A wee bit of fun which I hope you will enjoy. An enormous thank you to Bluesneak for her helpful suggestions in smoothing it out with her magic touch and her very kind comments. This is set during the first year of Scarlett's and Rhett's marriage and I have made two radical changes from The Book which I hope you will forgive. I don't want to tell you what they are as I don't want to spoil anything.

February came in on an icy Northern wind and with it an unrelenting rain that fell like sharp needles on exposed skin. The streets of Atlanta were clogged with heavy red mud that threatened to take hold of a lady's boot and refuse to let it go, if one was so daring as to try and walk through it. People's eyes streamed and their red noses dripped. There were very few smiling faces to be seen.

Scarlett was in her cramped little office at the back corner of her store near Five Points. She was seated at her desk beside the small grate of coal which spit with the rain. Periodically, the wind would blew in such a way as to push the smoke back down the flue into the enclosed room.

Scarlett's temper was as foul as the weather outside. The worst part about Christmas was nobody bought anything in January and people seemed to take a long time in paying their December accounts.

Mrs. Abigail Taylor - $4.50

Mr. Rene Picard - $6.05 (That dutch oven he bought for his mother-in-law, hope it gave him some peace over the holidays)

Mr. Adam Werk - $9.40 - PAST DUE! ( who let that one slip by?)

Scarlett's pen stabbed into the ink pot and returned to the ledger. Was she the only one who worried over paying bills on time? More names and more amounts were added to the page until she reached the bottom. Carefully, Scarlett blotted the fresh ink before turning the ledger page over.

Inserted between the pages of the heavy book was a piece of thick vellum, quality paper, the sort that most could not afford.

So are you to my thoughts as food to life,

Or as sweet-season'd showers are to the ground;

And for the peace of you I hold such strife

As 'twixt a miser and his wealth is found.

Now proud as an enjoyer, and anon

Doubting the filching age will steal his treasure;

Now counting best to be with you alone,

Then better'd that the world may see my pleasure:

Sometime all full with feasting on your sight,

And by and by clean starved for a look;

Possessing or pursuing no delight

Save what is had, or must from you be took.

Thus do I pine and surfeit day by day,

Or gluttoning on all, or all away.

–

Your Secret Admirer

Scarlett quickly scanned over the words until she came to the salutation, 'Your Secret Admirer'. "What is this silliness?" she murmured. She turned the paper over and back again, she didn't recognize the handwriting nor the signature.

"Albert" Scarlett called out to the store manager.

"Yes, ma'am?" Albert came to the doorway of the office. The bald spot on his head shining in the gaslight and his wirey brows furrowed in concern. He held his hands together against his thin chest, hoping that he wasn't in for yet another tongue lashing from Mrs. Butler.

"Has anyone been in my office today?"

"No ma'am, no one aside from yourself, ma'am."

"You're sure?" Scarlett said, fingering the heavy paper.

"Yes ma'am. Anything wrong, ma'am?"

"No, no. It's just...No, nothing is wrong." Scarlett looked at the paper and gave her head a little shake. Some clerk from the printing company had no doubt left this paper in the ledger by accident.

She read through the poem again. It was quite pretty. 'So are you to my thoughts as food to life.' Her stomach gave a gurgle. Yes, she was hungry and it was past dinner time.

"Albert, have you finished the sweeping up yet?"

"Yes ma'am."

"Then let us close up for the night. Tomorrow, make sure to change that display on the front counter, I think we should try coaxing the ladies towards those linen tea towels."

"Yes, ma'am."

"Good night Albert."

"Good night, ma'am"

Scarlett closed the ledger and started to turn down the gas light. She looked at the paper again and then neatly folded it, putting in her reticule. Maybe Rhett would enjoy it. He always seemed to be reading books and poetry.

He had left that day, taking the children with him to Charleston. He had some work to do for his mother and he thought Wade may like to meet his father's commanding officer and the man after whom he was named. Wade Hampton was an old family friend of the Butlers as was, it seemed, everyone in Charleston society. Rhett had also promised to take them out in his sailboat to Fort Sumter to see where the War had started. Ella was excited to see her Grandmama again and to be pampered and petted as the only granddaughter. Scarlett had begged off the visit, using the excuse that the mills and the store needed her attention. But if she was honest, it was because she still felt uncomfortable around Mrs. Butler. Though her mother-in-law was nothing but kind to her, Scarlett always felt like she had to be on her best behaviour and watching her manners every second. She never felt good enough to be married into the Butler clan and she suspected the good people of Charleston were looking down their aristocratic noses at her.

