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Scarlett O’Hara was not beautiful, but men seldom realized it when caught by her charm as the Tarleton twins were. In her face were too sharply blended the delicate features of her mother, a Coast 53 страница



“Do you know any Ku Klux? Is Tommy Wellburn or Hugh or-”

He shrugged impatiently.

“How should I know? I’m a renegade, a turncoat, a Scallawag. Would I be likely to know? But I do know men who are suspected by the Yankees and one false move from them and they are as good as hanged. While I know you would have no regrets at getting your neighbors on the gallows, I do believe you’d regret losing your mills. I see by the stubborn look on your face that you do not believe me and my words are falling on stony ground. So all I can say is, keep that pistol of yours handy-and when I’m in town, I’ll try to be on hand to drive you.”

“Rhett, do you really-is it to protect me that you-”

“Yes, my dear, it is my much advertised chivalry that makes me protect you.” The mocking light began to dance in his black eyes and all signs of earnestness fled from his face. “And why? Because of my deep love for you, Mrs. Kennedy. Yes, I have silently hungered and thirsted for you and worshipped you from afar; but being an honorable man, like Mr. Ashley Wilkes, I have concealed it from you. You are, alas, Frank’s wife and honor has forbidden my telling this to you. But even as Mr. Wilkes’ honor cracks occasionally, so mine is cracking now and I reveal my secret passion and my-”

“Oh, for God’s sake, hush!” interrupted Scarlett, annoyed as usual when he made her look like a conceited fool, and not caring to have Ashley and his honor become the subject of further conversation. “What was the other thing you wanted to tell me?”

“What! You change the subject when I am baring a loving but lacerated heart? Well, the other thing is this.” The mocking light died out of his eyes again and his face was dark and quiet.

“I want you to do something about this horse. He’s stubborn and he’s got a mouth as tough as iron. Tires you to drive him, doesn’t it? Well, if he chose to bolt, you couldn’t possibly stop him. And if you turned over in a ditch, it might kill your baby and you too. You ought to get the heaviest curb bit you can, or else let me swap him for a gentle horse with a more sensitive mouth.”

She looked up into his blank, smooth face and suddenly her irritation fell away, even as her embarrassment had disappeared after the conversation about her pregnancy. He had been kind, a few moments before, to put her at her ease when she was wishing that she were dead. And he was being kinder now and very thoughtful about the horse. She felt a rush of gratitude to him and she wondered why he could not always be this way.

“The horse is hard to drive,” she agreed meekly. “Sometimes my arms ache all night from tugging at him. You do what you think best about him, Rhett.”

His eyes sparkled wickedly.

“That sounds very sweet and feminine, Mrs. Kennedy. Not in your usual masterful vein at all. Well, it only takes proper handling to make a clinging vine out of you.”

She scowled and her temper came back.

“You will get out of this buggy this time, or I will hit you with the whip. I don’t know why I put up with you-why I try to be nice to you. You have no manners. You have no morals. You are nothing but a-Well, get out. I mean it.”

But when he had climbed down and untied his horse from the back of the buggy and stood in the twilight road, grinning tantalizingly at her, she could not smother her own grin as she drove off.

Yes, he was coarse, he was tricky, he was unsafe to have dealings with, and you never could tell when the dull weapon you put into his hands in an unguarded moment might turn into the keenest of blades. But, after all, he was as stimulating as-well, as a surreptitious glass of brandy!

During these months Scarlett had learned the use of brandy. When she came home in the late afternoons, damp from the rain, cramped and aching from long hours in the buggy, nothing sustained her except the thought of the bottle hidden in her top bureau drawer, locked against Mammy’s prying eyes. Dr. Meade had not thought to warn her that a woman in her condition should not drink, for it never occurred to him that a decent woman would drink anything stronger than scuppernong wine. Except, of course, a glass of champagne at a wedding or a hot toddy when confined to bed with a hard cold. Of course, there were unfortunate women who drank, to the eternal disgrace of their families, just as there were women who were insane or divorced or who believed, with Miss Susan B. Anthony, that women should have the vote. But as much as the doctor disapproved of Scarlett, he never suspected her of drinking.



