Lois had decided that a necessary economy was for one of them to travel by public transport Her firm was on the other side of London obviously Simon must be the one to economise The overcrowded tube journey stayed in a mood of envious resentment had become an unproductive thirty minutes of brooding on present discontents He would recall his grandfathers house in Hampstead where he had stayed as a boy the smell of dinner from the kitchen his grandmothers insistence that the returning breadwinner tired from his exhausting day in court should be given peace a little gentle cosseting and relief from every petty domestic anxiety She had been a lawyers wife indefatigable in legal good causes elegantly present at all lawyers functions apparently content with the sphere of life which she had made her own Well that world had passed for ever Lois had made it plain before their marriage that her career was as important as his It hardly needed saying this was after all a modern marriage The job was important to her and important to them both The house the au pair their whole standard of living depended on two salaries And now what they were precariously achieving could be destroyed by that selfrighteous interfering Venetia