Rhett Butler's People

by Donald McCaig

  CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

  A Catholic City

  Aspring morning in the Vieux Carré: Church bells echoed in the narrow streets, the birds-of-paradise were flowering, and behind wrought-iron gates overripe lemons and oranges were dropping from the trees.

  Waiting beside Rhett for a cab, Belle Watling remembered the pregnant young girl she’d been in this city so many years ago.

  “What did you say, Belle?” Rhett asked.

  “I spect I was talkin’ to myself. I was thinkin’ how New Orleans seemed like the biggest city in the world.” Belle added, “Lord a mercy, I was scared.”

  Rhett helped her into an open landaulet. “Do you remember when you and me met up outside the St. Louis Hotel? That Didi woman you was with? Mercy, what a beauty! She was wearin’ the brightest red hat I’d ever seen. Sometimes I still dream about that hat ….” She touched Rhett’s arm, “If you hadn’t found me that day, Rhett, I…”

  “But I did, Belle.” He smiled. “Very occasionally, things turn out better than we expect.”

  Belle knew Rhett’s marriage wasn’t one of those things. That foolishness between Mr. Wilkes and Miss Scarlett had birthed something terrible. Belle’d never known Rhett so drawn and sorrowful.

  When they stopped at number 12 Royal Street, Rhett said, “I think it best if you meet Taz alone. I don’t want his dislike of me ruining things. I’ll be back in an hour.”

  “But Rhett!”

  He helped her down and gave her Andrew’s bequest. “Go on, Belle. Go brave.” The cab horse’s iron shoes rang on the ancient cobblestones.

  Belle had moved Andrew’s things from Isaiah’s rough paper parcel to a nice poplar box, which seemed more respectful. Now, with the box in her hands, she wondered if she couldn’t have found a nicer one—maybe walnut. Belle told herself, Ruth Belle Watling! Don’t be a ninny! and yanked the bellpull more vigorously than she’d intended.

  On tenterhooks, she listened for his footsteps and the rasp of drawn bolts. The gate creaked, swinging open. “Maman!”

  Belle dissolved in tears. “You’ve grown a beard!”

  “I was just about to go out. … I am surprised, so happy you are here! Please, please come in.”

  Taz’s little garden was the prettiest Belle had ever seen. Its lime tree was certainly the most fragrant. What a sweet little bench! What a cunning little fish pond! The house—was this her dear son’s house? What a perfect little house! Belle sniffled into her handkerchief.

  Taz threw his arms out to encompass it all. “Maman, it is yours!”

  Belle froze like an animal sensing a trap. “But Taz, my home’s in Atlanta.”

  “Come in, Maman,” Taz adjusted. “Please. I’ll make tea. English tea. Unless you’d rather have water or a glass of wine?”

  “Taz, who would have dreamed …” Belle’s gesture was a mother’s delight. “Honey, you’ve done right well for yourself!”

  “Maman, I have done it all for you.” Taz flashed his familiar grin. “And I’m not always so pompous. I promise you I’m not. Why didn’t you tell me you were coming? Bon Dieu, I am so very happy. Please, let me show you the house.” Taz laid Belle’s box on a window ledge and led her into the kitchen, which had just enough room for both of them. “Oh,” Belle said, “it’s so cozy and snug!”

  The front bedroom’s balcony overlooked the garden. When Taz said, “This will be your room,” Belle pretended she hadn’t heard. The bedroom in the back had a separate staircase, which would be ideal—as Belle understood—for the young man about town who might come home late.

  Back in the parlor, Taz insisted Belle take his new chair, a Suffolk chair, which, he told her, “was made in New York City.”

  “I don’t believe I ever sat in a more comfortable chair.”

  When Belle ran out of things to admire, silence filled the room. The birds twittered loudly in the garden.

  “I’ve missed you, Taz,” Belle said.

  “I missed you, too.” Impulsively, Taz knelt and pressed her hand. “I am a full partner of J. Nicolet. We do a very good business and employ four men.”

  Belle beamed at her boy.

  Taz rubbed his palm across his forehead. To Belle, that familiar gesture recalled the little boy he’d been, and tears welled in her eyes. He said, “You know what I wish for. I never could fool you.”

  Belle went to the window and pushed the shutters open. She said, “I’d forgotten how well things grow in New Orleans.”

  “Will you come here and live with me?”

