Despite the short distance from Pitty's, both women were thoroughly drenched by the time they reached the mansion. Ella had fallen-face first into a puddle and had risen, sputtering with rage and humiliation. Scarlett helped her daughter to her feet with an inward sigh, wondering how she was ever going to catch a husband. Shaking her bangs from her eyes, Ella gave a great shudder and began issuing a steady stream of soft sneezes that crescendoed into an explosion that sent a spray of spittle and bogies into Scarlett's face.
"Take off those clothes and sit by the fire as soon as we go inside, you hear?" Scarlett said as she struggled to keep her calm. "We don't need you coming down with the flu again." Ella sniffed in reply and Scarlett turned to the door, but as her hand went round the knob, she stiffened.
"What's wrong, Mother?" Scarlett stood there frowning with her nose in the air but shook her head. "Nothing, dear. Someone just walked over my grave." She turned the key and wrenched the door open, but as she crossed the threshold, a scent hit her nose, one that she had not smelled for a long time. The scent was not lost on Ella, who wrinkled her upturned nose:
"Has Wade been smoking hemp again?"
"That isn't hemp."
Her mother's face was stark white, the eyes two glowing balls of green fire. Ella followed Scarlett's gaze to the dining room, from which poured a stream of warm, golden light and floated wisps of silver-grey smoke. Scarlett peeled off her cloak and gloves with the graceful brutality of a jungle cat, her eyes never leaving her target.
"Go upstairs."
"But-"
"NOW!" Scarlett roared as she stormed down the hall, eyes blazing in her white face. The press of wet, heavy skirts against her body, the breath exiting her lungs in rapid, painful spurts as she had made that mad dash, the words of a dead woman echoing in her ears, filling her with a euphoria that had been followed by utter despair, and the grief she had never truly been able to bury...with each and every step, she was re-submerged into that nightmare that had over the years become a blur of faces, a hum of indistinct voices that had culminated in that final rejoinder.
She hovered over the knob with trembling fingertips, the blood screaming in her ears, her heart fluttering in her throat and there he was, lounging in that same chair, looking as cool as a cucumber. He looked up and when those dark eyes met hers, the thousand curses and reprimands she had stored in her heart died on her lips and she stood before him, quivering.
Ella came sailing in, voice raised in adolescent petulance: "But can't we have dinner first? I'm hungry!," but at the sight of him, she jumped, giving a small gasp. "Uncle Rhett," she whispered. Scarlett's hair was wild from the wind and rain, but it was nothing compared to her eyes. Ella stood at the doorway, a hand pressed to her mouth, looking to and fro. Whenever Mother had been angry, big brother and Mammy had been there, but now it was up to her to stop the inevitable storm. Ella desperately searched her pockets, bits of rubbish raining down on the carpet until she finally unearthed a grubby report card which she waved in the air like a flag for surrender: "I got full marks this semester!" And then Scarlett found her tongue.
"You should consider yourself lucky that it wasn't Wade who found you first. He's a better shot than you ever were."
"With you teaching him? You couldn't fire a shot unless the target was right in front of you and even then it's a miracle if you didn't shoot yourself."
"Who the hell let you in here?"
"What do you mean?
"Don't you play coy with me. I had the lock changed. I mean who opened the door and let you in? I need to know who I should fire and if you don't tell me, I will fire them all. You wouldn't want that on your conscience, would you?"
"As a matter of fact, it was Wade."
"Wade?" she echoed in disbelief and then she understood: the furtive glances, the thoughtful solicitousness, the words that had slipped off that silver tongue and into her ear as sweet as honey...
"That two-faced-"
"I'll admit I had my doubts that this would work but then again, you always were rather slow on the uptake. You never had the makings of an intellectual but I hadn't known that you were illiterate."
"I can read!" she seethed.
"Not well, apparently. I wager you saw divorce and jumped to conclusions." Scarlett stood there with her arms folded tightly across her chest.
"But I was curious as to why you waited until now to make your move. With Melanie dead and me and Bonnie out of your way, you could have had your fill of Ashley and still had time to spare before the funeral, but perhaps you had been hoping for something."
"Don't be so conceited. I was only waiting for the gossip to die down and now that it has-"
"This wouldn't be your first fake marriage, although in this case, I don't know who I'd feel sorrier for."
"You know, I've missed these nightly conversations and what better time to have a row than now, especially seeing that there aren't any stairs for you to use this time!"
"How very much like a woman, talking about anything and everything aside from your own wrongdoings."
"This, coming from the man who used to run off to a brothel whenever things got tough? But I must say, it must have taken some real courage for you to show up here after all this time. With no whore to run to and an empty liquor cabinet, you must have been absolutely petrified." She glanced at the empty decanter on the table. "Is this you or the liquor talking? I've always had a difficult time telling."
"No man could stay sober while being married to you."
There was something clawing at the back of her mind, some weak inner voice that screamed to her that she ought to curb the words that were pouring from her mouth as toxic as any poison, but she was seeing red.
"M-mother," Ella whimpered.
"You go to bed, Ella Lorena! Or I swear I'll-"
"Go on. Show us that famous charm of yours. If only you had given in to your true nature all those years ago, it would saved us all the trouble of pretending. But I know why you had to live in this farce. You couldn't stand the idea of being alone, of being unwanted. How so childish a fear could persist in so cutthroat a woman is beyond me."
"What is this? Some mind-reading drivel you picked up from some book somewhere? For all your boasting about your exploits with women, you failed to keep even one by your side, so what makes you think you can understand me any better than you did any of them?"
"Your track record isn't any better, my dear: two dead and one permanently incapacitated. I was lucky to escape with my life."
"You seem to be doing just fine."
"Only because I had wised up in the nick of time; if I had taken you up on your offer, I would have joined our daughter. But perhaps that was what you had wanted all along."
Ella turned white as milk. She wanted to run away, to flee to her room and cover her ears, to do anything that would shut out these horrible things that were being flung about the room, but she was rooted to the spot.
"Look at you, playing the victim as always. You seem to have forgotten that you had been on your knees, begging me to marry you!"
"And what a decision that was. It's the sort of choice that no amount of time or liquor could ever wash away; Ashley Wilkes dodged a bullet."
He was on his feet now and was looking her up and down, appraising her points like a judge at a cattle show, "but it looks like the outside is finally matching what's inside."
"How dare you! Those last few weeks, you couldn't even pull on your own boots without falling over!"
"I was doing every male in town a public service. I was showing them what happens to any man who tries to do any good for you. And it appears that my advice has been well taken."
She was shaking, fingernails digging into clenched fists. "I know what this is: this isn't about me. You don't give a damn about me. You just can't stand the idea of me being happy without you, of me belonging to someone else, to another man. That's why you're here, isn't it?"
He sighed and crossed the room with his hands in his pockets, looking down at her. Scarlett grabbed hold of the nearest chair, fighting the urge to flee. "You can never see a helping hand, can you? Especially when it's right in front of your face." She spasmed as he brushed past her, jumping as the front door shut.
Big fat tears were trickling down Ella's cheeks, but Scarlett's face was calm, impassive even.
"You mustn't cry, darling. There isn't anything to cry about."
"Oh, Mother."
"You'll find that there's no use in crying and you'll be hard-pressed to find anyone who cares."
She swept from the room, and Ella sobbed as she listened to her mother's footsteps die in the upper hall.