Wade Hampton Hamilton turned over in his bed and looked at the slumbering Hugh Elsing. What a beautiful man. Wade was ashamed at this thought, but Hugh was quite dashing. At one time he'd been emotionally drawn, working as a wagon driver for Mother's sawmill, but now Hugh was practicing law and seemed to be enjoying life, and certainly Wade and Hugh enjoyed each other's company.

Wade shook his head and grinned. He'd been here all night, but even if Mother had not been out of town, she wouldn't have noticed Wade's keeping late hours. When Wade stayed over at Aunt Pittypat's, the old lady was quite concerned when Wade came in after ten, but Mother never seemed to let things like this bother her.

"A boy needs a social life" Mother would say. Perhaps Mother remembered her overprotected and chaperoned girlhood when she'd been a young belle at Tara.

"It was all such nonsense" Scarlett had told Wade once. "The last good ball we had was after the Wilkes barbecue, and my little sister was forbidden to go because she wasn't yet fourteen."

Wade had been about that age—fourteen, when Uncle Peter, Pittypat's old darky had caught Wade with a neighbor boy in the carriage house, both of them quite undressed.

But Uncle Peter had realized that it would cause more grief than good to mention it anywhere.

Mother wasn't home right now. She was staying at Tara. The store was being run by Wade's Uncle Ashley, who was little more than drunk these days. Wade quite often had to go over Ashley's figures at the end of the day—Wade had inherited his mother's cleverness with mathematics—while Ashley just sat in an intoxicated state, staring at nothing.

As Wade was putting on his britches, he remembered the letter he'd received the day before from Ella, his half-sister. He took it out and read it one more time.

"Dear Wade…

I don't know what is happening here. Aunt Suellen finally caught Mother and Uncle Will when she came home early from Jonesboro. You had told me about this, and I couldn't believe it—Uncle Will is a wonderful man, but he is old and has one leg!

Aunt Suellen had a screaming fight with Mother. She said something about Mother taking her first love and now trying to steal her husband! Mother said something like, "Fiddle-dee-dee, I don't want to marry him, you goose." But of course Aunt Suellen was heartbroken, and Uncle Will has gone over to the Fontaine's farm to spend a few days.

Tony Fontaine has just returned from his long trip after the unpleasant business with Mr. Hilton back in '69; it doesn't look as if anything will be done to Tony now. We have a new mayor after all!

So Mother has refused to leave Tara, and so I am staying as well. I really hope Mother will stay away from Will Benteen after this. It's not Aunt Suellen's fault that Mother has to always get what she wants.

Possibly I will be helping Hetty Tarleton teach, they say I don't need a certificate. I hope the little monsters aren't as bad as we were as children!

Best,

Ella."

Wade folded the letter, putting it away, and tapped Hugh's arm, kissing him on the ear, and whispering "I'm going now." Wade went to the window.

But Hugh called faintly from the bed, "Hey, I love you, you know."

Wade shushed him, smiling. "Don't talk nonsense, Hugh." For God's sake we're men. It's just a little horseplay we do, not like the feeling between man and wife. Wade was sure that he would become interested in young girls soon, and many of them were quite friendly, and sometimes a bit forward with him.

Nanette Picard, Hugh's niece, was always waving and smiling at Wade, and Wade knew several of his boyhood friends were quite smitten with Nan's dark hair and mischievous green eyes.

But Wade was still having fun, just fooling about with boys. There were lots here in Atlanta, Hugh was by no means Wade's favorite. Even at Tara, where Wade had discovered that Big Sam, the darky foreman, had never "jumped the broom" for good reason.

Before Archie, the Wilkes' one-eyed driver had been killed in a barroom fight, he'd taught Wade tricks that he'd learned during his forty years in the Fayetteville prison. "Tain't that I'm queer." Archie had said "Just so much more you can do with a boy."

Wade also remembered his music teacher, Mr. Foote, at the academy had actually proposed leaving his wife and taking Wade to France after graduation. "People would understand us there."

Could you imagine that?

Hugh Elsing was a bit clinging, and needed Wade too much, and Wade hoped that didn't mean he'd have to stop playing around with Hugh. Still, Wade walked over to the bed and gave Hugh another kiss. Hugh looked like a bunny under the sheets!

"What were you reading?" Hugh asked urgently. "Did that baker's apprentice write you another poem?"

Wade smiled and waved good bye. He didn't have time to explain Ella's letter, and would have been drawn and quartered before he'd let Hugh know about Mother's nonsense with Will Benteen. It was like the nonsense with Hugh, just playtime.

Climbing out on the trellis, Wade surveyed the street, but it was five a.m., and quite deserted. Sometimes when Wade left Hugh's of a morning, Grandpa Merriweather would be going by in his bakery wagon on early deliveries, but not today, thank goodness.

