Interest in it and was sharp and cross with the clerks. Johnnie

Gallegher's mill was thriving and the lumber yard selling all his

supply easily, but nothing Johnnie did or said pleased her.

Johnnie, as Irish as she, finally erupted into rage at her naggings

and threatened to quit, after a long tirade which ended with "and

the back of both me hands to you, Ma'm, and the curse of Cromwell

on you." She had to appease him with the most abject of apologies.

She never went to Ashley's mill. Nor did she go to the lumber-yard

office when she thought he would be there. She knew he was

avoiding her, knew that her constant presence in his house, at

Melanie's inescapable invitations, was a torment to him. They

never spoke alone and she was desperate to question him. She

wanted to know whether he now hated her and exactly what he had

told Melanie, but he held her at arm's length and silently pleaded

with her not to speak. The sight of his face, old, haggard with

remorse, added to her load, and the fact that his mill lost money

every week was an extra irritant which she could not voice.

His helplessness in the face of the present situation irked her.

She did not know what he could do to better matters but she felt

that he should do something. Rhett would have done something.

Rhett always did something, even if it was the wrong thing, and she

unwillingly respected him for it.

Now that her first rage at Rhett and his insults had passed, she

began to miss him and she missed him more and more as days went by

without news of him. Out of the welter of rapture and anger and

heartbreak and hurt pride that he had left, depression emerged to

sit upon her shoulder like a carrion crow. She missed him, missed

his light flippant touch in anecdotes that made her shout with

laughter, his sardonic grin that reduced troubles to their proper

proportions, missed even his jeers that stung her to angry retort.

Most of all she missed having him to tell things to. Rhett was so

satisfactory in that respect. She could recount shamelessly and

with pride how she had skinned people out of their eyeteeth and he

would applaud. And if she even mentioned such things to other

people they were shocked.

She was lonely without him and Bonnie. She missed the child more

than she had thought possible. Remembering the last harsh words

Rhett had hurled at her about Wade and Ella, she tried to fill in

some of her empty hours with them. But it was no use. Rhett's

words and the children's reactions opened her eyes to a startling,

a galling truth. During the babyhood of each child she had been

too busy, too worried with money matters, too sharp and easily

Vexed, to win their confidence or affection. And now, it was

either too late or she did not have the patience or the wisdom to

penetrate their small secretive hearts.

Ella! It annoyed Scarlett to realize that Ella was a silly child

but she undoubtedly was. She couldn't keep her little mind on one

subject any longer than a bird could stay on one twig and even when

Scarlett tried to tell her stories, Ella went off at childish

tangents, interrupting with questions about matters that had

nothing to do with the story and forgetting what she had asked long

before Scarlett could get the explanation out of her mouth. And as

for Wade--perhaps Rhett was right. Perhaps he was afraid of her.

That was odd and it hurt her. Why should her own boy, her only

boy, be afraid of her? When she tried to draw him out in talk, he

looked at her with Charles' soft brown eyes and squirmed and

twisted his feet in embarrassment. But with Melanie, he bubbled

over with talk and brought from his pocket everything from fishing

worms to old strings to show her.

Melanie had a way with brats. There was no getting around it. Her

own little Beau was the best behaved and most lovable child in

Atlanta. Scarlett got on better with him than she did with her own

son because little Beau had no self-consciousness where grown

people were concerned and climbed on her knee, uninvited, whenever

he saw her. What a beautiful blond boy he was, just like Ashley!

Now if only Wade were like Beau-- Of course, the reason Melanie

could do so much with him was that she had only one child and she

hadn't had to worry and work as Scarlett had. At least, Scarlett

tried to excuse herself that way but honesty forced her to admit

that Melanie loved children and would have welcomed a dozen. And

the over-brimming affection she had was poured out on Wade and the

neighbors' broods.

Scarlett would never forget the shock of the day she drove by

Melanie's house to pick up Wade and heard, as she came up the front

walk, the sound of her son's voice raised in a very fair imitation

of the Rebel Yell--Wade who was always as still as a mouse at home.

And manfully seconding Wade's yell was the shrill piping of Beau.

When she had walked into the sitting room she had found the two

charging at the sofa with wooden swords. They had hushed abashed

as she entered and Melanie had arisen, laughing and clutching at

hairpins and flying curls from where she was crouching behind the

sofa.

"It's Gettysburg," she explained. "And I'm the Yankees and I've

gotten the worst of it. This is General Lee," pointing to Beau,

"and this is General Pickett," putting an arm about Wade's

shoulder.

Yes, Melanie had a way with children that Scarlett could never

fathom.

"At least," she thought, "Bonnie loves me and likes to play with

me." But honesty forced her to admit that Bonnie infinitely

preferred Rhett to her. And perhaps she would never see Bonnie

again. For all she knew, Rhett might be in Perisa or Egypt and