“I’ve been looking out for you. Mr. Robillard, he wants you.” Jerome looked at the straggle of O’Haras with unconcealed disdain.

Scarlett’s chin stiffened. Something was going to have to be done about the butler’s impertinence. She sailed into her grandfather’s room with an angry complaint on her lips.

Pierre Robillard gave her no time to speak. “You are dishevelled,” he said coldly, “and you have ruptured the schedule of my house. While you were consorting with those Irish peasants, the dinner hour has passed.”

Scarlett leapt hotly to the bait. “I’ll thank you to keep a civil tongue when you refer to my cousins.”

The old man’s eyelids half hid the gleam in his eyes. “What do you call a man who’s in trade?” he said quietly.

“If you’re talking about Jamie O’Hara, I call him a successful, hard-working businessman, and I respect him for what he’s accomplished.”

Her grandfather set the hook. “And no doubt you admire his garish wife, too.”

“Indeed I do! She’s a kind and generous woman.”

“I believe that’s the impression her trade tries to make. You are aware, are you not, that she was a barmaid in an Irish saloon.”

Scarlett gasped like a landed fish. It couldn’t be true! Unwelcome pictures filled her mind. Maureen holding up her glass for another whiskey . . . playing the bones and singing lustily all the verses of bawdy songs . . . brushing her tousled bright hair off her red face without trying to pin it back up . . . lifting her skirts to her knees to dance the reel . . .

Common. Maureen was common.

They were all kind of common.

Scarlett felt like crying. She’d been so happy with the O’Haras, she didn’t want to lose them. But . . . here in this house where her mother had grown up, the gulf between Robillard and O’Hara was too broad to ignore. No wonder Grandfather’s ashamed of me. Mother would be heartbroken if she could see me walking on the street with a bunch like I just came home with. A woman in public without so much as a shawl over her pregnant belly, and a million children running all over the place like wild Indians, and not even a maid to carry the shopping. I must have looked as trashy as the rest of them. And Mother tried so hard to teach me to be a lady. She’d be happy she was dead if she knew that her daughter was friends with a woman who worked in a saloon.

Scarlett looked anxiously at the old man. Could he possibly know about the building she owned in Atlanta and rented to a saloonkeeper?

Pierre Robillard’s eyes were closed. He seemed to have slipped into the sudden sleep of old age. Scarlett tiptoed out of the room. When she closed the door behind her, the old soldier smiled, then went to sleep.


Jerome brought her the mail on a silver tray. He was wearing white gloves. Scarlett took the envelopes from the tray, a short nod her only thank you. It wouldn’t do to show her gratification, not if she was going to keep Jerome in his place. The previous evening, after waiting for an eternity in the drawing room for Rhett, who never showed up, she had given the servants a tongue-lashing they’d never forget. Jerome in particular. It was a godsend that the butler was so nearly impertinent; she needed someone to unload her anger and disappointment on.

Uncle Henry Hamilton was furious that she’d transferred the money to the Savannah bank. Too bad. Scarlett crumpled up his brief letter and dropped it on the floor.

The fat envelope was from Aunt Pauline. Her meandering complaints could wait, and they were sure to be complaints. Scarlett opened the stiff square envelope next.

She didn’t recognize the handwriting on the front.

It was an invitation. The name was unfamiliar, and she had to think hard before she remembered. Of course. Hodgson was the married name of one of those old ladies, the Telfair sisters. The invitation was for a ceremony of dedication for Hodgson Hall, with a reception to follow. “New home of the Georgia historical Society.” It sounded even deadlier than that awful musicale. Scarlett made a face and put the invitation aside. She’d have to find some letter paper and send her regrets. The aunts liked to be bored to death, but not she.

The aunts. Might as well get it over with. She tore open Pauline’s letter.

. . . profoundly ashamed of your outrageous behavior. If we had known that you were coming with us to Savannah without so much as a word of explanation to Eleanor Butler we would have insisted that you leave the train and go back.

What the devil was Aunt Pauline saying? Was it possible that Miss Eleanor didn’t mention the note I left for her? Or that she didn’t get it? No, it wasn’t possible. Aunt Pauline was just making trouble.

Scarlet’s eyes moved quickly over Pauline’s complaints about the folly of Scarlett’s travelling after her ordeal when the boat capsized and about Scarlett’s “unnatural reticence” in not telling her aunts that she’d been in the accident.