Later that night, nestling into her bed, Scarlett lay listening to the wind's wild gusts against the house and the periodic splatter of rain against the windows. She began to think how much she missed Rhett's warmth next to her. The bed seemed so big and so cold without him. She was lonely without him and wished he was there, smoking a cigar, stroking her arm and listening to her complaints of laggard customers. She wondered what he was doing and if he missed her as much. She wondered if he could hear her thoughts. "Oh don't be ridiculous, Scarlett!" she huffed to herself, "You're acting like a silly little school girl."

Rolling over on her side , she lay still for a minute, trying to think of something else. Scarlett pulled Rhett's pillow closer to her. He insisted on using a firm pillow so unlike her large fluffy ones filled with soft goose down. He said he had spent too many years sleeping on hard bunks and rocky ground to ever feel comfortable otherwise. Resting her cheek against the pillow. she could faintly smell his scent. She burrowed her face into it, breathing deeply. It made her miss him more and also made her feel closer to him. Holding it tightly molding it against her body, she finally fell off to dreams of his return.

The following morning, Scarlett had forgotten all about the note in the ledger. Rhett had sent her a telegram from Charleston letting her know of their safe arrival. The work for his mother was a bit more entailed than what he had originally expected, so he was unsure how long he needed to stay in Charleston. Scarlett was grumpy and unsettled as she made her way out to the mill with the wind buffeting the small trap and the unrelenting rain showering down. The heavy carriage blanket kept her legs warm but her hands were stiff with the cold. The meeting with Johnnie Gallagher was acrimonious and the two of them ended up in a very loud row over some missing inventory.

"Are ye implying Mrs., that I be stealing from you?" Johnnie's face was red with shouting. "For if that be your suspicion, I'll be shot of ye. No man nor woman will be calling me a thief to my face!"

Though that is what he was, and Scarlett knew it. She just had no proof yet. "Just you wait Johnnie Gallagher, I will find some one else to manage this mill, I swear I will, before you steal me blind!" Scarlett thought to herself. But until then she had to bite her tongue and bide her time.

She stormed out of the mill and climbed up into her carriage. "Damn this weather, when will Spring arrive?" Scarlett reached for the blanket again, it was folded neatly on the seat. Shaking it around her legs a piece of brown butcher's paper dropped out.

But to see her was to love her,

Love but her, and love forever. Your Secret Admirer

"So I do have a secret admirer!" Scarlett smiled smugly, pleased that men still found her attractive even though she was married and had two children. But who could it be? And how had he gotten the note in the lap robe? She was sure she had used it on the way to the mill and there had been no note in its folds. Scarlett glanced around but saw nothing but the trees and the buildings of the mill. Could it be Johnnie Gallagher? The thought made her feel slightly sick and slapping the reins she put the horse into a quick trot home.

For the following twelve days Scarlett continued to find notes from the Secret Admirer - each written on different pieces of paper and each found in a different place.

In a glove, rolled tightly at the bottom of the thumb was a small scroll which read:

Thou art to me a delicious torment. Your Secret Admirer.

Upon leaving a small ladies tea at Mrs. Meade's, Scarlett opened her umbrella again for the walk to her carriage. A small lace paper fluttered down.

Be thou the rainbow in the storms of life. The evening beam that smiles the clouds away, and tints tomorrow with prophetic ray. Your Secret Admirer

How had it come to get into her umbrella which she had used not two hours ago? Was Dr. Meade her secret admirer? Heaven forbid!

One night, while taking down her hair in preparation for bed she found a tiny note threaded through a hair pin.

Fair tresses, man's imperial race ensnare,

And Beauty draws us with a single hair. Your Secret Admirer

How could have he come so close to put the pin in her hair and her not notice? Who was this man?

Once upon a time, Scarlett would have relished the thought of having a secret admirer, but not anymore. Now, the constant notes and the unexpected places where they were found made her feel uncomfortable. She felt as if someone was watching her. She was constantly looking at every man that came near, wondering if he was the one? She missed Rhett even more. Surely her Secret Admirer must know she was married - and maybe he also knew that Rhett was away from Atlanta!

