What couldn't any of the folks in the County do with it!
And what did so small a lie matter?
After all, anything you could get out of the Yankees was fair money, no matter how you got it.
"Yesterday, about noon when Ashley and me were splittin' rails, Suellen got this wagon and got your pa in it and off they went to town without a word to anybody.
Miss Melly had a notion what it was all about but she was prayin' somethin' would change Suellen, so she didn't say nothin' to the rest of us.
She just didn't see how Suellen could do such a thing.
"Today I heard all about what happened.
That pusillanimous fellow, Hilton, had some influence with the other Scallawags and Republicans in town and Suellen had agreed to give them some of the money--I don't know how much--if they'd kind of wink their eye about Mr. O'Hara bein' a loyal Union man and play on how he was an Irishman and didn't fight in the army and so on, and sign recommendations.
All your pa had to do was take the oath and sign the paper and off it would go to Washington.
"They rattled off the oath real fast and he didn't say nothin' and it went right well till she got him up to the signin' of it.
And then the old gentleman kind of come to himself for a minute and shook his head.
I don't think he knew what it was all about but he didn't like it and Suellen always did rub him the wrong way.
Well, that just about gave her the nervous fits after all the trouble she'd gone to.
She took him out of the office and rode him up and down the road and talked to him about your ma cryin' out of her grave at him for lettin' her children suffer when he could provide for them.
They tell me your pa sat there in the wagon and cried like a baby, like he always does when he hears her name.
Everybody in town saw them and Alex Fontaine went over to see what was the matter, but Suellen gave him the rough side of her tongue and told him to mind his own business, so he went off mad.
"I don't know where she got the notion but some time in the afternoon she got a bottle of brandy and took Mr. O'Hara back to the office and begun pourin' it for him.
Scarlett, we haven't had no spirits 'round Tara for a year, just a little blackberry wine and scuppernong wine Dilcey makes, and Mr. O'Hara warn't used to it.
He got real drunk, and after Suellen had argued and nagged a couple of hours he gave in and said Yes, he'd sign anything she wanted.
They got the oath out again and just as he was about to put pen to paper, Suellen made her mistake.
She said:
'Well, now. I guess the Slatterys and the MacIntoshes won't be givin' themselves airs over us!'
You see, Scarlett, the Slatterys had put in a claim for a big amount for that little shack of theirs that the Yankees burned and Emmie's husband had got it through Washington for them.
"They tell me that when Suellen said those names, your pa kind of straightened up and squared his shoulders and looked at her, sharp- like.
He warn't vague no more and he said:
'Have the Slatterys and the MacIntoshes signed somethin' like this?' and Suellen got nervous and said Yes and No and stuttered and he shouted right loud:
'Tell me, did that God-damned Orangeman and that God-damned poor white sign somethin' like this?'
And that feller Hilton spoke up smooth-like and said:
'Yes sir, they did and they got a pile of money like you'll get.'
"And then the old gentleman let out a roar like a bull.
Alex Fontaine said he heard him from down the street at the saloon.
And he said with a brogue you could cut with a butterknife:
'And were ye afther thinkin' an O'Hara of Tara would be follyin' the dirthy thracks of a Goddamned Orangeman and a God-damned poor white?'
And he tore the paper in two and threw it in Suellen's face and he bellowed:
'Ye're no daughter of mine!' and he was out of the office before you could say Jack Robinson.
"Alex said he saw him come out on the street, chargin' like a bull.
He said the old gentleman looked like his old self for the first time since your ma died.
Said he was reelin' drunk and cussin' at the top of his lungs.
Alex said he never heard such fine cussin'.
Alex's horse was standin' there and your pa climbed on it without a by-your-leave and off he went in a cloud of dust so thick it choked you, cussin' every breath he drew.
"Well, about sundown Ashley and me were sittin' on the front step, lookin' down the road and mighty worried.
Miss Melly was upstairs cryin' on her bed and wouldn't tell us nothin'.
Terrectly, we heard a poundin' down the road and somebody yellin' like they was fox huntin' and Ashley said:
'That's queer!
That sounds like Mr. O'Hara when he used to ride over to see us before the war."
"And then we seen him way down at the end of the pasture.
He must have jumped the fence right over there.
And he come ridin' hell- for-leather up the hill, singin' at the top of his voice like he didn't have a care in the world.
I didn't know your pa had such a voice.
He was singin'