“Miss Eleanor, isn’t Rhett shocking?” she laughed. “Was he a wicked little boy, too?” Behind her she sensed Rhett’s abrupt movement. Ha! That had struck home. He’d felt guilty for years about the pain he’d caused his mother when his escapades made his father disown him.
“Supper’s served, Miz Butler,” said Manigo from the doorway.
Rhett offered his mother his arm, and Scarlett felt a stab of jealousy. Then she reminded herself that his devotion to his mother was the very thing that permitted her to stay, and she swallowed her anger. “I’m so hungry I could eat half a cow,” she said, her voice bright, “and Rhett’s just starving, aren’t you, darling?” She had the upper hand now; he had admitted that much. If she lost it, she’d lose the whole game, she’d never get him back.
As it turned out, Scarlett needn’t have worried. Rhett took command of the conversation the moment they were seated. He recounted his search for the tea service in Philadelphia, transforming it into an adventure, painting deft word portraits of the succession of people he talked to, mimicking their accents and idiosyncrasies with such skill that his mother and Scarlett found themselves laughing until their sides ached.
“And after following that long trail to get to him,” Rhett concluded with a theatrical gesture of dismay, “just imagine my horror when the new owner seemed to be too honest to sell the tea service for the twenty times its value I offered. For a minute, I was afraid I’d have to steal it back, but fortunately he was receptive to the suggestion that we amuse ourselves with a friendly game of cards.”
Eleanor Butler tried to look disapproving. “I do hope you didn’t do anything dishonest, Rhett,” she said. But there was laughter beneath the words.
“Mama! You shock me. I only deal from the bottom when I’m playing with professionals. This miserable ex-colonel in Sherman’s army was such an amateur I had to cheat to let him win a few hundred dollars to ease his pain. He was like the reverse side of an Ellinton.”
Mrs. Butler laughed. “Oh, the poor man. And his wife—my heart goes out to her.” Rhett’s mother leaned toward Scarlett. “Some of the skeletons in my side of the family,” Eleanor Butler said in a mock whisper. She laughed again and began to reminisce.
The Ellintons, Scarlett learned, were famous all up and down the East Coast for the family weakness: they would gamble on anything. The first Ellinton to settle in Colonial America was part of the shipload only because he had won a land grant in a wager with the owner as to who could drink the most ale and remain standing. “By the time he won,” Mrs. Butler said, in neat conclusion, “he was so drunk that he thought it made sense to go take a look at his prize. They say he didn’t even know where he was going until he got there, because he won most of the sailors’ rum ration playing dice.”
“What did he do when he sobered up?” Scarlett wanted to know.
“Oh, my dear, he never did. He died only ten days after the ship made landfall. But in the meantime he had wagered some other gambler at dice and won a girl—one of the indentured servants from the ship—and, since later she turned out to be carrying his child, there was a sort of ex post facto wedding at his grave marker, and her son became one of my great-great-grandfathers.”
“He was rather a gamester himself, wasn’t he?” Rhett asked.
“Oh, of course. It truly ran in the family.” And Mrs. Butler continued along the family tree.
Scarlett glanced at Rhett often. How many surprises were there in this man she hardly knew? She’d never seen him so relaxed and happy and totally at home. I never made a home for him, she realized. He never even liked the house. It was mine, done the way I wanted, a present from him, not his at all. Scarlett wanted to break in on Miss Eleanor’s stories, to tell Rhett that she was sorry for the past, that she’d make up for all her mistakes. But she kept silent. He was content, enjoying himself and his mother’s ramblings. She mustn’t break this mood.
The candles in their tall silver holders were reflected in the polish of the mahogany table and in the pupils of Rhett’s gleaming black eyes. They bathed the table and the three of them in a warm, still light, making an island of soft brilliance in the shadows of the long room. The world outside was closed off by the thick folds of curtains at the windows and by the intimacy of the small candlelit island. Eleanor Butler’s voice was gentle, Rhett’s laughter a quiet, encouraging chuckle. Love made an airy yet unbreakable web between mother and son. Scarlett had a sudden consuming yearning to be enclosed in that web.
