Rhett Butler's People

  “I’ll stay.”

  Andrew opened the bidding for Cassius at four hundred dollars.

  “I have four hundred …. Six? Sir, are you sure? Yes, sir. I have six hundred for this fine young negro. Banjo throwed in with the man—one price takes both of ’em.”

  “Why’s Watling bidding?” Edgar Puryear asked. “Langston has no need of a banjo player.”

  At eight hundred, everyone had dropped out except Isaiah Watling and Andrew Ravanel.

  Isaiah Watling bid nine fifty.

  When Andrew Ravanel bid one thousand dollars, Watling lifted his hand until he had everyone’s attention. He climbed onto a tack box, head and shoulders above the crowd. “Mr. Ravanel, sir. I have my instructions from Master Langston Butler. I’m to ask how, if you win this nigger, you will pay for him. Where’s the cash to be paid today? Where’s your five hundred dollars?”

  Andrew Ravanel stiffened as if struck. Surprise, outrage, and embarrassment chased across his face. When Andrew turned to Edgar Allan, his friend was gone. Those closest to Andrew pretended they weren’t looking at him. Those farther away concealed grins.

  “Good sirs, good sirs!” the auctioneer cried.

  “You gave us the rules,” Watling reminded the auctioneer. “I suppose you’ll stick to ’em.”

  Someone cried, “Yes, yes.”

  Another: “Rules are rules.”

  “Stick to the damn rules.”

  Andrew shouted, “Watling, by God, I’ll—”

  “Mr. Ravanel, I ain’t actin’ for Isaiah Watling. I ain’t my own man no more. I’m actin’ for Master Langston Butler. It’s Master Butler askin’ Mr. Ravanel: ‘Where’s your five hundred?’”

  “Are you saying my word, the sworn word of Andrew Ravanel—”

  “His word?” an anonymous voice.

  “A Ravanel’s word?” an anonymous guffaw.

  “If Mr. Ravanel ain’t got it, Mr. Auctioneer, my nine hundred fifty dollars buys the nigger. I’ll pay cash in full.”

  The news of Andrew Ravanel’s humiliation (some called it his “comeuppance”) flashed through the clubhouse. Jamie Fisher felt like someone had punched him under the heart.

  When Jamie found him, Andrew Ravanel was clutching the grandstand rail, white-knuckled.

  “My friend Edgar saw it coming. Edgar Puryear can spot these plays a mile off. But when I turned to Edgar, Edgar wasn’t there. I’ve seen Henry Kershaw lose a thousand on the turn of a card. But where was friend Henry?” Andrew’s wounded eyes passed over the crowd, which was more indifferent to Andrew Ravanel than that young man imagined. “My little friend, Jamie Fisher. They tell me Jamie is the richest gent in the Carolinas. Five hundred dollars is pocket change to young Fisher!”

  “I’m sorry, Andrew. If I’d been there …”

  “Christ, Jamie. How can I bear it! In front of everyone—everyone! Christ! You should have heard them laughing at me. Andrew Ravanel, Andrew’ll bid when he can’t pay! Oh my God, Jamie, I wish I were dead!”

  “Should you challenge Watling, I will second—”

  “Jamie, Jamie. I cannot challenge Watling.” Andrew’s voice was weak as a ragpicker’s horse. “Isaiah Watling is no more a gentleman than his son was. If I challenge Watling, I confess Andrew Ravanel is no gentleman.”

  “But Rhett fought Shad Watling.”

  “I don’t want to talk about Rhett Butler, Jamie! I have never wished to talk about Rhett Butler! Surely I have made myself clear!” When he tried to light a cigar, his hands shook and he flung the match down. “Damn Langston Butler! I know that auctioneer; he would have taken my IOU.”

  “It’s only a banjo player, Andrew.”

  “‘Only a banjo player’?” Andrew’s tight laugh condescended to Jamie’s naïveté. “Is Langston Butler planning a musicale? Perhaps Langston Butler wants instruction in banjo picking? Do you think so, Jamie? I think Langston Butler has purchased an unusually expensive rice hand.” Andrew continued as if explaining to a child. “Langston Butler revenged himself on Jack Ravanel by humiliating his son. All Charleston has the measure of Andrew Ravanel now. Andrew Ravanel is a sham!”

  Jamie Fisher’s throat constricted. “Andrew, I … I don’t know… Andrew. You are so fine and rare. I’d—”

  Andrew cut him off with a gesture.

