经典英文名著阅读赏析-《飘》节选

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《飘》节选

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《飘》节选》，供大家参考。更多内容请看本 站频道。

THE WAR went on, successfully for the most part, but

people had stopped saying “One more victory and the war is

over,” just as they had stopped saying the Yankees were

cowards. It was obvious to all now that the Yankees were far

from cowardly and that it would take more than one victory to

conquer them. However, there were the Confederate victories

in Tennessee scored by General Morgan and General Forrest and

the triumph at the Second Battle of Bull Run hung up like

visible Yankee scalps to gloat over. But there was a heavy

price on these scalps. The hospitals and homes of Atlanta

were overflowing with the sick and wounded, and more and more

women were appearing in black. The monotonous rows of

soldiers’ graves at Oakland Cemetery stretched longer every

day.

Confederate money had dropped alarmingly and the price of

food and clothing had risen accordingly. The commissary was

laying such heavy levies on foodstuffs that the tables of

Atlanta were beginning to suffer. White flour was scarce and

so expensive that corn bread was universal instead of

biscuits, rolls and waffles. The butcher shops carried almost

no beef and very little mutton, and that mutton cost so much

only the rich could afford it. However there was still plenty

of hog meat, as well as chickens and vegetables.

The Yankee blockade about the Confederate ports had

tightened, and luxuries such as tea, coffee, silks, whalebone

stays, colognes, fashion magazines and books were scarce and

dear. Even the cheapest cotton goods had skyrocketed in price

and ladies were regretfully making their old dresses do

another season. Looms that had gathered dust for years had

been brought down from attics, and there were webs of

homespun to be found in nearly every parlor. Everyone,

soldiers, civilians, women, children and negroes, began to

wear homespun. Gray, as the color of the Confederate uniform,

practically disappeared and homespun of a butternut shade

took its place.

Already the hospitals were worrying about the scarcity of

quinine, calomel, opium, chloroform and iodine. Linen and

cotton bandages were too precious now to be thrown away when

used, and every lady who nursed at the hospitals brought home

baskets of bloody strips to be washed and ironed and returned

for use on other sufferers.

But to Scarlett, newly emerged from the chrysalis of

widowhood, all the war meant was a time of gaiety and

excitement. Even the small privations of clothing and food

did not annoy her, so happy was she to be in the world again.

When she thought of the dull times of the past year, with

the days going by one very much like another, life seemed to

have quickened to an incredible speed. Every day dawned as an

exciting adventure, a day in which she would meet new men who

would ask to call on her, tell her how pretty she was, and

how it was a privilege to fight and, perhaps, to die for her.

She could and did love Ashley with the last breath in her

body, but that did not prevent her from inveigling other men

into asking to marry her.

The ever-present war in the background lent a pleasant

informality to social relations, an informality which older

people viewed with alarm. Mothers found strange men calling

on their daughters, men who came without letters of

introduction and whose antecedents were unknown. To their

horror, mothers found their daughters holding hands with

these men. Mrs. Merriwether, who had never kissed her husband

until after the wedding ceremony, could scarcely believe her

eyes when she caught Maybelle kissing the little Zouave, René

Picard, and her consternation was even greater when Maybelle

refused to be ashamed. Even the fact that René immediately

asked for her hand did not improve matters. Mrs. Merriwether

felt that the South was heading for a complete moral collapse

and frequently said so. Other mothers concurred heartily with

her and blamed it on the war.

But men who expected to die within a week or a month

could not wait a year before they begged to call a girl by

her first name, with “Miss,” of course, preceding it. Nor

would they go through the formal and protracted courtships

which good manners had prescribed before the war. They were

likely to propose in three or four months. And girls who knew

very well that a lady always refused a gentleman the first

three times he proposed rushed headlong to accept the first

time.

This informality made the war a lot of fun for Scarlett.

Except for the messy business of nursing and the bore of

bandage rolling, she did not care if the war lasted forever.

In fact, she could endure the hospital with equanimity now

because it was a perfect happy hunting ground. The helpless

wounded succumbed to her charms without a struggle. Renew

their bandages, wash their faces, pat up their pillows and

fan them, and they fell in love. Oh, it was Heaven after the

last dreary year!

