Disclaimer: The characters here and the world they inhabit are the creation and property of Margaret Mitchell, her heirs, and their assigns.
It was mid-June before Rhett returned to Charleston. Caroline was out of the house, and didn't realize he'd returned until she came home from a tea that afternoon. She heard he was home, and there was activity in both his study and his bedroom. Since it was supper time, she went straight to the dining room, where he sat at the head of the table.
"How were your travels?" she asked.
"Pleasant enough," he replied, bored already to find himself at home.
"And how is your kept woman?"
"The only woman I keep is you, my termagant."
"I meant the woman who has half a million dollars of my money."
"You're holding out on me, Caroline. I've seen every one of your account summaries since we married. Where have you hidden half a million dollars?"
Her eyes narrowed, and Rhett grinned.
"I didn't, because you gave it to that other woman." The settlement Rhett had given the O'Hara woman rankled Caroline's soul. He'd said that he had to give her half of his property to get it through the divorce court as quickly as her father wanted.
"Do you mean my wife?"
"Don't call her that. You had it annulled, didn't you?"
Finally, Rhett frowned. Caroline felt strength returning to her. "She was nothing but a mistress to you."
He smiled blandly again. "And even so, we shared a bed, and children, and things you and I will never have together, my harridan. In truth she's more my wife even now than any woman with whom I've shared a bed or even a house."
"One child, who's dead."
Rhett reached into his vest pocket and pulled out a blue flower that had been pressed. "One very dear child, given to me by her very dear mother." He smiled in a way that made Caroline's heart turn with longing.
Captain Butler was so genteel and manly at the St. Cecelia ball in 1874. When he'd danced the reel with Caroline, she'd felt as though she was the most envied woman in the room, and when she managed to get a waltz with him, she felt as though she was dancing on air. That night after she had been put to bed she imagined his hands all over her.
Daddy passed it off as a joke when she said she wanted to marry him, but she knew it wasn't. She knew they belonged together. She found out which parties and balls he would be attending that season and made sure she was at as many as she could get invited to. She asked for all the gossip about him and managed to get it. He was extremely rich and word was that his current wife's engagement ring came from England and covered almost all the space between her knuckles. The current wife didn't matter; they were as good as divorced and had been for years. Caroline continued to build her dream castle and told her father after every party that Rhett Butler was her choice. Finally, just after Easter, he told her that Mr. Butler would propose by the end of the summer.
The high point of Caroline Bell's entire life was the moment in mid-August when Captain Butler came and asked her to walk with him in her father's garden. She was radiantly happy. She was sure that Rhett had come to realize that he couldn't live without her, that she was the key to his every happiness. She should have savored that two-minute walk down to the gate that led to the river. Nothing before it and nothing after it in her life would ever come close to that amount of happiness.
The first step down was seeing the box from the local jeweler. She was expecting something much fancier, especially since he'd reportedly been travelling. The second was the ring itself. It couldn't be more than a single carat, in a very plain solitaire. What happened to the four-carat diamond surrounded by emeralds that her predecessor was no doubt polishing right now?
The prospective groom himself seemed distracted. Instead of the lofty profession of love she dreamed of, he simply handed her the box with an absent-minded, "I suppose you're expecting this." Then he led her back to the house.
"But—" He stopped and waited for her to continue. "Aren't you going to kiss me?"
He looked her up and down in a way that made her feel undressed like a piece of pork being unwrapped from butchers' paper and replied, "I wouldn't dream of it." He quickly walked through the house, stopping just long enough to tell her father, "It's done," and walked out to the street.
She decided he must be in a hurry to attend his business, for the wedding was in three weeks. She spent every minute and hundreds of her father's dollars getting the perfect dress, dresses for the wedding trip to New York, and arranging the wedding and banquet to follow. Surely Rhett would be more like a groom when they reached the important day.
Caroline was almost as happy as the moment before her proposal when her father met her at the door of the chapel to walk her down the aisle. Starting tonight, the man she loved more than anything would be her husband, and they would be happy forever. As before, she should have savored that moment a little longer.
