Don’t you think so, Melly?”
“Well,” began Melly helplessly.
The idea of appearing publicly at a social gathering while in mourning was so unheard of she was bewildered.
“Scarlett’s right,” said Mrs. Merriwether, observing signs of weakening.
She rose and jerked her hoops into place.
“Both of you—all of you must come.
Now, Pitty, don’t start your excuses again.
Just think how much the hospital needs money for new beds and drugs.
And I know Charlie would like you to help the Cause he died for.”
“Well,” said Pittypat, helpless as always in the presence of a stronger personality, “if you think people will understand.”
“Too good to be true!
Too good to be true!” said Scarlett’s joyful heart as she slipped unobtrusively into the pink-and-yellow-draped booth that was to have been the McLure girls’.
Actually she was at a party!
After a year’s seclusion, after crepe and hushed voices and nearly going crazy with boredom, she was actually at a party, the biggest party Atlanta had ever seen.
And she could see people and many lights and hear music and view for herself the lovely laces and frocks and frills that the famous Captain Butler had run through the blockade on his last trip. She sank down on one of the little stools behind the counter of the booth and looked up and down the long hall which, until this afternoon, had been a bare and ugly drill room.
How the ladies must have worked today to bring it to its present beauty.
It looked lovely. Every candle and candlestick in Atlanta must be in this hall tonight, she thought, silver ones with a dozen sprangling arms, china ones with charming figurines clustering their bases, old brass stands, erect and dignified, laden with candles of all sizes and colors, smelling fragrantly of bayberries, standing on the gun racks that ran the length of the hall, on the long flower-decked tables, on booth counters, even on the sills of the open windows where the draughts of warm summer air were just strong enough to make them flare.
In the center of the hall the huge ugly lamp, hanging from the ceiling by rusty chains, was completely transformed by twining ivy and wild grapevines that were already withering from the heat.
The walls were banked with pine branches that gave out a spicy smell, making the corners of the room into pretty bowers where the chaperons and old ladies would sit.
Long graceful ropes of ivy and grapevine and smilax were hung everywhere, in looping festoons on the walls, draped above the windows, twined in scallops all over the brightly colored cheesecloth booths.
And everywhere amid the greenery, on flags and bunting, blazed the bright stars of the Confederacy on their background of red and blue.
The raised platform for the musicians was especially artistic.
It was completely hidden from view by the banked greenery and starry bunting and Scarlett knew that every potted and tubbed plant in town was there, coleus, geranium, hydrangea, oleander, elephant ear—even Mrs. Elsing’s four treasured rubber plants, which were given posts of honor at the four corners.
At the other end of the hall from the platform, the ladies had eclipsed themselves.
On this wall hung large pictures of President Davis and Georgia’s own “Little Alec” Stephens, VicePresident of the Confederacy.
Above them was an enormous flag and, beneath, on long tables was the loot of the gardens of the town, ferns, banks of roses, crimson and yellow and white, proud sheaths of golden gladioli, masses of varicolored nasturtiums, tall stiff hollyhocks rearing deep maroon and creamy heads above the other flowers.
Among them, candles burned serenely like altar fires.
The two faces looked down on the scene, two faces as different as could be possible in two men at the helm of so momentous an undertaking: Davis with the flat cheeks and cold eyes of an ascetic, his thin proud lips set firmly; Stephens with dark burning eyes deep socketed in a face that had known nothing but sickness and pain and had triumphed over them with humor and with fire—two faces that were greatly loved.
The elderly ladies of the committee in whose hands rested the responsibility for the whole bazaar rustled in as importantly as full-rigged ships, hurried the belated young matrons and giggling girls into their booths, and then swept through the doors into the back rooms where the refreshments were being laid out.
Aunt Pitty panted out after them.
The musicians clambered upon their platform, black, grinning, their fat cheeks already shining with perspiration, and began tuning their fiddles and sawing and whanging with their bows in anticipatory importance.
Old Levi, Mrs. Merriwether’s coachman, who had led the orchestras for every bazaar, ball and wedding since Atlanta was named Marthasville, rapped with his bow for attention.
Few except the ladies who were conducting the bazaar had arrived yet, but all eyes turned toward him. Then the fiddles, bull fiddles, accordions, banjos and knuckle-bones broke into a slow rendition of
“Lorena”—too slow for dancing, the dancing would come later when the booths were emptied of their wares.
Scarlett felt her heart beat faster as the sweet melancholy of the waltz came to her:
“The years creep slowly by, Lorena!
The snow is on the grass again.
The sun’s far down the sky, Lorena...”
One-two-three, one-two-three, dip-sway—three, turn—two-three. What a beautiful waltz!
She extended her hands slightly, closed her eyes and swayed with the sad haunting rhythm.
There was something about the tragic melody and Lorena’s lost love that mingled with her own excitement and brought a lump into her throat.
Then, as if brought into being by the waltz music, sounds floated in from the shadowy moonlit street below, the trample of horses’ hooves and the sound of carriage wheels, laughter on the warm sweet air and the soft acrimony of negro voices raised in argument over hitching places for the horses.
There was confusion on the stairs and light-hearted merriment, the mingling of girls’ fresh voices with the bass notes of their escorts, airy cries of greeting and squeals of joy as girls recognized friends from whom they had parted only that afternoon.
Suddenly the hall burst into life.
It was full of girls, girls who floated in butterfly bright dresses, hooped out enormously, lace pantalets peeping from beneath; round little white shoulders bare, and faintest traces of soft little bosoms showing above lace flounces; lace shawls carelessly hanging from arms; fans spangled and painted, fans of swan’s-down and peacock feathers, dangling at wrists by tiny velvet ribbons; girls with masses of golden curls about their necks and fringed gold earbobs that tossed and danced with their dancing curls. Laces and silks and braid and ribbons, all blockade run, all the more precious and more proudly worn because of it, finery flaunted with an added pride as an extra affront to the Yankees.
Not all the flowers of the town were standing in tribute to the leaders of the Confederacy.
The smallest, the most fragrant blossoms bedecked the girls. Tea roses tucked behind pink ears, cape jessamine and bud roses in round little garlands over cascades of side curls, blossoms thrust demurely into satin sashes, flowers that before the night was over would find their way into the breast pockets of gray uniforms as treasured souvenirs.
There were so many uniforms in the crowd—so many uniforms on so many men whom Scarlett knew, men she had met on hospital cots, on the streets, at the drill ground.
They were such resplendent uniforms, brave with shining buttons and dazzling with twined gold braid on cuffs and collars, the red and yellow and blue stripes on the trousers, for the different branches of the service, setting off the gray to perfection.
Scarlet and gold sashes swung to and fro, sabers glittered and banged against shining boots, spurs rattled and jingled.