"Isn't this a fine day? I do say so," Scarlett stepped out of the carriage, with Suellen and Careen after her, and as Mammy got out with a little grunt, Beatrice Tarleton was their hostess to greet them.

"Mrs Tarleton," Scarlett began, noting Beatrice trussed up but for the riding crop at her side, "I daresay your sons will have a time hiding in the field, if that riding crop is known not to be on its shelf."

Beatrice Tarleton threw back her head and laughed, "Scarlett, my boys are over by the house. You may see them if you wish - they've already been given a sharp speaking to about the state of affairs. You know, I'm having them sent to the University of Virginia this time. Oh, Scarlett. There's that smile - you look more like your pa every day."

Scarlett scowled, and turned from the carriage to the Tarleton home which was a sight for eyes if not quite matching Tara. The fiery heads of the Tarletons could be seen bobbing in the crowd, and there was Cathleen Calvert, and India Wilkes, and Joe Fontaine, and Charles Hamilton.

This last piqued Scarlett's interest, for surely Melly as around - but she could not crane her neck and linger and remain a lady - so she made all greetings as was commonplace to people she had grew up with, and Charles had attached himself to Honey, so her plan was thwarted.

The food was to be held outside, and with barbecues and tables set out, although Tara was far reaching beauty and the Wilkes' plantation Tall Oakes was more stately, Fairhill was not without its charms, and many a time Scarlett found herself, seated on a bench with fork poised from plate to mouth, remembering that a lady must eat little or not at all, and hearing the horses neigh from fields afar.

"Miss Scarlett?"

Scarlett shielded her eyes and glanced up, and saw Ashley Wilkes, golden in hair and erect in posture.

"Oh, Mr Wilkes," Scarlett gathered her hoops about her, her plate to one side, and Ashley manfully covering a smile, as they the two of them stood together under that fir tree while the barbeque roasted and provided an almost unpleasing intimacy for that shared fact alone, "It is good to see you at Fairhill, you and India and Honey. Will your father, Mr Wilkes, be joining us, too?"

"He is right over there," Ashley, pointing for Scarlett's advantage, hid all too well the smile that was from her insistence upon the Savannah customs of her mother which in Clayton County, was only tolerated by her, and only slightly so by her daughter.

"Oh, I do see him," Scarlett nodded, quick as a bird, turning to Ashley, "I hear your father has had a new shipment of books ordered. About - about what, I could not say."

Ashley smiled, "How could you, Scarlett? But if I may, was it necessary to remove your interest altogether?"

Scarlett paused, "Pardon, Mr Wilkes? I'm afraid I don't know what to say."

"I saw it in your eyes," Ashley's eyes twinkled, "Do you yourself read often, when you are not in that great plantation of Mr O'Hara's?"

"Well - " Scarlett begun, and caught herself, " - do you know, at Fayette, they rather had us balance books on our heads as we walked around. I daresay, the only time I could open one is if it slipped from my pretty little head."

Ashley gestured, "And did it?"

Scarlett relaxed her face, and realised she had become closer to intimacy than she had liked, "Please excuse me, Mr Wilkes, but I feel faint all of a sudden, and must sit down."

Ashley made all indications for hospitality, but Scarlett dispatched him as well she could, and replaced her seat on the bench and began gobbling without realising her plate was once more back in her hands, and her fork clattered to the meat which continued to cook.

"Oh, that meat," Scarlett muttered, "If I have to smell it - and those poor animals which suffered to make it - at least the horses are safe."

Scarlett, during a lull in this muttering which saw fit to remedy her nerves, caught upon a fact of nature in her sister Suellen who had surely been watching all this time, from where Mr Kennedy had not yet budged in his discussion with John Tarleton, and Suellen, in impatient waiting, had occupation to study the closeness with which Scarlett and Ashley had been acquainted.

"I daresay I should put a cushion over her face while she slept," Scarlett adjusted her hoops once more, checking that no spoil of meat had landed on the folds, "Oh, if I weren't a lady, what wouldn't I do?"

The afternoon siesta began with the girls traipsing upstairs, and while Mammy chatted with the Tarleton mammy outside in the corridor, Scarlett lay in a fit of dislike and repugnance while the fans were waved over their faces, and she strained to lie quietly, keep her eyes closed, and not hear the horses' whinnying through the windows.

"Oh, it's no good," Scarlett muttered, and noticed that Suellen, content in her lullaby, would not stir for a fire that could engulf Fairhill, "There's nothing that can be done. I can't simply lie here when - when there's so much to do."

Scarlett listened at the door, and improbably caught the silence, and twisted the door handle. She stepped out, and hurried down the stairs where she froze at a gust of laughter, and realised she must have found the men discussing tactics in a board room of sorts. She continued past, and came outside where the barbeque's roasting smells still lingered, and there was much clean up to be done by the slaves before the dancing could commence indoors.

Scarlett made her way under trees and past benches, still seeing in her mind's eye Charles talking with Ashley, or the twins Tarleton making jokes, or the Fontaines miming the pistols they would draw and the injuries they had suffered, in pain or in pride.

Out spanned the fields, and to the paddocks was where Scarlett found Beatrice Tarleton, with no time to ride Nellie for all the preparations for tonight, but sneaking oats for her to eat.

"Mrs Tarleton," Scarlett waved, and not for the first time felt, at the surprise which shuddered through Beatrice, that perhaps her introduction could use some preface.

"Oh, Scarlett, you'll scare my poor Nellie," Beatrice's frown puckered her face, "Shouldn't you be upstairs with the girls?"

"That's precisely why," Scarlett held her hoops over the divots of mud which had occasioned Nellie's walk out of the stables this morning, "I couldn't sleep but to hear the horses whinning. I hoped to see them all."

"It must've been only Nellie you heard," Beatrice was worried, and began looking over the other side of the plantation, "I didn't know you had an interest in horses, Scarlett."

Scarlett smiled, and came forth to rub Nellie's neck, "Call it a curiosity, Mrs Tarleton."

"I won't hear of it! You must call me Beatrice," she replied, and held Scarlett's hand out of reach, "Such a delicate hand and gloved, you must approach Nellie properly. Like this."

Stunned, and by approbation of gaining Nellie's favor - or at least, this being followed by Beatrice's nod of approval, Scarlett smiled.

"There. You must go inside," Beatrice gathered her folds, "There's a lot to be done, and my girls won't help a jot. They're all as silly as their brothers are mischievous. Hurry along, before your Mammy catches you."