if she could stand the trip. She is going to have a difficult time, even in the best of circumstances — very narrow in the hips, as you know, and probably will need forceps for her delivery, so I don’t want any ignorant darky midwife meddling with her. Women like her should never have children, but — Anyway, you pack Miss Pitty’s trunk and send her to Macon. She’s so scared she’ll upset Miss Melly and that won’t do any good. And now, Miss,” he fixed her with a piercing glance, “I don’t want to hear about you going home, either. You stay with Miss Melly till the baby comes. Not afraid, are you?”
“Oh, no!” lied Scarlett, stoutly.
“That’s a brave girl. Mrs. Meade will give you whatever chaperonage you need and I’ll send over old Betsy to cook for you, if Miss Pitty wants to take her servants with her. It won’t be for long. The baby ought to be here in another five weeks, but you never can tell with first babies and all this shelling going on. It may come any day.”
So Aunt Pittypat went to Macon, in floods of tears, taking Uncle Peter and Cookie with her. The carriage and horse she donated to the hospital in a burst of patriotism which she immediately regretted and that brought on more tears. And Scarlett and Melanie were left alone with Wade and Prissy in a house that was much quieter, even though the cannonading continued.
In those first days of the siege, when the Yankees crashed here and there against the defenses of the city, Scarlett was so frightened by the bursting shells she could only cower helplessly, her hands over her ears, expecting every moment to be blown into eternity. When she heard the whistling screams that heralded their approach, she rushed to Melanie’s room and flung herself on the bed beside her, and the two clutched each other, screaming “Oh! Oh!” as they buried their heads in the pillows. Prissy and Wade scurried for the cellar and crouched in the cobwebbed darkness, Prissy squalling at the top of her voice and Wade sobbing and hiccoughing.
These matters she discussed with Prissy in whispers one evening, as they prepared Melanie’s supper tray, and Prissy, surprisingly enough, calmed her fears.
“Miss Scarlett, effen we kain git de doctah w’en Miss Melly’s time come, doan you bodder. Ah kin manage. Ah knows all ‘bout birthin’. Ain’ mah ma a midwife? Ain’ she raise me ter be a midwife, too? Jes’ you leave it ter me.
Often in the late night hours, when the lamps were out and Melanie asleep and deathly silence pressed over the town, Scarlett, lying awake, heard the latch of the front gate click and soft urgent tappings on the front door.
Always, faceless soldiers stood on the dark porch and from the darkness many different voices spoke to her. Sometimes a cultured voice came from the shadows: “Madam, my abject apologies for disturbing you, but could I have water for myself and my horse?” Sometimes it was the hard burring of a mountain voice, sometimes the odd nasals of the flat Wiregrass country to the far south, occasionally the lulling drawl of the Coast that caught at her heart, reminding her of Ellen’s voice.
“Missy, I got a pardner here who I wuz aimin’ ter git ter the horsepittle but looks like he ain’t goin’ ter last that fer. Kin you take him in?”
“Lady, I shore could do with some vittles. I’d shore relish a corn pone if it didn’t deprive you none.”
“Madam, forgive my intrusion but — could I spend the night on your porch? I saw the roses and smelled the honeysuckle and it was so much like home that I was emboldened —”

Rhett Butler

She heard the front gate click and she hastily raised her head and dashed her hand across her wet eyes. She rose and saw it was Rhett Butler coming up the walk, carrying his wide Panama hat in his hand. She had not seen him since the day when she had alighted from his carriage so precipitously at Five Points. On that occasion, she had expressed the desire never to lay eyes on him again. But she was so glad now to have someone to talk to, someone to divert her thoughts from Ashley, that she hastily put the memory from her mind. Evidently he had forgotten the contretemps, or pretended to have forgotten it, for he settled himself on the top step at her feet without mention of their late difference.

“So you didn’t refugee to Macon! I heard that Miss Pitty had retreated and, of course, I thought you had gone too. So, when I saw your light I came here to investigate. Why did you stay?”

“To keep Melanie company. You see, she — well, she can’t refugee just now.”

“Thunderation,” he said, and in the lamplight she saw that he was frowning. “You don’t mean to tell me Mrs. Wilkes is still here? I never heard of such idiocy. It’s quite dangerous for her in her condition.”