Then Rhett said, “Tell Scarlett about Cousin Townsend, Mama,” and she was safe in the warmth of the candlelight, included in the happiness that ringed the table. She wished that it could last forever, and she begged Miss Eleanor to tell about Cousin Townsend.
“Townsend’s not really a cousin-cousin, you know, only a third cousin twice removed, but he is the direct descendent of Great-Great-Grandfather Ellinton, only son of an eldest son of an eldest son. So he inherited that original land grant, and the Ellinton gambler’s fever, and the Ellinton luck. They were always lucky, the Ellintons. Except for one thing: there’s another Ellinton family trait, the boys are always cross-eyed. Townsend married an extremely beautiful girl from a fine Philadelphia family—Philadelphia called it the wedding of beauty and the beast. But the girl’s father was a lawyer and a very sensible man about property, and Townsend was fabulously rich. Townsend and his wife settled in Baltimore. Then, of course, the War came. Townsend’s wife went running home to her family the minute Townsend went off to join General Lee’s army. She was a Yankee, after all, and Townsend would more than likely get killed. He couldn’t shoot a barn, much less a barn door, because of his cross eyes. However, he still had the Ellinton luck. He never got anything worse than chilblains although he served all the way through to Appomattox. Meanwhile, his wife’s three brothers and her father were all killed, fighting in the Union Army. So she inherited everything piled up by her careful father and his careful ancestors. Townsend’s living like a king in Philadelphia and doesn’t care a fig that all his property in Savannah was confiscated by Sherman. Did you see him, Rhett? How is he?”
“More cross-eyed than ever, with two cross-eyed sons and a daughter that, thank God, takes after her mother.”
Scarlett hardly heard Rhett’s answer. “Did you say the Ellintons were from Savannah, Miss Eleanor? My mother was from Savannah,” she said eagerly. The crisscross of relations that was so much a part of Southern life had long been a frustrating lack in her own. Everyone she knew had a network of cousins and uncles and aunts that covered generations and hundreds of miles. But she had none. Pauline and Eulalie had no children. Gerald O’Hara’s brothers in Savannah were childless, too. There must be lots of O’Haras still in Ireland, but that did her no good, and all the Robillards except her grandfather were gone from Savannah.
Now here she was, again hearing about somebody else’s family. Rhett had kin in Philadelphia. No doubt he was related to half of Charleston, too. It wasn’t fair. But maybe these Ellinton people were tied to the Robillards somehow. Then she’d be part of the web that included Rhett. Perhaps she could find a connection to the world of the Butlers and Charleston, the world that Rhett had chosen and she was determined to enter.
“I remember Ellen Robillard very well,” said Mrs. Butler. “And her mother. Your grandmother, Scarlett, was probably the most fascinating woman in all of Georgia, and South Carolina, too.”
Scarlett leaned forward, enthralled. She’d heard only bits and pieces of stories about her grandmother. “Was she really scandalous, Miss Eleanor?”
“She was extraordinary. But when I knew her best, she wasn’t scandalous at all. She was too busy having babies. First your Aunt Pauline, then Eulalie, then your mother. As a matter of fact, I was in Savannah when your mother was born. I remember the fireworks. Your grandfather hired some famous Italian to come down from New York and put on a magnificent fireworks display every time your grandmother gave him a baby. You wouldn’t remember, Rhett, and I don’t suppose
you’ll thank me for remembering, either, but you were scared witless. I took you outside especially to see them, and you cried so loud that I nearly died of shame. All the other children there were clapping their hands and shrieking with joy. Of course, they were older. You were still in dresses, barely over a year old.”
Scarlett stared at Mrs. Butler, then at Rhett. It wasn’t possible! Rhett couldn’t be older than her mother. Why, her mother was—her mother. She’d always taken it for granted that her mother was old, past the age of strong emotions. How could Rhett be older? How could she love him so desperately if he was that old?
Then Rhett added shock upon shock. He dropped his napkin on the table, stood, stepped to Scarlett’s side and kissed the top of her head, moved on to take his mother’s hand in his and kiss it. “I’m off now, Mama,” he said.
Oh Rhett, no! Scarlett wanted to shout. But she was too stunned to say anything, even to ask where he was going.