Scarlett was back again where she had been before she

married Charles and it was as if she had never married him,

never felt the shock of his death, never borne Wade. War and

marriage and childbirth had passed over her without touching

any deep chord within her and she was unchanged. She had a

child but he was cared for so well by the others in the red

brick house she could almost forget him. In her mind and

heart, she was Scarlett O’Hara again, the belle of the

County. Her thoughts and activities were the same as they had

been in the old days, but the field of her activities had

widened immensely. Careless of the disapproval of Aunt

Pitty’s friends, she behaved as she had behaved before her

marriage, went to parties, danced, went riding with soldiers,

flirted, did everything she had done as a girl, except stop

wearing mourning. This she knew would be a straw that would

break the backs of Pittypat and Melanie. She was as charming

a widow as she had been a girl, pleasant when she had her own

way, obliging as long as it did not discommode her, vain of

her looks and her popularity.

She was happy now where a few weeks before she had been

miserable, happy with her beaux and their reassurances of her

charm, as happy as she could be with Ashley married to

Melanie and in danger. But somehow it was easier to bear the

thought of Ashley belonging to some one else when he was far

away. With the hundreds of miles stretching between Atlanta

and Virginia, he sometimes seemed as much hers as Melanie’s.

So the autumn months of 1862 went swiftly by with nursing,

dancing, driving and bandage rolling taking up all the time

she did not spend on brief visits to Tara. These visits were

disappointing, for she had little opportunity for the long

quiet talks with her mother to which she looked forward while

in Atlanta, no time to sit by Ellen while she sewed, smelling

the faint fragrance of lemon verbena sachet as her skirts

rustled, feeling her soft hands on her cheek in a gentle

caress.

Ellen was thin and preoccupied now and on her feet from

morning until long after the plantation was asleep. The

demands of the Confederate commissary were growing heavier by

the month, and hers was the task of making Tara produce. Even

Gerald was busy, for the first time in many years, for he

could

get no overseer to take Jonas Wilkerson’s place and he

was riding his own acres. With Ellen too busy for more than a

goodnight kiss and Gerald in the fields all day, Scarlett

found Tara boring. Even her sisters were taken up with their

own concerns. Suelle

n had now come to an “understanding”

with Frank Kennedy and sang “When This Cruel War Is Over”

with an arch meaning Scarlett found well-nigh unendurable,

and Carreen was too wrapped up in dreams of Brent Tarleton to

be interesting company.

Though Scarlett always went home to Tara with a happy

heart, she was never sorry when the inevitable letters came

from Pitty and Melanie, begging her to return. Ellen always

sighed at these times, saddened by the thought of her oldest

daughter and her only grandchild leaving her.

“But I mustn’t be selfish and keep you here when you

are needed to nurse in Atlanta,” she said. “Only—

only, my

darling, it seems that I never get the time to talk to you

and to feel that you are my own little girl again before you

are gone fro

m me.”

“I’m always your little girl,” Scarlett would say and

bury her head upon Ellen’s breast, her guilt rising up to

accuse her. She did not tell her mother that it was the

dancing and the beaux which drew her back to Atlanta and not

the service of the Confederacy. There were many things she

kept from her mother these days. But, most of all, she kept

secret the fact that Rhett Butler called frequently at Aunt

Pittypat’s house.

During the months that followed the bazaar, Rhett called

whenever he was in town, taking Scarlett riding in his

carriage, escorting her to danceables and bazaars and waiting

outside the hospital to drive her home. She lost her fear of

his betraying her secret, but there always lurked in the back

of her mind the disquieting memory that he had seen her at

her worst and knew the truth about Ashley. It was this

knowledge that checked her tongue when he annoyed her. And he

annoyed her frequently.

He was in his mid-thirties, older than any beau she had

ever had, and she was as helpless as a child to control and

handle him as she had handled beaux nearer her own age. He

always looked as if nothing had ever surprised him and much

had amused him and, when he had gotten her into a speechless

temper, she felt that she amused him more than anything in

the world. Frequently she flared into open wrath under his

expert baiting, for she had Gerald’s Irish temper along with

the deceptive sweetness of face she had inherited from Ellen.

