Some day you'll be glad of what I'm doin'.'
Miss Melanie told me last night that Suellen had told her about her schemes but Miss Melly said she didn't have no notion Suellen was serious.
She said she didn't tell none of us because she was so upset at the very idea."
"What idea?
Are you ever going to get to the point?
We're halfway home now.
I want to know about Pa."
"I'm trying to tell you," said Will, "and we're so near home, I guess I'd better stop right here till I've finished."
He drew rein and the horse stopped and snorted.
They had halted by the wild overgrown mock-orange hedge that marked the Macintosh property.
Glancing under the dark trees Scarlett could just discern the tall ghostly chimneys still rearing above the silent ruin.
She wished that Will had chosen any other place to stop.
"Well, the long and the short of her idea was to make the Yankees pay for the cotton they burned and the stock they drove off and the fences and the barns they tore down."
"The Yankees?"
"Haven't you heard about it?
The Yankee government's been payin' claims on all destroyed property of Union sympathizers in the South."
"Of course I've heard about that," said Scarlett.
"But what's that got to do with us?"
"A heap, in Suellen's opinion.
That day I took her to Jonesboro, she run into Mrs. MacIntosh and when they were gossipin' along, Suellen couldn't help noticin' what fine-lookin' clothes Mrs. Macintosh had on and she couldn't help askin' about them.
Then Mrs. MacIntosh gave herself a lot of airs and said as how her husband had put in a claim with the Federal government for destroyin' the property of a loyal Union sympathizer who had never given aid and comfort to the Confederacy in any shape or form."
"They never gave aid and comfort to anybody," snapped Scarlett.
"Scotch-Irish!"
"Well, maybe that's true.
I don't know them.
Anyway, the government gave them, well--I forget how many thousand dollars.
A right smart sum it was, though.
That started Suellen.
She thought about it all week and didn't say nothin' to us because she knew we'd just laugh.
But she just had to talk to somebody so she went over to Miss Cathleen's and that damned white trash, Hilton, gave her a passel of new ideas.
He pointed out that your pa warn't even born in this country, that he hadn't fought in the war and hadn't had no sons to fight, and hadn't never held no office under the Confederacy.
He said they could strain a point about Mr. O'Hara bein' a loyal Union sympathizer.
He filled her up with such truck and she come home and begun workin' on Mr. O'Hara.
Scarlett, I bet my life your pa didn't even know half the time what she was talkin' about.
That was what she was countin' on, that he would take the Iron Clad oath and not even know it."
"Pa take the Iron Clad oath!" cried Scarlett.
"Well, he'd gotten right feeble in his mind these last months and I guess she was countin' on that.
Mind you, none of us suspicioned nothin' about it.
We knew she was cookin' up somethin', but we didn't know she was usin' your dead ma to reproach him for his daughters bein' in rags when he could get a hundred and fifty thousand dollars out of the Yankees."
"One hundred and fifty thousand dollars," murmured Scarlett, her horror at the oath fading.
What a lot of money that was!
And to be had for the mere signing of an oath of allegiance to the United States government, an oath stating that the signer had always supported the government and never given aid and comfort to its enemies.
One hundred and fifty thousand dollars!
That much money for that small a lie!
Well, she couldn't blame Suellen.
Good heavens!
Was that what Alex meant by wanting to rawhide her?
What the County meant by intending to cut her?
Fools, every one of them.
What couldn't she do with that much money!