As she got closer to the minister and her groom, Caroline realized that the smile she had seen on the groom's face at every wedding she'd ever been to was missing from hers. Instead of a smile, Rhett gave her a look of disinterest and her father a glower. The ceremony went quickly. Caroline tried to gaze lovingly into his eyes and whispered her vows with a choked voice. Rhett repeated the words the minister prompted him with, showing less feeling than the minister did. After an air kiss to her cheek, they walked out of the church.
Caroline was starting to feel that something was amiss. Rhett sat across from her in the coach to the house for the banquet, instead of by her side. He was not exactly discourteous, but gave the smallest responses possible to every attempt at conversation. The meal was no better. He pulled back every time she tried to start a conversation. When they mingled with their guests, Rhett didn't hold her hand or arm. In fact, he didn't behave as though he was any closer or more interested in her than Daddy's business associates who were at the wedding.
Once started, the snowball grew and sped up as it went downhill. Rhett was brought to her bedroom after she'd been changed, but he was still dressed. The door was shut behind them, and he just stared at her. "Go ahead and make yourself comfortable," he muttered.
He sat down on her chair and took out his pocket watch while she removed her robe and sat on the bed. After two or three minutes he stood up. This was it, Caroline told herself, beaming at him with joy. "Good night, Mrs. Butler," he said—was that sarcasm in his voice?" He walked out of the bedroom and she could hear his shoes echoing down the hall toward the servants' stairs.
She didn't see him again until the next morning at breakfast, when she met him in the breakfast room. He was drinking coffee and reading the paper. "Your father already left for the day. He'll be back for dinner before we sail to New York." He set his coffee cup down, refolded the paper, and left.
That was it? How could this be their marriage? They were planning to move down the street to a different, smaller house that Rhett had purchased. Perhaps he was waiting until they lived there?
The full humiliation of last night didn't surface until mid-morning, when several ladies visited. They made the usual congratulations while smirking, perhaps a little unkindly. It wasn't until her maid of honor, Margaret, came that she knew the full truth. Margo took Caro to a corner and whispered that not ten minutes after being put in Caroline's bedroom, Rhett Butler was seen entering the business establishment of a well-known madam, still in his wedding clothes!
Dinner was a disaster. "Daddy, did you know he left as soon as we retired for the night, that he went to the house of that woman?"
Charles Bell did indeed know by then. "What's the meaning of this, Butler?"
"Mr. Bell, you bought your child a toy. A toy can't love her, either emotionally or physically."
"You are to behave as a proper husband does!"
"As you did to your late wife, Charles?" Rhett raised his eyebrow. "I believe I have that quite well covered."
Daddy blustered. "You will have a proper marriage with my daughter, or—"
"Or what? If you make those pictures public, there's nothing to keep me from divorcing your daughter, and it's well documented that we haven't consummated the marriage. I could go back to my proper wife."
Daddy blustered some more, but there was nothing to be done. For a man with as nefarious a reputation as Rhett Butler had, there was remarkably little with which to blackmail him. Caroline tried for months to change things. She paraded into his office in skimpy nightgowns, gaining nothing but a casual glance and a terse "Good night." Once she walked down wearing just her dressing gown and took it off in front of him.
Rhett shook his head and pulled a small painting out of his desk drawer. It was a small woman, dressed in a red gown cut quite low, but fitted so tightly over her lovely curves that there was no question of what was underneath it. The flirtatious look in the green eyes was something the other woman was no doubt born with. Caroline could never copy it if she sat in front of the mirror for a decade.
"Do you expect me to believe that you weren't with that O'Hara woman?"
Rhett looked at the flower and sighed. "Scarlet O'Hara is no more. The world will never see anything like her again."
Caroline hid a small smile. Her rival was dead. "Where have you been, then?"
"Here and there. I spent a week or two in New Orleans, where she and I went on our honeymoon." A fond smile crossed his face. A pang went through Caroline at the thought that he would never think of her, dead or alive, in such a way.
