Gone with the Wind: Chapter 39 Summary & Analysis

The day after getting Will’s letter, Scarlett’s train pulls into Jonesboro. The train depot hasn’t been rebuilt since the war. She sits on a barrel and waits for Will, who should be here by now. He should’ve known she’d take the first train from Atlanta when she heard Gerald was dead. She’s wearing an ill-fitting mourning dress she borrowed from Mrs. Meade and has only a small bag with her. She doesn’t want anyone to see her and say sympathetic things about Gerald. A lump rises in her throat. Why did no one write her that Gerald was sick?

Alex Fontaine crosses the train tracks. When he sees Scarlett, he rushes forward to shake her hand. He says Will is at the blacksmith’s and is on the way to pick her up. Alex says he’s sorry about Gerald, and that he died like a soldier. Scarlett says she doesn’t want to talk about it. Alex says if he had a sister who did what Suellen did, he’d whip her. There is something Scarlett doesn’t know, and Alex isn’t telling her. Alex looks at her and notices how much she’s changed. She looks well-fed, and her eyes have a commanding look in them. Alex has changed too; he looks more rugged than ever. His days in the army had been easy compared to this poverty.

Alex thanks Scarlett for helping Tony escape. He offers to repay her, but Scarlett hushes him. Alex leaves, saying he’ll see her tomorrow at Gerald’s funeral. Will arrives in the same rickety wagon Scarlett had fled Atlanta in. She vows to burn the wagon as soon as possible. Will greets Scarlett like a sister and they start for Tara in silence. Scarlett takes in the beautiful red earth, blooming with cotton and honeysuckle. After a bit, Will asks Scarlett if she approves of him marrying Suellen. Surprised, Scarlett says she thought he liked Carreen. Will sighs; Scarlett doesn’t know what’s been happening here. Carreen is joining a convent; she never got over Brent. Scarlett scoffs and says Charles died but she didn’t join a convent. Will says that Charles’s death didn’t break Scarlett’s heart.

Will says that Suellen needs a husband and children like all women do. Scarlett knows there must be another reason why Will wants to marry a “complaining nag” like Suellen. Will says the truth is he doesn’t want to leave Tara. He’s put work into it and now he loves it. Once he marries Suellen, Ashley plans to leave with Melanie and find work in a New York bank. Will says Ashley is ashamed of living at Tara on charity. Scarlett panics. She thinks of Ashley every day; he can’t go North! Yes, he’s too well-bred to work like a farmer and was meant to live in a mansion, reading books and ruling enslaved persons. He doesn’t belong at Tara, but Scarlett won’t let him leave Georgia. She’ll hire him to run her mill and make it seem like she’s doing him a favor.

Will asks Scarlett not to yell at Suellen because it won’t bring Gerald back. Scarlett thinks of Gerald’s dead body in the parlor and begins to cry. She remembers how Gerald used to cry when she cried, and how he’d come home drunk, jumping fences, and singing at the top of his lungs. Scarlett asks why no one wrote to tell her Gerald was sick. Will says Gerald wasn’t sick.

Will tells the story of Gerald’s death: Will was paying the taxes and fixing Tara with the money Scarlett sent. But Suellen wanted clothes and a horse and carriage. She was jealous that Scarlett had a buggy in Atlanta, and she was hurt that Scarlett married Frank. That was a “scurvy trick” to play on Suellen, Will says. Scarlett thinks privately that if a girl can’t keep a beau, she deserves to lose him. Will says that a month ago, he took Suellen to Jonesboro, where Suellen visited Cathleen Calvert. Suellen insisted everyone was wrong about Hilton and he’s actually nice and smart. She began taking Gerald on walks past Ellen’s grave and making him cry.

Will stops the wagon so he can finish the story before they get home. Suellen’s idea, he continues, was to take advantage of the Yankee government’s offer to pay for damaged property of Union sympathizers. Suellen had learned from Mrs. McIntosh about this offer, and with Hilton’s help, gathered the information she needed about the Iron Clad Oath (the oath of Union sympathy). Then, Suellen berated Gerald for letting his family starve when he could get them $150,000. Scarlett gasps at the high sum, feeling that this much money is worth Suellen’s small lie.

Yesterday, Will continues, Suellen took Gerald to Jonesboro. She had made a deal with Hilton that she’d give him some of the money if he attested that Gerald was a Union sympathizer. All Gerald had to do was sign the oath. At the last minute, Gerald refused to sign. Suellen drove him around talking about Ellen and making him cry again. She got him drunk. He was about to sign again when Suellen said the Slatterys wouldn’t feel superior to the O’Haras now. Gerald said he wouldn’t sign anything such “trash” had signed and that Suellen was no daughter of his.

Will continues: Alex Fontaine saw Gerald in in a rage, and Gerald took Alex’s horse and rode off. At sundown, Ashley and Will heard Gerald galloping home and singing. As he approached the fence, he said, “Look Ellen!” but the horse didn’t jump. Gerald flew forward off the horse and broke his neck. When Scarlett doesn’t speak, Will continues towards Tara.