Itself, because Scarlett had thought life could teach her no more.

Now she felt like a child, every day on the brink of a new

discovery.

First, she learned that marriage with Rhett was a far different

matter from marriage with either Charles or Frank. They had

respected her and been afraid of her temper. They had begged for

favors and if it pleased her, she had bestowed them. Rhett did not

fear her and, she often thought, did not respect her very much

either. What he wanted to do, he did, and if she did not like it,

he laughed at her. She did not love him but he was undoubtedly an

exciting person to live with. The most exciting thing about him

was that even in his outbursts of passion which were flavored

sometimes with cruelty, sometimes with irritating amusement, he

seemed always to be holding himself under restraint, always riding

his emotions with a curb bit.

"I guess that's because he isn't really in love with me," she

thought and was content enough with the state of affairs. "I

should hate for him to ever turn completely loose in any way." But

still the thought of the possibility teased her curiosity in an

exciting way.

Living with Rhett, she learned many new things about him, and she

had thought she knew him so well. She learned that his voice could

be as silky as a cat's fur one moment and crisp and crackling with

oaths the next. He could tell, with apparent sincerity and

approval, stories of courage and honor and virtue and love in the

odd places he had been, and follow them with ribald stories of

coldest cynicism. She knew no man should tell such stories to his

wife but they were entertaining and they appealed to something

coarse and earthy in her. He could be an ardent, almost a tender,

lover for a brief while, and almost immediately a mocking devil who

ripped the lid from her gunpowder temper, fired it and enjoyed the

explosion. She learned that his compliments were always two edged

and his tenderest expressions open to suspicion. In fact, in those

two weeks in New Orleans, she learned everything about him except

what he really was.

Some mornings he dismissed the maid and brought her the breakfast

tray himself and fed her as though she were a child, took the

hairbrush from her hand and brushed her long dark hair until it

snapped and crackled. Yet other mornings she was torn rudely out

of deep slumber when he snatched all the bed covers from her and

tickled her bare feet. Sometimes he listened with dignified

Interest to details of her businesses, nodding approval at her

sagacity, and at other times he called her somewhat dubious

tradings scavenging, highway robbery and extortion. He took her to

plays and annoyed her by whispering that God probably didn't

approve of such amusements, and to churches and, sotto voce,

retailed funny obscenities and then reproved her for laughing. He

encouraged her to speak her mind, to be flippant and daring. She

picked up from him the gift of stinging words and sardonic phrases

and learned to relish using them for the power they gave her over

other people. But she did not possess his sense of humor which

tempered his malice, nor his smile that jeered at himself even

while he was jeering others.

He made her play and she had almost forgotten how. Life had been

so serious and so bitter. He knew how to play and swept her along

with him. But he never played like a boy; he was a man and no

matter what he did, she could never forget it. She could not look

down on him from the heights of womanly superiority, smiling as

women have always smiled at the antics of men who are boys at

heart.

This annoyed her a little, whenever she thought of it. It would be

pleasant to feel superior to Rhett. All the other men she had

known she could dismiss with a half-contemptuous "What a child!"

Her father, the Tarleton twins with their love of teasing and their

elaborate practical jokes, the hairy little Fontaines with their

childish rages, Charles, Frank, all the men who had paid court to

her during the war--everyone, in fact, except Ashley. Only Ashley

and Rhett eluded her understanding and her control for they were

both adults, and the elements of boyishness were lacking in them.

She did not understand Rhett, nor did she trouble to understand

him, though there were things about him which occasionally puzzled

her. There was the way he looked at her sometimes, when he thought

she was unaware. Turning quickly she frequently caught him

watching her, an alert, eager, waiting look in his eyes.

"Why do you look at me like that?" she once asked irritably. "Like

a cat at a mouse hole!"

But his face had changed swiftly and he only laughed. Soon she

forgot it and did not puzzle her head about it any more, or about

anything concerning Rhett. He was too unpredictable to bother

about and life was very pleasant--except when she thought of

Ashley.

Rhett kept her too busy to think of Ashley often. Ashley was

hardly ever in her thoughts during the day but at night when she

was tired from dancing or her head was spinning from too much

champagne--then she thought of Ashley. Frequently when she lay

drowsily in Rhett's arms with the moonlight streaming over the bed,

she thought how perfect life would be if it were only Ashley's arms

which held her so closely, if it were only Ashley who drew her

black hair across his face and wrapped it about his throat.

Once when she was thinking this, she sighed and turned her head

toward the window, and after a moment she felt the heavy arm

beneath her neck become like iron, and Rhett's voice spoke in the

stillness: "May God damn your cheating little soul to hell for all

eternity!"

