II
Perhaps the only fault in Anne's education of her husband had been
her inability to cling. In his new menage this error was rectified,
and the effect on him was conspicuously good; in fact, I think Rose's
confidence in his greatness pulled them through the difficult time.
For there was no denying that it was difficult. Many people looked
coldly on them, and I know there was even some talk of asking him to
resign from the firm of architects of which he was a member. The
other men were all older, and very conservative. Julian represented
to them everything that was modern and dangerous. Granger, the
leading spirit, was in the habit of describing himself as holding
old-fashioned views, by which he meant that he had all the virtues
of the Pilgrim Fathers and none of their defects. I never liked him,
but I could not help respecting him. The worst you could say of him
was that his high standards were always successful.
You felt that so fanatical a sense of duty ought to have required
some sacrifices.
To such a man Julian's conduct appeared not only immoral but
inadvisable, and unfitting in a young man, especially without
consulting his senior partners.
We used to say among ourselves that Granger's reason for wanting to
get rid of Julian was not any real affection for the dim old moral
code, but rather his acute realization that without Anne his junior
partner was a less valuable asset.
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