Or did he really think Marcia could fit? That she could learn to be a real part of them? Or, again, as he remembered Ricky's comment that she was a 'dish', had Ricky gone overboard about her? Was he so taken by her looks and all that he was forgetting the clan? Not consciously, of course; he would not, could not, do that consciously. But perhaps unknowing? Using the other arguments as rationalization?
Somehow, Tom doubted this. Ricky might not be too deep a thinker but, Tom thought, he was generally extremely level headed. No, he thought, Ricky was probably quite serious in thinking the clan should accept Marcia, that she, in one way or another, would be good for the clan. And that left only the question of whether he was right or not.
Tom's eyes swung to Sandy, and he remembered his discussion with her. And he remembered her parting shot which had asked him if he was afraid of Marcia. If, perhaps, he did not resent her for being better educated than he, and if, maybe, she might awe him. Was that it? he wondered. Did he feel awe at her? He did of her father, certainly. He remembered his talks with Mr. Graves, and remembered coming out of them feeling beaten and bedraggled—something of the way he might feel towards Marcia.
Yes, he had to admit it, there was that feeling there. She was from a background he did not know and it did, in truth, somewhat scare him. How much did this influence him? He did not know.
He looked at Betsy, thinking of his talk with her. He remembered how she had brushed aside any thought that the kids might be harmed by Marcia. Was she right? Were the kids so stable emotionally that nothing Marcia could bring into their world would seriously harm them? Remembering Sue who had come to flirt with him with her four-year-old eyes, it was not hard to believe that Betsy was right.
Also there was Betsy's discussion of what might happen to Marcia. Betsy had argued, Tom remembered, that Marcia might well learn to fit, that she would find all the old rules by which she had lived outside the clan so completely inadequate that she would be forced to learn from scratch. Was that right, he wondered. After the initial period when she would be learning how little she knew, would she then be able to learn like a child, without undue prejudice, just because her background was so different? It was possible, he had to admit.
And finally he looked at Pete. Pete had argued that it was not immoral to take in Marcia for economic reasons, that it was not like marrying a girl for her money. Economics were an integral and avowed part of the clan idea; and certainly the moralities of a clan had to be different from those of a monogamist marriage. Yes, he had to admit that he thought Pete's arguments sound. There was a different ethics here. There had to be. What the true ethics would say of the case of Marcia, he did not know. But at least he could not lightly dismiss it all as simply and obviously immoral. It could not be that simple.
AS TOM looked at them and pondered what he should say, the answer suddenly came to him. It came to him like a revelation, and he felt as if something inside of him had broken, something that had hampered and restricted him, even without his knowing it. He felt free, suddenly, free and exultant.
He smiled at them and said: "When Ricky told me this afternoon, I was afraid; as I talked to several of you since that time, I continued to be afraid. And I was afraid when I came here tonight. But now, as I look at your bright faces, I am no longer. You and I are the clan, and the clan is stronger than anyone outside. Not Marcia, nor Graves, nor anyone else can break it; only we can break it—only we, by losing faith in it. I know now that I have not had the faith that I should have. The faith in you, and in us, and in our relations to each other. As I stood here looking at the faces of those I talked to, and remembering what you said, it came to me how foolish I have been.