Scarlett had found that a drink of neat brandy before supper helped immeasurably and she would always chew coffee or gargle cologne to disguise the smell. Why were people so silly about women drinking, when men could and did get reeling drunk whenever they wanted to? Sometimes when Frank lay snoring beside her and sleep would not come, when she lay tossing, torn with fears of poverty, dreading the Yankees, homesick for Tara and yearning for Ashley, she thought she would go crazy were it not for the brandy bottle. And when the pleasant familiar warmth stole through her veins, her troubles began to fade. After three drinks, she could always say to herself: “I’ll think of these things tomorrow when I can stand them better.”

But there were some nights when even brandy would not still the ache in her heart, the ache that was even stronger than fear of losing the mills, the ache to see Tara again. Atlanta, with its noises, its new buildings, its strange faces, its narrow streets crowded with horses and wagons and bustling crowds sometimes seemed to stifle her. She loved Atlanta but-oh, for the sweet peace and country quiet of Tara, the red fields and the dark pines about it! Oh, to be back at Tara, no matter how hard the life might be! And to be near Ashley, just to see him, to hear him speak, to be sustained by the knowledge of his love! Each letter from Melanie, saying that they were well, each brief note from Will reporting about the plowing, the planting, the growing of the cotton made her long anew to be home again.

I’ll go home in June. I can’t do anything here after that. I’ll go home for a couple of months, she thought, and her heart would rise. She did go home in June but not as she longed to go, for early in that month came a brief message from Will that Gerald was dead.

 

 

Chapter XXXIX

 

 

The train was very late and the long, deeply blue twilight of June was settling over the countryside when Scarlett alighted in Jonesboro. Yellow gleams of lamplight showed in the stores and houses which remained in the village, but they were few. Here and there were wide gaps between the buildings on the main street where dwellings had been shelled or burned. Ruined houses with shell holes in their roofs and half the walls torn away stared at her, silent and dark. A few saddle horses and mule teams were hitched outside the wooden awning of Bullard’s store. The dusty red road was empty and lifeless, and the only sounds in the village were a few whoops and drunken laughs that floated on the still twilight air from a saloon far down the street.

The depot had not been rebuilt since it was burned in the battle and in its place was only a wooden shelter, with no sides to keep out the weather. Scarlett walked under it and sat down on one of the empty kegs that were evidently put there for seats. She peered up and down the street for Will Benteen. Will should have been here to meet her. He should have known she would take the first train possible after receiving his laconic message that Gerald was dead.

She had come so hurriedly that she had in her small carpetbag only a nightgown and a tooth brush, not even a change of underwear. She was uncomfortable in the tight black dress she had borrowed from Mrs. Meade, for she had had no time to get mourning clothes for herself. Mrs. Meade was thin now, and Scarlett’s pregnancy being advanced, the dress was doubly uncomfortable. Even in her sorrow at Gerald’s death, she did not forget the appearance she was making and she looked down at her body with distaste. Her figure was completely gone and her face and ankles were puffy. Heretofore she had not cared very much how she looked but now that she would see Ashley within the hour she cared greatly. Even in her heartbreak, she shrank from the thought of facing him when she was carrying another man’s child. She loved him and he loved her, and this unwanted child now seemed to her a proof of infidelity to that love. But much as she disliked having him see her with the slenderness gone from her waist and the lightness from her step, it was something she could not escape now.

She patted her foot impatiently. Will should have met her. Of course, she could go over to Bullard’s and inquire after him or ask someone there to drive her over to Tara, should she find he had been unable to come. But she did not want to go to Bullard’s. It was Saturday night and probably half the men of the County would be there. She did not want to display her condition in this poorly fitting black dress which accentuated rather than hid her figure. And she did not want to hear the kindly sympathy that would be poured out about Gerald. She did not want sympathy. She was afraid she would cry if anyone even mentioned his name to her. And she wouldn’t cry. She knew if she once began it would be like the time she cried into the horse’s mane, that dreadful night when Atlanta fell and Rhett had left her on the dark road outside the town, terrible tears that tore her heart and could not be stopped.

No, she wouldn’t cry! She felt the lump in her throat rising again, as it had done so often since the news came, but crying wouldn’t do any good. It would only confuse and weaken her. Why, oh, why hadn’t Will or Melanie or the girls written her that Gerald was ailing? She would have taken the first train to Tara to care for him, brought a doctor from Atlanta if necessary. The fools-all of them! Couldn’t they manage anything without her? She couldn’t be in two places at once and the good Lord knew she was doing her best for them all in Atlanta.

