If they were enemies. If Charlie were dead in the North it would

comfort me to know that someone-- And I don't care what you ladies

think of me," her voice broke again, "I will withdraw from both

clubs and I'll--I'll pull up every weed off every Yankee's grave I

can find and I'll plant flowers, too--and--I just dare anyone to

stop me!"

With this final defiance Melanie burst into tears and tried to make

her stumbling way to the door.

Grandpa Merriwether, safe in the masculine confines of the Girl of

the Period Saloon an hour later, reported to Uncle Henry Hamilton

that after these words, everybody cried and embraced Melanie and it

all ended up in a love feast and Melanie was made secretary of both

organizations.

"And they are going to pull up the weeds. The hell of it is Dolly

said I'd be only too pleased to help do it, 'cause I didn't have

anything much else to do. I got nothing against the Yankees and I

think Miss Melly was right and the rest of those lady wild cats

wrong. But the idea of me pulling weeds at my time of life and

with my lumbago!"

Melanie was on the board of lady managers of the Orphans' Home and

assisted in the collection of books for the newly formed Young

Men's Library Association. Even the Thespians who gave amateur

plays once a month clamored for her. She was too timid to appear

behind the kerosene-lamp footlights, but she could make costumes

out of croker sacks if they were the only material available. It

was she who cast the deciding vote at the Shakespeare Reading

Circle that the bard's works should be varied with those of Mr.

Dickens and Mr. Bulwer-Lytton and not the poems of Lord Byron, as

had been suggested by a young and, Melanie privately feared, very

fast bachelor member of the Circle.

In the nights of the late summer her small, feebly lighted house

was always full of guests. There were never enough chairs to go

around and frequently ladies sat on the steps of the front porch

with men grouped about them on the banisters, on packing boxes or

on the lawn below. Sometimes when Scarlett saw guests sitting on

the grass, sipping tea, the only refreshment the Wilkeses could

afford, she wondered how Melanie could bring herself to expose her

poverty so shamelessly. Until Scarlett was able to furnish Aunt

Pitty's house as it had been before the war and serve her guests

good wine and juleps and baked ham and cold haunches of venison,

she had no intention of having guests in her house--especially

prominent guests, such as Melanie had.

General John B. Gordon, Georgia's great hero, was frequently there

with his family. Father Ryan, the poet-priest of the Confederacy,

never failed to call when passing through Atlanta. He charmed

gatherings there with his wit and seldom needed much urging to

recite his "Sword of Lee" or his deathless "Conquered Banner,"

which never failed to make the ladies cry. Alex Stephens, late

Vice-President of the Confederacy, visited whenever in town and,

when the word went about that he was at Melanie's, the house was

filled and people sat for hours under the spell of the frail

invalid with the ringing voice. Usually there were a dozen

children present, nodding sleepily in their parents' arms, up hours

after their normal bedtime. No family wanted its children to miss

being able to say in after years that they had been kissed by the

great Vice-President or had shaken the hand that helped to guide

the Cause. Every person of importance who came to town found his

way to the Wilkes home and often they spent the night there. It

crowded the little flat-topped house, forced India to sleep on a

pallet in the cubbyhole that was Beau's nursery and sent Dilcey

speeding through the back hedge to borrow breakfast eggs from Aunt

Pitty's Cookie, but Melanie entertained them as graciously as if

hers was a mansion.

No, it did not occur to Melanie that people rallied round her as

round a worn and loved standard. And so she was both astounded and

embarrassed when Dr. Meade, after a pleasant evening at her house

where he acquitted himself nobly in reading the part of Macbeth,

kissed her hand and made observations in the voice he once used in

speaking of Our Glorious Cause.

"My dear Miss Melly, it is always a privilege and a pleasure to be