“I wish you wouldn’t go out in the rainy pitch dark, Rhett,” his mother protested. “And Scarlett’s here. You’ve barely had a chance to say hello to her.”
“It’s stopped raining, and the full moon’s out,” Rhett said. “I can’t waste the chance to ride the tide upriver, and I’ve just enough time to catch it before it turns. Scarlett understands that you’ve got to check up on your workers if you go away and leave them—she’s a businesswoman. Aren’t you, my pet?” His eyes glittered from the candle flame reflected in them when he looked at her. Then he walked into the hall.
She pushed back from the table, almost upending her chair in her haste. Then, without a word to Mrs. Butler, she ran frantically after him.
He was in the vestibule, buttoning his coat, hat in his hand. “Rhett, Rhett, wait!” Scarlett cried. She ignored the warning in his look when he turned to face her. “Everything was so nice at supper,” she said. “Why do you want to go?”
Rhett stepped past her and pushed the door from the vestibule to the hallway. It closed with a heavy dull click of the latch, shutting off the rest of the house. “Don’t make a scene, Scarlett. They’re wasted on me.”
As if he could see inside her skull, he drawled his final words. “Don’t count on sharing my bed, either, Scarlett.”
He opened the door to the street. Before she could say a word, he was gone. The door swung slowly closed behind him.
Scarlett stamped her foot. It was an inadequate outlet for her anger and disappointment. Why did he have to be so mean? She grimaced—half anger, half unwilling laughter—in grudging acknowledgment of Rhett’s cleverness. He’d known what she was planning easy enough. Well then, she’d have to be cleverer, that’s all. She’d have to give up the idea of having a baby right away, think of something else. Her brow was furrowed when she went back to join Rhett’s mother.
“There now, dear, don’t be upset,” Eleanor Butler said, “he’ll be all right. Rhett knows the river like the back of his hand.” She had been standing near the mantel, unwilling to go into the hall and risk intruding on Rhett’s farewell to his wife. “Let’s go into the library, it’s cozy there, and let the servants clear the table.”
Scarlett settled into a high-back chair, protected from drafts. No, she said, she didn’t want a throw over her knees, she was just fine, thank you. “Let me tuck you in, Miss Eleanor,” she insisted, taking the cashmere shawl from her. “You sit down now, and ease yourself.” She bullied Mrs. Butler into comfort.
“What a dear girl you are, Scarlett, so like your darling mother. I remember how thoughtful she always was, such beautiful manners. All the Robillard girls were well behaved, of course, but Ellen was special . . .”
Scarlett closed her eyes and inhaled the faint whisper of lemon verbena. Everything was going to be all right. Miss Eleanor loved her, she’d make Rhett come home, and they’d all live happily together forever and ever.
Scarlett half-dozed in the deep-cushioned chair, lulled by the soft reminiscences of a gentler time. When the disturbance erupted in the hall beyond the door, she was jerked back to confused consciousness. For a moment she didn’t know where she was or how she had gotten there, and she blinked, bleary-eyed, at the man in the doorway. Rhett? No, it couldn’t be Rhett, not unless he’d shaved off his mustache.
The big man who wasn’t Rhett stepped unevenly across the doorsill. “I came to meet my sister,” he said. The words slurred together.
Margaret Butler ran towards Eleanor. “I tried to stop him,” she cried, “but he was in one of those moods—I couldn’t get him to listen, Miss Eleanor.”
Mrs. Butler stood up. “Hush, Margaret,” she said with quiet urgency. “Ross, I’m waiting for a proper greeting.” Her voice was unusually loud, the words very distinct.
Scarlett’s mind was clear now. So this was Rhett’s brother. And drunk, too, by the look of him. Well, she’d seen drunk men before, they were no special novelty. She stood, smiled at Ross, her dimple flickering. “I declare, Miss Eleanor, how could one lady be so lucky as to have two sons, each one handsomer than the other? Rhett never told me he had such a good-looking brother!”