Last year, shortly before Mammy's stroke, the old darky had reminded Wade of how little Bonnie had once talked him and Ella into stealing a pie from Grandpa's wagon, and they'd been thrashed for it mercilessly. But Bonnie, of course had been untouched, and eaten most of the pie, anyway. Baby Bonnie had been a lively one!

Wade climbed down the ivy, dropping lightly to the ground. God forbid that old biddy Mrs. Elsing looked out the front window, or one or two of the Gallagher children. After the killing of Fanny's husband, Fanny had returned to the Elsing home to live.

Wade had been horrified to learn from Hugh that Fanny was seeing Agamemnon Link a former Yankee corporal. But Wade knew he couldn't judge anyone, as long as Fanny didn't marry the bastard.

Just as Wade crossed Peachtree Street, he heard a call. "Hey there, cousin. Getting in a bit early, ain't we?"

Wade turned and saw Beauregard Emory Wilkes leaning against a fence with his trusty stick. Beau had begun going blind when he was eight, right after his mother had died in childbirth. Now, in his seventeenth year, Beau had quite adjusted to it. A sighted person wouldn't have noticed Wade in the early gloom.

"I heard your door key clanging against your lucky bullet, or whatever that thing is that your father left you." Beau explained, as Wade walked up to him. "How's Hugh Elsing?"

Wade breathed hotly. "Beau…"

Beau leaned forward, his eyes obscured behind little black shaded spectacles "Or was it Hugh at all? Lots of deviates here. Maybe it was Fernald Dill over on Elouise Street, or one of the hoboes in Grant Park. Get blown for a quarter, Wade?"

"Beau, it's none of your damn business where I was, and do you have to talk so loudly?"

Beau reached out a groping hand, and found Wade's shoulder. "Wadie, I don't care that you're a poofter, but someone else might, and fairies don't do well in Atlanta. You could get hurt, and cause a great deal of shame for your mother and my father, and perhaps cost them business at the Kennedy Mercantile, if not the mills."

Wade looked at his boots. Beau was right, of course. Beau had covered for Wade more than once during Wade's period with Judge Adams—the Judge, long married had had to meet Wade in the Wilkes cellar. It had been fairly easy as Ashley, Beau's father had little interest in whether his nephew was staying the night (or in what room) but now Wade was becoming a man, and this had to stop.

"It's just a temporary thing, I know you tell me." Beau said, as he let go of Wade's shoulder. "The Greeks did this, and all, but Hilda Dudley came by yesterday looking for you, she wanted to go riding, and why waste your time with an idiot like Elsing? Wade you are a grown man now—nineteen years old. You decided not to go to the university, and you're doing quite well in managing the sawmill. You really should look for a wife."

Beau grinned. "I can stay a bachelor. Who'd want me?" Beau tapped his dark spectacles.

Wade assented, and then looked suspiciously at his cousin. "What're you doing wandering around by yourself at near-dawn, Blinky?"

Beau snorted. "Well, as you know, I like my trips to Mrs. Watlings house. You've lent me money often enough. Seeing as which I shouldn't throw the first stone at your glass house. Father's allowance only covers one trip a month or maybe two, so I found a friend who contributed a dollar for my fun with one of Belle's ladies, and I was just resting up after my evening."

Wade laughed. "And you have the effrontery to tell me not to carouse of a night! The blind leading the—"

"The sodomite—" Beau said, and both boys laughed self consciously.

"You really should visit with me sometime" Beau said archly "Miss Violet would get you interested in girls really fast."

"Who was it that sported you a buck for her favors?" Wade asked once more.

"Beau didn't have to pay. I have considerable credit at Mrs. Watling's establishment" came a deep voice from behind Wade.

Wade spun around and there was Rhett Butler, his stepfather, and another man, rather pale looking in his mid thirties.

"Jesse, you met Beau earlier, and this is my wife's oldest son, Wade. Wade, this is Jesse ah…Jackson."

Wade hugged Rhett and shook hands with the pale man. He'd not seen his stepfather in almost a year. Rhett did not live with Scarlett anymore at the house on Peachtree Street, although they were still lawfully married.

Rhett stayed at the Watling house, and clearly, he had quite a bit of pull there. Beau could probably visit a girl every night of the year, if Rhett willed it.

"Of course, you must've had a time of it!" Wade said, looking back at Beau and grinning. "I've not been to Mrs. Watling's but I understand it's quite a place for young gentlemen to sow their wild oats."

Jesse Jackson smiled. "As a farmer's son, I wish I'd done my reaping and sowing in cathouses rather than on my father's farm, but I'm actually quite happily married. I just sat in the parlor with Butler here while young Beau enjoyed himself upstairs."