The most surprising thing about the love notes was Scarlett never thought Ashley could be writing them nor did she want even want him to be. It would have made sense that Ashley would write such poetry to her but they had both come to a place of easy friendship now. They could talk about the old days and laugh at memories and sometimes shed a few tears at what had gone. Scarlett still flirted with Ashley but no more than with any other man and both knew it meant nothing. Rhett, though still somewhat reluctant to believe that Scarlett loved him alone, accepted that Ashley Wilkes would always be a part of Scarlett's life and so a part of his. But the nights after encounters with Ashley, Rhett would make love to Scarlett for hours, introducing her to new sensations, new delights. He would take her to the heights of passion just keeping her from her peak waiting for her to cry out his name, and then they would both then he would know that Scarlett was his and his alone.

Then the notes started turning up in unexpected places in her home. Under her morning coffee cup she found:

Give me a kiss, and to that kiss a score; Then to that twenty, add a hundred more: A thousand to that hundred: so kiss on, To make that thousand up a million. Treble that million, and when that is done, Let's kiss afresh, as when we first begun. Your Secret Admirer

In her hat band was tucked:

She moves a goddess and she looks a queen. Your Secret Admirer

In her dressing gown she found threaded through the loops:

O thou Art Fairer than the evening air

Clad in the beauty of a thousand stars. Your Secret Admirer

Where at first Scarlett was happy with the notes, her vanity stroked and smug at the thought of showing Rhett she had an admirer and maybe making him a little jealous and more appreciative for what he had, she started to become nervous. This man was able to get close enough to her and to her home to leave these notes and steal away without anyone seeing. Over and over Scarlett questioned Lou, Mammy and even that fool Prissy as to how the notes came into the house, what strangers had they seen, but they were adamant that they knew nothing. But someone must know something!

The final straw came one night two weeks after she found the first note in the ledger. Ever since Rhett had left for Charleston, Scarlett had clung to his pillow, breathed in its perfume and pretended Rhett was lying close to her. She knew it was silly but it made her feel closer to him and not so alone. But that night she felt the crinkle of thin paper when she reached for the pillow. With trembling fingers, she pulled out a note written on onion skin:

She walks in beauty, like the night

Of cloudless climes and starry skies;

And all that's best of dark and bright

Meet in her aspect and her eyes:

Thus mellowed to that tender light

Which heaven to gaudy day denies.

Your Secret Admirer

Now she was angry. How dare this coward, who was too frightened to make himself known to her, think he could come into her room, leave his silly little notes and think that he could woo her. This fool was not going to intimidate her. He was not going to scare her. He had no right to invade her bedroom with his nasty thoughts and desires. Scarlett pushed back the covers and walked over to the door. As she turned the key in the lock, she said, "Yes, I do walk and I will fight you, Mr. Secret Admirer."

She went back to the bed and snatched up the note. "Go away! You are not welcome here!" Tearing the onion skin into tiny bits, she tossed them on the floor. She grabbed Rhett's pillow and pressed it to her chest. Once again, she got up from her bed and made her way to her dressing room. Digging through a hat box on one of the higher shelves she found what she was searching for, a small nickel-finished Derringer with mother- of-pearl handle. Rhett had given it to her while they were engaged. "Oh, it's so pretty!" she had exclaimed. "Yes, pretty and deadly. Use it with care, my dear. I don't want you to shoot yourself in the foot. Otherwise who would I dance with?" Rhett had chuckled.

Scarlett returned to her bed and tucking the little gun in her beside table drawer, she turned down the gas and went to sleep with murderous thoughts towards the "Secret Admirer".

The following day, Scarlett felt it more prudent to stay at home rather than going to the mills or the store. She debated sending Rhett a telegram or even going to Charleston herself but decided facing a cowardly letter writer was preferable to facing Rhett's mother. So Scarlett spent the day nagging Prissy, checking through the household accounts, debating whether her new ball gown couldn't be cut a little lower in the back and other general chores.

As she sat down for her solitary dinner, Pork brought in a telegram from Rhett.

Delayed longer. Children well, happy. Mother sends love. Think of you often. Rhett.

Thinks of me often, well isn't that fine! No I love you or counting the minutes until we are no longer parted or missing you madly. Just 'Think of you often'.