Ross staggered towards her. His eyes raked her body, then fastened on her tousled curls and rouged face. He leered rather than smiled. “So this is Scarlett,” he said thickly. “I might have known Rhett would end up with a fancy piece like her. Come on, Scarlett, give your new brother a friendly kiss. You know how to please a man, I’m sure.” His big hands ran up her arms like huge spiders and fastened themselves on her bare throat. Then his open mouth was over hers, his sour breath in her nose, his tongue forcing itself between her teeth. Scarlett tried to get her hands up to shove him away, but Ross was too strong, his body too closely pressed against hers.
She could hear Eleanor Butler’s voice, and Margaret’s, but she couldn’t make out what they were saying. All her attention was focused on the need to break free of the repulsive embrace, and on the shame of Ross’ insulting words. He had called her a whore! And he was treating her like one.
All of a sudden Ross thrust her away, tumbled her back into her chair. “I’ll bet you’re not so cold to my dear big brother,” he growled.
Margaret Butler was sobbing against Eleanor’s shoulder.
“Ross!” Mrs. Butler hurled the name like a knife. Ross turned with a clumsy lurch, sending a small table crashing to the floor.
“Ross!” his mother said again. “I have rung for Manigo. He will help you home and give Margaret decent escort. When you sober up, you will write letters of apology to Rhett’s wife and to me. You have disgraced yourself, and Margaret, and me, and you will not be received in this house until I have recovered from the shame you’ve caused me.”
“I’m so sorry, Miss Eleanor,” Margaret wept.
Mrs. Butler put her hands on Margaret’s shoulders. “I am sorry for you, Margaret,” she said. Then she moved Margaret away from her. “Go home now. You will, of course, always be welcome here.”
Manigo’s wise old eyes took in the situation with one look, and he removed Ross, who surprisingly said not a word in protest. Margaret scuttled out behind them. “I’m so sorry,” she repeated again and again, until the sound of her voice was cut off by the closing of the big front door.
“My darling child,” Eleanor said to Scarlett, “there is no excuse I can make. Ross was drunk, he didn’t know what he was saying. But that is no excuse.”
Scarlett was shaking all over. From disgust, from humiliation, from anger. Why had she let it happen, let Rhett’s brother revile her and put his hands and his mouth on her? I should have spit in his face, clawed him blind, hit his nasty, foul mouth with my fists. But I didn’t, I just took it—as if I deserved it, as if it was true. Scarlett had never been so ashamed. Shamed by Ross’ words, shamed by her own weakness. She felt defiled, dirty, and eternally humiliated. Better if Ross had hit her, or cut her with a knife. Her body would recover from a bruise or a wound. But her pride would never be healed from the sickness she felt.
Eleanor leaned over her, tried to put
her arms around her, but Scarlett shrank from her touch. “Leave me alone!” she tried to shout, but it came out a moan.
“I won’t,” said Mrs. Butler, “not until you listen to me. You’ve got to understand, Scarlett, you have to hear me. There’s so much you don’t know. Are you listening?” She drew a chair close to Scarlett’s, sat in it, only inches away.
“No! Go away.” Scarlett put her hands over her ears.
“I won’t leave you,” said Eleanor. “And I’ll tell you—again and again, a thousand times if need be—until you hear me . . .” Her voice went on and on, gentle but insistent, while her hand stroked Scarlett’s bent head—comforting, caring, insinuating her kindness and her love through Scarlett’s refusal to hear her. “What Ross did was unpardonable,” she said, “I don’t ask you to forgive him. But I must, Scarlett. He is my son, and I know the pain in him that made him do it. He wasn’t trying to hurt you, my dear. It was Rhett he was attacking through you; he knows, you see, that Rhett is too strong for him, that he’ll never be able to match Rhett in anything. Rhett reaches out and takes what he wants, he makes things happen, he gets things done. And poor Ross is a failure at everything.
“Margaret told me privately this afternoon that when Ross went to work this morning, they told him he was fired. Because of his drinking, you see. He always drank, men always do, but not the way he’s been drinking since Rhett came back to Charleston a year ago. Ross was trying to make the plantation go, he’s been slaving away at it ever since he came back from the War, but something always went wrong, and he never did get a decent rice crop. Everything was about to be sold up for taxes. So when Rhett offered to buy the plantation from him, Ross had to let it go. It would have been Rhett’s anyhow, except that he and his father—but that’s another story.
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