Scarlett was silent, embarrassed, for Melanie’s condition was not a subject she could discuss with a man. She was embarrassed, too, that Rhett should know it was dangerous for Melanie. Such knowledge sat ill upon a bachelor.

“It’s quite ungallant of you not to think that I might get hurt too,” she said tartly.

His eyes flickered with amusement.

“I’d back you against the Yankees any day.”

“I’m not sure that that’s a compliment,” she said uncertainly.

“It isn’t,” he answered. “When will you stop looking for compliments in men’s lightest utterances?”

“When I’m on my deathbed,” she replied and smiled, thinking that there would always be men to compliment her, even if Rhett never did.

“Vanity, vanity,” he said. “At least, you are frank about it.”

He opened his cigar case, extracted a black cigar and held it to his nose for a moment. A match flared, he leaned back against a post and, clasping his hands about his knees, smoked a while in silence. Scarlett resumed her rocking and the still darkness of the warm night closed about them. The mockingbird, which nested in the tangle of roses and honeysuckle, roused from slumber and gave one timid, liquid note. Then, as if thinking better of the matter, it was silent again.

From the shadow of the porch, Rhett suddenly laughed, a low, soft laugh.

“So you stayed with Mrs. Wilkes! This is the strangest situation I ever encountered!”

“I see nothing strange about it,” she answered uncomfortably, immediately on the alert.

Finally a courier came up from Jonesboro with the reassuring news that the Yankees had been beaten back. But they had made a sortie into Jonesboro, burned the depot, cut the telegraph wires and torn up three miles of track before they retreated.

No, the Yankees hadn’t gotten to Tara. The same courier who brought the dispatches to General Hood assured Scarlett of that. He had met Gerald in Jonesboro after the battle, just as he was starting to Atlanta, and Gerald had begged him to bring a letter to her.

But what was Pa doing in Jonesboro? The young courier looked ill at ease as he made answer. Gerald was hunting for an army doctor to go to Tara with him.

As she stood in the sunshine on the front porch, thanking the young man for his trouble, Scarlett felt her knees go weak. Carreen must be dying if she was so far beyond Ellen’s medical skill that Gerald was hunting a doctor! As the courier went off in a small whirlwind of red dust, Scarlett tore open Gerald’s letter with fingers that trembled. So great was the shortage of paper in the Confederacy now that Gerald’s note was written between the lines of her last letter to him and reading it was difficult.

“Dear Daughter, Your Mother and both girls have the typhoid. They are very ill but we must hope for the best. When your mother took to her bed she bade me write you that under no condition were you to come home and expose yourself and Wade to the disease. She sends her love and bids you pray for her.”

“Pray for her!” Scarlett flew up the stairs to her room and, dropping on her knees by the bed, prayed as she had never prayed before. No formal Rosaries now but the same words over and over: “Mother of God, don’t let her die! I’ll be so good if you don’t let her die! Please, don’t let her die!”

For the next week Scarlett crept about the house like a stricken animal, waiting for news, starting at every sound of horses’ hooves, rushing down the dark stair at night when soldiers came tapping at the door, but no news came from Tara. The width of the continent might have spread between her and home instead of twenty-five miles of dusty road.

The mails were still disrupted, no one knew where the Confederates were or what the Yankees were up to. No one knew anything except that thousands of soldiers, gray and blue, were somewhere between Atlanta and Jonesboro. Not a word from Tara in a week.

From the kitchen below, she heard the rattle of china as Prissy prepared breakfast, but no sound of Mrs. Meade’s Betsy. The shrill, melancholy minor of Prissy was raised, “Jes’ a few mo’ days, ter tote de wee-ry load . . .” The song grated on Scarlett, its sad implications frightening her, and slipping on a wrapper she pattered out into the hall and to the back stairs and shouted: “Shut up that singing, Prissy!”

A sullen “Yas’m” drifted up to her and she drew a deep breath, feeling suddenly ashamed of herself.

“Where’s Betsy?”

“Ah doan know. She ain’ came.”

Scarlett walked to Melanie’s door and opened it a crack, peering into the sunny room. Melanie lay in bed in her nightgown, her eyes closed and circled with black, her heart-shaped face bloated, her slender body hideous and distorted. Scarlett wished viciously that Ashley could see her now. She looked worse than any pregnant woman she had ever seen. As she looked, Melanie’s eyes opened and a soft warm smile lit her face.