Heretofore she had never bothered to control her temper

except

in Ellen’s presence. Now it was painful to have to

choke back words for fear of his amused grin. If only he

would ever lose his temper too, then she would not feel at

such a disadvantage.

After tilts with him from which she seldom emerged the

victor she vowed he was impossible, ill-bred and no gentleman

and she would have nothing more to do with him. But sooner or

later, he returned to Atlanta, called, presumably on Aunt

Pitty, and presented Scarlett, with overdone gallantry, a box

of bonbons he had brought her from Nassau. Or preempted a

seat by her at a musicale or claimed her at a dance, and she

was usually so amused by his bland impudence that she laughed

and overlooked his past misdeeds until the next occurred.

For all his exasperating qualities, she grew to look

forward to his calls. There was something exciting about him

that she could not analyze, something different from any man

she had ever known. There was something breathtaking in the

grace of his big body which made his very entrance into a

room like an abrupt physical impact, something in the

impertinence and bland mockery of his dark eyes that

challenged her spirit to subdue him.

“It’s almost like I was in love with him!” she thought,

bewildered. “But I’m not and I just can’t understand it.”

But the exciting feeling persisted. When he came to call,

his complete masculinity made Aunt Pitty’s well

-bred and

ladylike house seem small, pale and a trifle fusty. Scarlett

was not the only member of the household who reacted

strangely and unwillingly to his presence, for her kept Aunt

Pitty in a flutter and a ferment.

While Pitty knew Ellen would disapprove of his calls on

her daughter, and knew also that the edict of Charleston

banning him from polite society was not one to be lightly

disregarded, she could no more resist his elaborate

compliments and hand kissing than a fly can resist a honey

pot. Moreover, he usually brought her some little gift from

Nassau which he assured her he had purchased especially for

her and blockaded in at risk of his life

—

papers of pins and

needles, buttons, spools of silk thread and hairpins. It was

almost impossible to obtain these small luxuries now

—

ladies

were wearing hand-whittled wooden hairpins and covering

acrons with cloth for buttons

—

and Pitty lacked the moral

stamina to refuse them. Besides, she had a childish love of

surprise packages and could not resist opening his gifts. And,

having once opened them, she did not feel that she could

refuse them. Then, having accepted his gifts, she could not

summon courage enough to tell him his reputation made it

improper for him to call on three lone women who had no male

protector. Aunt Pitty always felt that she needed a male

protector when Rhett Butler was in the house.

“I don’t know what it is about him,” she would

sigh

helplessly. “But—well, I think he’d be a nice, attractive

man if I could just feel that

—

well, that deep down in his

heart he respected women.”

Since the return of her wedding ring, Melanie had felt

that Rhett was a gentleman of rare refinement and delicacy

and she was shocked at this remark. He was unfailingly

courteous to her, but she was a little timid with him,

largely because she was shy with any man she had not known

from childhood. Secretly she was very sorry for him, a

feeling which would have amused him had he been aware of it.

She was certain that some romantic sorrow had blighted his

life and made him hard and bitter, and she felt that what he

needed was the love of a good woman. In all her sheltered

life she had never seen evil and could scarcely credit its

existence, and when gossip whispered things about Rhett and

the girl in Charleston she was shocked and unbelieving. And,

instead of turning her against him, it only made her more

timidly gracious toward him because of her indignation at

what she fancied was a gross injustice done him.

Scarlett silently agreed with Aunt Pitty. She, too, felt

that he had no respect for any woman, unless perhaps for

Melanie. She still felt unclothed every time his eyes ran up

and down her figure. It was not that he ever said anything.

Then she could have scorched him with hot words. It was the

bold way his eyes looked out of his swarthy face with a

displeasing air of insolence, as if all women were his

property to be enjoyed in his own good time. Only with

Melanie was this look absent. There was never that cool look

of appraisal, never mockery in his eyes, when he looked at

Melanie; and there was an especial note in his voice when he

spoke to her, courteous, respectful, anxious to be of service.

