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A Speculator's Story: Excerpts from Margaret Mitchell's Gone With the Wind

Everyone knew now that the fate of the Confederacy rested as much upon the skill of the blockade boats in eluding the Yankee fleet as it did upon the soldiers at the front. Rumor had it that Captain Butler was one of the best pilots in the South and that he was reckless and utterly without nerves. Reared in Charleston, he knew every inlet, creek, shoal and rock of the Carolina coast near that port, and he was equally at home in the waters around Wilmington. He had never lost a boat or even been forced to dump a cargo. AT the onset of the war, he had emerged from obscurity with enough money to buy a small swift boat and now, when blockaded goods realized two thousand per cent on each cargo, he owned four boats. He had good pilots and paid them well, and they slid out of Charleston and Wilmington on dark nights, bearing cotton for Nassau, England and Canada. The cotton mills of England were standing idle and the workers were starving, and any blockader who could outwit he Yankee fleet could command his own price in Liverpool. Rhett's boats were singularly lucky both in taking out cotton for the Confederacy and bringing in the war materials for which the South was desperate. Yes, the ladies felt they could forgive and forget a great many things for such a brave man.

*

Now there was a thinly veiled note of mockery in his conversations with everyone. When praised for his services to the Confederacy, he unfailingly replied that blockading was a business with him. If he could make as much money out of government contracts, he would say, picking out with his eyes those who had government contracts, then he would certainly abandon the hazards of blockading and take to selling shoddy cloth, sanded sugar, spoiled flour and rotten leather to the Confederacy.

Most of his remarks were unanswerable, which made them all the worse. There had already been minor scandals about those holding government contracts. Letters from men at the front complained constantly of shoes that wore out in a week, gunpowder that would not ignite, harness that snapped at any strain, meat that was rotten and flour that was full of weevils. Atlanta people tried to think that the men who sold such stuff to the government must be contract holders from Alabama or Virginia or Tennessee, and not Georgians. For did not the George contract holders include men from the very best families? Were they not the first to cheer at "Dixie" and the most rampant seekers, in oratory at least, for Yankee blood? The full tide of fury against those profiteering on government contracts had not yet risen, and Rhett's words were taken merely as evidence of his own bad breeding.

He not only affronted the town with insinuations of venality on the part of men in high places and slurs on the courage of the men in the field, but he took pleasure in tricking the dignified citizenry into embarrassing situations. He could no more resist pricking the conceits, the hypocrisies and the flamboyant patriotism of those about him than a small boy can resist putting a pin into a balloon. He neatly deflated the pompous and exposed the ignorant and the bigoted, and he did it in such subtle ways, drawing his victims out by his seemingly courteous interest, that they never were quite certain what had happened until they stood exposed as windy, high flown and slightly ridiculous.

*

Dr. Meade took action, in the form of a letter to the newspaper wherein he did not mention Rhett by name, though his meaning was obvious. The editor, sensing the social drama of the situation, put it on the second page of the paper, in itself a startling innovation, as the first two pages of the paper were always devoted to advertisements of slaves, mules, plows, coffins, houses for sale or rent, cures for private diseases, abortifacients and restoratives for lost manhood.

The doctor's letter was the first of a chorus of indignation that was beginning to be heard all over the South against speculators, profiteers and holders of government contracts. ... The rumor which had been creeping about underground was now being openly discussed, that Rhett Butler not only ran his own four boats and sold the cargoes at unheard-of prices but bought up the cargoes of other boats and held them for rises in prices. It was said that he was at the head of a combine worth more than a million dollars, with Wilmington as its headquarters for the purpose of buying blockade goods on the docks.

"There are many brave and patriotic men in the blockade arm of the Confederacy's naval service," ran the last of the doctor's letter, "unselfish men who are risking their lives and all their wealth that the Confederacy may survive. No one begrudges them the scant monetary returns they make for their risks. But there are others, scoundrels, who masquerade under the cloak of the blockader for their own selfish gains, and I call upon every loyal Confederate to cast them out."

Atlanta read, knew the oracle had spoken, and, as loyal Confederates, they hastened to cast Rhett out.

*

"I think people are acting like chickens with their heads off about Captain Butler," said Melanie. "He wouldn't hold food from starving people. Why, he even gave me a hundred dollars for the orphans. I'm sure he's just as loyal and patriotic as any of us and he's just too proud to defend himself. You know how obstinate men are when they get their backs up."