  Negroes with Jockey Club armbands were clearing people off the track.

  “Andrew?”

  “For God’s sake, Jamie. Won’t you be silent!”

  As the track emptied, a horsewoman trotted through the officials, ignoring their gestures to leave the track.

  Andrew froze: a hawk who sees its future. He breathed, “Why, there’s Rosemary.”

  “Looking for you, surely.” Relief at the distraction lifted Jamie’s voice an octave. “Andrew, I must tell you about Juliet’s amusing wager ….”

  “Oh dear, Jamie. Something’s wrong. Rosemary’s upset. Look how she saws the bit, asks her horse to trot, then curbs it.”

  Jockey Club functionaries cried, “Miss!” and “The race, miss!” but jumped out of her way. Rosemary searched faces along the rail, her yellow silk scarf streaming behind her, a defiant banner.

  “My,” Andrew Ravanel said thoughtfully, “Rosemary is angry, isn’t she?”

  Rosemary’s horse reared when she jerked its reins. “Goddamn you, horse, settle! Andrew! Where is my father? Have you seen my father?”

  Andrew Ravanel fell into a deep, cool stillness. Time had slowed to this simple moment. “Beautiful Rosemary,” Andrew said almost wistfully, “your esteemed parent has left the racecourse.”

  A Jockey Club steward, a white man with a green sash of office, hurried toward them. “Madam! Madam!”

  “Damn you, horse! Damn you! Will you stand still!” Rosemary used her quirt. “I must find my father.” Rosemary’s face twisted. “I have news. This day I have learned why my father is truly damned.”

  With an imperious gesture, Andrew Ravanel stopped the steward in his tracks, stepped onto the track, caught Rosemary’s bridle, and brought her agitated horse to a standstill.

  One steward, one horsewoman, one gentleman holding her horse—otherwise, the racecourse was empty.

  The rage at the core of their tableau drew every eye.

  On the clubhouse veranda, a Yankee visitor turned to his Charleston host, “What the devil?”

  His host replied, “You’re in Charleston now, Sam. Enjoy the fireworks.”

  If Rosemary hadn’t been adrift in helpless, inarticulate fury, she would have been alerted by Andrew’s too-sweet tone. “Stay a moment, dear Rosemary. We’ll sort things out. Here, let me help.” Andrew formed a stirrup with his hands.

  Hastily, Rosemary dismounted. “Must I still call Langston Butler ‘father,’ Andrew? He has lied to me. He has destroyed my brother. He …”

  “Langston Butler has so much to answer for.”

  Andrew Ravanel took Rosemary into his arms and, in the full view of all Charleston, kissed her fiercely and lingeringly on the lips.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Matrimony Is an Honorable Estate …

  I believe Rosemary rather enjoyed it,” Andrew Ravanel said carelessly.

  Andrew, his father, Jack, and Langston Butler stood in the foyer of Colonel Jack’s King Street town house. The room had been hard used—the broad plank floor scarred by spurs, the benches scuffed from serving as bootjacks.

  Butler had neither removed his hat nor relinquished his cane to the stand. He gripped that cane as if it might become a weapon. “My daughter’s romantic impulses are not at issue.”

  Langston Butler emptied a pouch onto the hall table. His disdainful index finger stirred the due bills, notes, and promises to pay. “Twenty cents on the dollar is the fair market value of Ravanel honor.”

  “Perhaps, sir, you intend my son to be affianced to your daughter?” Colonel Jack hoped.

  “A Ravanel for a son-in-law?” Red spots blossomed on Langston Butler’s pale cheeks. “A Ravanel for my son-in-law?”
/>
  Andrew Ravanel took a step forward, but his father caught his arm.

  “I have come to advise I have purchased your notes and mortgages and they are of this date due and payable. This house and your remaining properties will be sold to satisfy your debts. Henceforth, Chapultapec will race under Butler colors.”

  “Now Langston.” Colonel Jack chuckled. “You didn’t come to our humble home to possess it. Butlers grabbed Jack’s good lands already, and an agriculturalist like yourself doesn’t covet the poor ground I still hold. I know you, Langston. I’ve known you since you were a grasping, flint-hearted, arrogant boy. You’ve a proposition for Old Jack, some little arrangement to quell gossip and, may I suggest, improve the Ravanel fortunes to a modest degree? Have I the right of it, sir?”

  Langston smiled a singularly unpleasant smile. “Your wife, Frances, was widely admired, Jack. There was no more gracious gentlewoman in the Low Country.”

