He supposed not; certainly they had given no evidence of any such disposition. It hardened him against them. He hated the thought of the gay tea given for Amy that afternoon when Ruth, just back after all those years away, was home alone with her father, who was dying. Amy they were taking in so graciously—because things had gone right with her; Ruth, whom they knew, who had been one of them, they left completely out. There flamed up a desire to take Amy with him, as against them, to show them that she was sweeter and larger than they, that she understood and put no false value on a cordiality that left the heart hard.
But Amy looked so much one of them, seemed so much one with them in her talk about them, that he put off what he wanted to say, listening to her. And yet, he assured himself, that was not the whole of Amy; he softened and took heart in the thought of her tenderness in moments of love, her sweetness when the world fell away and they were man and woman to each other. Those real things were stronger in her than this crust of worldliness. He would reach through that to the life that glowed behind it. If he only had the skill, the understanding, to reach through that crust to the life within, to that which was real, she would understand that the very thing bringing them their happiness was the thing which in Ruth put her apart from her friends; she would be larger, more tender, than those others. He wanted that triumph for her over them. He would glory in it so! There would be such pride in showing Amy to Ruth as a woman who was real. And most of all, because it was a thing so deep in his own life, he wanted Amy to come within, to know from within, his feeling about Ruth.
"You know, dear, that was Ruth's old crowd you were meeting this afternoon," he finally said.
He saw her instantly stiffen. Her mouth looked actually hard. That, he quickly told himself, was what those people had done to her.
"And that house," he went on, his voice remaining quiet, "was like another home to Ruth."
Amy cleared her throat. "She didn't make a very good return for the hospitality, do you think?" she asked sharply.
Flushing, he started to reply to that, but instead asked abruptly, "Does Edith know that Ruth is home?"
"Yes," Amy replied coldly, "they were speaking of her."
"Speaking of her!" he scoffed.
"I suppose you would think," she flamed, "that they ought to have met her at the train!"