Wade looked earnestly into Rhett's face. "Are you home for a while, Uncle Rhett? It's a silly question, but Atlanta isn't the same when you're out of town."

Rhett grimaced. "Well you know, I don't drop by the house anymore, though I paid dearly for it. But—Wade I've found a new business interest. Since Atlanta and most of Fulton County has passed a dry law, I might be staying a while, since there's a fellow in town who wants to try a non-intoxicating product, sort of a clean version of coca wine. Do you know John Pemberton, who runs the apothecary shop—the druggist?"

"Beau, Ella and I have had quite a few strawberry phosphates at their counter" Wade said, leaning next to Beau on the fence.

"Well, Pemberton has formulated a tasty drink, made from the coca leaf itself. He wants to call it Coca-Cola, and thinks it might take off, distracting most of Atlanta from hankering after liquor."

Wade laughed, and Beau with him. Both had promised as children to stay temperate—Melanie Hamilton Wilkes had made them promise—and both had dismissed this promise as soon as they could get into the rum punch and moonshine sold in the back alley behind the Silver Dollar saloon.

"You're right, boys. " Rhett said, smiling. "This Coca-Cola isn't going to replace hooch, or forty-rod, or even claret. Not even for me. We'll always have it at Belle's. There will always be a place for spirits. But the coca leaf, which is imported from—"

"Peru" finished Beau, always the know it all.

"Yes, that's right. It's quite a stimulant, this coca leaf. Peruvians make tea from it, and chew it for fun. Quite stimulating, like laudanum."

Wade thought about this. Dr. Meade prescribed laudanum for pain and also for a few bored old ladies.

"What is your business, Mr. Jackson" asked Beau of the pale man.

"Well, Mr. Wilkes, I guess you could say I move money around…redistribute it, you know." Mr. Jackson replied, and he and Rhett Butler exploded in a laughter that mystified the younger men.

Jackson tapped Rhett on the shoulder. "I've got to meet a train, friend. I'll see you soon."

For some reason the "train" remark also made Rhett smile broadly. "Well tell Cole Younger that I said hello. Hope to see you soon, Jesse."

"Yes, good luck on your business venture with this coca leaf thing, Butler."

"Thanks, but you won't blame me if I don't deposit my profits in any bank you plan to visit, Jesse."

Old men seem to laugh a lot for no particular reason, Wade and Beau thought, simultaneously.

Rhett took Wade aside a moment later. "I wanted to tell you that I saw you a few nights ago at the Candlelight Inn. You were chatting up Leith Albyrs. Be careful of that boy. Wade. He's a thief and the child of a notorious carpetbagger. The little swindler knows you have money."

Wade looked at Rhett, astonished. "What were you doing at the Candlelight Inn, Uncle Rhett? You're not an er, confirmed bachelor."

Rhett smiled widely. "Well, for one thing, a fairy tavern is one place I don't have to listen to the glories of the War Between the States. If I didn't know better, you'd think our side won with all the "General Lee" this and the "Stonewall that." But I have friends there that I've met through my brother.

Wade looked a little puzzled.

"My brother and a gentleman friend of his, own a share in the Candlelight Inn. Yes, that's right. Dorsey Butler, the good example, and my father's favorite son. Unlike my expulsion from West Point for general orneriness, Dorsey was dismissed for far more scatological reasons, and my father had to cover it up with much money. But enough of that. Stay away from Leith Albyrs. See any other young man you like, Wade."

Wade shook his head. "It's just a fun thing, Uncle Rhett. I'll choose my companions more carefully. I do like Leith though. But I'll try to begin keeping company with some girl, soon."

Wade rather liked Leith Albyrs, and hoped that Rhett's observations weren't too canny.

"It may not be a phase, Wade, and if it isn't, you can live the life you like, if you are careful. My brother has learned that."

"No, Uncle Rhett, I am a normal man, and I will meet a nice girl." Wade said stubbornly, hoping of course it wouldn't have to happen too soon.

Rhett smiled, and said nothing. He patted Wade on the shoulder.

"How is your mother? We don't see each other much but I hope she's doing well. The sawmill seems to be thriving." Rhett grimaced. He'd always resented this business venture of Scarlett's. Wade remembered how Rhett had encouraged Scarlett to call the mercantile the "Caveat Emptorium."

Wade was unsure of whether Rhett was aware of Scarlett's fling with Will Benteen. Wade had learned in his brief life that closed mouths seemed to suffer less, so he just said, "Mother's taking some time at Tara right now. The cotton is coming in, and so she's looking after that. Uncle Ashley is running the store here in town, and I'm helping a bit at one of the mills. We finally are employing free darkies again, instead of convicts, and fortunately, a few of the darkies are family men, and don't drink up their pay, and disappear for days."

