Disclaimer: I own nothing in regard to GWTW

Author's Notes: Thank you for all the reviews and feedback.

Chapter Sixty-One

After Rhett's return to Charleston, he and Rudy talked about selling their share of the du Pont shipping line. They agreed to sell it because they were both sure war was in the foreseeable future. They wanted to get their money out of all of their Southern investments. Neither man thought the South could win in a war with the North. Rudy wrote Eleuthere and told him that he and Rhett had agreed to sell their share of the shipping line. All Eleuthere had to do was come to Charleston and they would sign the papers.

Eleuthere wrote back and said he and Madaline would be there after the first of the year.

Rudy invited Eleuthere and Madaline to stay at his home. Eleuthere accepted.

Scarlett had a birthday party for Grace. She had invited Grace's cousins, Robert, and Daphne. She had even told Rosemary, "If you want to invite Doug, he is more than welcome."

"I think I will to see how he behaves around small children."

"Good idea."

Doug did attend the party and while he didn't interact with the children. He didn't seem to be uncomfortable around them. Rosemary was about to turn eighteen. She needed to make a decision. No, she needed to admit that Harrison was never coming back. If Doug asked her to marry him she would. Of course, all this may be a moot point. He may not want to marry her. He had been calling on her for almost two years and he hadn't said anything about marriage. It was a good thing she enjoyed living with her parents and Rhett and his family. She liked playing with her nephews and her niece, and she didn't have to be responsible for them.

When Grace turned one, Scarlett was sure Rhett would start trying to force her to have another child, but he did not. She finally asked him about more children at the end of December. He replied, "I'm not in any hurry to have more. Probably when Grace turns three, we will start trying again. I now know you are extremely fertile, so until we are ready, we don't need to get started."

"How do you know I am fertile?"

"Both times we didn't use protection, you got with child."

Rhett would never tell Scarlett of the time he didn't put the cloth into her. She would never forgive him for that.

"True."

"What is going to happen to Faith?"

"She will go back to work for Mrs. Bunker. In October, Mother saw that Mrs. Bunker was once again with child. Mother told Mrs. Bunker that she believed we would not have a need for Faith after November if Mrs. Bunker wanted to hire her back. Mrs. Bunker did, so right now, I am keeping Faith employed until Mrs. Bunker delivers her baby. She is due in January."

"The opposite of what happened when you were carrying Tommy."

"Yes, hopefully if Daphne or I need Faith in the near future, Mrs. Bunker will be finished with her."

"Is this how it usually works with wet nurses?"

"I don't know. I have never done this before."

"I guess we could ask my mother."

"If you want to, but when I am not around."

After Rhett had asked his mother about her experience with wet nurses, Beth said, "I just found a slave who could be your wet nurse. She just continued nursing you until Robert was born. Much like with Alex and Kenny."

"And Rosemary?"

"I found another slave girl who had lost her child."

"Hopefully, we will be able to find another wet nurse when we need one."

"You will. Infant mortality has always been high. I know a lot of women don't allow themselves to feel anything for the baby until it is at least a year old."

"How can a woman do that?"

"It is what Scarlett has done, but her actions are understandable because of her family history."

"Indeed. She is quite fond of Tommy now. She is always disappointed when I won't let her bring him with us when we travel."

"Yes, she is. And she is starting to let herself care about Grace, too."

One night in early January at supper, Beth had said, "We got our invitation to the St. Cecilia Ball."

Everyone was shocked.

Percy said, "I would have thought we would have been dropped after I sent my former slaves up North."

Robert said, "We are probably ninety-nine on the list."

Everyone laughed.

Rhett said, "Did you ever hear from any of them?"

"Not a word."

"I would have thought at least one of them would have written to you to let you know they had arrived safely."

"I imagine at first, they were too busy getting settled into their new lives. I also imagine that they were separated. Sixty people would be a lot for one person to help start a new life. They may have assumed someone else would do it. They may have been scared to let anyone down here know their locations. If I don't know where they are, I can't tell anyone where they are. I don't know why. I am just going to assume they are now living better lives than they could have down here."

"That is true, Father. What you did was a good thing."

"Most of the slave owners certainly don't think so."

Beth said, "Whether what you did was right or wrong is a matter of opinion, but either way you can't undo it. I think it was a good thing. Scarlett, Rosemary, and Daphne, can you ladies go with me to Liz's and pick out a new style for your dress for the ball?"

Scarlett said, "When?"

"Does tomorrow morning work for you?"

Daphne said, "Can we wait and go in the afternoon say around one? I like to wait until the boys are taking their naps to go out."

"Yes, that is fine. Rosemary? Scarlett?"

Rosemary said, "That is fine with me. Mother, can we go rug shopping?" With a chagrin smile, she added, "You were right. I frequently forgot to take my shoes off. That yellow rug is really showing the dirt now."

"Of course. Later in the week, we will go."

Scarlett said, "I can go tomorrow afternoon."

Percy would have been happy to know that indeed all his former slaves were now living productive lives except for one. Jesse had become the de facto leader of the small group of refugees. All the rest of the group assumed he would contact Percy and let him know they had arrived in the North and were safe. And Jesse probably would have except by the time he was settled enough to think about writing a letter he had gotten sick and died. His last thought was, 'Thank you, Mr. Percy. I died free.'

