She had had her way.
This was what she wanted and Ashley wanted.
But it was not making her happy.
Her vanity was sore and she was mortified at the thought that Rhett had taken it all so lightly, that he didn't want her, that he put her on the level of other women in other beds.
She wished she could think of some delicate way to tell Ashley that she and Rhett were no longer actually man and wife.
But she knew now she could not.
It all seemed a terrible mess now and she half heartedly wished she had said nothing about it.
She would miss the long amusing conversations in bed with Rhett when the ember of his cigar glowed in the dark.
She would miss the comfort of his arms when she woke terrified from the dreams that she was running through cold mist.
Suddenly she felt very unhappy and leaning her head on the arm of the chair, she cried.
CHAPTER LII
One rainy afternoon when Bonnie was barely past her first birthday, Wade moped about the sitting room, occasionally going to the window and flattening his nose on the dripping pane.
He was a slender, weedy boy, small for his eight years, quiet almost to shyness, never speaking unless spoken to.
He was bored and obviously at loss for entertainment, for Ella was busy in the corner with her dolls, Scarlett was at her secretary muttering to herself as she added a long column of figures, and Rhett was lying on the floor, swinging his watch by its chain, just out of Bonnie's reach.
After Wade had picked up several books and let them drop with bangs and sighed deeply, Scarlett turned to him in irritation.
"Heavens, Wade!
Run out and play."
"I can't.
It's raining."
"Is it?
I hadn't noticed.
Well, do something.
You make me nervous, fidgeting about.
Go tell Pork to hitch up the carriage and take you over to play with Beau."
"He isn't home," sighed Wade.
"He's at Raoul Picard's birthday party."
Raoul was the small son of Maybelle and Rene Picard--a detestable little brat, Scarlett thought, more like an ape than a child.
"Well, you can go to see anyone you want to.
Run tell Pork."
"Nobody's at home," answered Wade.
"Everybody's at the party."
The unspoken words "everybody--but me" hung in the air; but Scarlett, her mind on her account books, paid no heed.
Rhett raised himself to a sitting posture and said:
"Why aren't you at the party too, son?"
Wade edged closer to him, scuffing one foot and looking unhappy.
"I wasn't invited, sir."
Rhett handed his watch into Bonnie's destructive grasp and rose lightly to his feet.
"Leave those damned figures alone, Scarlett.
Why wasn't Wade invited to this party?"
"For Heaven's sake, Rhett!
Don't bother me now.
Ashley has gotten these accounts in an awful snarl-- Oh, that party?
Well, I think it's nothing unusual that Wade wasn't invited and I wouldn't let him go if he had been.
Don't forget that Raoul is Mrs. Merriwether's grandchild and Mrs. Merriwether would as soon have a free issue nigger in her sacred parlor as one of us."
Rhett, watching Wade's face with meditative eyes, saw the boy flinch.
"Come here, son," he said, drawing the boy to him.
"Would you like to be at that party?"
"No, sir," said Wade bravely but his eyes fell.
"Hum. Tell me, Wade, do you go to little Joe Whiting's parties or Frank Bonnell's or--well, any of your playmates?"
"No, sir.