She twisted about on the keg, becoming nervous and fidgety as Will still did not come. Where was he? Then she heard the scrunching of cinders on the railroad tracks behind her and, twisting her body, she saw Alex Fontaine crossing the tracks toward a wagon, a sack of oats on his shoulder.

“Good Lord! Isn’t that you, Scarlett?” he cried, dropping the sack and running to take her hand, pleasure written all over his bitter, swarthy little face. “I’m so glad to see you. I saw Will over at the blacksmith’s shop, getting the horse shod. The train was late and he thought he’d have time. Shall I run fetch him?”

“Yes, please, Alex,” she said, smiling in spite of her sorrow. It was good to see a County face again.

“Oh-er-Scarlett,” he began awkwardly, still holding her hand, “I’m mighty sorry about your father.”

“Thank you,” she replied, wishing he had not said it. His words brought up Gerald’s florid face and bellowing voice so clearly.

“If it’s any comfort to you, Scarlett, we’re mighty proud of him around here,” Alex continued, dropping her hand. “He-well, we figure he died like a soldier and in a soldier’s cause.”

Now what did he mean by that, she thought confusedly. A soldier? Had someone shot him? Had he gotten into a fight with the Scallawags as Tony had? But she mustn’t hear more. She would cry if she talked about him and she mustn’t cry, not until she was safely in the wagon with Will and out in the country where no stranger could see her. Will wouldn’t matter. He was just like a brother.

“Alex, I don’t want to talk about it,” she said shortly.

“I don’t blame you one bit, Scarlett,” said Alex while the dark blood of anger flooded his face. “If it was my sister, I’d-well, Scarlett, I’ve never yet said a harsh word about any woman, but personally I think somebody ought to take a rawhide whip to Suellen.”

What foolishness was he talking about now, she wondered. What had Suellen to do with it all?

“Everybody around here feels the same way about her, I’m sorry to say. Will’s the only one who takes up for her-and, of course, Miss Melanie, but she’s a saint and won’t see bad in anyone and-”

“I said I didn’t want to talk about it,” she said coldly but Alex did not seem rebuffed. He looked as though he understood her rudeness and that was annoying. She didn’t want to hear bad tidings about her own family from an outsider, didn’t want him to know of her ignorance of what had happened. Why hadn’t Will sent her the full details?

She wished Alex wouldn’t look at her so hard. She felt that he realized her condition and it embarrassed her. But what Alex was thinking as he peered at her in the twilight was that her face had changed so completely he wondered how he had ever recognized her. Perhaps it was because she was going to have a baby. Women did look like the devil at such times. And, of course, she must be feeling badly about old man O’Hara. She had been his pet. But, no, the change was deeper than that. She really looked as if she had three square meals a day. And the hunted-animal look had partly gone from her eyes. Now, the eyes which had been fearful and desperate were hard. There was an air of command, assurance and determination about her, even when she smiled. Bet she led old Frank a merry life! Yes, she had changed. She was a handsome woman, to be sure, but all that pretty, sweet softness had gone from her face and that flattering way of looking up at a man, like he knew more than God Almighty, had utterly vanished.

Well, hadn’t they all changed? Alex looked down at his rough clothes and his face fell into its usual bitter lines. Sometimes at night when he lay awake, wondering how his mother was going to get that operation and how poor dead Joe’s little boy was going to get an education and how he was going to get money for another mule, he wished the war was still going on, wished it had gone on forever. They didn’t know their luck then. There was always something to eat in the army, even if it was just corn bread, always somebody to give orders and none of this torturing sense of facing problems that couldn’t be solved-nothing to bother about in the army except getting killed. And then there was Dimity Munroe. Alex wanted to marry her and he knew he couldn’t when so many were already looking to him for support. He had loved her for so long and now the roses were fading from her cheeks and the joy from her eyes. If only Tony hadn’t had to run away to Texas. Another man on the place would make all the difference in the world. His lovable bad-tempered little brother, penniless somewhere in the West. Yes, they had all changed. And why not? He sighed heavily.

“I haven’t thanked you for what you and Frank did for Tony,” he said. “It was you who helped him get away, wasn’t it? It was fine of you. I heard in a roundabout way that he was safe in Texas. I was afraid to write and ask you-but did you or Frank lend him any money? I want to repay-”

“Oh, Alex, please hush! Not now!” cried Scarlett. For once, money meant nothing to her.

