The town writhed at these last two! Belle Watling! To owe their men’s lives to her! It was intolerable! Women who had ostentatiously crossed the street when they saw Belle coming, wondered if she remembered and trembled for fear she did. The men felt less humiliation at taking their lives from Belle than the women did, for many of them thought her a good sort. But they were stung that they must owe lives and ******* to Rhett Butler, a speculator and a Scalawag. Belle and Rhett, the town’s best-known fancy woman and the town’s most hated man. And they must be under obligation to them.
Another thought that stung them to impotent wrath was the knowledge that the Yankees and Carpetbaggers would laugh. Oh, how they would laugh! Twelve of the town’s most prominent citizens revealed as habitual frequenters of Belle Watling’s sporting house! Two of them killed in a fight over a cheap little girl, others ejected from the place as too drunk to be tolerated even by Belle and some under arrest, refusing to admit they were there when everyone knew they were there!
Atlanta was right in fearing that the Yankees would laugh. They had squirmed too long beneath Southern coldness and contempt and now they exploded with hilarity. Officers woke comrades and retailed the news. Husbands roused wives at dawn and told them as much as could be decently told to women. And the women, dressing hastily, knocked on their neighbors’ doors and spread the story. The Yankee ladies were charmed with it all and laughed until tears ran down their faces. This was Southern chivalry and gallantry for you! Maybe those women who carried their heads so high and snubbed all attempts at friendliness wouldn’t be so uppity, now that everyone knew where their husbands spent their time when they were supposed to be at political meetings. Political meetings! Well, that was funny!
But even as they laughed, they expressed regret for Scarlett and her tragedy. After all, Scarlett was a lady and one of the few ladies in Atlanta who were nice to Yankees. She had already won their sympathy by the fact that she had to work because her husband couldn’t or wouldn’t support her properly. Even though her husband was a sorry one, it was dreadful that the poor thing should discover he had been untrue to her. And it was doubly dreadful that his death should occur simultaneously with the discovery of his infidelity. After all, a poor husband was better than no husband at all, and the Yankee ladies decided they’d be extra nice to Scarlett But the others, Mrs. Meade, Mrs. Merriwether, Mrs. Elsing, Tommy Wellburn’s widow and most of all, Mrs. Ashley Wilkes, they’d laugh in their faces every time they saw them. That would teach them a little courtesy.
Much of the whispering that went on in the dark rooms on the north side of town that night was on this same subject. Atlanta ladies vehemently told their husbands that they did not care a rap what the Yankees thought. But inwardly they felt that running an Indian gantlet would be infinitely preferable to suffering the ordeal of Yankee grins and not being able to tell the truth about their husbands.
Dr. Meade, beside himself with outraged dignity at the position into which Rhett had jockeyed him and the others, told Mrs. Meade that, but for the fact that it would implicate the others, he would rather confess and be hanged than say he had been at Belle’s house.
“It is an insult to you, Mrs. Meade,” he fumed.
“But everyone will know you weren’t there for—for—”
“The Yankees won’t know. They’ll have to believe it if we save our necks. And they’ll laugh. The very thought that anyone will believe it and laugh infuriates me. And it insults you because—my dear, I have always been faithful to you.”
“I know that,” and in the darkness Mrs. Meade smiled and slipped a thin hand into the doctor’s. “But I’d rather it were really true than have one hair of your head in danger.”
“Mrs. Meade, do you know what you are saying?” cried the doctor, aghast at the unsuspected realism of his wife.”
“Yes, I know. I’ve lost Darcy and I’ve lost Phil and you are all I have and, rather than lose you, I’d have you take up your permanent abode at that place.”
“You are distrait! You cannot know what you are saying.”
“You old fool,” said Mrs. Meade tenderly and laid her head against his sleeve.
Dr. Meade fumed into silence and stroked her cheek and then exploded again. “And to be under obligation to that Butler man! Hanging would be easy compared to that. No, not even if I owe him my life, can I be polite to him. His insolence is monumental and his shamelessness about his profiteering makes me boil. To owe my life to a man who never went in the army—”
“Melly said he enlisted after Atlanta fell.”
“It’s a lie. Miss Melly will believe any plausible scoundrel. And what I can’t understand is why he is doing all this—going to all this trouble. I hate to say it but—well, there’s always been talk about him and Mrs. Kennedy. I’ve seen them coming in from rides together too often this last year. He must have done it because of her.”
“If it was because of Scarlett, he wouldn’t have lifted his hand. He’d have been glad to see Frank Kennedy hanged. I think it’s because of Melly—”
“Mrs. Meade, you can’t be insinuating that there’s ever been anything between those two!”
“Oh, don’t be silly! But she’s always been unaccountably fond of him ever since he tried to get Ashley exchanged during the war. And I must say this for him, he never smiles in that nasty-nice way when he’s with her. He’s just as pleasant and thoughtful as can be—really a different man. You can tell by the way he acts with Melly that he could be decent if he wanted to. Now, my idea of why he’s doing all this is—” She paused. “Doctor, you won’t like my idea.”
“I don’t like anything about this whole affair!”