“No—”she thought grimly,“Tara isn't going to be like that.Not even if I have to plow myself.This whole section,this whole state can go back to woods if it wants to,but I won't let Tara go.And I don't intend to waste my money on tombstones or my time crying about the war.We can make out somehow.I know we could make out somehow if the men weren't all dead.Losing the darkies isn't the worst part about this.It's the loss of the men,the young men.”She thought again of the four Tarletons and Joe Fontaine,of Raiford Calvert and the Munroe brothers and all the boys from Fayetteville and Jonesboro whose names she had read on the casualty lists.“If there were just enough men left,we could manage somehow but—”
Another thought struck her—suppose she wanted to marry again.Of course,she didn't want to marry again.Once was certainly enough.Besides,the only man she'd ever wanted was Ashley and he was married if he was still living.But suppose she should want to marry.Who would there be to marry her?The thought was appalling.
“Melly,”she said,“what's going to happen to Southern girls?”
“What do you mean?”
“Just what I say.What's going to happen to them?There's no one to marry them.Why,Melly,with all the boys dead,there'll be thousands of girls all over the South who'll die old maids.”
“And never have any children,”added Melanie,to whom this was the most important thing.
Evidently the thought was not new to Suellen who sat in the back of the wagon,for she suddenly began to cry.She had not heard from Frank Kennedy since Christmas.She did not know if the lack of mail service was the cause,or if he had merely trifled with her affections and then forgotten her.Or maybe he had been killed in the last days of the war!The latter would have been infinitely preferable to his forgetting her,for at least there was some dignity about a dead love,such as Carreen and India Wilkes had,but none about a deserted fiance.
“Oh,in the name of God,hush!”said Scarlett.
“Oh,you can talk,”sobbed Suellen,“because you've been married and had a baby and everybody knows some man wanted you.But look at me!And you've got to be mean and throw it up to me that I'm an old maid when I can't help myself.I think you're hateful.”
“Oh,hush!You know how I hate people who bawl all the time.You know perfectly well old Ginger Whiskers isn't dead and that he'll come back and marry you.He hasn't any better sense.But personally,I'd rather be an old maid than marry him.”
There was silence from the back of the wagon for a while and Carreen comforted her sister with absent-minded pats,for her mind was a long way off,riding paths three years old with Brent Tarleton beside her.There was a glow,an exaltation in her eyes.
“Ah,”said Melanie sadly,“what will the South be like without all our fine boys?What would the South have been if they had lived?We could use their courage and their energy and their brains.Scarlett,all of us with little boys must raise them to take the places of the men who are gone,to be brave men like them.”
“There will never again be men like them,”said Carreen softly.“No one can take their places.”
They drove home the rest of the way in silence.
One day not long after this,Cathleen Calvert rode up to Tara at sunset.Her sidesaddle was strapped on as sorry a mule as Scarlett had ever seen,a flop-eared lame brute,and Cathleen was almost as sorry looking as the animal she rode.Her dress was of faded gingham of the type once worn only by house servants,and her sunbonnet was secured under her chin by a piece of twine.She rode up to the front porch but did not dismount,and Scarlett and Melanie,who had been watching the sunset,went down the steps to meet her.Cathleen was as white as Cade had been the day Scarlett called,white and hard and brittle,as if her face would shatter if she spoke.But her back was erect and her head was high as she nodded to them.
Scarlett suddenly remembered the day of the Wilkes barbecue when she and Cathleen had whispered together about Rhett Butler.How pretty and fresh Cathleen had been that day in a swirl of blue organdie with fragrant roses at her sash and little black velvet slippers laced about her small ankles.And now there was not a trace of that girl in the stiff figure sitting on the mule.
“I won't get down,thank you,”she said.“I just came to tell you that I'm going to be married.”
“What!”
“Who to?”
“Cathy,how grand!”
“When?”
“Tomorrow,”said Cathleen quietly and there was something in her voice which took the eager smiles from their faces.“I came to tell you that I'm going to be married tomorrow,in Jonesboro—and I'm not inviting you all to come.”
They digested this in silence,looking up at her,puzzled.Then Melanie spoke.
“Is it someone we know,dear?”
“Yes,”said Cathleen,shortly.“It's Mr.Hilton.”
“Mr.Hilton?”
“Yes,Mr.Hilton,our overseer.”
Scarlett could not even find voice to say “Oh!”but Cathleen,peering down suddenly at Melanie,said in a low savage voice:“If you cry,Melly,I can't stand it.I shall die!”
Melanie said nothing but patted the foot in its awkward home-made shoe which hung from the stirrup.Her head was low.
“And don't pat me!I can't stand that either.”
Melanie dropped her hand but still did not look up.
“Well,I must go.I only came to tell you.”The white brittle mask was back again and she picked up the reins.
“How is Cade?”asked Scarlett,utterly at a loss but fumbling for some words to break the awkward silence.
“He is dying,”said Cathleen shortly.There seemed to be no feeling in her voice.“And he is going to die in some comfort and peace if I can manage it,without worry about who will take care of me when he's gone.You see,my stepmother and the children are going North for good,tomorrow.Well,I must be going.”
