Gone with the Wind (66 page)

“Miss Scarlett, dem trashy niggers done runned away an' some of dem went off wid de Yankees an'—”

“How many are left?”

“Dey's me, Miss Scarlett, an' Mammy. She been nussin' de young Misses all day. An' Dilcey, she settin' up wid de young Misses now. Us three, Miss Scarlett.”

“Us three” where there had been a hundred. Scarlett with an effort lifted her head on her aching neck. She knew she must keep her voice steady. To her surprise, words came out as coolly and naturally as if there had never been a war and she could, by waving her hand, call ten house servants to her.

“Pork, I'm starving. Is there anything to eat?”

“No'm. Dey tuck it all.”

“But the garden?”

“Dey tuhned dey hawses loose in it.”

“Even the sweet potato hills?”

Something almost like a pleased smile broke over his thick lips.

“Miss Scarlett, Ah done fergit de yams. Ah specs dey's right dar. Dem Yankee folks ain' never seed no yams an' dey thinks dey's jest roots an'—”

“The moon will be up soon. You go out and dig us some and roast them. There's no corn meal? No dried peas? No chickens?”

“No'm. No'm. Whut chickens dey din' eat right hyah dey cah'ied off 'cross dey saddles.”

They—They—They—Was there no end to what “They” had done? Was it not enough to burn and kill? Must they also leave women and children and helpless negroes to starve in a country which they had desolated?

“Miss Scarlett, Ah got some apples Mammy buhied unner de house. We been eatin' on dem today.”

“Bring them before you dig the potatoes. And, Pork—I—I feel so faint. Is there any wine in the cellar, even blackberry?”

“Oh, Miss Scarlett, de cellar wuz de fust place dey went.”

A swimming nausea compounded of hunger, sleeplessness, exhaustion and stunning blows came on suddenly and she gripped the carved roses under her hand.

“No wine,” she said dully, remembering the endless rows of bottles in the cellar. A memory stirred.

“Pork, what of the corn whisky Pa buried in the oak barrel under the scuppernong arbor?”

Another ghost of a smile lit the black face, a smile of pleasure and respect.

“Miss Scarlett, you sho is de beatenes' chile! Ah done plum fergit dat bah'l. But, Miss Scarlett, dat whisky ain' no good. Ain' been dar but 'bout a year an' whisky ain' no good fer ladies nohow.”

How stupid negroes were! They never thought of anything unless they were told. And the Yankees wanted to free them.

“It'll be good enough for this lady and for Pa. Hurry, Pork, and dig it up and bring us two glasses and some mint and sugar and I'll mix a julep.”

His face was reproachful.

“Miss Scarlett, you knows dey ain' been no sugar at Tara fer de longes'. An' dey hawses done et up all de mint an' dey done broke all de glasses.”

“If he says ‘They' once more, I'll scream. I can't help it,” she thought, and then, aloud: “Well, hurry and get the whisky quickly. We'll take it neat.” And, as he turned: “Wait, Pork. There's so many things to do that I can't seem to think…. Oh, yes, I brought home a horse and a cow and the cow needs milking, badly, and unharness the horse and water him. Go tell Mammy to look after the cow. Tell her she's got to fix the cow up somehow. Miss Melanie's baby will die if he doesn't get something to eat and—”

“Miss Melly ain'—kain—?” Pork paused delicately.

“Miss Melanie has no milk.” Dear God, but Mother would faint at that!

“Well, Miss Scarlett, mah Dilcey ten' ter Miss Melly's chile. Mah Dilcey got a new chile herseff an' she got mo'n nuff fer both.”

“You've got a new baby, Pork?”

Babies, babies, babies. Why did God make so many babies? But no, God didn't make them. Stupid people made them.

“Yas'm, big fat black boy. He—”

“Go tell Dilcey to leave the girls. I'll look after them. Tell her to nurse Miss Melanie's baby and do what she can for Miss Melanie. Tell Mammy to look after the cow and put that poor horse in the stable.”

“Dey ain' no stable, Miss Scarlett. Dey use it fer fiah wood.”

“Don't tell me any more what ‘They' did. Tell Dilcey to look after them. And you, Pork, go dig up that whisky and then some potatoes.”

“But, Miss Scarlett, Ah ain' got no light ter dig by.”