“I don’t see why you’re so much nicer to her than to

me,” said Scarlett petulantly, one afternoon when Melanie

and Pitty had retired to take their naps and she was alone

with him.

For an hour she had watched Rhett hold the yarn Melanie

was winding for knitting, had noted the blank inscrutable

expression when Melanie talked at length and with pride of

Ashley and his promotion. Scarlett knew Rhett had no exalted

opinion of Ashley and cared nothing at all about the fact

that he had been made a major. Yet he made polite replies and

murmured the correct things about Ashley’s gallantry.

And if I so much as mention Ashley’s name, she had

thought irritably, he cocks his eyebrow up and smiles that

nasty, knowing smile!

“I’m much prettier than she is,” she continued, “and

I don’t see why you’re nicer to her.”

“Dare I hope that you are jealous?”

“Oh, don’t presume!”

“Another hope crushed. If I am ‘nicer’ to Mrs. Wilkes,

it is because she deserves it. She is one of the very few

kind, sincere and unselfish persons I have ever known. But

perhaps you have failed to note these qualities. And moreover,

for all her youth, she is one of the few great ladies I have

ever been privileged to know.”

“Do you mean to say you don’t think I’m a great lady,

too?”

“I thin

k we agreed on the occasion of our first meeting

that you were no lady at all.”

“Oh, if you are going to be hateful and rude enough to

bring that up again! How can you hold that bit of childish

temper against me? That was so long ago and I’ve grown up

si

nce then and I’d forget all about it if you weren’t

always harping and hinting about it.”

“I don’t think it was childish temper and I don’t

believe you’ve changed. You are just as capable now as then

of throwing vases if you don’t get your own way. But y

ou

usually get your way now. And so there’s no necessity for

broken bric-a-

brac.”

“Oh, you are—I wish I was a man! I’d call you out

and

—”

“And get killed for your pains. I can drill a dime at

fifty yards. Better stick to your own weapons

—

dimples, vases

and the like.”

“You are just a rascal.”

“Do you expect me to fly into a rage at that? I am sorry

to disappoint you. You can’t make me mad by calling me names

that are true. Certainly I’m a rascal, and why not? It’s a

free country and a man may be a ra

scal if he chooses. It’s

only hypocrites like you, my dear lady, just as black at

heart but trying to hide it, who become enraged when called

by their right names.”

She was helpless before his calm smile and his drawling

remarks, for she had never before met anyone who was so

completely impregnable. Her weapons of scorn, coldness and

abuse blunted in her hands, for nothing she could say would

shame him. It had been her experience that the liar was the

hottest to defend his veracity, the coward his courage, the

ill-bred his gentlemanliness, and the cad his honor. But not

Rhett. He admitted everything and laughed and dared her to

say more.

He came and went during these months, arriving unheralded

and leaving without saying good-by. Scarlett never discovered

just what business brought him to Atlanta, for few other

blockaders found it necessary to come so far away from the

coast. They landed their cargoes at Wilmington or Charleston,

where they were met by swarms of merchants and speculators

from all over the South who assembled to buy blockaded goods

at auction. It would have pleased her to think that he made

these trips to see her, but even her abnormal vanity refused

to believe this. If he had ever once made love to her, seemed

jealous of the other men who crowded about her, even tried to

hold her hand or begged for a picture or a handkerchief to

cherish, she would have thought triumphantly he had been

caught by her charms. But he remained annoyingly unloverlike

and, worst of all, seemed to see through all her maneuverings

to bring him to his knees.

Whenever he came to town, there was a feminine fluttering.

Not only did the romantic aura of the dashing blockader hang

about him but there was also the titillating element of the

wicked and the forbidden. He had such a bad reputation! And

every time the matrons of Atlanta gathered together to gossip,

his reputation grew worse, which only made him all the more

glamorous to the young girls. As most of them were quite

innocent, they had heard little more than that he was “quite

loose with women”—

and exactly how a man went about the

business of being “loose” they did not know. They also

heard whispers that no girt was safe with him. With such a

reputation, it was strange that he had never so much as

kissed the hand of an unmarried girl since he first appeared

in Atlanta. But that only served to make him more mysterious

and more exciting.

