When Scarlett got the news of Ashley's peccadilloes she was amused, perhaps more than she should have been. "He has an expensive mistress? That's not like the Ashley I know…God bless him, he's just after a little fun."
Perhaps she was thinking of all the guilt and misery that Ashley had gone through since the war. And of course, she'd known Ashley as a rich planter's son, a man of books and ideas, but not the most practical sort.
Wade had been raised among people who worked or did not eat, and he'd found all this talk of the way things were somewhat irritating. Some of Rhett's associates were Carpetbaggers, and they stole and swindled, and Aunt Pittypat's friends struggled to maintain businesses, or were doing carpentry or labor.
But Wade couldn't understand the dreamy thing. And normally, Scarlett couldn't either; his mother was always working to make money NOW. But there was a peculiar blind spot when it came to Ashley Wilkes.
"If there isn't a serious amount of cash missing, perhaps I can just have your Uncle Ashley just deal with the customers. He has such c harm."
He can't even do simple arithmetic without a pen and pad, Wade thought. And he's a THIEF! When Wade had thought Scarlett might hang Ashley, he'd been somewhat defensive of his uncle, but now he was worried his mother might have lost her fiduciary mind. Ashley Wilkes was a terrible businessman, even when honest, and Zebulon, one of the darky assistants, had had to take over more than once in the negotiations with lumber purchasers.
Mother no longer burned a torch for Ashley Wilkes, Wade knew how it had once been, but she seemed to view the former earl of Twelve Oaks as a sort of gamboling favorite child. There was nothing she'd rather do than relieve Ashley of his duties and let him play the flute or write poetry or some nonsense, but his pride demanded that he stay employed. And now his pride was ruinous for them all.
If it had been anyone else with their hands in the cashbox, Scarlett would have shot him herself. She'd worked mighty hard for her money, and now owned three sawmills, but she was in a good mood, or temporarily mad, and was enjoying her afternoons with Will Benteen. Still, someone had to watch the till.
"Good gracious, Wade, can't you spare someone else just to handle the actual financial transactions? Let your Uncle Ashley sell and keep him in the store maybe reading in the back or something. Zebulon and Aubrey Wellburn can watch him whilst they stock the shelves and such."
Wade felt his mother's eyes on him. Wade had grown up to be a handsome young man, now nearly twenty years old. Scarlett had been a mite disappointed when he told her he didn't want to go to the University, but he'd surprised Scarlett with his hard work.
Wade had begun working part time in the store in his mid teens and had taken over managing the store and the mills last year, when Scarlett was out of town, and she was amazed at his talent.
Scarlett wondered if Wade had found a nice girl yet. If he married someone from one of the better families around Five Points, families who were still slow to warm Mrs. Butler even a decade after the war had ended, it might accelerate more business.
Certainly Wade, as a son of the Hamilton family and charming in his own right was intriguing young ladies. Scarlett had seen this with her own eyes.
She hoped Wade wasn't pursuing chippies at the Girl of the Period saloon. She knew her blind nephew Beau tapped his way over there quite often, and had surprising results.
"Mother, at best, I think Uncle Ashley should perhaps just deliver lumber, " Wade said, smiling.
"Father could do sales—I think he's more to offer than just being a simple deliveryman." Beau said, annoyed. "He did go to Harvard."
"Beau, Uncle may have taken close to a thousand dollars." Wade said heatedly. "We can't afford another theft."
"Well, theft is a strong word, perhaps." Scarlett said. "I understand your uncle has been drinking a bit, Perhaps we can get the temptation of—what's the white trash woman's name? We can get her to leave town."
But, six weeks later, Scarlett had something more serious to worry about. Ashley and the "white trash" mistress had left town, and thanks to Wade's forgetting Ashley's name on a business account (there because of the half interest Scarlett had given Ashley in the mills some years before) had taken more than three thousand dollars, almost all their nest egg.
It had turned out that Ashley had been bleeding this account quite regularly for over a year, and while Wade had discovered the missing funds from the sawmills and the store relatively quickly, it had not occurred to him to check the major business account.
Unable to pay workers, and numerous mill hands, Scarlett found the sawmills deserted, during an especially productive time, when a major new hotel was being built. Just a small subsistence was coming in from the store, as they had no back up money to refill the inventory.
"No, no, I don't want to send the marshal after Ashley. He's like a lost or absentminded child, he really is." Scarlett said, but Wade was afraid his mother would have to sell at least one of the mills to make up for his uncle's skullduggery.