Why couldn’t Pauline tell her what she wanted to know? There wasn’t a word about Rhett. She went through page after page of Pauline’s spiky handwriting, looking for his name. God’s nightgown! Her aunt could lecture longer than a hellfire preacher. There. At last.

. . . dear Eleanor is understandably concerned that Rhett felt it necessary to travel all the way to Boston for the meeting about his fertilizer shipments. He should not have gone to the chill of the Northern climate immeolately after the ordeal of his long immersion in cold waterfrllowing the capsing of his boat . . .

Scarlett let the pages fall into her lap. Of course! Oh, thank God. That’s why Rhett hadn’t come after her yet. Why didn’t Uncle Henry tell me Rhett’s telegram came from Boston? Then I wouldn’t have driven myself crazy expecting him to show up on the doorstep any minute. Does Aunt Pauline say when he’s coming back?

Scarlett pawed through the jumble of letter sheets. Where had she stopped? She found her place and read eagerly to the end. But there was no mention of what she wanted to know. Now what am I going to do? Rhett might be gone for weeks. Or he might be on his way back right this very minute.

Scarlett picked up the invitation from Mrs. Hodgson again. At least it would be someplace to go. She’d have a screaming fit if she had to stay in this house day after day.

If only she could run over to Jamie’s every now and then, just for a cup of tea. But no, that was unthinkable.


And yet, she couldn’t not think of the O’Haras. The next morning she went with the sullen cook to the City Market to supervise what she bought and how much she paid for it. With nothing else to occupy her, Scarlett was determined to see her grandfather’s house in order. While she was having coffee, she heard a soft hesitant voice speak her name. It was lovely, shy young Kathleen. “I’m not familiar with all the American fishes,” she said. “Will you help me choose the best prawns?” Scarlett was bewildered until the girl gestured toward the shrimp.

“The angels must have sent you, Scarlett,” Kathleen said when her purchase was made. “I’d be lost for sure without you. Maureen wants only the best. We’re expecting Colum, you see.”

Colum—am I supposed to know him? Maureen or somebody mentioned that name once, too. “Why’s Colum so important?”

Kathleen’s blue eyes widened in amazement that the question could be asked. “Why? Well . . . because Colum’s Colum, that’s all. He’s . . .” She couldn’t find the words she was looking for. “He’s just Colum, that’s all. He brought me here, don’t you know? He’s my brother, like Stephen.”

Stephen. The quiet dark one. Scarlett hadn’t realized he was Kathleen’s brother. Maybe that’s why he’s so quiet. Maybe they’re all shy as mice in that family. “Which one of Uncle James’ brothers is your father?” she asked Kathleen.

“Ah, but my father’s dead, God rest his soul.”

Was the girl simple? “What was his name, Kathleen?”

“Oh, it’s his name you’re wanting to know! Patrick, that was his name, Patrick O’Hara. Patricia’s called after him, being Jamie’s firstborn and Patrick his own father’s name.”

Scarlett’s forehead creased in concentration. So Jamie was Kathleen’s brother, too. So much for thinking the whole family was shy. “Do you have any other brothers?” she asked.

“Oh, yes,” Kathleen said with a happy smile, “brothers, and sisters, too. Fourteen of us all told. Still living, I mean.” And she crossed herself.

Scarlett drew away from the girl. Oh, Lord, more than likely the cook’s been listening, and it’ll get back to grandfather. I can hear him now. Talking about Catholics breeding like rabbits.

But in fact Pierre Robillard made no mention at all of Scarlett’s cousins. He summoned her for a presupper visit, announced that his bills were proving satisfactory, then dismissed her.

She stopped Jerome to check over the supper tray, examined the silver to see that it was gleaming and free of fingerprints. When she put the coffee spoon down it tapped against the soup spoon. I wonder if Maureen would teach me to play the spoons? The thought caught her off guard.

That night she dreamed about her father. She woke in the morning with a smile still on her lips, but her cheeks stiff with the dried streaks of tears.

At the City Market she heard Maureen O’Hara’s distinctive gusty laughter just in time to dart behind one of the thick brick piers and miss being seen. But she could see Maureen, and Patricia, looking as big as a house, and a straggle of children behind them. “Your father’s the only one of us not in a fever for your uncle to arrive,” she heard Maureen say. “He’s enjoying the special treats I fix for supper every night in hopes of Colum.”