Outside of the army heroes, he was the most talked-about

man in Atlanta. Everyone knew in detail how he had been

expelled from West Point for drunkenness and “something

about women.” That terrific scandal concerning the

Charleston girl he had compromised and the brother he had

killed was public property. Correspondence with Charleston

friends elicited the further information that his father, a

charming old gentleman with an iron will and a ramrod for a

backbone, had cast him out without a penny when he was twenty

and even stricken his name from the family Bible. After that

he had wandered to California in the gold rush of 1849 and

thence to South America and Cuba, and the reports of his

activities in these parts were none too savory. Scrapes about

women, several shootings, gun running to the revolutionists

in Central America and, worst of all, professional gambling

were included in his career, as Atlanta heard it.

There was hardly a family in Georgia who could not own to

their sorrow at least one male member or relative who gambled,

losing money, houses, land and slaves. But that was different.

A man could gamble himself to poverty and still be a

gentleman, but a professional gambler could never be anything

but an outcast.

Had it not been for the upset conditions due to the war

and his own services to the Confederate government, Rhett

Butler would never have been received in Atlanta. But now,

even the most strait laced felt that patriotism called upon

them to be more broad minded. The more sentimental were

inclined to view that the black sheep of the Butler family

had repented of his evil ways and was making an attempt to

atone for his sins. So the ladies felt in duty bound to

stretch a point, especially in the case of so intrepid a

blockader. Everyone knew now that the fate of the Confederacy

rested as much upon the skill of the blockade boats in

eluding the Yankee fleet as it did upon the soldiers at the

front.

Rumor had it that Captain Butler was one of the best

pilots in the South and that he was reckless and utterly

without nerves. Reared in Charleston, he knew every inlet,

creek, shoal and rock of the Carolina coast near that port,

and he was equally at home in the waters around Wilmington.

He had never lost a boat or even been forced to dump a cargo.

At the onset of the war, he had emerged from obscurity with

enough money to buy a small swift boat and now, when

blockaded goods realized two thousand per cent on each cargo,

he owned four boats. He had good pilots and paid them well,

and they slid out of Charleston and Wilmington on dark nights,

bearing cotton for Nassau, England and Canada. The cotton

mills of England were standing idle and the workers were

starving, and any blockader who could outwit the Yankee fleet

could command his own price in Liverpool. Rhett

’s boats were

singularly lucky both in taking out cotton for the

Confederacy and bringing in the war materials for which the

South was desperate. Yes, the ladies felt they could forgive

and forget a great many things for such a brave man.

He was a dashing figure and one that people turned to

look at. He spent money freely, rode a wild black stallion,

and wore clothes which were always the height of style and

tailoring. The latter in itself was enough to attract

attention to him, for the uniforms of the soldiers were dingy

and worn now and the civilians, even when turned out in their

best, showed skillful patching and darning. Scarlett thought

she had never seen such elegant pants as he wore, fawn

colored, shepherd’s plaid, and checked. As for his

waistcoats, they were indescribably handsome, especially the

white watered- silk one with tiny pink rosebuds embroidered on

it. And he wore these garments with a still more elegant air

as though unaware of their glory.

There were few ladies who could resist his charms when he

chose to exert them, and finally even Mrs. Merriwether unbent

and invited him to Sunday dinner.

Maybelle Merriwether was to marry her little Zouave when

he got his next furlough, and she cried every time she

thought of it, for she had set her heart on marrying in a

white satin dress and there was no white satin in the

Confederacy. Nor could she borrow a dress, for the satin

wedding dresses of years past had all gone into the making of

battle flags. Useless for the patriotic Mrs. Merriwether to

upbraid her daughter and point out that homespun was the

proper bridal attire for a Confederate bride. Maybelle wanted

satin. She was willing, even proud to go without hairpins and

buttons and nice shoes and candy and tea for the sake of the

Cause, but she wanted a satin wedding dress.

