Her voice was cool but acid.
Whenever she thought of Scarlett it was hard for her even to be polite, remembering, always remembering Stuart Tarleton.
"And I have always thought there was more between her and that Butler man before Mr. Kennedy was killed than most people suspected."
Before the ladies could recover from their shocked astonishment at her statement and at a spinster mentioning such a matter, Melanie was standing in the doorway.
So engrossed had they been in their gossip that they had not heard her light tread and now, confronted by their hostess, they looked like whispering schoolgirls caught by a teacher.
Alarm was added to consternation at the change in Melanie's face.
She was pink with righteous anger, her gentle eyes snapping fire, her nostrils quivering.
No one had ever seen Melanie angry before.
Not a lady present thought her capable of wrath.
They all loved her but they thought her the sweetest, most pliable of young women, deferential to her elders and without any opinions of her own.
"How dare you, India?" she questioned in a low voice that shook.
"Where will your jealousy lead you?
For shame!"
India's face went white but her head was high.
"I retract nothing," she said briefly.
But her mind was seething.
"Jealous, am I?" she thought.
With the memory of Stuart Tarleton and of Honey and Charles, didn't she have good reason to be jealous of Scarlett?
Didn't she have good reason to hate her, especially now that she had a suspicion that Scarlett had somehow entangled Ashley in her web?
She thought:
"There's plenty I could tell you about Ashley and your precious Scarlett."
India was torn between the desire to shield Ashley by her silence and to extricate him by telling all her suspicions to Melanie and the whole world.
That would force Scarlett to release whatever hold she had on Ashley.
But this was not the time.
She had nothing definite, only suspicions.
"I retract nothing," she repeated.
"Then it is fortunate that you are no longer living under my roof," said Melanie and her words were cold.
India leaped to her feet, red flooding her sallow face.
"Melanie, you--my sister-in-law--you aren't going to quarrel with me over that fast piece--"
"Scarlett is my sister-in-law, too," said Melanie, meeting India's eyes squarely as though they were strangers.
"And dearer to me than any blood sister could ever be.
If you are so forgetful of my favors at her hands, I am not.
She stayed with me through the whole siege when she could have gone home, when even Aunt Pitty had run away to Macon.
She brought my baby for me when the Yankees were almost in Atlanta and she burdened herself with me and Beau all that dreadful trip to Tara when she could have left me here in a hospital for the Yankees to get me.
And she nursed and fed me, even if she was tired and even if she went hungry.
Because I was sick and weak, I had the best mattress at Tara.
When I could walk, I had the only whole pair of shoes.
You can forget those things she did for me, India, but I cannot.
And when Ashley came home, sick, discouraged, without a home, without a cent in his pockets, she took him in like a sister.
And when we thought we would have to go North and it was breaking our hearts to leave Georgia, Scarlett stepped in and gave him the mill to run.
And Captain Butler saved Ashley's life out of the kindness of his heart.
Certainly Ashley had no claim on him!
And I am grateful, grateful to Scarlett and to Captain Butler.
But you, India!
How can you forget the favors Scarlett has done me and Ashley?
How can you hold your brother's life so cheap as to cast slurs on the man who saved him?
If you went down on your knees to Captain Butler and Scarlett, it would not be enough."
"Now, Melly," began Mrs. Merriwether briskly, for she had recovered her composure, "that's no way to talk to India."
"I heard what you said about Scarlett too," cried Melanie, swinging on the stout old lady with the air of a duelist who, having withdrawn a blade from one prostrate opponent, turns hungrily toward another.
"And you too, Mrs. Elsing.