It was going to be more difficult than she anticipated, greeting Rhett with just the proper degree of casualness and, as for telling him about the new baby! She looked at his face as he came up the steps, that dark nonchalant face, so impervious, so blank. No, she'd wait to tell him. She couldn't tell him right away. And yet, such tidings as these belonged first to a husband, for a husband was always happy to hear them. But she did not think he would be happy about it.
She stood on the landing, leaning against the banisters and wondered if he would kiss her. But he did not. He said only: "You are looking pale, Mrs. Butler. Is there a rouge shortage?"
No word of missing her, even if he didn't mean it. And he might have at least kissed her in front of Mammy who, after bobbing a curtsy, was leading Bonnie away down the hall to the nursery. He stood beside her on the landing, his eyes appraising her carelessly.
"Can this wanness mean that you've been missing me?" he questioned and though his lips smiled, his eyes did not.
So that was going to be his attitude. He was going to be as hateful as ever. Suddenly the child she was carrying became a nauseating burden instead of something she had gladly carried, and this man before her, standing carelessly with his wide Panama hat upon his hip, her bitterest foe, the cause of all her troubles. There was venom in her eyes as she answered, venom that was too unmistakable to be missed, and the smile went from his face.
"If I'm pale it's your fault and not because I've missed you, you conceited thing. It's because --" Oh, she hadn't intended to tell him like this but the hot words rushed to her lips and she flung them at him, careless of the servants who might hear. "It's because I'm going to have a baby!"
He sucked in his breath suddenly and his eyes went rapidly over her. He took a quick step toward her as though to put a hand on her arm but she twisted away from him, and before the hate in her eyes his face hardened.
"Indeed!" he said coolly. "Well, who's the happy father? Ashley?"
She clutched the newel post until the ears of the carved lion dug with sudden pain into her palm. Even she who knew him so well had not anticipated this insult. Of course, he was joking but there were some jokes too monstrous to be borne. She wanted to rake her sharp nails across his eyes and blot out that queer light in them.
"Damn you!" she began, her voice shaking with sick rage. "You -- you know it's yours. And I don't want it any more than you do. No -- no woman would want the children of a cad like you. I wish -- Oh, God, I wish it was anybody's baby but yours!"
She saw his swarthy face change suddenly, anger and something she could not analyze making it twitch as though stung.
"There!" she thought in a hot rage of pleasure. "There! I've hurt him now!"
But the old impassive mask was back across his face and he stroked one side of his mustache.
"Cheer up," he said, turning from her and starting up the stairs, "maybe you'll have a miscarriage."
For a dizzy moment she thought what childbearing meant, the nausea that tore her, the tedious waiting, the thickening of her figure, the hours of pain. Things no man could ever realize. And he dared to joke. She would claw him. Nothing but the sight of blood upon his dark face would ease this pain in her heart. She lunged for him, swift as a cat, but with, a light startled movement, he sidestepped, throwing up his arm to ward her off. She was standing on the edge of the freshly waxed top step, and as her arm with the whole weight of her body behind it, struck his out-thrust arm, she lost her balance. She made a wild clutch for the newel post and missed it. She went down the stairs backwards, feeling a sickening dart of pain in her ribs as she landed. And, too dazed to catch herself, she rolled over and over to the bottom of the flight.
It was the first time Scarlett had ever been ill, except when she had her babies, and somehow those times did not count. She had not been forlorn and frightened then, as she was now, weak and pain racked and bewildered. She knew she was sicker than they dared tell her, feebly realized that she might die. The broken rib stabbed when she breathed, her bruised face and head ached and her whole body was given over to demons who plucked at her with hot pinchers and sawed on her with dull knives and left her, for short intervals, so drained of strength that she could not regain grip on herself before they returned. No, childbirth had not been like this. She had been able to eat hearty meals two hours after Wade and Ella and Bonnie had been born, but now the thought of anything but cool water brought on feeble nausea.
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.