Alex was silent for a moment.

“I’ll get Will for you,” he said, “and we’ll all be over tomorrow for the funeral.”

As he picked up the sack of oats and turned away, a wobbly-wheeled wagon swayed out of a side street and creaked up to them. Will called from the seat: “I’m sorry I’m late, Scarlett.”

Climbing awkwardly down from the wagon, he stumped toward her and, bending, kissed her cheek. Will had never kissed her before, had never failed to precede her name with “Miss” and, while it surprised her, it warmed her heart and pleased her very much. He lifted her carefully over the wheel and into the wagon and, looking down, she saw that it was the same old rickety wagon in which she had fled from Atlanta. How had it ever held together so long? Will must have kept it patched up very well. It made her slightly sick to look at it and to remember that night. If it took the shoes off her feet or food from Aunt Pitty’s table, she’d see that there was a new wagon at Tara and this one burned.

Will did not speak at first and Scarlett was grateful. He threw his battered straw hat into the back of the wagon, clucked to the horse and they moved off. Will was just the same, lank and gangling, pink of hair, mild of eye, patient as a draft animal.

They left the village behind and turned into the red road to Tara. A faint pink still lingered about the edges of the sky and fat feathery clouds were tinged with gold and palest green. The stillness of the country twilight came down about them as calming as a prayer. How had she ever borne it, she thought, away for all these months, away from the fresh smell of country air, the plowed earth and the sweetness of summer nights? The moist red earth smelled so good, so familiar, so friendly, she wanted to get out and scoop up a handful. The honeysuckle which draped the gullied red sides of the road in tangled greenery was piercingly fragrant as always after rain, the sweetest perfume in the world. Above their heads a flock of chimney swallows whirled suddenly on swift wings and now and then a rabbit scurried startled across the road, his white tail bobbing like an eiderdown powder puff. She saw with pleasure that the cotton stood well, as they passed between plowed fields where the green bushes reared themselves sturdily out of the red earth. How beautiful all this was! The soft gray mist in the swampy bottoms, the red earth and growing cotton, the sloping fields with curving green rows and the black pines rising behind everything like sable walls. How had she ever stayed in Atlanta so long?

“Scarlett, before I tell you about Mr. O’Hara-and I want to tell you everything before you get home-I want to ask your opinion on a matter. I figger you’re the head of the house now.”

“What is it, Will?”

He turned his mild sober gaze on her for a moment.

“I just wanted your approval to my marryin’ Suellen.”

Scarlett clutched the seat, so surprised that she almost fell backwards. Marry Suellen! She’d never thought of anybody marrying Suellen since she had taken Frank Kennedy from her. Who would have Suellen?

“Goodness, Will!”

“Then I take it you don’t mind?”

“Mind? No, but-Why, Will, you’ve taken my breath away! You marry Suellen? Will, I always thought you were sweet on Carreen.”

Will kept his eyes on the horse and flapped the reins. His profile did not change but she thought he sighed slightly.

“Maybe I was,” he said.

“Well, won’t she have you?”

“I never asked her.”

“Oh, Will, you’re a fool. Ask her. She’s worth two of Suellen!”

“Scarlett, you don’t know a lot of things that’s been going on at Tara. You ain’t favored us with much of your attention these last months.”

“I haven’t, haven’t I?” she flared. “What do you suppose I’ve been doing in Atlanta? Riding around in a coach and four and going to balls? Haven’t I sent you money every month? Haven’t I paid the taxes and fixed the roof and bought the new plow and the mules? Haven’t-”

“Now, don’t fly off the handle and get your Irish up,” he interrupted imperturbably. “If anybody knows what you’ve done, I do, and it’s been two men’s work.”

Slightly mollified, she questioned, “Well then, what do you mean?”

“Well, you’ve kept the roof over us and food in the pantry and I ain’t denyin’ that, but you ain’t given much thought to what’s been goin’ on in anybody’s head here at Tara. I ain’t blamin’ you, Scarlett. That’s just your way. You warn’t never very much interested in what was in folks’ heads. But what I’m tryin’ to tell you is that I didn’t never ask Miss Carreen because I knew it wouldn’t be no use. She’s been like a little sister to me and I guess she talks to me plainer than to anybody in the world. But she never got over that dead boy and she never will. And I might as well tell you now she’s aimin’ to go in a convent over to Charleston.”