"Do you need anything else, Miz Scarlett?" Pork asked.

Sighing, Scarlett thought, yes, I need my husband home. "No Pork, nothing else. You can go to bed now. Prissy can clear the table in the morning."

"Yassum. G'night Miz Scarlett."

Scarlett pushed away her plate, her hunger gone. Raising her glass of red wine up, Scarlett said "And I think of you often, too, Mr. Butler." The candles cast their light making the red wine in her goblet glow on the white damask tablecloth. It was like the blood on the snowy shirtfront of a man who had just been shot.

"Enough of these thoughts." Scarlett drained her glass and pushed back from the table, she blew out the candles and made her way up the dim stairway. Outside her bedroom door, Scarlett noticed some bits on the rich thick carpet. "Can't Prissy do anything right? " she grumbled "Would it be too much for her to make sure my floors are kept swept? I swear I'll get rid of her tomorrow." Scarlett bent down to pick up the tiny bits. "Rose petals? How on earth did they get here?" The petals seemed to make a trail through her doorway. Quietly opening the heavy oak door, Scarlett stepped into her room. Not only did the petals make a trail but they were sprinkled on her bed in the shape of a heart with an arrow through it. Scarlett then noticed a bottle of champagne sitting in a ice-filled wine bucket by her vanity. Her heart began to beat rapidly.

"At last, we are alone," came a hoarse whisper. Scarlett whirled around, there in the doorway stood a large figure, cloaked in a long black cape and with a black silk mask hiding his face.

"Who are you? How did you get in here?" Scarlett demanded, backing away from the intruder.

"I am your Secret Admirer." the figure whispered.

"Get out! Get out of here! I am a married woman and my husband will kill you!"

"Ah, but your husband is in Charleston, isn't he?'

Scarlett had slowly backed away to the bedside table. Reaching behind her, she opened the drawer and thankfully felt the cold metal of her gun. She slowly raised it. Aiming the pistol at the figure in front of her, Scarlett said "Come any closer and I'll shoot you myself."

But the figure in black slowly advanced towards her. The small pistol wavered in Scarlett's tight grip. Squeezing her eyes shut, she pulled hard on the trigger.

Click, click. Nothing happened. Click.

The masked stranger whispered again. "Now I've got you, my lovely."

Without thought or hesitation Scarlett threw the gun and hit the figure square between the eyes. He crashed to the floor like a stone.

Scarlett gasped. Had she killed him? She inched herself towards the heap on the floor. "Oh my God! I've killed him! And no one will believe me!" She poked her toe against the body, no movement. She pulled back her foot to kick him but like a snake, his arm lashed out, grabbing her ankle causing her to loose her balance and fall on top of him.

"Ooph," it grunted. "Uncle!"

Scarlett scrambled up on her feet. "What? What did you say?"

"I said Uncle, I call Uncle!"

"Rhett? Rhett, is that you?"

Rhett slowly removed his silk mask and Scarlett burst into laughter seeing his dancing eyes and sheepish smile.

"You've got quite the goose egg on your head, my husband!"

"And you, my dear, have quite the arm." Rhett groaned, gingerly touching the bump on his head. "How was I to know my charming wife would go to such lengths to defend her honour?"

Scarlett went to the champagne bucket and wrapped some ice in her small lace edged hankie. She tenderly placed it on Rhett's bruised forehead.

"Where did you learn to throw like that?" he asked.

"When I was young, at Tara. I had the best arm in the whole county."

"Another one of your many talents."

"Thank you, sir. So, you are my Secret Admirer, hmm?"

"Surprise," Rhett drawled. "Disappointed?"

"No." Scarlett took away the ice and tenderly kissed his bruise. "Not at all." She kissed him again. " But why did you do all this?"

"Don't you know what day it is?"

"Thursday."

"It's February 14th!'

"So?"

"It's Valentine's Day, my unromantic sweet! The day for lovers."

"Ah and we are lovers, aren't we?"

"That we are, my darling."

"Then I was 'often in your thoughts'?" Scarlett still had a burr under her bonnet.

Rhett laughed loud and strong. "You are referring to my telegram? I had to keep you in the dark, didn't I? And by the way, though I have sworn to share all of my worldly goods with you, may I please have my pillow back?"

