Alexandra Ripley - Scarlett

Then she heard Mammy’s voice. Thin and halting, but Mammy’s beloved, loving voice. “Now, Missy, ain’t I done tole you and tole you not to set foot outside without you wears a bonnet and carries a sunshade . . . Tole you and tole you . . .”

“Mammy!” Scarlett fell to her knees beside the bed. “Mammy, it’s Scarlett. Your Scarlett. Please don’t be sick, Mammy, I can’t bear it, not you.” She put her head down on the bed beside the bony thin shoulders and wept stormily, like a child.

A weightless hand smoothed her bent head. “Don’t cry, chile. Ain’t nothing so bad that it can’t be fixed.”

“Everything,” Scarlett wailed. “Everything’s gone wrong, Mammy.”

“Hush, now, it’s only one cup. And you got another tea set anyhow, just as pretty. You kin still have your tea party just like Mammy promised you.”

Scarlett drew back, horrified. She stared at Mammy’s face and saw the shining love in the sunken eyes, eyes that did not see her.

“No,” she whispered. She couldn’t stand it. First Melanie, then Rhett, and now Mammy; everyone she loved had left her. It was too cruel. It couldn’t be.

“Mammy,” she said loudly, “Mammy, listen to me. It’s Scarlett.” She grabbed the edge of the mattress and tried to shake it. “Look at me,” she sobbed, “me, my face. You’ve got to know me, Mammy. It’s me, Scarlett.”

Will’s big hands closed around her wrists. “You don’t want to do that,” he said. His voice was soft, but his grip was like iron. “She’s happy when she’s like that, Scarlett. She’s back in Savannah taking care of your mother when she was a little girl. Those were happy times for her. She was young; she was strong; she wasn’t in pain. Let her be.”

Scarlett struggled to get free. “But I want her to know me, Will. I never told her how much she means to me. I have to tell her.”

“You’ll have your chance. Lots of times she’s different, knows everybody. Knows she’s dying, too. These times are better. Now you come on with me. Everybody’s waiting for you. Delilah listens out for Mammy from the kitchen.”

Scarlett allowed Will to help her to her feet. She was numb all over, even her heart. She followed him silently to the living room. Suellen started immediately to berate her, taking up her complaints where she had left off, but Will hushed her. “Scarlett’s suffered a deep blow, Sue, leave her alone.” He poured whiskey into a glass and placed it in Scarlett’s hand.

The whiskey helped. It burned the familiar path through her body, dulling her pain. She held out her empty glass to Will, and he poured some more whiskey into it.

“Hello, darlings,” she said to her children, “come give Mother a hug.” Scarlett heard her own voice; it sounded as if it belonged to someone else, but at least it was saying the right thing.

She spent all the time she could in Mammy’s room, at Mammy’s side. She had fastened all her hopes on the comfort of Mammy’s arms around her, but now it was her strong young arms that held the dying old black woman. Scarlett lifted the wasted form to bathe Mammy, to change Mammy’s linen, to help her when breathing was too hard, to coax a few spoonfuls of broth between her lips. She sang the lullabies Mammy had so often sung to her, and when Mammy talked in delirium to Scarlett’s dead mother, Scarlett answered with the words she thought her mother might have said.

Sometimes Mammy’s rheumy eyes recognized her, and the old woman’s cracked lips smiled at the sight of her favorite. Then her quavering voice would scold Scarlett, as she had scolded her since Scarlett was a baby. “Your hair looks purely a mess, Miss Scarlett, now you go brush a hundred strokes like Mammy taught you.” Or, “You ain’t got no call to be wearing a frock all crumpled up like that. Go put on something fresh before folks see you.” Or, “You looks pale as a ghost, Miss Scarlett. Is you putting powder on your face? Wash it off this minute.”

Whatever Mammy commanded, Scarlett promised to do. There was never time enough to obey before Mammy slid back into unconsciousness, or that other world where Scarlett did not exist.

During the day and evening Suellen or Lutie or even Will would share the work of the sickroom, and Scarlett could snatch a half hour’s sleep, curled in the sagging rocking chair. But at night Scarlett kept solitary vigil. She lowered the flame in the oil lamp and held Mammy’s thin dry hand in hers. While the house slept and Mammy slept, she was able at last to cry, and her heartbroken tears eased her pain a little.

Once, in the small quiet hour before dawn, Mammy woke. “What for is you weeping, honey?” she whispered. “Old Mammy is ready to lay down her load and rest in the arms of the Lord. There ain’t no call to take on so.” Her hand stirred in Scarlett’s, freed itself, stroked Scarlett’s bent head. “Hush, now. Nothing’s so bad as you think.”

“I’m sorry,” she sobbed, “I just can’t stop crying.”

Mammy’s bent fingers pushed Scarlett’s tangled hair away from her face. “Tell old Mammy what’s troubling her lamb.”

Scarlett looked into the old, wise, loving eyes and felt the most profound pain she had ever known. “I’ve done everything wrong, Mammy. I don’t know how I could have made so many mistakes. I don’t understand.”

“Miss Scarlett, you done what you had to do. Can’t nobody do more than that. The good Lord sent you some heavy burdens, and you carried them. No sense asking why they was laid on you or what it took out of you to tote them. What’s done is done. Don’t fret yourself now.” Mammy’s heavy eyelids closed over tears that glistened in the dim light, and her ragged breathing slowed in sleep.

How can I not fret? Scarlett wanted to shout. My life is ruined, and I don’t know what to do. I need Rhett, and he’s gone. I need you, and you’re leaving me, too.

She lifted her head, wiped her tears away on her sleeve and straightened her aching shoulders. The coals in the pot-bellied stove were nearly used up, and the bucket was empty. She had to refill it, she had to feed the fire. The room was beginning to chill, and Mammy must be kept warm. Scarlett pulled the faded patchwork quilts up over Mammy’s frail form, then she took the bucket out into the cold darkness of the yard. She hurried toward the coal bin, wishing she’d thought to put on a shawl.

There was no moon, only a crescent sliver lost behind a cloud. The air was heavy with night’s moisture, and the few stars not hidden by clouds looked very far away and icy-brilliant. Scarlett shivered. The blackness around her seemed formless, infinite. She had rushed blindly into the center of the yard, and now she couldn’t make out the familiar shapes of smoke-house and barn that should be nearby. She turned in sudden panic, looking for the white bulk of the house she’d just left. But it, too, was dark and formless. No light showed anywhere. It was as if she were lost in a bleak and unknown and silent world. Nothing was stirring in the night, not a leaf not a feather on a bird’s wing. Terror plucked at her taut nerves, and she wanted to run. But where to? Everywhere was alien darkness.

Scarlett clenched her teeth. What kind of foolishness was this? I’m at home, at Tara, and the dark cold will be gone as soon as the sun’s up. She forced a laugh; the shrill unnatural sound made her jump.

They do say it’s always darkest before the dawn, she thought. I reckon this is proof of it. I’ve got the megrims, that’s all. I just won’t give in to them, there’s no time for that, the stove needs feeding. She put a hand out before her into the blackness and walked toward where the coal bin should be, next to the woodpile. A sunken spot made her stumble, and she fell. The bucket clattered loudly, then was lost.