“Are you joking?”

“Well, I knew it would take you back and I just want to ask you, Scarlett, don’t you argue with her about it or scold her or laugh at her. Let her go. It’s all she wants now. Her heart’s broken.”

“But God’s nightgown! Lots of people’s hearts have been broken and they didn’t run off to convents. Look at me. I lost a husband.”

“But your heart warn’t broken,” Will said calmly and, picking up a straw from the bottom of the wagon, he put it in his mouth and chewed slowly. That remark took the wind out of her. As always when she heard the truth spoken, no matter how unpalatable it was, basic honesty forced her to acknowledge it as truth. She was silent a moment, trying to accustom herself to the idea of Carreen as a nun.

“Promise you won’t fuss at her.”

“Oh, well, I promise,” and then she looked at him with a new understanding and some amazement. Will had loved Carreen, loved her now enough to take her part and make her retreat easy. And yet he wanted to marry Suellen.

“Well, what’s all this about Suellen? You don’t care for her, do you?”

“Oh, yes, I do in a way,” he said removing the straw and surveying it as if it were highly interesting. “Suellen ain’t as bad as you think, Scarlett. I think we’ll get along right well. The only trouble with Suellen is that she needs a husband and some children and that’s just what every woman needs.”

The wagon jolted over the rutty road and for a few minutes while the two sat silent Scarlett’s mind was busy. There must be something more to it than appeared on the surface, something deeper, more important, to make the mild and soft-spoken Will want to marry a complaining nagger like Suellen.

“You haven’t told me the real reason, Will. If I’m head of the family, I’ve got a right to know.”

“That’s right,” said Will, “and I guess you’ll understand. I can’t leave Tara. It’s home to me, Scarlett, the only real home I ever knew and I love every stone of it. I’ve worked on it like it was mine. And when you put out work on somethin’, you come to love it. You know what I mean?”

She knew what he meant and her heart went out in a surge of warm affection for him, hearing him say he, too, loved the thing she loved best.

“And I figger it this way. With your pa gone and Carreen a nun, there’ll be just me and Suellen left here and, of course, I couldn’t live on at Tara without marryin’ Suellen. You know how folks talk.”

“But-but Will, there’s Melanie and Ashley-”

At Ashley’s name he turned and looked at her, his pale eyes unfathomable. She had the old feeling that Will knew all about her and Ashley, understood all and did not either censure or approve.

“They’ll be goin’ soon.”

“Going? Where? Tara is their home as well as yours.”

“No, it ain’t their home. That’s just what’s eatin’ on Ashley. It ain’t his home and he don’t feel like he’s earnin’ his keep. He’s a mighty pore farmer and he knows it. God knows he tries his best but he warn’t cut out for farmin’ and you know it as well as I do. If he splits kindlin’, like as not he’ll slice off his foot. He can’t no more keep a plow straight in a furrow than little Beau can, and what he don’t know about makin’ things grow would fill a book. It ain’t his fault. He just warn’t bred for it. And it worries him that he’s a man livin’ at Tara on a woman’s charity and not givin’ much in return.”

“Charity? Has he ever said-”

“No, he’s never said a word. You know Ashley. But I can tell. Last night when we were sittin’ up with your pa, I tole him I had asked Suellen and she’d said Yes. And then Ashley said that relieved him because he’d been feelin’ like a dog, stayin’ on at Tara, and he knew he and Miss Melly would have to keep stayin’ on, now that Mr. O’Hara was dead, just to keep folks from talkin’ about me and Suellen. So then he told me he was aimin’ to leave Tara and get work.”

“Work? What kind? Where?”

“I don’t know exactly what he’ll do but he said he was goin’ up North. He’s got a Yankee friend in New York who wrote him about workin’ in a bank up there.”

“Oh, no!” cried Scarlett from the bottom of her heart and, at the cry, Will gave her the same look as before.

“Maybe ‘twould be better all ‘round if he did go North.”

“No! No! I don’t think so.”

Her mind was working feverishly. Ashley couldn’t go North! She might never see him again. Even though she had not seen him in months, had not spoken to him alone since that fateful scene in the orchard, there had not been a day when she had not thought of him, been glad he was sheltered under her roof. She had never sent a dollar to Will that she had not been pleased that it would make Ashley’s life easier. Of course, he wasn’t any good as a farmer. Ashley was bred for better things, she thought proudly. He was born to rule, to live in a large house, ride fine horses, read books of poetry and tell negroes what to do. That there were no more mansions and horses and negroes and few books did not alter matters. Ashley wasn’t bred to plow and split rails. No wonder he wanted to leave Tara.