"Do you mean to tell me you have been here in Atlanta this whole time?'"

"Well, I did take the children to my mother's home but then I took the train back the following day."

"But Rhett, I missed you so much."

" Have you ever heard the words, "Absence makes the heart grow fonder?"

"And my heart is very fond of you, my dearest."

Their eyes locked together and both started to gleam until they closed with a deep kiss. Their lips sparked and delighted in the familiar taste and touch of each other. Scarlett suddenly broke away and with wide eyes she said "My God Rhett, I might have shot you!"

"And you would have become a very wealthy widow. Luckily, I took the precaution of removing the bullets from your deadly pop gun."

He moved his lips back to hers.

"Really Rhett, how wealthy?"

"Remind me to change my will tomorrow."

"Oh stop. I promise you'll die a natural death in your own bed!"

She started to nibble on his ear. "Rhett, arsenic is a natural ingredient, isn't it?"

Rhett grasped Scarlett and rolled himself on top of her slim form. Holding her wrists over her head, he looked into her gorgeous eyes. Scarlett started to giggle.

"Say it!" Rhett growled.

"I love you." Scarlett cooed.

"Wonderful and..."

"And what?"

"Say it!"

With a sensuous smile, Scarlett relented "Uncle, I call Uncle."

A little bit of fluff. I hope you enjoyed it. The quotes that I used are listed below in order of appearance

1) William Shakespeare - Sonnet 75

2) Robert Burns - Ae Fond Kiss

3) Ralph Waldo Emerson - Essays: First Series

4) Lord Byron - The Bride of Abydos. Canto 1 Canto 2 Stanza 20

5) Alexander Pope - The Rape of the Lock

6) Robert Herrick - To Anthea, Ah My Anthea

7) Alexander Pope - The Rape of the Lock

8) Christopher Marlowe - The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus

9) Lord Byron - She Walks In Beauty

Needless to say, I want to have a copy of Barlett's Famous Quotations of my own.

And by way of saying thank you to Bluesneak, I add the following:

Epilogue:

The fire had burned down to embers and the ice had melted in the wine-bucket. The rose petals were scattered over the carpet and throughout the bed, lending their perfume to the other heavy scents in the room. The champagne was all gone. Most of it had been drunk but some had been spilt on the linen sheets and some had been used by Scarlett in a delightful idea involving a mouthful of the wine and a very firm and very strong part of Rhett's anatomy.

They lay entwined under the warm covers. Rhett was stroking Scarlett's tousled hair, thinking of tomorrow, with Scarlett seated naked in front of her vanity mirror and he brushing the love tangles from her ebony locks. Scarlett's soft thigh was lying between the hard muscled legs of Rhett, her fingers making lazy figure eights on his abdomen.

"Rhett, how did you do it?" Scarlett asked.

"Mmm? Well, I think the bubbles may have helped." Rhett lazily drawled.

Scarlett smiled. "No, not that - though it was lovely, wasn't it?" She paused, her thoughts momentarily distracted.

"No, I meant how did you hide all those notes?"

"I can't tell you all my secrets, Scarlett."

"You will if you plan to sleep in this bed!"

"Oh alright, Uncle!" They both smiled.

"Well, some of them I was able to hide myself. The first one in the ledger, the one in the lap robe, ( I followed you to the mill and waited until you went in the office), and of course the one under my pillow. I never realized how fond you were of my pillow until I snuck in one night to retrieve it and saw your exquisite body wrapped around it."

"Why, where were you? Here in the house?"

"Yes, I slept in the guest room down the hall. I must admit it was torture having to stay hidden from you when you were only two doors away from me. I don't think I got a good night's sleep the whole time. I tossed and turned each night."

"Oh so did I! It was awful." Scarlett exclaimed. "But what about the other notes?"

"Well, let's just say some money changed hands and some friends were helpful to such a romantic notion."

"I think it was one of the most romantic things anyone has ever done for me. You truly are my Valentine."

"And your not so Secret Admirer. I love you honey."

Scarlett's fingers seemed to have tired of the figure eights and were now moving in another direction. "Rhett, I think we should get in a few cases of champagne, don't you?"

Rhett's hands had also started wandering. "I'll be sure to see the wine merchant tomorrow." he murmured before his lips became otherwise occupied.