Its taxes. What we need now is something to eat."

"Pork, have any of you been to Twelve Oaks or the MacIntosh place

to see if there's anything left in the gardens there?"

"No, Ma'm! Us ain' lef' Tara. De Yankees mout git us."

"I'll send Dilcey over to MacIntosh. Perhaps she'll find something

there. And I'll go to Twelve Oaks."

"Who wid, chile?"

"By myself. Mammy must stay with the girls and Mr. Gerald can't--"

Pork set up an outcry which she found infuriating. There might be

Yankees or mean niggers at Twelve Oaks. She mustn't go alone.

"That will be enough, Pork. Tell Dilcey to start immediately. And

you and Prissy go bring in the sow and her litter," she said

briefly, turning on her heel.

Mammy's old sunbonnet, faded but clean, hung on its peg on the back

porch and Scarlett put it on her head, remembering, as from another

world, the bonnet with the curling green plume which Rhett had

brought her from Paris. She picked up a large split-oak basket and

started down the back stairs, each step jouncing her head until her

spine seemed to be trying to crash through the top of her skull.

The road down to the river lay red and scorching between the ruined

cotton fields. There were no trees to cast a shade and the sun

beat down through Mammy's sunbonnet as if it were made of tarlatan

Instead of heavy quilted calico, while the dust floating upward

sifted into her nose and throat until she felt the membranes would

crack dryly if she spoke. Deep ruts and furrows were cut into the

road where horses had dragged heavy guns along it and the red

gullies on either side were deeply gashed by the wheels. The

cotton was mangled and trampled where cavalry and infantry, forced

off the narrow road by the artillery, had marched through the green

bushes, grinding them into the earth. Here and there in the road

and fields lay buckles and bits of harness leather, canteens

flattened by hooves and caisson wheels, buttons, blue caps, worn

socks, bits of bloody rags, all the litter left by the marching

army.

She passed the clump of cedars and the low brick wall which marked

the family burying ground, trying not to think of the new grave

lying by the three short mounds of her little brothers. Oh, Ellen--

She trudged on down the dusty hill, passing the heap of ashes

and the stumpy chimney where the Slattery house had stood, and she

wished savagely that the whole tribe of them had been part of the

ashes. If it hadn't been for the Slatterys--if it hadn't been for

that nasty Emmie who'd had a bastard brat by their overseer--Ellen

wouldn't have died.

She moaned as a sharp pebble cut into her blistered foot. What was

she doing here? Why was Scarlett O'Hara, the belle of the County,

the sheltered pride of Tara, tramping down this rough road almost

barefoot? Her little feet were made to dance, not to limp, her

tiny slippers to peep daringly from under bright silks, not to

collect sharp pebbles and dust. She was born to be pampered and

waited upon, and here she was, sick and ragged, driven by hunger to

hunt for food in the gardens of her neighbors.

At the bottom of the long hill was the river and how cool and still

were the tangled trees overhanging the water! She sank down on the

low bank, and stripping off the remnants of her slippers and

stockings, dabbled her burning feet in the cool water. It would be

so good to sit here all day, away from the helpless eyes of Tara,

here where only the rustle of leaves and the gurgle of slow water

broke the stillness. But reluctantly she replaced her shoes and

stockings and trudged down the bank, spongy with moss, under the

shady trees. The Yankees had burned the bridge but she knew of a

footlog bridge across a narrow point of the stream a hundred yards

below. She crossed it cautiously and trudged uphill the hot half-

mile to Twelve Oaks.

There towered the twelve oaks, as they had stood since Indian days,

but with their leaves brown from fire and the branches burned and

scorched. Within their circle lay the ruins of John Wilkes' house,

the charred remains of that once stately home which had crowned the

hill in white-columned dignity. The deep pit which had been the

cellar, the blackened field-stone foundations and two mighty

chimneys marked the site. One long column, half-burned, had fallen

across the lawn, crushing the cape jessamine bushes.

Scarlett sat down on the column, too sick at the sight to go on.

This desolation went to her heart as nothing she had ever

experienced. Here was the Wilkes pride in the dust at her feet.

Here was the end of the kindly, courteous house which had always

welcomed her, the house where in futile dreams she had aspired to

be mistress. Here she had danced and dined and flirted and here

she had watched with a jealous, hurting heart how Melanie smiled up

at Ashley. Here, too, in the cool shadows of the trees, Charles

Hamilton had rapturously pressed her hand when she said she would

marry him.

"Oh, Ashley," she thought, "I hope you are dead! I could never

bear for you to see this."

Ashley had married his bride here but his son and his son's son

would never bring brides to this house. There would be no more

matings and births beneath this roof which she had so loved and

longed to rule. The house was dead and to Scarlett, it was as if

all the Wilkeses, too, were dead in its ashes.

"I won't think of it now. I can't stand it now. I'll think of it

later," she said aloud, turning her eyes away.

Seeking the garden, she limped around the ruins, by the trampled

rose beds the Wilkes girls had tended so zealously, across the back

yard and through the ashes to the smokehouse, barns and chicken

houses. The split-rail fence around the kitchen garden had been

demolished and the once orderly rows of green plants had suffered

the same treatment as those at Tara. The soft earth was scarred

with hoof prints and heavy wheels and the vegetables were mashed