Rhett smiled. "What you should do is only pay them every two weeks. That will weed out the slackers and the dipsomaniacs. Shiftless types will want to be paid daily if they can get away with it, and drink all they like."

Wade nodded. Rhett Butler had a head for business, for one who didn't work terribly hard himself. There was no doubt about this.

Rhett nodded his head towards the boy on the fence. "How's Beau?"

Wade shook his head sadly.

"It was a terribly blow to Beau when his eyes got so bad that he could no longer read. The Wilkeses are a scholarly people. Then, about three years ago it all went black for Beau. Beau is quite independent, and gets around town quite well on that stick of his, but he refused to go to a college for the blind, even though Mother has offered to pay for it. I think Beau doesn't want to leave his pa, who is having a problem with drink, as you know."

Wade was vaguely aware that Rhett and Uncle Ashley had never really gotten along, and expected a smart remark about the drinking, but Rhett said nothing.

"Beau's Aunt India—she's married to my Uncle Henry Hamilton now, they call him a cradle snatcher, though Aunt India's in her thirties—India has been able to get some of the raised dot books for the blind, invented by that Frenchman, Louis Braille. But Beau is resistant, he doesn't want to learn to use them. I read Beau penny dreadfuls now and then, and Uncle Ashley reads Beau Shakespeare—mainly the sonnets, at night before they go to bed."

"You mean before Ashley Wilkes passes out." Rhett said, smiling inimically. "Do you think Beau might be interested in travel? Perhaps I could take him along with me while I promote this Coca-Cola venture. He's a bright lad and although he can't see to write, perhaps I need a secretary."

"Well, if you entertain Beau the way you did last night during your travels, he might be quite pleased with the employment" Wade laughed. "Beau probably would love the adventure. I'm not sure if my uncle would be agreeable, however. Since losing Aunt Melly, he really is attached to his boy."

Rhett looked meditatively down the street and then back at Wade. "Your Aunt Melanie was a great lady. Perhaps the greatest I've ever known, though I was partial to poor Mammy, as well. Can she move at all since the stroke?"

Wade looked unhappy. "No, not really. Mammy's here, you know, not at Tara. She can blink her left eye and take food, but that's about it. Prissy looks after her."

And your sister Ella?"

Wade smiled. "Ella may teach school near Tara. She has no more than a primary education, but that's far beyond most of the people there. Ella loves books and can do mental arithmetic and orthography. The Tarleton girls have a good little schoolhouse, and it's become quite popular, serving all the white children in Jonesboro."

Rhett reflected. "Ella's just fifteen. Ah well, schoolmarming is better than what my sisters did at that age—giggling, gossiping, sewing hope chests. And the Tarleton girls were little more than that before they lost everything and now run a schoolhouse. We're building an interesting society, much like the one built after the fall of Rome."

Wade grinned. One thing Rhett and Ashley had in common was long windedness and pomposity. Of course things were different now—Wade could not remember when everyone was rich and slaves labored in the fields…but it must be quite a change to the old timers.

"You know, I wasn't the only one who predicted that we'd lose that ridiculous war. Or how it would affect our lovely society. The Yankees had all the weaponry, the ball bearing factories. And even after all this, the Yankees really had little interest in freeing the darkies. I think they just thought it would eliminate competition…they paid their workers almost nothing, and we paid absolutely nothing…and now we're even, I suppose." Rhett was silent. But then he said "Amazing things have happened though, in the fifteen years since the war ended."

Wade was a bit bored by all this old timer reminiscing. But it was indeed true. Wade remembered when he'd been just a sprat, eating nothing but mush and yams, because the Yankees had chased off the darkies and burned their resources.

When Wade had been nine or ten, the Yankees had been trying to interfere with the rebuilding of Atlanta, but in spite of it all, Mrs. Merriweather had started her bakery, Dr. Meade had built up his practice, and other businesses had thrived.

Now Wade Hamilton was a prosperous manager of a sawmill, and a graduate of a fine boy's school. He'd even had money to bribe the Milledgeville constable last month when Wade and Rector Dobbins had been caught in a compromising way.

"It's just going to get more interesting, Wade." Rhett said, smiling. "I can't promise you we'll all be rich, but we'll be a lot more energetic than our forebears. My father was a languid property owner, but his father was a pirate. After I was turned out of the house when I was little more than your age, I made my living taking rich boys money with the devil's pasteboards, and then gold hunting and then as a blockade runner during the war. But I had a damned good time, and I think you will, as well."

As Wade noticed the tight behind of a young mill hand trudging towards the Kennedy sawmill, he felt he had to agree.

.