"Then we split," Betsy answered. "But so what? I don't think she can do it; but even if she can, so what? I wouldn't want it to happen but it wouldn't be a disaster. We'd all land on our feet somewhere. I know I'd head out for the nearest clan and I'd get into that clan just as soon as I could. When I got into it, and got accepted as a real part of it, then I'd think of the rest of this as just an unhappy incident. A tragedy, but not the end of life. But as far as I'm concerned, this is too remote a possibility to worry about."
"You are quite unafraid, aren't you?" Tom said.
"Yes," she answered simply, her voice calm and cool. "I'm not afraid of Marcia—not of what she can do to the kids or to myself. I think the kids are strong enough emotionally to stand anything. And I think I am, too."
There was a quiet confidence in her voice. She reached out and patted his hand. Then, getting up, she started to get out the food for the evening meal while Tom continued to sit there, thinking. And when Tom got up and walked out, she still said nothing but looked after him with a look that had something warm and tender in it.
AS HE walked through the livingroom, he saw Rita stretched out on the couch. He looked questioningly at her wondering if the day had been too hard for her, being, as she was, six months along towards the twelfth child of the clan. But she smiled at him and shook her head. "Don't be worried," she said; "I'm just a little tired but not too much."
"Anything I can get you?" he asked.
"No, thanks," she said, her voice cheerful. "I just need to get off my feet."
He started to say something about Marcia, but then stopped. What good would it do? he asked himself. Rita, with the instinct of birth close upon her, was too absorbed in herself and the life she carried. The problem, to her, would exist only if it threatened herself or her child. And by all the signs, she felt no threat. Her calm acceptance of the daily life, her quiet absorption in the now and here, measured a confidence in the clan that was complete.
No, to talk of Marcia could do no good. If he succeeded in impressing her with the importance of the problem, it would be because he made her realize that Marcia was a threat. It would be at the expense of her feeling of security, the security that let her wait her time out in calm acceptance and assurance. And if he did not persuade her of the problem's significance, she could not contribute to it. Under normal circumstances, she was not one to deal with abstract questions. She had an acute awareness of personalities that transcended logic. She had an instinct, a sixth sense, almost, for responding to the needs of others. But she was not a philosopher, and neither could she handle abstract problems.