“Come in,” she invited, turning awkwardly on her side. “I’ve been awake since sun-up thinking, and, Scarlett, there’s something I want to ask you.”

She entered the room and sat down on the bed that was glaring with harsh sunshine.

Melanie reached out and took Scarlett’s hand in a gentle confiding clasp.

“Dear,” she said, “I’m sorry about the cannon. It’s toward Jonesboro, isn’t it?”

Scarlett said “Um,” her heart beginning to beat faster as the thought recurred.

“I know how worried you are. I know you’d have gone home last week when you heard about your mother, if it hadn’t been for me. Wouldn’t you?”

“Yes,” said Scarlett ungraciously.

“Scarlett, darling. You’ve been so good to me. No sister could have been sweeter or braver. And I love you for it. I’m so sorry I’m in the way.”

Scarlett stared. Loved her, did she? The fool!

“And Scarlett, I’ve been lying here thinking and I want to ask a very great favor of you.” Her clasp tightened. “If I should die, will you take my baby?”

Melanie’s eyes were wide and bright with soft urgency.

“Will you?”

Scarlett jerked away her hand as fear swamped her. Fear roughened her voice as she spoke.

Oh, don’t be a goose, Melly. You aren’t going to die. Every woman thinks she’s going to die with her first baby. I know I did.”

“No, you didn’t. You’ve never been afraid of anything. You are just saying that to try to cheer me up. I’m not afraid to die but I’m so afraid to leave the baby, if Ashley is — Scarlett, promise me that you’ll take my baby if I should die. Then I won’t be afraid. Aunt Pittypat is too old to raise a child and Honey and India are sweet but — I want you to have my baby. Promise me, Scarlett. And if it’s a boy, bring him up like Ashley, and if it’s a girl — dear, I’d like her to be like you.”

“God’s nightgown!” cried Scarlett, leaping from the bed. “Aren’t things bad enough without you talking about dying?”

“I’m sorry, dear. But promise me. I think it’ll be today. I’m sure it’ll be today. Please promise me.”

“Oh, all right, I promise,” said Scarlett, looking down at her in bewilderment

Why do you think it will be today, Melly?”

“I’ve been having pains since dawn — but not very bad ones.”

“You have? Well, why didn’t you call me? I’ll send Prissy for Dr. Meade.”

“No, don’t do that yet, Scarlett. You know how busy he is, how busy they all are. Just send word to him that we’ll need him some time today. Send over to Mrs. Meade’s and tell her and ask her to come over and sit with me. She’ll know when to really send for him.”

“Oh, stop being so unselfish. You know you need a doctor as much as anybody in the hospital. I’ll send for him right away.”

“No, please don’t. Sometimes it takes all day having a baby and I just couldn’t let the doctor sit here for hours when all those poor boys need him so much. Just send for Mrs. Meade. She’ll know.”

“Oh, all right,” said Scarlett.

When he had finished she sent him off to the back yard to play and watched him toddle across the straggling grass to his playhouse with great relief.

She rose and went out onto the front porch and looked for them impatiently, but the Meade house was around a shady bend in the street and she could see no one. After a long while Prissy came into view, alone, switching her skirts from side to side and looking over her shoulder to observe the effect.

“You’re as slow as molasses in January,” snapped Scarlett as Prissy opened the gate. “What did Mrs. Meade say? How soon will she be over here?”

“She warn’t dar,” said Prissy.

“Where is she? When will she be home?”

“Well’m,” answered Prissy, dragging out her words pleasurably to give more weight to her message. “Dey Cookie say Miss Meade done got wud early dis mawnin’ dat young Mist’ Phil done been shot

Scarlett stared at her and had an impulse to shake her. Negroes were always so proud of being the bearers of evil tidings.

“Well, don’t stand there like a ninny. Go down to Mrs. Merriwether’s and ask her to come up or send her mammy. Now, hurry.”

“Dey ain’ dar, Miss Scarlett. Ah drapped in ter pass time of de day wid Mammy on mah way home. Dey’s done gone. House all locked up. Spec dey’s at de horsepittle.”

“So that’s where you were so long! Whenever I send you somewhere you go where I tell you and don’t stop to ‘pass any time’ with anybody. Go —”

She stopped and racked her brain. Who was left in town among their friends who would be helpful? There was Mrs. Elsing. Of course, Mrs. Elsing didn’t like her at all these days but she had always been fond of Melanie.