  Belle turned to him with a tremulous smile. “Taz, I’ve a business to look after.”

  “Sell it. You won’t want for anything. I can provide ….”

  “Taz, my dear boy, I thank you from the bottom of my heart, but I can’t.”

  “But Maman,” Taz spoke as if to a child, “here in New Orleans, you would be a lady.”

  Belle restrained her laugh. Belle Watling, a lady! “No, my darling,” she said. “I’d spoil everything. Think what J. Nicolet would say when he learned your mother is nothing but a common—”

  The ringing bell saved Belle. She said, “Get the gate, Taz. Rhett and me’ll tell you everything you want to know.”

  Outside that gate, with Bonnie Blue’s tiny hand in his own, Rhett Butler had slipped into that mood where the deepest affections are colored by sorrow and love’s losses seem the greater part of love.

  How had the boy he’d brought from the Asylum for Orphan Boys become this young man standing before him? The young man’s eyes were honest and calm. “Welcome to my home, sir. I owe you an apology.”

  “This is my Bonnie Blue,” Rhett said.

  “Hello,” Bonnie piped up. “I’m four. I’ve had my birthday.”

  Taz smiled. “A fine thing it is to have a birthday. But are you sure you’re four? You’re so tall for four.”

  “I am very tall,” Bonnie assured him. “I have a pony.”

  “A pony! My goodness!” Taz ushered them into his garden.

  Poplar box in her lap, Belle waited on the circular stone bench beneath a lime tree. Bonnie dashed to the tiny pool, where goldfish flashed under a carpet of water lilies.

  “I thought we’d talk better out-of-doors,” Belle said quietly. “Ain’t this place pretty, Rhett?”

  Taz began, “Sir, I must apologize. I have been an ungrateful fool. I—”

  Rhett put a finger to his lips. “Shh.”

  “Sir, I—”

  “It was nothing, Taz.” Rhett grinned. “On second thought, I’m glad it’s over.” He took Belle’s hand. “Your mother and I … for a good many years we were custodians of another man’s reputation. A man who had more to lose than we did. Andrew Ravanel was one of the bravest soldiers in the Confederacy. In his last moments, he thought of you.”

  “But…” Taz opened the box and stared, unseeing, at a revolver, a Confederate Colonel’s epaulets, a heavy silver watch, and a folded piece of paper.

  Since the goldfish wouldn’t come out from beneath the lily pads, Bonnie ran to the grown-ups and stood on tiptoes to see what was in the young man’s box. Maybe today was his birthday.

  Rhett said, “The grateful citizens of Cynthiania, Tennessee, gave your father that watch, Taz. There’s an inscription.”

  Tazewell turned the heavy watch in his hand. “Merde! You’re saying Andrew Ravanel was my father? Colonel Andrew Ravanel? Why did you let me think I was your bastard? Why not tell me the truth?”

  “Read the note, honey,” Belle said softly.

  To whom it may concern,

  I acknowledge Tazewell Watling as my firstborn son and bequeath him these, my worldly goods. I pray he will do better with his life than I have done with mine.

  Andrew Ravanel, Colonel, C.S.A.

  Taz folded the note. Opened it a second time and stared.

  “Taz,” Rhett said quietly, “please, sit down.”

  When he did, his mother put her arm around him.

  Rhett took a deep breath. “I’ve always
loved New Orleans. It’s a Catholic city, tolerant, sensual, and wise. The Low Country, where your mother and I grew up, Taz …”

  Rhett stopped and began again. “Planters like my father, Langston Butler, had the power of life and death. Everything and everyone on Broughton Plantation belonged to the Master. Langston’s slaves, Langston’s overseer, Langston’s horses, Langston’s overseer’s daughter, Langston’s wife, Langston’s daughter …” Rhett coughed. “Even Langston Butler’s renegade elder son. To trifle with the least of Langston’s possessions was to trifle with the Master himself.”

  Belle sighed. “Don’t it seem so long ago?”

  “Taz, it’s a long story your mother and I have to tell. Do you think you could find a glass of wine?”

  When Taz and Bonnie went in the house, Rhett strolled the garden, hands in pockets, whistling softly.

  Taz returned and set the tray on the bench.

  “I don’t want any wine. I’m too little.” Bonnie went back to the pool and lay down on the edge, where the goldfish couldn’t see her.