Caroline thought of her honeymoon. They spent the days of that week in the New York garment district, buying dresses and materials, but never doing anything really loverish. Rhett didn't even pay much attention to what she bought. She wasn't sure he'd be able to pick her out of a crowd even now. In the evenings, he took her to dinner, but he was always careful to touch her as little as possible. At night they went into their hotel and he locked himself into one room, leaving the rest of the suite to her.
She calculated. Two weeks in New Orleans, even with travel time, didn't allow for the nearly three months he'd been gone. "You must have been in other places."
He shrugged. "I traveled a bit. Most recently I spent a week in Atlanta. I needed to see some lawyers and there were things that Scarlett put in storage for me that I wanted to get."
"Didn't she have children?"
"They don't need me. There are plenty of people to take care of them."
Rhett was done with dinner. He stood and bowed formally before walking toward his office.
This was Caroline's chance. She ran up the stairs and put on the nightgown that had been intended for her wedding night. Quickly running a brush through her hair, she looked herself over in the mirror. She couldn't compete, but the competition was gone. She slipped into the hallway and down to Rhett's room. The workers were gone and the room was dark. She slipped into his bed and waited.
She woke up when he came in with a candle. He lit the various lamps in the room. The clock said it was an hour later.
After lighting candles on his mantlepiece and straightening some picture frames, Rhett saw her sitting on the bed. "Damn it, Caroline!"
She sat up and rubbed her eyes. "Rhett, surely with her gone—"
Then she saw the painting over the mantlepiece, that had been hung that afternoon. It was easily four feet tall and three feet wide. It was the same woman as the previous small portrait he'd shown her, here dressed for a grand event. She was in a blue gown with a full skirt, but the bodice was snug and enough to show that she used none of the tricks women would use to make their breasts seem better or their waists seem smaller. Scarlett O'Hara, in all her glory, faced the occupant of the bed with a flirtatious glance.
"Why would you—"
"Nothing is changed, Caroline. If it hadn't been for you, she and I would have reconciled and I would have that in my bed instead of…" He sat down in a chair and saluted the portrait with his whiskey glass.
He shrugged. "I'll leave you here, then. Good night, Mrs. Butler." His voice was definitely mocking. He stood and walked downstairs. She heard the front door slam and knew where he was going. Whenever she attempted seduction, he went to the same whorehouse. Her humiliation was unending.
She stood and went over to his chair. The whisky glass was still on the side table, with a swallow left in it. She drank it and walked over to the fireplace to look at Scarlett O'Hara, of the black hair and beautiful green eyes. Caroline felt washed out in comparison, washed out in comparison to a dead woman.
On the mantlepiece were a couple of photographs she'd never seen. One, she was sure, was Rhett's daughter Bonnie. Next to it was a more recent framed picture of two little boys sitting with a woman. Glancing between the portrait and the picture, she knew the woman was Scarlett. The little boys were the image of Rhett.
A month later, Rhett had a portfolio in his hands: EWAN JOSEPH McLURE, born October 3, 1836. Scarlett's husband was born the same year as the Republic of Texas, to Joseph and Brigit McLure. He was a good student in school in Victoria… top ten percent in his class at Tulane… married Marie Fortin, born in St. Charles Parish, Louisiana…studied under a top lawyer in Victoria…admitted to the Texas bar in 1860… enlisted in May, 1861.
It wasn't clear what McLure did during the war, but he came back to Victoria to discover his family had all died. He became a Texas Ranger in 1870. In 1875 he married Katie Scarlett O'Hara in Dixon County, Texas, and three children were listed: Gerald, Langston, and Aiden. Currently the owner of a horse ranch in Dixon County.
Scarlett's most recent child might not have been born or recorded yet when these records were obtained, Rhett reflected. He tapped his desk. There were several commendations listed from McLure's time with the Rangers, but nothing from his war service record.