And when Wade went to the bank, to see about a quick mortgage, Mr. Gadsby, the bank manager, had shaken his head.
"What do you mean? We have money here!" Wade demanded. "You can't give us a small mortgage while we make up the loss?"
"Wade, if it were up to me, you know it wouldn't matter, son." Mr. Gadsby said with a smile. "The money from Mrs. Butler's sawmills and her store has helped quite a bit in building up the coffers of our bank, but Captain Butler has his own shares here, and unfortunately he is a major shareholder. In fact, he is one of the directors of First Atlanta Savings. He has forbidden us from lending any money to his wife."
Wade had gone to see Rhett over lunch at the Girl of the Period saloon. Gaping, he actually heard his stepfather say—
"I told your mother that I would lend her nothing after she broke her promise not to hire Ashley Wilkes at the mills ten years ago. If she'd used any money to support Ashley Wilkes at all, I'd loan her nothing else. And I would ensure no one else did."
Wade giggled hysterically. "No, it was a mistake. Uncle Rhett, this is a dire emergency."
"Yes, your mother's chickens have come home to roost." Rhett said complacently, as he winnowed a toothpick between molars. "It's unfortunate for her, and in a way it's certainly surprising. I never saw Ashley Wilkes as a cad, or a scoundrel, certainly not an embezzler. In a way, I rather respect him for it."
Wade was wild. What now? Mother seemed to be taking this whole thing a bit lightly for one who had struggled so hard to get hold of greenbacks back in the day, and Rhett had little interest in saving what was in effect, Wade's future.
Wade's early years had been spent on what was left of Tara after the Yankees had come and burned all but the house. Horrible meals of yams and little else, working in the fields, which Wade had begun doing at six or seven, and thinking his life would be that of a Cracker.
Wade had remembered his mother going to Atlanta, becoming involved in business. She'd married Frank Kennedy, an "old maid in britches" for the money to pay the back taxes on Tara, and then Mother had borrowed the money for the mills from Rhett Butler, and inherited Frank's store when he died.
Now Wade was watching Rhett Butler look quite pleased with himself. Wade knew that he had to do something but he just found himself staring at his stepfather, bug-eyed.
"I might consider lending you the money myself to get the books back in order if you and your mother made an honest effort to get the money Mr. Wilkes took."
"How would we do that?" Wade asked, incredulously.
"You have to go after him and prosecute him. I have a friend who is a bounty hunter. He used to ride around with my friend Mr. Jackson who you met. And now Boyd's a retriever of lost items, and lost people. I'll send Boyd to get your Uncle Ashley, if your mother gives her consent and she must sign a contract stipulating that she will prosecute Ashley Wilkes to the fullest extent of the law."
"She might not want to do that, Uncle Rhett."
"Well then, you will find yourself an impoverished young man, Wade."
Scarlett had been enraged when Wade came with Rhett's offer. More about Rhett getting one over on her than about fear for Ashley. For a time it seemed that she wrestled with which she wanted more—the business she'd worked so hard to maintain or her fondness for Ashley Wilkes, no longer a burning torch but—
Scarlett railed for a week over this, and then got a notice from yet another contractor that he would be taking his business elsewhere if she didn't have the manpower to provide him with some lumber. And so Scarlett capitulated, and Rhett gave her the money to hire more darkies.
But then of course, Rhett came to the house that he owned but no longer lived in, with a quiet stranger with sandy brown hair and quite a voluptuous moustache.
Wade crinkled his eyes at this fellow and realized he'd met him once before in a pansy bar in Macon. Strangely, the chap was also an old acquaintance of Mother.
"Boyd Tarleton, as I live and breathe." Scarlett's mouth dropped open. "Even hiding behind that gorgeous moustache, I remember you."
Boyd Tarleton smiled. "That's right, Scarlett O'Hara. You were the girl my twin brothers were besotted with, and Tom, too, for a bit. Just head over heels, every man in Clayton County…and my sisters couldn't stand you, they were so jealous!"
"We all thought you were dead, Boyd. Your mother told me that they never found your body. " Scarlett's eyes were wet as she kissed the long missing Boyd Tarleton. "She has a nice tombstone with your name, sharing it with your brother Tom, and the twins have the other one."
"I never really went back." Boyd said, smiling ruefully. "Well, once. I told my parents that I wasn't going to fight in the war anymore, after watching my three brothers and many childhood friends die, and then I left, and as I was dead to them, I assume they saved face by laying a tombstone. And I think also they were distressed by my confirmed bachelorhood." For some reason, Boyd Tarleton looked straight at Wade.