Rhett, hearing of this from Melanie, brought in from

England yards and yards of gleaming white satin and a lace

veil and presented them to her as a wedding gift. He did it

in such a way that it was unthinkable to even mention paying

him for them, and Maybelle was so delighted she almost kissed

him. Mrs. Merriwether knew that so expensive a gift

—

and a

gift of clothing at that

—

was highly improper, but she could

think of no way of refusing when Rhett told her in the most

florid language that nothing was too good to deck the bride

of one of our brave heroes. So Mrs. Merriwether invited him

to dinner, feeling that this concession more than paid for

the gift.

He not only brought Maybelle the satin but he was able to

give excellent hints on the making of the wedding dress.

Hoops in Paris were wider this season and skirts were shorter.

They were no longer ruffled but were gathered up in scalloped

festoons, showing braided petticoats beneath. He said, too,

that he had seen no pantalets on the streets, so he imagined

they were “out.” Afterwards, Mrs. Merriwether told Mrs.

Elsing she feared that if she had given him any encouragement

at all, he would have told her exactly what kind of drawers

were being worn by Parisiennes.

Had he been less obviously masculine, his ability to

recall details of dresses, bonnets and coiffures would have

been put down as the rankest effeminacy. The ladies always

felt a little odd when they besieged him with questions about

styles, but they did it nevertheless. They were as isolated

from the world of fashion as shipwrecked mariners, for few

books of fashion came through the blockade. For all they knew

the ladies of France might be shaving their heads and wearing

coonskin caps, so Rhett’s memory for furbel

ows was an

excellent substitute for Godey’s Lady’s Book. He could and

did notice details so dear to feminine hearts, and after each

trip abroad he could be found in the center of a group of

ladies, telling that bonnets were smaller this year and

perched higher, covering most of the top of the head, that

plumes and not flowers were being used to trim them, that the

Empress of France had abandoned the chignon for evening wear

and had her hair piled almost on the top of her head, showing

all of her ears, and that evening frocks were shockingly low

again.

For some months, he was the most popular and romantic

figure the town knew, despite his previous reputation,

despite the faint rumors that he was engaged not only in

blockading but in speculating on foodstuffs, too. People who

did not like him said that after every trip he made to

Atlanta, prices jumped five dollars. But even with this

under- cover gossip seeping about, he could have retained his

popularity had he considered it worth retaining. Instead, it

seemed as though, after trying the company of the staid and

patriotic citizens and winning their respect and grudging

liking, something perverse in him made him go out of his way

to affront them and show them that his conduct had been only

a masquerade and one which no longer amused him.

It was as though he bore an impersonal contempt for

everyone and everything in the South, the Confederacy in

particular, and toot no pains to conceal it. It was his

remarks about the Confederacy that made Atlanta look at him

first in bewilderment, then coolly and then with hot rage.

Even before 1862 passed into 1863, men were bowing to him

with studied frigidity and women beginning to draw their

daughters to their sides when he appeared at a gathering.

He seemed to take pleasure not only in affronting the

sincere and red-hot loyalties of Atlanta but in presenting

himself in the worst possible light. When well-meaning people

complimented him on his bravery in running the blockade, he

blandly replied that he was always frightened when in danger,

as frightened as were the brave boys at the front. Everyone

knew there had never been a cowardly Confederate soldier and

they found this statement peculiarly irritating. He always

referred to the soldiers as “our brave boys” and “our

heroes in gray” and did it in su

ch a way as to convey the

utmost in insult. When daring young ladies, hoping for a

flirtation, thanked him for being one of the heroes who

fought for them, he bowed and declared that such was not the

case, for he would do the same thing for Yankee women if the

same amount of money were involved.

Since Scarlett’s first meeting with him in Atlanta on

the night of the bazaar, he had talked with her in this

manner, but now mere was a thinly veiled note of mockery in

his conversations with everyone. When praised for his

services to the Confederacy, he unfailingly replied that

blockading was a business with him. If he could make as much

money out of government contracts, he would say, picking out

with his eyes those who had government contracts, then he

would certainly abandon the hazards of blockading and take to

selling shoddy cloth, sanded sugar, spoiled flour and rotten

leather to the Confederacy.

