Here's Post Command, lady-- What's the matter?"
"This house--this house is your headquarters?"
Scarlett looked up at the lovely old dwelling facing on the square and could have cried.
She had been to so many parties in this house during the war. It had been a gay beautiful place and now--there was a large United States flag floating over it.
"What's the matter?"
"Nothing--only--only--I used to know the people who lived here."
"Well, that's too bad.
I guess they wouldn't know it themselves if they saw it, for it shore is torn up on the inside. Now, you go on in, Ma'm, and ask for the captain."
She went up the steps, caressing the broken white banisters, and pushed open the front door.
The hall was dark and as cold as a vault and a shivering sentry was leaning against the closed folding doors of what had been, in better days, the dining room.
"I want to see the captain," she said.
He pulled back the doors and she entered the room, her heart beating rapidly, her face flushing with embarrassment and excitement.
There was a close stuffy smell in the room, compounded of the smoking fire, tobacco fumes, leather, damp woolen uniforms and unwashed bodies.
She had a confused impression of bare walls with torn wallpaper, rows of blue overcoats and slouch hats hung on nails, a roaring fire, a long table covered with papers and a group of officers in blue uniforms with brass buttons.
She gulped once and found her voice.
She mustn't let these Yankees know she was afraid.
She must look and be her prettiest and most unconcerned self.
"The captain?"
"I'm one captain," said a fat man whose tunic was unbuttoned.
"I want to see a prisoner, Captain Rhett Butler."
"Butler again?
He's popular, that man," laughed the captain, taking a chewed cigar from his mouth.
"You a relative, Ma'm?"
"Yes--his--his sister."
He laughed again.
"He's got a lot of sisters, one of them here yesterday."
Scarlett flushed.
One of those creatures Rhett consorted with, probably that Watling woman.
And these Yankees thought she was another one.
It was unendurable.
Not even for Tara would she stay here another minute and be insulted.
She turned to the door and reached angrily for the knob but another officer was by her side quickly.
He was clean shaven and young and had merry, kind eyes.
"Just a minute, Ma'm. Won't you sit down here by the fire where it's warm?
I'll go see what I can do about it.
What is your name?
He refused to see the--lady who called yesterday."
She sank into the proffered chair, glaring at the discomfited fat captain, and gave her name.
The nice young officer slipped on his overcoat and left the room and the others took themselves off to the far end of the table where they talked in low tones and pawed at the papers.
She stretched her feet gratefully toward the fire, realizing for the first time how cold they were and wishing she had thought to put a piece of cardboard over the hole in the sole of one slipper.
After a time, voices murmured outside the door and she heard Rhett's laugh.
The door opened, a cold draft swept the room and Rhett appeared, hatless, a long cape thrown carelessly across his shoulders.
He was dirty and unshaven and without a cravat but somehow jaunty despite his dishabille, and his dark eyes were snapping joyfully at the sight of her.
"Scarlett!"
He had her hands in both of his and, as always, there was something hot and vital and exciting about his grip.
Before she quite knew what he was about, he had bent and kissed her cheek, his mustache tickling her.
As he felt the startled movement of her body away from him, he hugged her about the shoulders and said:
"My darling little sister!" and grinned down at her as if he relished her helplessness in resisting his caress.
She couldn't help laughing back at him for the advantage he had taken.
What a rogue he was!