"And this is who is going to hunt down Ashley Wilkes?" Scarlett appealed to Rhett. "Boyd was the scholastic one of the Tarletons. He was going to be a lawyer—"
"I was the runt of the litter, that's right, only five foot ten." Boyd said, grinning under the big moustache. Wade had not thought of Boyd as being small, although he did think the man looked damned good.
Tarleton reminded Wade of Endicott Drury, a long time lover, who was the father of several of Wade and Beau's childhood friends. Married twenty-six years to a former Atlanta belle. You'd never know he was a fairy, Endicott, total maleness. And this was true of Boyd Tarleton as well.
"And-And Ashley was one of your good friends." Scarlett said, wondering. "How could you hunt him down. You all almost went on your Grand Tour together, only the twins kept getting you kicked out of school so you couldn't graduate and go to Europe."
"That's right, Ashley and I were bookworms, but I've learned a few things since wandering away from the War Between the States. I'm good with a pistol, and I am fond of money, and will do what it takes to get as much as possible. Rhett here tells me you are much in the same way about the latter."
Scarlett looked confused, but she finally signed Rhett's contract, biting her tongue. Boyd and Wade stepped outside for a moment, and Wade wondered for a moment if Boyd Tarleton recalled where they'd met, but just a little time later, Boyd pulled Wade into the carriage house for a pleasant half hour, and that worry was put to rest.
As they dressed afterwards, Wade asked Boyd why he didn't try to mend fences with his parents. "After all, they could really use some help at Fairhill. Your mother has more horses which makes her happy, but your father has only a couple of darky helpers, and they speak of you all—the boys—whenever I've visited, though I don't know them well."
Boyd smiled lazily at Wade as he leaned against the door of the carriage house. "You know, I always felt a bit different from the rest of the family—I read too much and was not that interested in horses or hunting. And of course I do have the Grecian love—the Oscar Wilde enthusiasm, as do you. They can't fathom that." Boyd paused. "My Grandpa said that most with our interest kill themselves, for honor. What balderdash!"
Wade shook his head. "It's just a temporary thing I'm going through, Boyd, fooling with men. An adolescent sport. I'm probably going to get married in a year or—"
"A year or ten, right?" Boyd Tarleton smiled. Wade was possessed by the man's long eyelashes.
Boyd laughed. "I remember making those promises to myself. Hope you work that one out, son. I was twenty-three when I deserted the war and I'm nearly twice that now. And I think if my parents knew as much about me as even you know…they do have a hint…they'd be much more unhappy than just tellin' people I've passed. "
As Boyd Tarleton walked back to the house, Wade called. "I hope you won't be too hard on Uncle Ashley when you catch him. The dime novels I've read about bounty hunters were a bit garish."
"Oh now, don't you worry, young 'un." Boyd Tarleton said, smiling. Captain Butler assured me he wanted Wilkes brought back alive. He said it would be far more entertaining."
Beau and Wade had never had a row. Certainly they'd thrown mud balls at each other as children, and tried, with pitiful effect to be amateur prizefighters. But after Beau lost his vision, it had been a more gentle friendship…they were closer than brothers, really. But then Beau learned that Wade had sent a bounty hunter to chase his father.
The argument had started in the back yard, and Wade had been stunned when his blind relative had punctuated one stinging remark with a haymaker across the jaw.
Wade had gotten up, hot with anger, and was about to lunge on his cousin. He knew he had to hold back, and reason with Beau.
"Damn it, Beau! Your father has nearly bankrupted us!"
The sightless boy swung on Wade again, moving towards the sound of his voice, but this time Wade was ready and he backed off, just slightly.
As Beau's arm swung into nothing, he gritted his teeth, humiliated.
"Father is temporarily unhinged, Wade. Rhett Butler, jealous over your mother's attentions, will have my father hung or killed in some worse way. Damn you, Wade Hamilton. Do you know who that lunatic Boyd Tarleton has been riding with all these years since he deserted. He's a bank robber with the Frank James gang. Robbing trains and banks with Jesse James and Cole Younger!"
Beau lunged at Wade, and Wade once more stepped aside, and when Beau got up, he felt around for his stick and began walking away, screaming back "You goddamned O'Haras care more about money than people! Aunt India told me this about you! And Rhett has always hated father! Sending a criminal like Tarleton after my poor—"
Wade had gone for a long walk.. What could Wade do? He couldn't in good conscience tell Beau that it wasn't his decision to prosecute, because in fact Wade had had to prod his mother towards saving her own business. It was like Ashley Wilkes had some magic hold over her, though it didn't seem like a romantic one any more.