Most of his remarks were unanswerable, which made them

all the worse. There had already been minor scandals about

those holding government contracts. Letters from men at the

front complained constantly of shoes that wore out in a week,

gunpowder that would not ignite, harness that snapped at any

strain, meat that was rotten and flour that was full of

weevils. Atlanta people tried to think that the men who sold

such stuff to the government must be contract holders from

Alabama or Virginia or Tennessee, and not Georgians. For did

not the Georgia contract holders include men from the very

best families? Were they not the first to contribute to the

hospital funds and to the aid of soldiers’ orphans? Were

they not the first to cheer at “Dixie” and the most rampant

seekers, in oratory at least, for Yankee blood? The full tide

of fury against those profiteering on government contracts

had not yet risen, and Rhett’s words were taken merely as

evidence of his own bad breeding.

He not only affronted the town with insinuations of

venality on the part of men in high places and slurs on the

courage of the men in the field, but he took pleasure in

tricking the dignified citizenry into embarrassing situations.

He could no more resist pricking the conceits, the

hypocrisies and the flamboyant patriotism of those about him

than a small boy can resist putting a pin into a balloon. He

neatly deflated the pompous and exposed the ignorant and the

bigoted, and he did it in such subtle ways, drawing his

victims out by his seemingly courteous interest, that they

never were quite certain what had happened until they stood

exposed as windy, high flown and slightly ridiculous.

During the months when the town accepted him, Scarlett

had been under no illusions about him. She knew that his

elaborate gallantries and his florid speeches were all done

with his tongue in his cheek. She knew that he was acting the

part of the dashing and patriotic blockade runner simply

because it amused him. Sometimes he seemed to her like the

County boys with whom she had grown up, the wild Tarleton

twins with their obsession for practical jokes

：

the devil-

inspired Fontaines, teasing, mischievous; the Calverts who

would sit up all night planning hoaxes. But there was a

difference, for beneath Rhett’s seeming lightness there was

something malicious, almost sinister in its suave brutality.

Though she was thoroughly aware of his insincerity, she

much preferred him in the role of the romantic blockader. For

one thing, it made her own situation in associating with him

so much easier than it had been at first. So, she was

intensely annoyed when he dropped his masquerade and set out

apparently upon a deliberate campaign to alienate Atlanta’s

good will. It annoyed her because it seemed foolish and also

because some of the harsh criticism directed at him fell on

her.

It was at Mrs. Elsing’s silver musicale for the benefit

of the convalescents that Rhett signed his final warrant of

ostracism. That afternoon the Elsing home was crowded with

soldiers on leave and men from the hospitals, members of the

Home Guard and the militia unit, and matrons, widows and

young girls. Every chair in the house was occupied, and even

the long winding stair was packed with guests. The large cut-

glass bowl held at the door by the Elsings’ butler had been

emptied twice of its burden of silver coins

：

That in itself

was enough to make the affair a success, for now a dollar in

silver was worth sixty dollars in Confederate paper money.

Every girl with any pretense to accomplishments had sung

or played the piano, and the tableaux vivants had been

greeted with flattering applause. Scarlett was much pleased

with herself, for not only had she and Melanie rendered a

touching duet, “When the Dew Is on the Blossom,” followed

as an encore by the more sprightly “Oh, Lawd, Ladies, Don’t

Mind Stephen!” but she had also been chosen to represent the

Spirit of the Confederacy in the last tableau.

She had looked most fetching, wearing a modestly draped

Greek robe of white cheesecloth girdled with red and blue and

holding the Stars and Bars in one hand, while with the other

she stretched out to the kneeling Captain Carey Ashburn, of

Alabama, the gold-hilted saber which had belonged to Charles

and his father.

When her tableau was over, she could not help seeking

Rhett’s eyes to see if he had appreciated the pretty picture

she made. With a feeling of exasperation she saw that he was

in an argument and probably had not even noticed her.

Scarlett could see by the faces of the group surrounding him

that they were infuriated by what he was saying.

She made her way toward them and, in one of those odd

silences which sometimes fall on a gathering, she heard

Willie Guinan, of the militia outfit, say plainly

：

“Do I

understand, sir, that you mean the Cause for which our heroes

have died is not sacred?”

“If you were run over by a railroad train your death

wouldn’t sanctify the railroad company, would it?” asked

Rhett, and his voice sounded as if he were humbly seeking

information.

