Chapter 26
Scarlett stood well within the dark and cool cluster of the pine trees of Tara. At a distance she could see the sluggish yellow river banked up on both sides by the soft red earth. She looked up into the darkness of the canopy with a queer kind of surprise. She had never actually been in this place before. So many times she had wandered up and down the drive from her plantation home to the Oak trees near the main path and although she had entertained a lively imagination of these virgin forests at the outskirts of Tara, she had never actually felt the curiosity to visit here. And yet, here she was now.
Standing in the middle, looking up into the soughing pines, she wondered for the first time how her mother had neglected the gripping realities of such wondrous nature. In her mind's eye, she saw her father, ruddy and stout, riding in cocky pace on his horse and leaping over the high hedges. His white mane flying in the wind and his eyes alive with the rush of the moment. Her mother viewed this as dangerous and yes it was, but how it just be dismissed as dangerous? Wasn't it so much more? The thrill, the excitement- why hide it all? Why was it to be such a secret to hide from her mother? Why couldn't mother just stand and laugh at father's antics? Scarlett knew she would have.
Suddenly she felt seized by a surge of emotion. So much of what she wanted had been lost in Mother's vision for Tara. They had all stayed true to her vision but not true to themselves.
She understood her family like never before. Mother had somehow longed and needed her beloved cousin but he had been exiled unfairly. And she had lost some part of herself in him. Pa saw her as a gentle lady from the Savannah but he did not realize that she was too idealistic and impractical in her vision. After all, Georgians would have accepted any decent folk into their social circle. Didn't they accept Gerald even though he was Irish and hardly had any formal education? Who in Clayton County had demanded girls to be raised as "Great Ladies"? Of course, it was all very exciting at that time.
Now Scarlett wondered why it had seemed so exciting. Why was it so exciting to be a Great Lady? Why was that considered such an honor? And why in Mother's way?
Somehow she now understood that she had made up this lie to cover Mother's inability to romp around and enjoy Tara with her. And this lie covered a sea of childhood heartache and disappointments.
And Pa's inability to run the plantation and manage the slaves. Why was that such a secret? Why was everyone adjusting and tip-toeing over things.
Mother pretended as though she was acting under Gerald's orders and Gerald pretended that he had a loving wife. But in reality they only needed each other to support their own narrow worlds and when one was gone, the other's world collapsed.
And Scarlett had lost parts of herself in this superficial alliance.