“Go to Mrs. Elsing’s, and explain everything very carefully and tell her to please come up here. And, Prissy, listen to me. Miss Melly’s baby is due and she may need you any minute now. Now you hurry right straight back.”

“Yas’m,” said Prissy and, turning, sauntered down the walk at snail’s gait.

“Hurry, you slow poke!”

“Yas’m.”

Prissy quickened her gait

In front of the Bonnell house, old Amos stood holding the head of the carriage horse and he greeted Scarlett with rolling eyes.

“Ain’t you gone yit, Miss Scarlett? We is goin’ now. Ole Miss packin’ her bag.”

“Going? Where?”

“Gawd knows, Miss. Somewheres. De Yankees is comin’!”

She hurried on, not even saying good-by. The Yankees were coming! At Wesley Chapel, she paused to catch her breath and wait for her hammering heart to subside. If she did not quiet herself she would certainly faint. As she stood clutching a lamp post for support, she saw an officer on horseback come charging up the street from Five Points and, on an impulse, she ran out into the street and waved at him.

“Oh, stop! Please, stop!”

He reined in so suddenly the horse went back on its haunches, pawing the air. There were harsh lines of fatigue and urgency in his face but his tattered gray hat was off with a sweep.

“Madam?”

“Tell me, is it true? Are the Yankees coming?”

“I’m afraid so.”

“Do you know so?”

“Yes, Ma’m. I know so. A dispatch came in to headquarters half an hour ago from the fighting at Jonesboro.”

“At Jonesboro? Are you sure?”

“I’m sure. There’s no use telling pretty lies, Madam. The message was from General Hardee and it said: ‘I have lost the battle and am in full retreat.’”

“Oh, my God!”

The dark face of the tired man looked down without emotion. He gathered the reins again and put on his hat.

“Oh, sir, please, just a minute. What shall we do?”

“Madam, I can’t say. The army is evacuating Atlanta soon.”

“Going off and leaving us to the Yankees?”

“I’m afraid so.”

She braced her shoulders and went down among them, straining her eyes among the upright figures to distinguish Dr. Meade. But she discovered she could not look for him, for if she did not step carefully she would tread on some poor soldier. She raised her skirts and tried to pick her way among them toward a knot of men who were directing the stretcher bearers.

As she walked, feverish hands plucked at her skirt and voices croaked: “Lady — water! Please, lady, water! For Christ’s sake, water!”

“Dr. Meade! Is Dr. Meade there?”

From the group one man detached himself and looked toward her. It was the doctor. He was coatless and his sleeves were rolled up to his shoulders. His shirt and trousers were as red as a butcher’s and even the end of his iron-gray beard was matted with blood. His face was the face of a man drunk with fatigue and impotent rage and burning pity. It was gray and dusty, and sweat had streaked long rivulets across his cheeks. But his voice was calm and decisive as he called to her.

“Thank God, you are here. I can use every pair of hands.”

For a moment she stared at him bewildered

“Hurry, child! Come here.”

She picked up her skirts and went to him as fast as she could go across the rows of bodies. She put her hand on his arm and felt that it was trembling with weariness but there was no weakness in his face.

“Oh, Doctor!” she cried. “You must come. Melanie is having her baby.”

He looked at her as if her words did not register on his mind. A man who lay upon the ground at her feet, his head pillowed on his canteen, grinned up companionably at her words.

“They will do it,” he said cheerfully.

She did not even look down but shook the doctor’s arm.

“It’s Melanie. The baby. Doctor, you must come. She — the —” This was no time for delicacy but it was hard to bring out the words with the ears of hundreds of strange men listening.

“The pains are getting hard. Please, Doctor!”

“A baby? Great God!” thundered the doctor and his face was suddenly contorted with hate and rage, a rage not directed at her or at anyone except a world wherein such things could happen. “Are you crazy? I can’t leave these men. They are dying, hundreds of them. I can’t leave them for a damned baby. Get some woman to help you. Get my wife.”

No, you must come, Doctor. You know you said she’d have a hard time —” Was it really she, Scarlett, standing here saying these dreadful indelicate things at the top of her voice in this hell of heat and groans? “She’ll die if you don’t come!”

He shook off her hand roughly and spoke as though he hardly heard her, hardly knew what she said.

