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gone With the Wind
Scarlett
O'Hara
was
not
beautiful
,
but
men
seldom
realized
it
when
caught
by
her
charm
as
the
Tarleton
twins
were
.
In
her
face
were
too
sharply
blended
the
delicate
features
of
her
mother
,
a
Coast
aristocrat
of
French
descent
,
and
the
heavy
ones
of
her
florid
Irish
father
.
But
it
was
an
arresting
face
,
pointed
of
chin
,
square
of
jaw
.
Her
eyes
were
pale
green
without
a
touch
of
hazel
,
starred
with
bristly
black
lashes
and
slightly
tilted
at
the
ends
.
Above
them
,
her
thick
black
brows
slanted
upward
,
cutting
a
startling
oblique
line
in
her
magnolia-white
skin
--
that
skin
so
prized
by
Southern
women
and
so
carefully
guarded
with
bonnets
,
veils
and
mittens
against
hot
Georgia
suns
.
Seated
with
Stuart
and
Brent
Tarleton
in
the
cool
shade
of
the
porch
of
Tara
,
her
father
's
plantation
,
that
bright
April
afternoon
of
1861
,
she
made
a
pretty
picture
.
Her
new
green
flowered-muslin
dress
spread
its
twelve
yards
of
billowing
material
over
her
hoops
and
exactly
matched
the
flat-heeled
green
morocco
slippers
her
father
had
recently
brought
her
from
Atlanta
.
The
dress
set
off
to
perfection
the
seventeen-inch
waist
,
the
smallest
in
three
counties
,
and
the
tightly
fitting
basque
showed
breasts
well
matured
for
her
sixteen
years
.
But
for
all
the
modesty
of
her
spreading
skirts
,
the
demureness
of
hair
netted
smoothly
into
a
chignon
and
the
quietness
of
small
white
hands
folded
in
her
lap
,
her
true
self
was
poorly
concealed
.
The
green
eyes
in
the
carefully
sweet
face
were
turbulent
,
willful
,
lusty
with
life
,
distinctly
at
variance
with
her
decorous
demeanor
.
Her
manners
had
been
imposed
upon
her
by
her
mother
's
gentle
admonitions
and
the
sterner
discipline
of
her
mammy
;
her
eyes
were
her
own
.
On
either
side
of
her
,
the
twins
lounged
easily
in
their
chairs
,
squinting
at
the
sunlight
through
tall
mint-garnished
glasses
as
they
laughed
and
talked
,
their
long
legs
,
booted
to
the
knee
and
thick
with
saddle
muscles
,
crossed
negligently
.
Nineteen
years
old
,
six
feet
two
inches
tall
,
long
of
bone
and
hard
of
muscle
,
with
sunburned
faces
and
deep
auburn
hair
,
their
eyes
merry
and
arrogant
,
their
bodies
clothed
in
identical
blue
coats
and
mustard-colored
breeches
,
they
were
as
much
alike
as
two
bolls
of
cotton
.
Outside
,
the
late
afternoon
sun
slanted
down
in
the
yard
,
throwing
into
gleaming
brightness
the
dogwood
trees
that
were
solid
masses
of
white
blossoms
against
the
background
of
new
green
.
The
twins
'
horses
were
hitched
in
the
driveway
,
big
animals
,
red
as
their
masters
'
hair
;
and
around
the
horses
'
legs
quarreled
the
pack
of
lean
,
nervous
possum
hounds
that
accompanied
Stuart
and
Brent
wherever
they
went
.
A
little
aloof
,
as
became
an
aristocrat
,
lay
a
black-spotted
carriage
dog
,
muzzle
on
paws
,
patiently
waiting
for
the
boys
to
go
home
to
supper
.
Between
the
hounds
and
the
horses
and
the
twins
there
was
a
kinship
deeper
than
that
of
their
constant
companionship
.
They
were
all
healthy
,
thoughtless
young
animals
,
sleek
,
graceful
,
high-spirited
,
the
boys
as
mettlesome
as
the
horses
they
rode
,
mettlesome
and
dangerous
but
,
withal
,
sweet-tempered
to
those
who
knew
how
to
handle
them
.
Although
born
to
the
ease
of
plantation
life
,
waited
on
hand
and
foot
since
infancy
,
the
faces
of
the
three
on
the
porch
were
neither
slack
nor
soft
.
They
had
the
vigor
and
alertness
of
country
people
who
have
spent
all
their
lives
in
the
open
and
troubled
their
heads
very
little
with
dull
things
in
books
.
Life
in
the
north
Georgia
county
of
Clayton
was
still
new
and
,
according
to
the
standards
of
Augusta
,
Savannah
and
Charleston
,
a
little
crude
.
The
more
sedate
and
older
sections
of
the
South
looked
down
their
noses
at
the
up-country
Georgians
,
but
here
in
north
Georgia
,
a
lack
of
the
niceties
of
classical
education
carried
no
shame
,
provided
a
man
was
smart
in
the
things
that
mattered
.
And
raising
good
cotton
,
riding
well
,
shooting
straight
,
dancing
lightly
,
squiring
the
ladies
with
elegance
and
carrying
one
's
liquor
like
a
gentleman
were
the
things
that
mattered
.
In
these
accomplishments
the
twins
excelled
,
and
they
were
equally
outstanding
in
their
notorious
inability
to
learn
anything
contained
between
the
covers
of
books
.
Their
family
had
more
money
,
more
horses
,
more
slaves
than
any
one
else
in
the
County
,
but
the
boys
had
less
grammar
than
most
of
their
poor
Cracker
neighbors
.
It
was
for
this
precise
reason
that
Stuart
and
Brent
were
idling
on
the
porch
of
Tara
this
April
afternoon
.
They
had
just
been
expelled
from
the
University
of
Georgia
,
the
fourth
university
that
had
thrown
them
out
in
two
years
;
and
their
older
brothers
,
Tom
and
Boyd
,
had
come
home
with
them
,
because
they
refused
to
remain
at
an
institution
where
the
twins
were
not
welcome
.
Stuart
and
Brent
considered
their
latest
expulsion
a
fine
joke
,
and
Scarlett
,
who
had
not
willingly
opened
a
book
since
leaving
the
Fayetteville
Female
Academy
the
year
before
,
thought
it
just
as
amusing
as
they
did
.