“Sir,” said Willie, his voice shaking, “if we were not

under this roof

—”

“I tremble to think what would happen,” said Rhett.

“For, of course, your

bravery is too well known.”

Willie went scarlet and all conversation ceased. Everyone

was embarrassed. Willie was strong and healthy and of

military age and yet he wasn’t at the front. Of course, he

was the only boy his mother had and, after all, somebody had

to be in the militia to protect the state. But there were a

few irreverent snickers from convalescent officers when Rhett

spoke of bravery.

“Oh, why doesn’t he keep his mouth shut!” thought

Scarlett indignantly. “He’s simply spoiling the whole

par

ty!”

Dr. Meade’s brows were thunderous.

“Nothing may be sacred to you, young man,” he said, in

the voice he always used when making speeches. “But there

are many things sacred to the patriotic men and ladies of the

South. And the freedom of our land from the usurper is one

and States’ Rights is another and—”

Rhett looked lazy and his voice had a silky, almost bored,

note.

“All wars are sacred,” he said. “To those who have to

fight them. If the people who started wars didn’t make them

sacred, who would be foolish enough to fight? But, no matter

what rallying cries the orators give to the idiots who fight,

no matter what noble purposes they assign to wars, there is

never but one reason for a war. And that is money. All wars

are in reality money squabbles. But so few people ever

realize it. Their ears are too full of bugles and drums and

the fine words from stay-at-home orators. Sometimes the

rallying cry is ‘Save the Tomb of Christ from the Heathen!’

Sometimes it’s ‘Down with Popery!’ and sometimes

‘Liberty!’ and sometimes ‘Cotton, Slavery and States’

Rights!’ ”

“What on earth has the Pope to do with it?” thought

Scarlett. “Or Christ’s tomb, either?”

But as she hurried toward the incensed group, she saw

Rhett bow jauntily and start toward the doorway through the

crowd. She started after him but Mrs. Elsing caught her skirt

and held her.

“Let him go,” she said in a clear voice that carried

throughout the tensely quiet room. “Let him go. He is a

traitor, a speculator! He is a viper that we have nursed to

our bosoms!”

Rhett, standing in the hall, his hat in his hand, heard

as he was intended to hear and, turning, surveyed the room

for a moment. He looked pointedly at Mrs. Elsing’s flat

bosom, grinned suddenly and, bowing, made his exit.

Mrs. Merriwe

ther rode home in Aunt Pitty’s carriage, and

scarcely had the four ladies seated themselves when she

exploded.

“There now, Pittypat Hamilton! I hope you are satisfied!”

“With what?” cried Pitty, apprehensively.

“With the conduct of that wretched Butler man you’ve

been harboring.”

Pittypat fluttered, too upset by the accusation to recall

that Mrs. Merriwether had also been Rhett Butler’s hostess

on several occasions. Scarlett and Melanie thought of this,

but bred to politeness to their elders, refrained from

remarking on the matter. Instead they studiously looked down

at their mittened hands.

“He insulted us all and the Confederacy too,” said Mrs.

Merriwether, and her stout bust heaved violently beneath its

glittering passementerie trimmings. “Saying that we were

fighting for money! Saying that our leaders had lied to us!

He should be put in jail. Yes, he should. I shall speak to Dr.

Meade about it. If Mr. Merriwether were only alive, he’d

tend to him! Now, Pitty Hamilton, you listen to me. You

mustn’t ever let that scamp come into your house again!”

“Oh,” mumbled Pitty, helplessly, looking as if she

wished she were dead. She looked appealingly at the two girls

who kept their eyes cast down and then hopefully toward Uncle

Peter’s erect back. She knew he was listening attentively

to

every word and she hoped he would turn and take a hand in the

conversation, as he frequently did. She hoped he would say

：

“Now, Miss Dolly, you let Miss Pitty be,” but Peter made no

move. He disapproved heartily of Rhett Butler and poor Pitty

knew it. She sighed and said

：

“Well, Dolly, if you think—”

“I do think,” returned Mrs. Merriwether firmly. “I

can’t imagine what possessed you to receive him in the first

place. After this afternoon, there won’t be a decent home in