“You can use a stick of firewood, can't you?”

“Dey ain' no fiah wood—Dey—”

“Do something…. I don't care what. But dig those things and dig them fast. Now, hurry.”

Pork scurried from the room as her voice roughened and Scarlett was left alone with Gerald. She patted his leg gently. She noted how shrunken were the thighs that once bulged with saddle muscles. She must do something to drag him from his apathy—but she could not ask about Mother. That must come later, when she could stand it.

“Why didn't they burn Tara?”

Gerald stared at her for a moment as if not hearing her and she repeated her question.

“Why—” he fumbled, “they used the house as a headquarters.”

“Yankees—in this house?”

A feeling that the beloved walls had been defiled rose in her. This house, sacred because Ellen had lived in it, and those—those—in it.

“So they were, Daughter. We saw the smoke from Twelve Oaks, across the river, before they came. But Miss Honey and Miss India and some of their darkies had refugeed to Macon, so we did not worry about them. But we couldn't be going to Macon. The girls were so sick—your mother—we couldn't be going. Our darkies ran—I'm not knowing where. They stole the wagons and the mules. Mammy and Dilcey and Pork—they didn't run. The girls—your mother—we couldn't be moving them.”

“Yes, yes.” He mustn't talk about Mother. Anything else. Even that General Sherman himself had used this room, Mother's office, for his headquarters. Anything else.

“The Yankees were moving on Jonesboro, to cut the railroad. And they came up the road from the river—thousands and thousands—and cannon and horses—thousands. I met them on the front porch.”

“Oh, gallant little Gerald!” thought Scarlett, her heart swelling, Gerald meeting the enemy on the stairs of Tara as if an army stood behind him instead of in front of him.

“They said for me to leave, that they would be burning the place. And I said that they would be burning it over my head. We could not leave—the girls—your mother were—”

“And then?” Must he revert to Ellen always?

“I told them there was sickness in the house, the typhoid, and it was death to move them. They could burn the roof over us. I did not want to leave anyway—leave Tara—”

His voice trailed off into silence as he looked absently
about the walls and Scarlett understood. There were too many Irish ancestors crowding behind Gerald's shoulders, men who had died on scant acres, fighting to the end rather than leave the homes where they had lived, plowed, loved, begotten sons.

“I said that they would be burning the house over the heads of three dying women. But we would not leave. The young officer was—was a gentleman.”

“A Yankee a gentleman? Why, Pa!”

“A gentleman. He galloped away and soon he was back with a captain, a surgeon, and he looked at the girls—and your mother.”

“You let a damned Yankee into their room?”

“He had opium. We had none. He saved your sisters. Suellen was hemorrhaging. He was as kind as he knew how. And when he reported that they were—ill—they did not burn the house. They moved in, some general, his staff, crowding in. They filled all the rooms except the sick room. And the soldiers—”

He paused again, as if too tired to go on. His stubbly chin sank heavily in loose folds of flesh on his chest. With an effort he spoke again.

“They camped all round the house, everywhere, in the cotton, in the corn. The pasture was blue with them. That night there were a thousand camp fires. They tore down the fences and burned them to cook with and the barns and the stables and the smokehouse. They killed the cows and the hogs and the chickens—even my turkeys.” Gerald's precious turkeys. So they were gone. “They took things, even the pictures—some of the furniture, the china—”

“The silver?”

“Pork and Mammy did something with the silver—put
it in the well—but I'm not remembering now,” Gerald's voice was fretful. “Then they fought the battle from here—from Tara—there was so much noise, people galloping up and stamping about. And later the cannon at Jonesboro—it sounded like thunder—even the girls could hear it, sick as they were, and they kept saying over and over: ‘Papa, make it stop thundering.'”

“And—and Mother? Did she know Yankees were in the house?”

“She—never knew anything.”

“Thank God,” said Scarlett. Mother was spared that. Mother never knew, never heard the enemy in the rooms below, never heard the guns at Jonesboro, never learned that the land which was part of her heart was under Yankee feet.