  Jack Ravanel went white. “You will not speak of my wife, Langston. You will not sully her precious name.”

  Langston tapped the heaped notes. “Do I have your undivided attention? Tonight at the Jockey Club Ball, I shall announce my daughter’s engagement to Mr. John Haynes. After my announcement, your son will make a public apology for any misunderstanding caused by his unseemly behavior at the racetrack this afternoon.” Langston turned a cold eye on Andrew. “Perhaps you were inebriated, sir. Perhaps you were so overcome with joy on learning of my daughter’s betrothal you forgot yourself.” Langston shrugged. “I leave the details to you. If you cannot tell a plausible lie, I daresay your father can coach you. After I accept your apology, you will announce your engagement to Miss Charlotte Fisher.”

  “Sir, I would not marry that girl if every blemish on her face were worth ten thousand dollars.”

  “As you wish.” Langston Butler waited silently while the Ravanels, father and son, uttered all the hot, helpless words they had to utter before accepting the inevitable.

  In the face of her granddaughter’s joy, Constance Fisher reluctantly acceded to her engagement to Andrew Ravanel.

  To escape her father’s house, Rosemary agreed to marry John Haynes; what Tunis had told her made living there intolerable. When she said as much, Langston replied, “I do not ask why you obey, merely that you do.”

  When the betrothed couple met privately in Langston Butler’s drawing room, John Haynes said, “Rosemary, this is more than I ever had dared to hope.” He knelt before her. “Although I fear your answer, dearest, I must know. Is our marriage your decision?”

  Rosemary hesitated before saying, “John, I shall try.”

  Stolid, respectable John Haynes became a happy, grinning boy. “Well then. Dear me. Well then. Nothing fairer. Dearest Rosemary. My dearest Rosemary …”

  Charlotte and Andrew were married in April, and Charlotte was, if not a beautiful bride, a radiant one.

  Charleston matrons clicked their tongues and hoped marriage would steady Andrew Ravanel.

  Langston Butler gave a certain negro banjo player to Mr. and Mrs. Ravanel. Even Isaiah Watling hadn’t been able to turn Cassius into a rice hand.

  Two weeks later, when Rosemary and John Haynes stood before St. Michael’s altar, John glowed with happiness. Rosemary was wan, and uttered her vows so quietly, few behind the front pews heard them.

  As the couple emerged from the church, Tunis Bonneau waited at the curb, holding a roan horse by its bridle.

  “My God,” Rosemary said. “Tecumseh!”

  “Your brother Rhett gives him to you and Mr. Haynes, Miss Rosemary,” Tunis said. “He writes that he is wishin’ you happiness on your wedding day.”

  Langston Butler turned to his new son-in-law. “Sir, I will take that animal and dispose of it.”

  John Haynes squeezed his bride’s hand. “Thank you, sir, but no. The horse is a gift from my friend and Mrs. Haynes’s brother, which she, and I, accept with pleasure.”

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  A Patriotic Ball

  Few Charlestonians believed Andrew Ravanel’s racecourse kiss had been as innocent as that gentleman afterward claimed, but the compromised parties were safely married. On the strength of Andrew’s new Fisher connections, Langston Butler quietly unloaded Colonel Jack’s notes at fifty cents on the dollar.

  Mr. and Mrs. John Haynes were seen about Charleston in a handsome blue sulky with Tecumseh in the shafts. John Haynes had paid three hundred for the rig—on his bride’s whim, it was reported.

  Some said Rhett Butler had been seen in New York. An English ship captain told John Haynes his brother-in-law was speculating on the London bourse. Tunis Bonneau, who was now Haynes & Son’s chief pilot, said Rhett was in New Orleans.

  Although the Hayneses showed proper deference to Rosemary’s parents and exchanged pleasantries after Sunday services, the younger couple retained their separate pew and Rosemary visited her mother only when her father was out of town. Mr. and Mrs. Haynes resided quietly at 46 Church Street and in due course were blessed with a daughter they christened Margaret Ann.

  Mr. and Mrs. Andrew Ravanel took up housekeeping in the Fishers’ East Bay establishment. Charleston’s moneylenders were dismayed to learn Constance Fisher would not be responsible for Ravanel debts.

