第378章

“Oh, I bear them no ill will. But I’m on the other side now and if I can assist in any way in putting them where they belong, I’ll do it. And how that will redound to my credit! I know just enough about the inside of some of these deals to be very valuable when the legislature starts digging into them—and that won’t be far off, from the way things look now. They’re going to investigate the governor, too, and they’ll put him in jail if they can. Better tell your good friends the Gelerts and the Hundons to be ready to leave town on a minute’s notice, because if they can nab the governor, they’ll nab them too.”

For too many years Scarlett had seen the Republicans, backed up by the force of the Yankee Army, in power in Georgia to believe Rhett’s light words. The governor was too strongly entrenched for any legislature to do anything to him, much less put him in jail.

“How you do run on,” she observed.

“If he isn’t put in jail, at least he won’t be reelected. We’re going to have a Democratic governor next time, for a change.”

“And I suppose you’ll have something to do with it?” she questioned sarcastically.

“My pet, I will. I am having something to do with it now. That’s why I stay out so late at nights. I’m working harder than I ever worked with a shovel in the gold rush, trying to help get the election organized. And—I know this will hurt you, Mrs. Butler, but I am contributing plenty of money to the organization, too. Do you remember telling me, years ago, in Frank’s store, that it was dishonest for me to keep the Confederate gold? At last I’ve come to agree with you and the Confederate gold is being spent to get the Confederates back into power.”

“You’re pouring money down a rat hole!”

“What! You call the Democratic party a rat hole?” His eyes mocked her and then were quiet, expressionless. “It doesn’t matter a damn to me who wins this election. What does matter is that everyone knows I’ve worked for it and that I’ve spent money on it. And that’ll be remembered in Bonnie’s favor in years to come.”

“I was almost afraid from your pious talk that you’d had a change of heart, but I see you’ve got no more sincerity about the Democrats than about anything else.”

“Not a change of heart at all. Merely a change of hide. You might possibly sponge the spots off a leopard but he’d remain a leopard, just the same.”

Bonnie, awakened by the sound of voices in the hall, called sleepily but imperiously: “Daddy!” and Rhett started past Scarlett.

“Rhett, wait a minute. There’s something else I want to tell you. You must stop taking Bonnie around with you in the afternoons to political meetings. It just doesn’t look well. The idea of a little girl at such places! And it makes you look so silly. I never dreamed that you took her until Uncle Henry mentioned it, as though he thought I knew and—”

He swung round on her and his face was hard.

“How can you read wrong in a little girl sitting on her father’s lap while he talks to friends? You may think it looks silly but it isn’t silly. People will remember for years that Bonnie sat on my lap while I helped run the Republicans out of this state. People will remember for years—” The hardness went out of his face and a malicious light danced in his eyes. “Did you know that when people ask her who she loves best, she says ‘Daddy and the Demiquats,’ and who she hates most, she says: ‘The Scallywags.’ People, thank God, remember things like that”

Scarlett’s voice rose furiously. “And I suppose you tell her I’m a Scalawag!”

“Daddy!” said the small voice, indignant now, and Rhett, still laughing, went down the hall to his daughter.

That October Governor Bullock resigned his office and fled from Georgia. Misuse of public funds, waste and corruption had reached such proportions during his administration that the edifice was toppling of its own weight. Even his own party was split, so great had public indignation become. The Democrats had a majority in the legislature now, and that meant just one thing. Knowing that he was going to be investigated and fearing impeachment, Bullock did not wait. He hastily and secretly decamped, arranging that his resignation would not become public until he was safely in the North.

When it was announced, a week after his flight, Atlanta was wild with excitement and joy. People thronged the streets, men laughing and shaking hands in congratulation, ladies kissing each other and crying. Everybody gave parties in celebration and the fire department was kept busy fighting the flames that spread from the bonfires of jubilant small boys.

Almost out of the woods! Reconstruction’s almost over! to be sure, the acting governor was a Republican too, but the election was coming up in December and there was no doubt in anyone’s mind as to what the result would be. And when the election came, despite the frantic efforts of the Republicans, Georgia once more had a Democratic governor.

There was joy then, excitement too, but of a different sort from that which seized the town when Bullock took to his heels. This was a more sober heartfelt joy, a deep-souled feeling of thanksgiving, and the churches were filled as ministers reverently thanked God for the deliverance of the state. There was pride too, mingled with the elation and joy, pride that Georgia was back in the hands of her own people again, in spite of all the administration in Washington could do, in spite of the army, the Carpetbaggers, the Scalawags and the native Republicans.

Seven times Congress had passed crushing acts against the state to keep it a conquered province, three times the army had set aside civil law. The negroes had frolicked through the legislature, grasping aliens had mismanaged the government, private individuals had enriched themselves from public funds. Georgia had been helpless, tormented, abused, hammered down. But now, in spite of them all, Georgia belonged to herself again and through the efforts of her own people.