And, getting up, he put on his clothes and left the room despite

her startled protests and questions. He reappeared the next

morning as she was breakfasting in her room, disheveled, quite

drunk and in his worst sarcastic mood, and neither made excuses nor

gave an account of his absence.

Scarlett asked no questions and was quite cool to him, as became an

injured wife, and when she had finished the meal, she dressed under

his bloodshot gaze and went shopping. He was gone when she

returned and did not appear again until time for supper.

It was a silent meal and Scarlett's temper was straining because it

was her last supper in New Orleans and she wanted to do justice to

the crawfish. And she could not enjoy it under his gaze.

Nevertheless she ate a large one, and drank a quantity of

champagne. Perhaps it was this combination that brought back her

old nightmare that evening, for she awoke, cold with sweat, sobbing

brokenly. She was back at Tara again and Tara was desolate.

Mother was dead and with her all the strength and wisdom of the

world. Nowhere in the world was there anyone to turn to, anyone to

rely upon. And something terrifying was pursuing her and she was

running, running till her heart was bursting, running in a thick

swimming fog, crying out, blindly seeking that nameless, unknown

haven of safety that was somewhere in the mist about her.

Rhett was leaning over her when she woke, and without a word he

picked her up in his arms like a child and held her close, his hard

muscles comforting, his wordless murmuring soothing, until her

sobbing ceased.

"Oh, Rhett. I was so cold and so hungry and so tired and I

couldn't find it. I ran through the mist and I ran but I couldn't

find it."

"Find what, honey?"

"I don't know. I wish I did know."

"Is it your old dream?"

"Oh, yes!"

He gently placed her on the bed, fumbled in the darkness and lit a

candle. In the light his face with bloodshot eyes and harsh lines

was as unreadable as stone. His shirt, opened to the waist, showed

a brown chest covered with thick black hair. Scarlett, still

shaking with fright, thought how strong and unyielding that chest

was, and she whispered: "Hold me, Rhett."

"Darling!" he said swiftly, and picking her up he sat down in a

large chair, cradling her body against him.

"Oh, Rhett, it's awful to be hungry."

"It must be awful to dream of starvation after a seven-course

dinner including that enormous crawfish." He smiled but his eyes

were kind.

"Oh, Rhett, I just run and run and hunt and I can't ever find what

it is I'm hunting for. It's always hidden in the mist. I know if

I could find it, I'd be safe forever and ever and never be cold or

hungry again."

"Is it a person or a thing you're hunting?"

"I don't know. I never thought about it. Rhett, do you think I'll

ever dream that I get there to safety?"

"No," he said, smoothing her tumbled hair, "I don't. Dreams aren't

like that. But I do think that if you get used to being safe and

warm and well fed in your everyday life, you'll stop dreaming that

dream. And, Scarlett, I'm going to see that you are safe."

"Rhett, you are so nice."

"Thanks for the crumbs from your table, Mrs. Dives. Scarlett, I

want you to say to yourself every morning when you wake up: 'I

can't ever be hungry again and nothing can ever touch me so long as

Rhett is here and the United States government holds out.'"

"The United States government?" she questioned, sitting up,

startled, tears still on her cheeks.

"The ex-Confederate money has now become an honest woman. I

invested most of it in government bonds."

"God's nightgown!" cried Scarlett, sitting up in his lap, forgetful

of her recent terror. "Do you mean to tell me you've loaned your

money to the Yankees?"

"At a fair per cent."

"I don't care if it's a hundred percent! You must sell them

immediately. The idea of letting the Yankees have the use of your

money!"

"And what must I do with it?" he questioned with a smile, noting

that her eyes were no longer wide with fright.

"Why--why buy property at Five Points. I'll bet you could buy all

of Five Points with the money you have."

"Thank you, but I wouldn't have Five Points. Now that the

Carpetbagger government has really gotten control of Georgia,

there's no telling what may happen. I wouldn't put anything beyond

the swarm of buzzards that's swooping down on Georgia now from

north, east, south and west. I'm playing along with them, you

understand, as a good Scallawag should do, but I don't trust them.

And I'm not putting my money in real estate. I prefer bonds. You

can hide them. You can't hide real estate very easily."

"Do you think--" she began, paling as she thought of the mills and

store.

"I don't know. But don't look so frightened, Scarlett. Our

charming new governor is a good friend of mine. It's just that

times are too uncertain now and I don't want much of my money tied

up in real estate."

He shifted her to one knee and, leaning back, reached for a cigar

and lit it. She sat with her bare feet dangling, watching the play

of muscles on his brown chest, her terrors forgotten.

"And while we are on the subject of real estate, Scarlett," he

said, "I am going to build a house. You might have bullied Frank