Margaret Mitchell - Gone with the Wind

It was the Fontaine boys, the first of the County men home from the war, who brought the news of the surrender. Alex, who still had boots, was walking and Tony, barefooted, was riding on the bare back of a mule. Tony always managed to get the best of things in that family. They were swarthier than ever from four years’ exposure to sun and storm, thinner, more wiry, and the wild black beards they brought back from the war made them seem like strangers.

On their way to Mimosa and eager for home, they only stopped a moment at Tara to kiss the girls and give them news of the surrender. It was all over, they said, all finished, and they did not seem to care much or want to talk about it. All they wanted to know was whether Mimosa had been burned. On the way south from Atlanta, they had passed chimney after chimney where the homes of friends had stood and it seemed almost too much to hope that their own house had been spared. They sighed with relief at the welcome news and laughed, slapping their thighs when Scarlett told them of Sally’s wild ride and how neatly she had cleared their hedge.

“She’s a spunky girl,” said Tony, “and it’s rotten luck for her, Joe getting killed. You all got any chewing tobacco, Scarlett?”

“Nothing but rabbit tobacco. Pa smokes it in a corn cob.”

“I haven’t fallen that low yet,” said Tony, “but I’ll probably come to it.”

“Is Dimity Munroe all right?” asked Alex, eagerly but a little embarrassed, and Scarlett recalled vaguely that he had been sweet on Sally’s younger sister.

“Oh, yes. She’s living with her aunt over in Fayetteville now. You know their house in Lovejoy was burned. And the rest of her folks are in Macon.”

“What he means is—has Dimity married some brave colonel in the Home Guard?” jeered Tony, and Alex turned furious eyes upon him.

“Of course, she isn’t married,” said Scarlett, amused.

“Maybe it would be better if she had,” said Alex gloomily. “How the hell—I beg your pardon, Scarlett. But how can a man ask a girl to marry him when his darkies are all freed and his stock gone and he hasn’t got a cent in his pockets?”

“You know that wouldn’t bother Dimity,” said Scarlett. She could afford to be loyal to Dimity and say nice things about her, for Alex Fontaine had never been one of her own beaux.

“Hell’s afire—Well, I beg your pardon again. I’ll have to quit swearing or Grandma will sure tan my hide. I’m not asking any girl to marry a pauper. It mightn’t bother her but it would bother me.”

While Scarlett talked to the boys on the front porch, Melanie, Suellen and Carreen slipped silently into the house as soon as they heard the news of the surrender. After the boys had gone, cutting across the back fields of Tara toward home, Scarlett went inside and heard the girls sobbing together on the sofa in Ellen’s little office. It was all over, the bright beautiful dream they had loved and hoped for, the Cause which had taken their friends, lovers, husbands and beggared their families. The Cause they had thought could never fall had fallen forever.

But for Scarlett, there were no tears. In the first moment when she heard the news she thought: Thank God! Now the cow won’t be stolen. Now the horse is safe. Now we can take the silver out of the well and everybody can have a knife and fork. Now I won’t be afraid to drive round the country looking for something to eat.

What a relief! Never again would she start in fear at the sound of hooves. Never again would she wake in the dark nights, holding her breath to listen, wondering if it were reality or only a dream that she heard in the yard the rattle of bits, the stamping of hooves and the harsh crying of orders by the Yankees. And, best of all, Tara was safe! Now her worst nightmare would never come true. Now she would never have to stand on the lawn and see smoke billowing from the beloved house and hear the roar of flames as the roof fell in.

Yes, the Cause was dead but war had always seemed foolish to her and peace was better. She had never stood starry eyed when the Stars and Bars ran up a pole or felt cold chills when “Dixie” sounded. She had not been sustained through privations, the sickening duties of nursing, the fears of the siege and the hunger of the last few months by the fanatic glow which made all these things endurable to others, if only the Cause prospered. It was all over and done with and she was not going to cry about it.

All over! The war which had seemed so endless, the war which, unbidden and unwanted, had cut her life in two, had made so clean a cleavage that it was difficult to remember those other care-free days. She could look back, unmoved, at the pretty Scarlett with her fragile green morocco slippers and her flounces fragrant with lavender but she wondered if she could be that same girl. Scarlett O’Hara, with the County at her feet, a hundred slaves to do her bidding, the wealth of Tara like a wall behind her and doting parents anxious to grant any desire of her heart. Spoiled, careless Scarlett who had never known an ungratified wish except where Ashley was concerned.

Somewhere, on the long road that wound through those four years, the girl with her sachet and dancing slippers had slipped away and there was left a woman with sharp green eyes, who counted pennies and turned her hands to many menial tasks, a woman to whom nothing was left from the wreckage except the indestructible red earth on which she stood.

As she stood in the hall, listening to the girls sobbing, her mind was busy.

“We’ll plant more cotton, lots more. I’ll send Pork to Macon tomorrow to buy more seed. Now the Yankees won’t burn it and our troops won’t need it. Good Lord! Cotton ought to go sky high this fall!”

She went into the little office and, disregarding the weeping girls on the sofa, seated herself at the secretary and picked up a quill to balance the cost of more cotton seed against her remaining cash.

“The war is over,” she thought and suddenly she dropped the quill as a wild happiness flooded her. The war was over and Ashley—if Ashley was alive he’d be coming home! She wondered if Melanie, in the midst of mourning for the lost Cause, had thought of this.

“Soon we’ll get a letter—no, not a letter. We can’t get letters. But soon—oh, somehow he’ll let us know!”

But the days passed into weeks and there was no news from Ashley. The mail service in the South was uncertain and in the rural districts there was none at all. Occasionally a passing traveler from Atlanta brought a note from Aunt Pitty tearfully begging the girls to come back. But never news of Ashley.

After the surrender, an ever-present feud over the horse smoldered between Scarlett and Suellen. Now that there was no danger of Yankees, Suellen wanted to go calling on the neighbors. Lonely and missing the happy sociability of the old days, Suellen longed to visit friends, if for no other reason than to assure herself that the rest of the County was as bad off as Tara. But Scarlett was adamant. The horse was for work, to drag logs from the woods, to plow and for Pork to ride in search of food. On Sundays he had earned the right to graze in the pasture and rest. If Suellen wanted to go visiting she could go afoot.

Before the last year Suellen had never walked a hundred yards in her life and this prospect was anything but pleasing. So she stayed at home and nagged and cried and said, once too often: “Oh, if only Mother was here!” At that, Scarlett gave her the longpromised slap, hitting her so hard it knocked her screaming to the bed and caused great consternation throughout the house. Thereafter, Suellen whined the less, at least in Scarlett’s presence.

Scarlett spoke truthfully when she said she wanted the horse to rest but that was only half of the truth. The other half was that she had paid one round of calls on the County in the first month after the surrender and the sight of old friends and old plantations had shaken her courage more than she liked to admit.