problem had arisen which was too big for him to handle. The extra tax assessment and the danger of losing Tara were matters Scarlett had to know about--and right away.
She looked at him with flashing eyes.
"Oh, damn the Yankees!" she cried. "Isn't it enough that they've licked us and beggared us without turning loose scoundrels on us?"
The war was over, peace had been declared, but the Yankees could still rob her, they
could still starve her, they could still drive her from her house. And fool that she was, she had thought through weary months that if she could just hold out until spring, everything would be all right. This crushing news brought by Will, coming on top of a year of backbreaking work and hope deferred, was the last straw.
"Oh, Will, and I thought our troubles were all over when the war ended!"
"No'm." Will raised his lantern-jawed, country-looking face and gave her a long steady look. "Our troubles are just gettin' started."
"How much extra taxes do they want us to pay?"
"Three hundred dollars."
She was struck dumb for a moment. Three hundred dollars! It might just as well be three
million dollars.
"Why," she floundered, "why--why, then we've got to raise three hundred, somehow."
"Yes'm--add a rainbow and a moon or two."
"Oh, but Will! They couldn't sell out Tara. Why--"
His mild pale eyes showed more hate and bitterness than she thought possible.
"Oh, couldn't they? Well, they could and they will and they'll like doin' it! Miss Scarlett, the country's gone plumb to hell, if you'll pardon me. Those Carpetbaggers and Scalawags can vote and most of us Democrats can't. Can't no Democrat in this state vote if he was on the tax books for more than two thousand dollars in 'sixty-five. That lets out folks like your pa and Mr.
Tarleton and the McRaes and the Fontaine boys. Can't nobody vote who was a colonel and over in the war and, Miss Scarlett, I bet this state's got more colonels than any state in the Confederacy. And can't nobody vote who held office under the Confederate government and that lets out everybody from the notaries to the judges, and the woods are full of folks like that. Fact is, the way the Yankees have framed up that amnesty oath, can't nobody who was somebody
before the war vote at all. Not the smart folks nor the quality folks nor the rich folks.
"Huh! I could vote if I took their damned oath. I didn't have any money in 'sixty-five and I certainly warn't a colonel or nothin' remarkable. But I ain't goin' to take their oath. Not by a dinged sight! If the Yankees had acted right, I'd have taken their oath of allegiance but I ain't now. I can be restored to the Union but I can't be reconstructed into it. I ain't goin' to take their oath even if I don't never vote again--But scum like that Hilton feller, he can vote, and scoundrels like Jonas Wilkerson and pore whites like the Slatterys and no-counts like the Macintoshes, they can vote. And they're runnin' things now. And if they want to come down on you for extra taxes a dozen times, they can do it. Just like a nigger can kill a white man and not get hung or--"He paused, embarrassed, and the memory of what had happened to a lone white woman on an
isolated farm near Lovejoy was in both their minds… "Those niggers can do anything against us and the Freedmen's Bureau and the soldiers will back them up with guns and we can't vote or do nothin' about it."
"Vote!" she cried. "Vote! What on earth has voting got to do with all this, Will? It's taxes we're talking about… Will, everybody knows what a good plantation Tara is. We could mortgage it for enough to pay the taxes, if we had to."
"Miss Scarlett, you ain't any fool but sometimes you talk like one. Who's got any money to lend you on this property? Who except the Carpetbaggers who are tryin' to take Tara away from you? Why, everybody's got land. Everybody's land pore. You can't give away land."
"I've got those diamond earbobs I got off that Yankee. We could sell them."
"Miss Scarlett, who 'round here has got money for earbobs? Folks ain't got money to buy side meat, let alone gewgaws. If you've got ten dollars in gold, I take oath that's more than most folks have got."
They were silent again and Scarlett felt as if she were butting her head against a stone
wall. There had been so many stone walls to butt against this last year.
"What are we goin' to do, Miss Scarlett?"
"I don't know," she said dully and felt that she didn't care. This was one stone wall too many and she suddenly felt so tired that her bones ached. Why should she work and struggle and wear herself out? At the end of every struggle it seemed that defeat was waiting to mock her.