*

"Even if you think such things, why do you say them?" Scarlett scolded Rhett. "If you'd just think what you please but keep your mouth shut, everything would be so much nicer."

"That's your system, isn't it, my green-eyed hypocrite. Tell me truthfully, don't you sometimes almost burst from keeping your mouth shut?"

"Well -- yes," Scarlett confessed reluctantly. "I do get awfully bored when they talk about the Cause, morning, noon and night. But goodness, Rhett Butler, if I admitted it nobody would speak to me and none of the boys would dance with me!"

"Well, I admire your self-control but I do not find myself equal to it. Nor can I masquerade in a cloak of romance and patriotism, no matter how convenient it might be. There are enough stupid patriots who are risking every cent they have in the blockade and who are going to come out of this war paupers. They don't need me among their number, either to brighten the record of patriotism or to increase the roll of paupers. ... The Confederacy is doomed. I give myself about six months more of blockading and then I'm through. After that, it will be too risky. And I'll sell my boats to some foolish Englishman who thinks he can slip them through. But one way or the other, it's not bothering me. I've made money enough, and it's in English banks and in gold. None of this worthless paper for me. ... Scarlett, our Southern way of living is as antiquated as the feudal system of the Middle Ages. It had to go and it's going now. And yet you expect me to listen to orators like Dr. Meade who tell me our Cause is just and holy? What kind of a fool do you think I am? The South threw me out to starve once. I haven't starved, and I am making enough money out of the South's death throes to compensate me for my lost birthright."

"I think you are vile and mercenary."

"No, I'm only farsighted. Though that is merely a synonym for mercenary. At least, people who were not as farsighted as I will call it that. Any loyal Confederate who had a thousand dollars in cash in 1861 could have done what I did, but how few were mercenary enough to take advantage of their opportunities! ... I told you once before that there were two times for making big money, one in the upbuilding of a country and the other in its destruction. Remember my words. Perhaps they may be of use to you some day."

*

Coldly and logically an idea grew in her brain. She thought of Rhett, a flash of white teeth against swarthy skin, sardonic black eyes caressing her. She recalled the hot night in Atlanta, close to the end of the siege, when he sat on Aunt Pitty's porch half hidden in the summer darkness, and she felt again the heat of his hand upon her arm as he said: "I want you more than I have ever wanted any woman -- and I've waited longer for you than I've ever waited for any woman."

"I'll marry him," she thought coolly. "And then I'll never have to bother about money again."

Oh, blessed thought, sweeter than hope of Heaven, never to worry about money again, to know that Tara was safe, that the family was fed and clothed, that she would never again have to bruise herself against stone walls!

*

"Hugh Elsing told me he didn't think they'd hang Captain Butler because the Yankees think he does know where the money is and just won't tell," Aunt Pittypat said.

"The money?" said Scarlett.

"Didn't you know? Didn't I write you? My dear, you have been buried at Tara, haven't you? The town simply buzzed when Captain Butler came back here with a fine horse and carriage and his pockets full of money, when all the rest of us didn't know where our next meal was coming from. It simply made everybody furious that an old speculator who always said nasty things about the Confederacy should have so much money when we were all so poor. Everybody was bursting to know how he managed to save his money but no one had the courage to ask him -- except me and he just laughed and said: 'In no honest way, you may be sure.'

"But, of course, he made his money out of the blockade -- "

"Of course, he did, honey, some of it. But that's not a drop in the bucket to what that man has really got. Everybody, including the Yankees, believes he's got millions of dollars in gold belonging to the Confederate government hid out somewhere. ... Didn't Captain Butler take thousands of bales of cotton to England and Nassau to sell for the Confederate government?" asked Pitty triumphantly. "Not only his own cotton but government cotton too? And you know what cotton brought in England during the war! Any price you wanted to ask!"

*

"Cheer up," he said, as she tied the bonnet strings. "You can come to my hanging and it will make you feel lots better. It'll even up all your old scores with me -- even this one. And I'll mention you in my will."

"Thank you, but they may not hang you till it's too late to pay the taxes," she said.