  Belle said, “Mama and me kept the Broughton dispensary, and sometimes I’d come into Charleston to the apothecary’s for quinine bark, and one day Andrew was there. First time we set eyes on each other, we fell in love. Don’t smile at me, Rhett Butler. You know it happens. Hell, you know it does. Anyway, that afternoon me and Andrew strolled around White Point Park, gabbin’ and lookin’ at each other. I reckon I wanted to eat him up. Well, nothin’ happened that day and I caught the ferry back to Broughton, but I wasn’t really surprised when a negro woman delivered a note sayin’ I should meet Andrew at Wilson’s Roadhouse.

  “Well, I snuck away that day, and a week later I snuck away again, and it wasn’t long before we were doin’ what the preachers say we shouldn’t. It never troubled me none, and if Mama knew, she never said nothin’. I never met none of Andrew’s kin nor his fancy friends—until the morning Rhett rode up to Wilson’s, and then everybody thought Rhett and me …

  “Andrew was so secretive about us. I always knew we wasn’t meant to marry.”

  Rhett said, “Andrew’s father, Jack, sold land when he had to and wrote as many IOUs as there were fools to accept them. He loved fast horses.”

  Bonnie sang, “Come out, little fishies. I won’t hurt you.”

  “Somehow my father and Jack Ravanel were involved in a rice-factoring syndicate, and when the syndicate collapsed, my father ended up with Jack’s IOUs—which pleased neither of them: my father because Jack hated to pay, and Jack because if any man in Carolina could squeeze a dollar out of him, that man was Langston Butler.

  “Langston let Jack know his patience was running thin. Langston could ruin Jack, and Jack knew it.

  “When Jack learned about Andrew and your mother, he worried. If Langston discovered his debtor’s son was trifling with his overseer’s daughter, that’d be the last straw. Jack ordered Andrew to stop seeing Belle, but Andrew refused.

  “Jack always liked to have an edge, and when he didn’t have one, he introduced a wild card. I didn’t understand until years afterward—but angry, confused Rhett Butler was Old Jack’s wild card.

  “It worked, too. My father was so busy disowning me, he never found out about Andrew and Belle.”

  When Rhett hitched himself into the window casing, his long legs just touched the ground. He offered his cigar case to Taz. When Taz declined, Rhett took his time lighting up.

  “Andrew was touchy, proud, and melancholy, but he was my friend. When I came back from West Point disgraced, I lived with the Ravanels.”

  “Colonel Jack got you drunk,” Belle said stoutly.

  Rhett laughed. “Belle, nobody but me gets me drunk. I was desperately unhappy, and Jack merely provided the whiskey and a gloomy porch where I could drink it. After he’d let me stew in my own morose juices long enough, Jack told me his son was involved with a slattern—sorry, Belle—and that if I was Andrew’s friend, I’d disentangle him. I have forgotten many things about those days, but I remember that morning. …”

  “I’m to spoil Andrew’s fun? Come now, Jack.”

  Colonel Jack’s tongue whipped like a snake run over in the road. Jack had ten thousand reasons why Rhett should help Andrew. Rhett was weary, part drunk, and plain didn’t give a damn. He’d have done anything just to shut Jack up.

  “You’ll talk to him, then?” Jack said. “Wilson’s Roadhouse? Boy, you’re a good’un. Don’t anyone tell you you’re not. If the slut’s father finds out about this, there’s no telling…”

  Rhett was thoroughly sick of Jack and thoroughly sick of himself, and there are worse things than a ride into the breaking day. Tecumseh’s trot was smooth as glass.

  The river was changing from black to silver and work gangs’ lanterns flickered in the fields before Rhett reached the Summerville crossroads. When he turned into Wilson’s stableyard, Andrew was outside, smoking. “Thank God, Rhett. Thank God it’s you.”

  A lamp glowed in the upstairs room where Belle waited for her lover. That same night, she’d told Andrew she was carrying his baby.

  Andrew clutched Rhett’s arm. “Rhett, she wants me to marry her. Rhett, I cannot; you know I must not.” Andrew tried a ghastly joke. “I am my father’s last negotiable asset!”

  When Belle came down into the yard, she was in love and beautiful. “Andrew? Who’s with you? Why, it’s Young Master Butler.” The young woman trusted that her love would see her through anything. “Andrew and I have been … keeping company. I got to go home now. Will you take me home, Young Master?”