“Die? Yes, they’ll all die — all these men. No bandages, no salves, no quinine, no chloroform. Oh, God, for some morphia! Just a little morphia for the worst ones. Just a little chloroform. God damn the Yankees! God damn the Yankees!”

“Give um hell, Doctor!” said the man on the ground, his teeth showing in his beard.

Scarlett began to shake and her eyes burned with tears of fright. The doctor wasn’t coming with her. Melanie would die and she had wished that she would die. The doctor wasn’t coming.

“Name of God, Doctor! Please!”

Dr. Meade bit his lip and his jaw hardened as his face went cool again.

“Child, I’ll try. I can’t promise you. But I’ll try. When we get these men tended to. The Yankees are coming and the troops are moving out of town. I don’t know what they’ll do with the wounded. There aren’t any trains. The Macon line has been captured. . . . But I’ll try. Run along now. Don’t bother me. There’s nothing much to bringing a baby. Just tie up the cord . . . .”

He turned as an orderly touched his arm and began firing directions and pointing to this and that wounded man. The man at her feet looked up at Scarlett compassionately. She turned away, for the doctor had forgotten her.

She picked her way rapidly through the wounded and back to Peachtree Street.

When she came in sight of the house, she saw Wade swinging on the front gate. When he saw her, his face puckered and he began to cry, holding up a grubby bruised finger.

“Hurt!” he sobbed. “Hurt!”

“Hush! Hush! Hush! Or I’ll spank you. Go out in the back yard and make mud pies and don’t move from there.”

“Wade hungwy,” he sobbed and put the hurt finger in his mouth.

“I don’t care. Go in the back yard and —”

She looked up and saw Prissy leaning out of the upstairs window, fright and worry written on her face; but in an instant they were wiped away in relief as she saw her mistress.

“Is de doctah come?”

“No. He can’t come.”

“Gawd, Miss Scarlett! Miss Melly bad off!”

“The doctor can’t come. Nobody can come. You’ve got to bring the baby and I’ll help you.”

Prissy’s mouth fell open and her tongue wagged wordlessly. She looked at Scarlett sideways and scuffed her feet and twisted her thin body.

“Don’t look so simple minded!” cried Scarlett, infuriated at her silly expression. “What’s the matter?”

Prissy edged back up the stairs.

“Fo’ Gawd, Miss Scarlett —” Fright and shame were in her rolling eyes.

“Well?”

“Fo’ Gawd, Miss Scarlett! We’s got ter have a doctah. Ah — Ah — Miss Scarlett, Ah doan know nuthin’ ‘bout bringin’ babies. Maw wouldn’ nebber lemme be ‘round folkses whut wuz havin’ dem.”

All the breath went out of Scarlett’s lungs in one gasp of horror before rage swept her. Prissy made a lunge past her, bent on flight, but Scarlett grabbed her.

“You black liar — what do you mean? You’ve been saying you knew everything about birthing babies. What is the truth? Tell me!” She shook her until the kinky head rocked drunkenly.

“Ah’s lyin’, Miss Scarlett! Ah doan know huccome Ah tell sech a lie. Ah jes’ see one baby birthed, an’ Maw she lak ter wo’ me out fer watchin’.”

Scarlett glared at her and Prissy shrank back, trying to pull loose. For a moment her mind refused to accept the truth, but when realization finally came to her that Prissy knew no more about midwifery than she did, anger went over her like a flame. She had never struck a slave in all her life, but now she slapped the black cheek with all the force in her tired arm. Prissy screamed at the top of her voice, more from fright than pain, and began to dance up and down, writhing to break Scarlett’s grip.

As she screamed, the moaning from the second floor ceased and a moment later Melanie’s voice, weak and trembling, called: “Scarlett? Is it you? Please come! Please!”

Scarlett dropped Prissy’s arm and the wench sank whimpering to the steps. For a moment Scarlett stood still, looking up, listening to the low moaning which had begun again.

She did recall a few things and she spoke to Prissy rapidly, authority in her voice.

“Build a fire in the stove and keep hot water boiling in the kettle. And bring up all the towels you can find and that ball of twine. And get me the scissors. Don’t come telling me you can’t find them. Get them and get them quick. Now hurry.”

She jerked Prissy to her feet and sent her kitchenwards with a shove. Then she squared her shoulders and started up the stairs. It was going to be difficult, telling Melanie that she and Prissy were to deliver her baby.