  Andrew Ravanel’s new manservant, Cassius, accompanied Andrew everywhere, waiting outside gambling hells or saloons until all hours. Often, Cassius led his master’s horse home at daybreak, with Andrew nodding in the saddle. When Andrew, Jamie Fisher, Henry Kershaw, and Edgar Allan Puryear went hunting, Cassius cooked their simple meals, blacked their boots, and picked lively tunes. Henry Kershaw insisted that Cassius’s sojourn in Langston Butler’s rice fields had improved the negro’s picking. Cassius’s music had become more, Henry vowed, “heartfelt.”

  After Grandmother Fisher deplored Andrew’s habits once too often, Mr. and Mrs. Ravanel quit Charlotte’s childhood home for Colonel Jack’s shabby town house, where the couple abided with that gentleman and his daughter, Juliet.

  In happier times, these matters might have excited greater curiosity, but these were not happy times. “Secession”—for thirty years the firebrands’ whisper—had become a full-throated shout.

  On October 16, 1859, John Brown murdered the peace. John Brown discredited peacemakers, sundered families into Unionists and Secessionists, and divided Presbyterians, Episcopalians, and Baptists into Northern and Southern congregations. With a handful of men, vague plans, and a willingness to murder for principle, John Brown descended on Harpers Ferry, Virginia, intending to spark a slave insurrection. Brown brought a thousand sharp steel pikes for the slaves to use on their masters.

  Low Country planters had a blood fear of insurrections. French refugees from the Santa Domingue insurrection (Eulalie Ward’s parents, the Robillards, among them) had arrived with dreadful stories of innocents murdered in their beds, ravished women, infants’ brains dashed out against doorsills. Nat Turner’s and Denmark Vesey’s slave insurrections had failed, but John Brown was a white man backed and financed by white men. Some Yankees claimed the murderer was a saint.

  After Brown’s raid, moderates were discredited, firebrands like Langston Butler controlled the legislature, and ordinarily prudent men hung on their every word. Cathecarte Puryear was voted out of the St. Cecilia Society.

  Although John Brown was captured, tried, and hanged, Low Country militias were forming before his body cooled: the Palmetto Brigade, the Charleston Rifles, the Charleston Light Horse, Hampton’s Legion. British ships delivered rifles, cannons, and military uniforms to Charleston’s wharves. Young men swore off drinking, and gambling hells fell on hard times. Cassius mastered new patriotic tunes as they were written.

  The year between Brown’s raid and Abraham Lincoln’s election was rife with omens. Seven pilot whales stranded themselves on the sands of Sullivan’s Island. Geese flew south two months earlier than usual. The rice crop was the most bountiful in living memory. Negro conjure men muttered and prophesied Armageddon. Jamie
Fisher told his sister, Charlotte, he felt like a bird hypnotized by a snake.

  Andrew Ravanel was elected captain of the Charleston Light Horse. When a subscription was begun to provide uniforms for the elite militia company, differences were set aside and Langston Butler made a generous contribution.

  One Saturday morning in early November, Colonel Jack Ravanel was found dead on the breakwater behind Adger’s Wharf. Although Tunis Bonneau’s father-in-law, the Reverend William Prescott, mentioned the old sinner’s demise in his Sunday sermon, Old Jack’s passing went otherwise unremarked. Charleston’s attention was fixed on the presidential election to be held the following Tuesday.

  Of the four presidential candidates that year, only one was thought to be an outright abolitionist, and though that man received almost three million fewer votes than his rivals and not a single vote in ten Southern states, that man was elected President. Many white Southerners believed the only distinction between President Abraham Lincoln and John Brown was that John Brown was dead.

  Just six weeks after Lincoln’s election, the Convention of the People of South Carolina met to briefly debate, then unanimously adopt an Ordinance of Secession. Church bells pealed, militiamen marched, and bonfires roared in the streets.

  The new militias drilled on the Washington Racecourse. The Charleston Light Horse wore gray pantaloons, high cordovan boots, and a short green jacket crisscrossed with gold braid. Enlisted men had gray kepis; officers wore a black planter’s hat embellished with an egret’s plume.

  Edgar Puryear and Henry Kershaw were elected lieutenants and Jamie Fisher was enrolled as Chief of Scouts.

  Charleston’s ladies turned out to admire the Light Horse’s agreeably frightening drills: left hand on the reins, right on the saber, each bold rider drawing his blade in a flashing silver arc before crashing through the ranks of straw dummies. The dummies carried broomstick rifles and were dressed in Federal blue.

  The ladies admired these young men who had spurned the dishonored red, white, and blue for the brave new palmetto banner.