In body or spirit before. At first she tried to stifle the

thoughts, but the hard self-honesty that lay at the base of her

nature would not permit it. And so, while the bazaar went on,

while she and Melanie waited on the customers who came to their

booth, her mind was busily working, trying to justify herself to

herself--a task which she seldom found difficult.

The other women were simply silly and hysterical with their talk

of patriotism and the Cause, and the men were almost as bad with

their talk of vital issues and States' Rights. She, Scarlett

O'Hara Hamilton, alone had good hard-headed Irish sense. She

wasn't going to make a fool out of herself about the Cause, but

neither was she going to make a fool out of herself by admitting

her true feelings. She was hard-headed enough to be practical

about the situation, and no one would ever know how she felt. How

surprised the bazaar would be if they knew what she really was

thinking! How shocked if she suddenly climbed on the bandstand

and declared that she thought the war ought to stop, so everybody

could go home and tend to their cotton and there could be parties

and beaux again and plenty of pale green dresses.

For a moment, her self-justification buoyed her up but still she

looked about the hall with distaste. The McLure girls' booth was

inconspicuous, as Mrs. Merriwether had said, and there were long

intervals when no one came to their corner and Scarlett had

nothing to do but look enviously on the happy throng. Melanie

sensed her moodiness but, crediting it to longing for Charlie, did

not try to engage her in conversation. She busied herself

arranging the articles in the booth in more attractive display,

while Scarlett sat and looked glumly around the room. Even the

banked flowers below the pictures of Mr. Davis and Mr. Stephens

displeased her.

"It looks like an altar," she sniffed. "And the way they all

carry on about those two, they might as well be the Father and the

Son!" Then smitten with sudden fright at her irreverence she

began hastily to cross herself by way of apology but caught

herself in time.

"Well, it's true," she argued with her conscience. "Everybody

carries on like they were holy and they aren't anything but men,

and mighty unattractive looking ones at that."

Of course, Mr. Stephens couldn't help how he looked for he had

been an invalid all his life, but Mr. Davis-- She looked up at

the cameo clean, proud face. It was his goatee that annoyed her

the most. Men should either be clean shaven, mustached or wear

full beards.

"That little wisp looks like it was just the best he could do,"

she thought, not seeing in his face the cold hard intelligence

that was carrying the weight of a new nation.

No, she was not happy now, and at first she had been radiant with

the pleasure of being in a crowd. Now just being present was not

enough. She was at the bazaar but not a part of it. No one paid

her any attention and she was the only young unmarried woman

present who did not have a beau. And all her life she had enjoyed

the center of the stage. It wasn't fair! She was seventeen years

old and her feet were patting the floor, wanting to skip and

dance. She was seventeen years old and she had a husband lying at

Oakland Cemetery and a baby in his cradle at Aunt Pittypat's and

everyone thought she should be content with her lot. She had a

whiter bosom and a smaller waist and a tinier foot than any girl

present, but for all they mattered she might just as well be lying

beside Charles with "Beloved Wife of" carved over her.

She wasn't a girl who could dance and flirt and she wasn't a wife

who could sit with other wives and criticize the dancing and

flirting girls. And she wasn't old enough to be a widow. Widows

should be old--so terribly old they didn't want to dance and flirt

and be admired. Oh, it wasn't fair that she should have to sit

here primly and be the acme of widowed dignity and propriety when

she was only seventeen. It wasn't fair that she must keep her

voice low and her eyes cast modestly down, when men, attractive

ones, too, came to their booth.

Every girl in Atlanta was three deep in men. Even the plainest

girls were carrying on like belles--and, oh, worst of all, they

were carrying on in such lovely, lovely dresses!

Here she sat like a crow with hot black taffeta to her wrists and

buttoned up to her chin, with not even a hint of lace or braid,

not a jewel except Ellen's onyx mourning brooch, watching tacky-

looking girls hanging on the arms of good-looking men. All

because Charles Hamilton had had the measles. He didn't even die

in a fine glow of gallantry in battle, so she could brag about

him.

Rebelliously she leaned her elbows on the counter and looked at

the crowd, flouting Mammy's oft-repeated admonition against

leaning on elbows and making them ugly and wrinkled. What did it

matter if they did get ugly? She'd probably never get a chance to

show them again. She looked hungrily at the frocks floating by,

butter-yellow watered silks with garlands of rosebuds; pink satins

with eighteen flounces edged with tiny black velvet ribbons; baby

blue taffeta, ten yards in the skirt and foamy with cascading

lace; exposed bosoms; seductive flowers. Maybelle Merriwether

went toward the next booth on the arm of the Zouave, in an apple-

green tarlatan so wide that it reduced her waist to nothingness.

It was showered and flounced with cream-colored Chantilly lace

that had come from Charleston on the last blockader, and Maybelle

was flaunting it as saucily as if she and not the famous Captain

Butler had run the blockade.

"How sweet I'd look in that dress," thought Scarlett, a savage

envy in her heart. "Her waist is as big as a cow's. That green

is just my color and it would make my eyes look-- Why will

blondes try to wear that color? Her skin looks as green as an old

cheese. And to think I'll never wear that color again, not even

when I do get out of mourning. No, not even if I do manage to get

married again. Then I'll have to wear tacky old grays and tans

and lilacs."

For a brief moment she considered the unfairness of it all. How

short was the time for fun, for pretty clothes, for dancing, for

coquetting! Only a few, too few years! Then you married and wore

dull-colored dresses and had babies that ruined your waist line

and sat in corners at dances with other sober matrons and only

emerged to dance with your husband or with old gentlemen who

stepped on your feet. If you didn't do these things, the other

matrons talked about you and then your reputation was ruined and

your family disgraced. It seemed such a terrible waste to spend

all your little girlhood learning how to be attractive and how to

catch men and then only use the knowledge for a year or two. When

she considered her training at the hands of Ellen and Mammy, she

knew it had been thorough and good because it had always reaped

results. There were set rules to be followed, and if you followed

them success crowned your efforts.

With old ladies you were sweet and guileless and appeared as

simple minded as possible, for old ladies were sharp and they

watched girls as jealously as cats, ready to pounce on any