Gone with the Wind / Унесённые ветром

I’m sorry I’ve upset you so. You don’t feel faint, do you? Can I get you a glass of water?”

“No,” she said, and managed a crooked smile.

“Shall we go sit on the bench?” he asked, taking her arm.

She nodded and he carefully led her across the grass to the iron bench beneath the largest oak in the front yard. How fragile and tender women are, he thought, the mere mention of war makes them faint. The idea made him feel very masculine.

“He has a lot of money,” she was thinking fast.

“And he hasn’t any parents to bother me and he lives in Atlanta. And if I married him right away, it would show Ashley that I didn’t care – that I was only flirting with him. And it would just kill Honey. She’d never, never catch another beau. And it would hurt Melanie, because she loves Charles so much. “And they’d all be sorry when I came back here to visit in a fine carriage and with lots of pretty clothes and a house of my own. And they would never, never laugh at me. ”

“Of course, it will mean fighting,” said Charles. “But don’t you worry, Miss Scarlett, it’ll be over in a month. I wouldn’t miss it for anything. I’m afraid there won’t be much of a ball tonight, because the Troop is going to meet at Jonesboro. The Tarleton boys have gone to spread the news. I know the ladies will be sorry.”

Coolness was beginning to come back to her. Why not take this pretty boy? He was as good as anyone else and she didn’t care.

“Will you wait for me, Miss Scarlett? It – it would be Heaven just knowing that you were waiting for me until after we licked them!” He hung breathless on her words. Her hand slid into his.

“I wouldn’t want to wait,” she said.

He sat clutching her hand, his mouth wide open. Watching him from under her lashes, Scarlett thought that he looked like a frog. He stuttered several times, closed his mouth and opened it again, and again became red in the face.

“Can you possibly love me?”

She said nothing but looked down into her lap, and Charles was embarrassed. Perhaps a man should not ask a girl such a question. Perhaps it would be hard for her to answer it. Charles was at a loss as to how to act. He wanted to shout and to sing and to kiss her and then run tell everyone, black and white, that she loved him. But he only squeezed her hand until he drove her rings into the flesh.