第370章

How easy it was to have a child and how painful not to have one! Strange, what a pang it had been even in her pain, to know that she would not have this child. Stranger still that it should have been the first child she really wanted. She tried to think why she wanted it but her mind was too tired. Her mind was too tired to think of anything except fear of death. Death was in the room and she had no strength to confront it, to fight it back and she was frightened. She wanted someone strong to stand by her and hold her hand and fight off death until enough strength came back for her to do her own fighting.

Rage had been swallowed up in pain and she wanted Rhett. But he was not there and she could not bring herself to ask for him.

Her last memory of him was how he looked as he picked her up in the dark hall at the bottom of the steps, his face white and wiped clean of all save hideous fear, his voice hoarsely calling for Mammy. And then there was a faint memory of being carried upstairs, before darkness came over her mind. And then pain and more pain and the room full of buzzing voices and Aunt Pittypat’s sobs and Dr. Meade’s brusque orders and feet that hurried on the stairs and tiptoes in the upper hall. And then like a blinding ray of lightning, the knowledge of death and fear that suddenly made her try to scream a name and the scream was only a whisper.

But that forlorn whisper brought instant response from somewhere in the darkness beside the bed and the soft voice of the one she called made answer in lullaby tones: “I’m here, dear. I’ve been right here all the time.”

Death and fear receded gently as Melanie took her hand and laid it quietly against her cool cheek. Scarlett tried to turn to see her face and could not. Melly was having a baby and the Yankees were coming. The town was afire and she must hurry, hurry. But Melly was having a baby and she couldn’t hurry. She must stay with her till the baby came and be strong because Melly needed her strength. Melly was hurting so bad—there were hot pinchers at her and dull knives and recurrent waves of pain. She must hold Melly’s hand.

But Dr. Meade was there after all, he had come, even if the soldiers at the depot did need him for she heard him say: “Delirious. Where’s Captain Butler?”

The night was dark and then light and sometimes she was having a baby and sometimes it was Melanie who cried out, but through it all Melly was there and her hands were cool and she did not make futile anxious gestures or sob like Aunt Pitty. Whenever Scarlett opened her eyes, she said “Melly?” and the voice answered. And usually she started to whisper: “Rhett—I want Rhett” and remembered, as from a dream, that Rhett didn’t want her, that Rhett’s face was dark as an Indian’s and his teeth were white in a jeer. She wanted him and he didn’t want her.

Once she said “Melly?” and Mammy’s voice said: “S’me, chile,” and put a cold rag on her forehead and she cried fretfully: “Melly—Melanie” over and over but for a long time Melanie did not come. For Melanie was sitting on the edge of Rhett’s bed and Rhett, drunk and sobbing, was sprawled on the floor, crying, his head in her lap.

Every time she had come out of Scarlett’s room she had seen him, sitting on his bed, his door wide, watching the door across the hall. The room was untidy, littered with cigar butts and dishes of untouched food. The bed was tumbled and unmade and he sat on it, unshaven and suddenly gaunt, endlessly smoking. He never asked questions when he saw her. She always stood in the doorway for a minute, giving the news: “I’m sorry, she’s worse,” or “No, she hasn’t asked for you yet. You see, she’s delirious” or “You mustn’t give up hope, Captain Butler. Let me fix you some hot coffee and something to eat. You’ll make yourself ill.”

Her heart always ached with pity for him, although she was almost too tired and sleepy to feel anything. How could people say such mean things about him—say he was heartless and wicked and unfaithful to Scarlett, when she could see him getting thin before her eyes, see the torment in his face? Tired as she was, she always tried to be kinder than usual when she gave bulletins from the sick room. He looked so like a damned soul waiting judgment—so like a child in a suddenly hostile world. But everyone was like a child to Melanie.

But when, at last, she went joyfully to his door to tell him that Scarlett was better, she was unprepared for what she found. There was a half-empty bottle of whisky on the table by the bed and the room reeked with the odor. He looked at her with bright glazed eyes and his jaw muscles trembled despite his efforts to set his teeth.

“She’s dead?”

“Oh, no. She’s much better.”

He said: “Oh, my God,” and put his head in his hands. She saw his wide shoulders shake as with a nervous chill and, as she watched him pityingly, her pity changed to honor for she saw that he was crying. Melanie had never seen a man cry and of all men, Rhett, so suave, so mocking, so eternally sure of himself.

It frightened her, the desperate choking sound he made. She had a terrified thought that he was drunk and Melanie was afraid of drunkenness. But when he raised his head and she caught one glimpse of his eyes, she stepped swiftly into the room, closed the door softly behind her and went to him. She had never seen a man cry but she had comforted the tears of many children. When she put a soft hand on his shoulder, his arms went suddenly around her skirts. Before she knew how it happened she was sitting on the bed and he was on the floor, his head in her lap and his arms and hands clutching her in a frantic clasp that hurt her.

She stroked the black head gently and said: “There! There!” soothingly. “There! She’s going to get well.”