“I saw few of them for I stayed upstairs with the girls and your mother. I saw the young surgeon mostly. He was kind, so kind, Scarlett. After he'd worked all day with the wounded, he came and sat with them. He even left some medicine. He told me when they moved on that the girls would recover but your mother—She was so frail, he said—too frail to stand it all. He said she had undermined her strength.…”

In the silence that fell, Scarlett saw her mother as she must have been in those last days, a thin tower of strength in Tara, nursing, working, doing without sleep and food that the others might rest and eat.

“And then, they moved on. Then, they moved on.”

He was silent for a long time and then fumbled at her hand.

“It's glad I am that you are home,” he said simply.

There was a scraping noise on the back porch. Poor Pork, trained for forty years to clean his shoes before
entering the house, did not forget, even in a time like this. He came in, carefully carrying two gourds, and the strong smell of dripping spirits entered before him.

“Ah spilt a plen'y, Miss Scarlett. It's pow'ful hard ter po' outer a bung hole inter a go'de.”

“That's quite all right, Pork, and thank you.” She took the wet gourd dipper from him, her nostrils wrinkling in distaste at the reek.

“Drink this, Father,” she said, pushing the whisky in its strange receptacle into his hand and taking the second gourd of water from Pork. Gerald raised it, obedient as a child, and gulped noisily. She handed the water to him but he shook his head.

As she took the whisky from him and held it to her mouth, she saw his eyes follow her, a vague stirring of disapproval in them.

“I know no lady drinks spirits,” she said briefly. “But today I'm no lady, Pa, and there is work to do tonight.”

She tilted the dipper, drew a deep breath and drank swiftly. The hot liquid burned down her throat to her stomach, choking her and bringing tears to her eyes. She drew another breath and raised it again.

“Katie Scarlett,” said Gerald, the first note of authority she had heard in his voice since her return, “that is enough. You're not knowing spirits and they will be making you tipsy.”

“Tipsy?” She laughed an ugly laugh. “Tipsy? I hope it makes me drunk. I would like to be drunk and forget all of this.”

She drank again, a slow train of warmth lighting in her veins and stealing through her body until even her finger tips tingled. What a blessed feeling, this kindly fire. It seemed to penetrate even her ice-locked heart and
strength came coursing back into her body. Seeing Gerald's puzzled hurt face, she patted his knee again and managed an imitation of the pert smile he used to love.

“How could it make me tipsy, Pa? I'm your daughter. Haven't I inherited the steadiest head in Clayton County?”

He almost smiled into her tired face. The whisky was bracing him too. She handed it back to him.

“Now you're going to take another drink and then I am going to take you upstairs and put you to bed.”

She caught herself. Why, this was the way she talked to Wade—she should not address her father like this. It was disrespectful. But he hung on her words.

“Yes, put you to bed,” she added lightly, “and give you another drink—maybe all the dipper and make you go to sleep. You need sleep and Katie Scarlett is here, so you need not worry about anything. Drink.”

He drank again obediently and, slipping her arm through his, she pulled him to his feet.

“Pork…”

Pork took the gourd in one hand and Gerald's arm in the other. Scarlett picked up the flaring candle and the three walked slowly into the dark hall and up the winding steps toward Gerald's room.

*     *     *

The room where Suellen and Carreen lay mumbling and tossing on the same bed stank vilely with the smell of the twisted rag burning in a saucer of bacon fat, which provided the only light. When Scarlett first opened the door the thick atmosphere of the room, with all windows closed and the air reeking with sick-room odors, medicine smells and stinking grease, almost made her faint. Doctors might say that fresh air was fatal in a sick room
but if she were to sit here, she must have air or die. She opened the three windows, bringing in the smell of oak leaves and earth, but the fresh air could do little toward dispelling the sickening odors which had accumulated for weeks in this close room.

Carreen and Suellen, emaciated and white, slept brokenly and awoke to mumble with wide, staring eyes in the tall four-poster bed where they had whispered together in better, happier days. In the corner of the room was an empty bed, a narrow French Empire bed with curling head and foot, a bed which Ellen had brought from Savannah. This was where Ellen had lain.

Scarlett sat beside the two girls, staring at them stupidly. The whisky taken on a stomach long empty was playing tricks on her. Sometimes her sisters seemed far away and tiny and their incoherent voices came to her like the buzz of insects. And again, they loomed large, rushing at her with lightning speed. She was tired, tired to the bone. She could lie down and sleep for days.