*

All her life she had heard sneers hurled at the Yankees because their pretensions to gentility were based on wealth, not breeding. But at this moment, heresy though it was, she could not help thinking the Yankees were right on this one matter, even if wrong in all others. It took money to be a lady. ... She shrugged in irritation. Perhaps these people were right and she was wrong but, just the same, these proud fools weren't looking forward as she was doing, straining every nerve, risking even honor and good name to get back what they had lost. It was beneath the dignity of many of them to indulge in a scramble for money. The times were rude and hard. They called for rude and hard struggle if one was to conquer them. Scarlett knew that family tradition would forcibly restrain many of these people from such a struggle -- with the making of money admittedly its aim. They all thought that obvious money-making and even talk of money were vulgar in the extreme. ... But she was going to be poor all her life. She wasn't going to sit down and patiently wait for a miracle to help her. She was going to rush into life and wrest from it what she could. Her father had started as a poor immigrant boy and had won the broad acres of Tara. What he had done, his daughter could do. She wasn't like these people who had gambled everything on a Cause that was gone and were content to be proud of having lost that Cause, because it was worth any sacrifice. They drew their courage from the past. She was drawing hers from the future.

*

"If there's one thing in the world that gives me more amusement than anything else," he remarked, "it's the sight of your mental struggles when a matter of principle is laid up against something practical like money. of course, I know the practical in you will always win, but I keep hanging around to see if your better nature won't triumph some day. And when that day comes I shall pack my bag and leave Atlanta forever. There are too many women whose better natures are always triumphing. ... Well, let's get back to business. How much and what for?"

"I don't know quite how much I'll need," she said sulkily. "But I want to buy a sawmill -- and I think I can get it cheap. And I'll need two wagons and two mules. I want good mules, too. And a horse and buggy for my own use."

"A sawmill?"

"Yes, and if you'll lend me the money, I'll give you a half-interest in it."

"Whatever would I do with a sawmill?"

7quot;Make money! We can make loads of money. or I'll pay you interest on the loan -- let's see, what is good interest?"

"Fifty per cent is considered very fine."

"Fifty -- oh, but you are joking! Stop laughing, you devil. I'm serious."

"That's why I'm laughing. I wonder if anyone but me realizes what goes on in that head back of your deceptively sweet face."

*

"What's the matter, honey?"

No one in the world could say that foolish word of endearment as caressingly as Rhett, even when he was joking, but he did not look as if he were joking now. She raised tormented eyes to his face and somehow found comfort in the blank inscrutability she saw there. She did not know why this should be, for he was such an unpredictable, callous person. Perhaps it was because, as he often said, they were so much alike. Sometimes she thought that all the people she had eve known were strangers except Rhett.

"Oh, Rhett, I am afraid I'll die and go to hell! I oughtn't to have married Frank. It was wrong. He was Suellen's beau and he loved her, not me. But I lied to him and told him she was going to Marry Tony Fontaine. Oh, how could I have done it! And then I made him so miserable. I made him do all sorts of things he didn't want to do, like making people pay their bills when they really couldn't afford to pay them. And it hurt him so when I ran the mills and built the saloon and leased convicts. He could hardly hold up his head for shame."

As I understand it, you are not really sorry for marrying Frank and bullying him and inadvertently causing his death. You are only sorry because you are afraid of going to hell. Is that right?"

"Well -- that sounds so mixed up."

"Your ethics are considerably mixed up too. If you didn't have this silly idea that you were damned to hellfire eternal, you'd think you were well rid of Frank."

"Oh, Rhett!"

"Oh, come! You are confessing and you might as well confess the truth as a decorous lie. Did your -- er -- conscience bother you much when you offered to -- shall we say -- part with that jewel which is dearer than life for three hundred dollars?"

"I really didn't think about God much then -- or hell. And when I did think -- well, I just God would understand."

"But you don't credit God with understanding why you married Frank?"

"Rhett, how can you talk so about God when you know you don't believe there is one?"

"But you believe in a God of Wrath and that's what's important at present. Why shouldn't the Lord understand? Are you sorry you still own Tara and there aren't Carpetbaggers living there? Are you sorry you aren't hungry and ragged? I'm surprised at you, Scarlett, for sprouting a conscience this late in life. Opportunists like you shouldn't have them."

"What is an oppor -- what did you call it?"

"A person who takes advantage of opportunities."

"Is that wrong?"

"It has always been held in disrepute -- especially by those who had the same opportunities and didn't take them."