"So Bill has been talking, has he," he said.

"Yes, I made him." She went on. "Amy set herself against him--and
against all your other old friends. Not at first--I want to be fair to
her, Joe--don't think I'm blaming just her for all this. I'm sure that
at first she was different--she wanted your friends to take her in.
Remember those dinners you took her to, and that week-end party up in
Vermont!"

Joe looked at her sharply:

"Who told you that?"

"Sally Crothers," said Ethel. "She was there."

"Sally Crothers? You know her!" he demanded. She smiled at the
startled look on his face.

"Why, yes," she replied "You see I've been hunting so hard for you, Joe,
among those friends you used to have. And I did it without ever letting
you know. Dwight, too--he was only one of them." She frowned, and added
briskly, "Just incidental, so to speak. But I don't care to talk of him
now--I'm speaking only of Amy. And from what Sally Crothers has told
me, poor Amy must have had some hard times. They weren't fair to her.
If they'd given her time and a real chance, everything might have been
different. But they didn't, they turned her down. And feeling hurt and
angry--and feeling besides how she'd have to grow--in her mind, I mean,
and her interests, to take any place among people like that--I think she
hesitated. You might have helped her then, perhaps--but you didn't--and
Amy was lazy, Joe--that had always been a part of her. So she wouldn't
make the effort. Instead of coming up to you, she made up her mind to
pull you down!"

"That isn't true!" he said harshly. "And if you've been taking for
God's own truth what Sally Crothers told you--"

"Stop! Please!" cried Ethel eagerly. "I didn't mean what I said just
then--I put it badly--oh, so wrong! She didn't say, 'I'll pull him
down.' She told herself your friends were snobs! And she said, 'I have
friends who are human, and they're quite good enough for me!' So she
went on with Fanny Carr. And others came, the circle grew. And it was
all done day by day, and week by week. It happened--and you never knew.
Nor did she. It was all so natural. But within a year she was going
with people, and so were you, who cared for nothing you had
wanted--women with no growth at all. They were all--oh, so common,
Joe!"

"That's a bit snobbish, isn't it?"

"You can call it what you like! But I say you can find them all over
town--richer and poorer, better and worse--women who want only common