Because the group had to be separated none of the other freed people knew that Jesse had died.

Later in the week, Faith got the note telling her to return to Mrs. Bunker's home. She told Agnes goodbye, but nobody else. Everyone else was just her employer.

When Scarlett noticed that Agnes was feeding Grace oatmeal, she said, "Where is Faith?"

"She left. Mrs. Bunker sent her a note telling her that her baby was coming."

"Oh. Excuse me. I need to find Rhett."

"I think Mr. Butler is at the park with Tommy."

"I didn't know he was going to the park."

"You were out."

"I was having tea with some other ladies."

"Yes, ma'am."

"I want to play with Grace. How much more does she have to eat?"

"Half of a bowl of oatmeal. It will be probably fifteen to twenty minutes. Grace is going to be fussy for the next several days because she can't nurse anymore."

"I will be back in twenty minutes."

"Yes, ma'am."

Scarlett was playing with Grace when Rhett and Tommy returned from the park. When Tommy saw his mother, he ran across the room and hugged her. She hugged him back. She played with both her children for a while.

After a while Rhett said, "Come for a walk with me."

When Scarlett and Rhett were alone, he said, "What is wrong?"

"Faith is gone, and she didn't even bother to tell me goodbye."

"Were you here at the time?"

"No, I was at a tea, but she could have waited for me."

"No, she had to get to her next employer's home. Didn't you tell me that the baby is supposed to nurse within the first hour of life?"

"Yes."

"Then she didn't have time to wait, especially considering she didn't know when you would be returning."

Later in the evening, while they were getting ready for bed, Rhett said, "She wasn't your friend."

"I know."

"What is the matter, Baby?"

"I thought we were closer than we were. I kept her employed for four years."

"Exactly, Baby. You were her employer. Not her friend. Not her companion. You were nothing more than her employer."

"I guess."

"Scarlett, did you ever have a conversation with Faith that wasn't about the children?"

"No."

Rhett knew Scarlett would accept the truth eventually. He knew that she had imagined their relationship better than it was. It was just employer and employee. Master and slave. Nothing more. Scarlett had fallen into the trap that most southern masters had fallen into. She had thought her slaves loved her as much as she had loved them. In truth, she had not loved them anymore than they had loved her. He understood why Scarlett thought that way, because her Mammy loved her, her sisters, and her mother. Mammy was the exception not the rule.

Rhett also imagined that because Scarlett had not had very many positive female relationships, she treasured the ones she had.

After about five minutes of silence, Scarlett said, "Do you think my relationship with your mother or your sister is any deeper than my relationship with Simone and Faith?"

"Yes, I think they both honestly care for you. They might even love you. You have a good relationship with Daphne. I would say the two of you are truly friends. You and Cathy are friends and there is Melanie. Also, you are friends with Mrs. Owens."

"No, Rachel died in the epidemic."

"I'm sorry to hear that."

"I liked Rachel, but I think we were more acquaintances than really friends. If I was having a social event, I would invite her, but I would never make plans just to spend the afternoon together or even go shopping together. I didn't even know she was dead until her husband told me when I sent her and her son an invitation to Tommy's birthday party. I didn't even tell you about her death."

"That's true. You have me as your friend."

As Scarlett got in the bed, she said, "My best friend."

"And lover."

Scarlett smiled and said, "And lover."

On January fifteenth Rudy and Rhett sold Eleuthere back fifty-one percent of his shipping line. After the paperwork had been signed and Eleuthere had given the partners the check, he said, "First thing I am going to do is start shipping cargo to Europe. I am sure there is quite a market there."

Rhett said, "You will have to let us know."

After a few minutes, of talking Rhett said, "I'm going to take the check to the bank. Are you still leaving tomorrow morning?"

"No, Madaline and I decided to leave tonight. I was able to get us a private car."

"I guess this is goodbye."

Later in the week Rhett and Rudy were talking and Rudy said, "He is going to need an infusion of cash within five years."

Rhett said, "If not sooner. He shouldn't have gotten him and his wife a private car. That is an expense he could have done without."

"Unless Madaline is paying for it and not him."

"He is not our problem anymore."

"Any problems at the bank?"

"They put a hold on it for two weeks until they get their money from First New Orleans Bank."

"We did quite well on that deal. We bought our share for four hundred dollars and bought a ship for one hundred dollars. Now we sold it back to Eleuthere for six hundred dollars while still keeping all the profits we made over these last five years."

Rhett smiled, "That is because we are such brilliant businessmen."

"I like Eleuthere, but I am glad to be finished running a shipping line with him. He always had one crazy scheme or another."

"Like shipping to Europe."

Both men laughed.

Rhett said, "See you tomorrow. I am going to take my children to the park so they can play on this lovely January day."

"See you."

Rudy knew he was getting to be a persnickety young man, but he had not liked the du Pont staying in his home and moving all his stuff. The couple would randomly move his knickknacks. And when he would move them back to its original position, they would say, "It looks better where I put it."

In the end he quit moving things back because he knew they were leaving the next day. He had spent the last several nights getting his house back in order.

Kenny had a second birthday party and Daphne was still not with child again. She and Robert had decided to try for a girl after Kenny's third birthday, if fate didn't intervene before then. Daphne had inherited about five thousand dollars from her parents and Robert was making a nice profit at the textile mill, but they both were still trying to save all the money they could.