  Rhett would.

  The sun rose as the two rode down the main trunk. Silent rice gangs watched them pass, shading their eyes against the sun.

  Rhett’s mind was clear as it had not been since he left West Point. He felt better than he had in months. Rhett Butler had absolutely nothing more to lose.

  Belle’s cheek was warm against his back.

  “Do you love anyone, Young Master?”

  “My sister, Rosemary. …”

  “Ain’t we lucky? Ain’t it better lovin’ than bein’ loved?”

  Twenty-four years after that morning ride, Rhett Butler laid his hands on Tazewell Watling’s shoulders and said, “Dites moi qui vous aimez, et je vous dirai qui vous etes: Tell me who you love and I’ll tell you who you are.”

  At Taz’s suggestion, they dined at Antoine’s, where the waiters fussed over Mr. Watling’s mother and Captain Butler’s little girl. Belle said it was the happiest day of her life.

  The next day, they took a train to Baton Rouge to meet Tazewell Watling’s partner. While Rhett, Taz, and J. Nicolet discussed common acquaintances, Belle, Prissy, and Bonnie walked along the bayou, where Prissy was scared half out of her wits when a harmless-looking log turned into an alligator.

  In Baton Rouge, they ate at a fisherman’s café. Bonnie loved the boudin but shuddered at the langoustine. “It’s a big spider!” Bonnie insisted.

  Back in New Orleans, they attended the races and saw The Marriage of Figaro at the French Opera House. One entire morning, Rhett and Bonnie rode uptown and downtown on the street railway because that’s what Bonnie wanted.

  Bonnie lifted her little face to his and said, “I wish Mother was here.”

  Rhett’s eyes were so sad. “Yes, sugar. I wish she was, too.”

  The rains that happy week were tropical rains, which cooled the earth and disappeared into mist as they fell.

  Rhett forgot his promise to take his daughter on a steamboat ride. He would regret that unkept promise for the rest of his days.

  CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

  Miss Melly Asks for Help

  A year and a month after Rhett and Bonnie visited New Orleans, Melanie Wilkes wrote her friend:

  Dearest Rosemary,

  I trust this finds you in good health and spirits. Do you like teaching at the Female Seminary?

  Rosemary, how can two stick-in-the-muds like us have become such dear friends?

  Dr. Meade is outside m
y door issuing instructions to Pittypat. The good doctor leaves me with admonitions and an array of varicolored potions and pills! When men can fix something, they fix it. When the repair is beyond them, they harrumph and dither!

  Although Dr. Meade blames me for the fix I’m in—I can see reproach in his eyes—he cannot decently utter them. Would any man presume to tell a wife she should have refused her husband’s embraces?

  He is less forbearing with Ashley, and my guilty husband avoids him. When Dr. Meade manages to ambush Ashley, my husband comes to my room so contrite, I must lift his spirits. Falsely cheerful wife and contrite husband: What geese we are!

  Dr. Meade blames Ashley for my pregnancy. Ashley is a gentleman and no gentleman could admit that his mousy, sickly wife has been a Salome whose allures the helpless male could not resist.

  Yet, Dear Friend, I confess that unlikely tale is the Truth, that this plain girl can, when needs must, be a Salome of the first order!

  A year ago in April, Scarlett and Ashley gave way—only for a moment—to the impulse that had smoldered in them for so many years. Ashley’s sister India, Archie Flytte, and old Mrs. Elsing—Atlanta’s prime busybody—caught them in an embrace. Naturally, India raced to me with their news—and on Ashley’s birthday, too, with our house prepared to receive guests and Japanese lanterns glowing fetchingly in our garden.

  Dear Rosemary, where it comes to my family, I am a mother tiger, and I understood perfectly, as India gleefully delivered her news, that I might undo two marriages, my own and your brother Rhett’s. India’s face positively glowed with malicious satisfaction. She has always hated Scarlett.

  I thought to myself, India, you are Ashley’s sister. Why can’t you see this must destroy the brother you love as thoroughly as the woman you despise?

  So I pronounced India a liar. I said that my husband, Ashley, and my dear friend Scarlett would never betray me. I ordered India from my house. When Archie Flytte corroborated India’s tale, I expelled him, too. Subsequently, Archie has uttered the vilest threats—not against me—against Scarlett and Rhett! I fear they have a bad enemy there.