But she could not let him go away from Georgia. If necessary, she would bully Frank into giving him a job in the store, make Frank turn off the boy he now had behind the counter. But, no-Ashley’s place was no more behind a counter than it was behind a plow. A Wilkes a shopkeeper! Oh, never that! There must be something-why, her mill of course! Her relief at the thought was so great that she smiled. But would he accept an offer from her? Would he still think it was charity? She must manage it so he would think he was doing her a favor. She would discharge Mr. Johnson and put Ashley in charge of the old mill while Hugh operated the new one. She would explain to Ashley how Frank’s ill health and the pressure of work at the store kept him from helping her, and she would plead her condition as another reason why she needed his help.

She would make him realize somehow that she couldn’t do without his aid at this time. And she would give him a half-interest in the mill, if he would only take it over-anything just to have him near her, anything to see that bright smile light up his face, anything for the chance of catching an unguarded look in his eyes that showed he still cared. But, she promised herself, never, never would she again try to prod him into words of love, never again would she try to make him throw away that foolish honor he valued more than love. Somehow, she must delicately convey to him this new resolution of hers. Otherwise he might refuse, fearing another scene such as that last terrible one had been.

“I can get him something to do in Atlanta,” she said.

“Well, that’s yours and Ashley’s business,” said Will and put the straw back in his mouth. “Giddap, Sherman. Now, Scarlett. there’s somethin’ else I’ve got to ask you before I tell you about your pa. I won’t have you lightin’ into Suellen. What she’s done, she’s done, and you snatchin’ her baldheaded won’t bring Mr. O’Hara back. Besides she honestly thought she was actin’ for the best!”

“I wanted to ask you about that. What is all this about Suellen? Alex talked riddles and said she ought to be whipped. What has she done?”

“Yes, folks are pretty riled up about her. Everybody I run into this afternoon in Jonesboro was promisin’ to cut her dead the next time they seen her, but maybe they’ll get over it. Now, promise me you won’t light into her. I won’t be havin’ no quarrelin’ tonight with Mr. O’Hara layin’ dead in the parlor.”

HE won’t be having any quarreling! thought Scarlett, indignantly. He talks like Tara was his already!

And then she thought of Gerald, dead in the parlor, and suddenly she began to cry, cry in bitter, gulping sobs. Will put his arm around her, drew her comfortably close and said nothing.

As they jolted slowly down the darkening road, her head on his shoulder, her bonnet askew, she had forgotten the Gerald of the last two years, the vague old gentleman who stared at doors waiting for a woman who would never enter. She was remembering the vital, virile old man with his mane of crisp white hair, his bellowing cheerfulness, his stamping boots, his clumsy jokes, his generosity. She remembered how, as a child, he had seemed the most wonderful man in the world, this blustering father who carried her before him on his saddle when he jumped fences, turned her up and paddled her when she was naughty, and then cried when she cried and gave her quarters to get her to hush. She remembered him coming home from Charleston and Atlanta laden with gifts that were never appropriate, remembered too, with a faint smile through tears, how he came home in the wee hours from Court Day at Jonesboro, drunk as seven earls, jumping fences, his rollicking voice raised in “The Wearin’ o’ the Green.” And how abashed he was, facing Ellen on the morning after. Well, he was with Ellen now.

“Why didn’t you write me that he was ill? I’d have come so fast-”

“He warn’t ill, not a minute. Here, honey, take my handkerchief and I’ll tell you all about it.”

She blew her nose on his bandanna, for she had come from Atlanta without even a handkerchief, and settled back into the crook of Will’s arm. How nice Will was. Nothing ever upset him.

“Well, it was this way, Scarlett. You been sendin’ us money right along and Ashley and me, well, we’ve paid taxes and bought the mule and seeds and what-all and a few hogs and chickens. Miss Melly’s done mighty well with the hens, yes sir, she has. She’s a fine woman, Miss Melly is. Well, anyway, after we bought things for Tara, there warn’t so much left over for folderols, but none of us warn’t complainin’. Except Suellen.


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