"Ashley's such a sweet man."Scarlett told Wade one afternoon as they sat on the porch swing, after a day of inventory at the store. Scarlett was far more tender with Wade now than she had been when he was a boy. It seemed that Mother really preferred men to children…she'd been angrily bewildered with Wade as a toddler. But if she didn't like children, what had possessed her to marry in the first place?
And that she' d married his father to make Ashley jealous? Wade had gotten this bit of information from Aunt India when he was about fifteen, and it still mystified him. Mystified him even more than why his boyhood friends were so fascinated with young women…
"Your uncle was a brilliant, chivalrous man before the war, and even during the fighting, I understood he'd climb on a cannon to get the fellows riled up to fight." Scarlett said. "I find it hard to believe but Melly—losing your Aunt Melanie must have broken his innards."
To put it medically, Wade thought sarcastically. Wade of course had been ravaged with grief when Aunt Melanie had died in childbirth—he'd never had anyone who loved him as much…but you can't excuse stealing, damn it!
Wade had not thought he'd see Boyd Tarleton again, but one day the tall (at least in Wade's opinion) man came into the store. He looked a bit bewildered.
"I can't seem to get a bead on where your uncle could have gone. Normally embezzlers, especially drunken adulterous ones—"
Wade winced. In his heart, he realized he loved Uncle Ashley very much. Uncle Ashley had introduced him to Dickens, read him "Vanity Fair" and taught him and Boyd the mandolin.
But he tried to listen to Boyd Tarleton.
"I've followed up to Macon and other places where Wilkes relatives might be, or people he's known. Because of course he'll blow his cash and need more money."
Wade tried not to smile. "You know, Boyd, I doubt that Uncle Ashley and his paramour went to stay with relatives, at least Wilkes people. My uncle probably is quite ashamed of his behavior and wants to be as far away from family as possible."
Wade put down the sack of rice he was holding and propped himself up on the counter. Yes, Boyd Tarleton was a handsome man. Could they lock the doors of the store here? Perhaps not. Too many folk passing in the street. God knows, Wade didn't want to be hung for sodomy.
Boyd grinned, approving Wade's common sense. "You're absolutely right, but where does a man like that go? Of course he wouldn't want his old time relatives to see him…but he might be familiar with New Orleans, or Paris? He did a Grand Tour, I understand. Butler said he would finance me hunting Wilkes to the ends of the earth, even if it's more than the amount that was embezzled."
My God, Rhett was angry. Wade scratched his chin. Could Ashley have actually left the country? What lunacy. Wade knew they had to make a genuine effort to find this idiot, or Rhett Butler would be quite annoyed. And if the bankrolling of the store and mills ceased, things might go quite badly for Wade's future, financially.
Boyd leaned his rear on a barrel of sorghum. "I did find out that the woman's name—the slut—is Pamela Vavasour. She lived over to Buckhead area. Perhaps I could check over there, but you know, I'd like it if you could come with me, Wade."
Wade felt Tarleton's brilliant hazel eyes on him. Wade went to the back of the store, and alerted Aubrey Wellburn, the clerk that he'd have to watch the store. Wade wondered if Aubrey's mother, Fanny, and the rest of the Elsing-Wellburn clan was enjoying the embezzlement story a bit too much.
Riding their horses, Wade couldn't get over how well Boyd Tarleton rode, or how eternally bored he looked while riding. His Colt .45 was prominent on one hip, and he seemed to be daydreaming. It was as if Boyd was in no real hurry to wrangle Ashley Wilkes, for he knew it was inevitable.
Pamela Vavasour's house was a small clapboard affair, especially in the handsome Buckhead neighborhood. While Boyd Tarleton stayed on his mare, Wade went to knock. Inside he heard a man's harsh voice: "Chauncey! Ermengarde, get the damn door!"
Mildly shocked after knocking, Wade dropped his hand and then the door opened to reveal a jaundiced looking small girl, presumably Ermengarde.
"Yes, does Pamela Vavasour reside here?" Good God, I'm not Sherlock Holmes, Wade thought to himself, nettled.
"Mama? She went with Mister Wilkes. Do y'all know him?" the little girl asked. Wade realized she was older than she seemed, and probably was little because of early malnutrition.
"Uh, yes, Mr. Wilkes is my uncle" Wade said slowly.
"Pappy! The big thief's nephew is here. Are you goin' to shoot him?" The child turned to Wade confidentially. "Mister Wilkes took Mama an' our gold. I never seen nobody get kilt before."