Gone With the Wind 201-300

Scarlett and Melanie are told that they have to stay home from a fundraiser for the hospital because Scarlett is still supposed to be in mourning over her husband, and Melanie can’t go out and have fun because her husband is at war. However, some of the people that were supposed to work one of the fundraising booths can’t make it, so Scarlett and Melanie have to work in their place. Scarlett is really excited because she’s sick of sitting around and mourning. She just wants to get out and dance and have fun. At the fundraiser, they have a dance where the men bid on the women, and whoever wins gets to dance with the women. Rhett Butler, a man who is not very well received in Atlanta because of his feelings toward the war, bids $150 in gold to dance with Scarlett. This is really scandalous because she should still be mourning, but she dances with him anyway. She always says how much she doesn’t like him and how he’s not a gentleman, but I think she secretly likes him a lot because he says things that make her think. Scarlett’s parents here of her scandalous behavior with Rhett, and they threaten to make her come back to Tara, but she ends up getting to stay in Atlanta. Scarlett secretly reads some of Ashley’s letters to Melanie, and she is still convinced that Ashley is in love with her. For a while, Rhett becomes very popular in Atlanta because people believe that he actually believes in the Southern cause. However, he soon starts speaking his mind that he thinks the South is going to lose and the war is pointless, and after this, he is shunned in pretty much all of Atlanta except in Aunt Pitty’s house because she’s not brave enough to kick him out.