He leaned back and looked at the portrait he'd just had hung across from his desk. There was nothing impeachable about his rival, unless his friends with old Confederate connections found something interesting during the war. There was nothing Rhett could offer Scarlett that she didn't have better exactly as she was.
Caroline breezed in. "Rhett…"
He closed the portfolio and set it in his drawer. "Yes, Caroline?"
"I keep thinking about what you said, about her being gone."
"To whom are we referring?"
She sighed and looked at him as though he were an idiot. "The O'Hara woman."
"Ah, my wife."
"Ex-wife. Did she still have the half million dollars?"
Rhett saw no reason to hide the truth, and he wondered where Caroline was headed. "She had a fair amount of her own money to start with too, and she's made a tidy profit over the years. I would say that by the end of this year her holdings will be worth a full million. She's a veritable Queen Midas." Even if Scarlett herself wouldn't understand the allusion.
Caroline's eyes got big and she swallowed hard. "Will that be reverting to you, now that she's gone?"
Rhett hid his smile. "I'm afraid not. There would be heirs, of course."
Caroline nodded. "Oh yes, her children. Shouldn't they be coming to you as well?"
"They have other family."
"But Rhett, clearly you're the closest family to those little boys—"
There was no hiding the truth, so he would exact every drop of agony from Caroline that he could from this conversation. "Which little boys?" If she was paying attention, she would see that although quiet, his tone was sharper.
"Those boys who look just like you in the picture."
"What picture?"
"On the mantlepiece in your room Rhett—"
"Have you been snooping through my things?"
"I was just—the picture was right there."
"And the boys are where they are and where they will remain until it pleases them to be somewhere else. Is that clear?"
The hint of danger in his voice had grown enough to send a frisson down her back. Caroline realized now that she was on thin ice. "If you say so, Rhett, but I wanted you to know I would be happy to—"
"That won't be necessary."
"How old are they?"
"They've recently had their fifth birthday."
Rhett watched her, practically counting the months on her fingers. Caroline gasped with horror.
"You must have… with her practically the day of our wedding!"
"About a month and a half before. So you see I couldn't ruin the memory by sharing a bed with just anyone after that."
"Not even your wife?"
"Hm."
"You went to a whorehouse on our wedding night, but I'm just anyone?"
"I spent the night drinking and playing cards. Made a tidy profit, too, as I recall." Rhett leaned back and admired the picture across the room from his desk.
"You didn't want to share a bed with anyone? I thought men needed—"
"I'm older now and less, er, needy. My plan was to set her up in the old McKinnon house down closer to the shore. She left Atlanta before I had the chance to present it to her."
This was a lot of Caroline to stomach. "That house is three times the size of this one!"
Rhett shrugged. "As you've observed, she's the mother of my children. She would have needed the space. I'd always hoped for a fairly large family."
"But I'm your wife! I'm supposed to be the mother of your children!"
He shook his head as though to a small child. "No, my dear, you were supposed to have a different life altogether. If you had found a husband of your own without resorting to stealing other women's husbands, you would likely have wanted the McKinnon house yourself."
"But—" Caroline couldn't figure out what to say next. She turned around and saw the portrait Rhett had been smiling at.
It was the same woman again, the O'Hara woman, holding the hand of her toddler daughter, almost the image of herself except for the blue eyes of the child.
A/N: More country music! Patsy Cline, this time. I considered Toto's "Hold the Line" and the Stones' "Paint it Black," but this was really the best song for this chapter. The only other thing to observe here is remind everyone of the five stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. At our house, we've noticed that they don't always go in a straight line, either. Sometimes it circles back a little, but eventually one gets through it all.
I've got some great readers and reviewers, including gabyhyatt, Phantom710, TheFauxGinge, WhitmanFrostFiend, Conlyn70, Truckee Gal, Guest 1 & 2 & 3 & 4 & 5, COCO B, kanga85, samandfreddie, gogomohamad229, Romabeachgirl1981, lescarlett, heresvivi, Jguest, gumper, Asline Nicole, and pro patria mori.