"I should have preferred an older woman."
"I doubt if she'll ever see thirty again, sir," said Fuller simply.
"Well, Fuller, I know you've the interests of the College very much at heart, and I'm quite willing to give her a trial on your recommendation," said Julian. "We'll put it before the directors at the meeting."
"Thank you, Sir Julian. I thought you'd probably trust my judgment," Fuller remarked, with satisfaction. "And I don't think you will regret it. She struck me as being a thorough woman of business, most capable, and as hard as nails."
At this final qualification Sir Julian looked rather glum, irresistibly reminded of the heroine of that episode which had wrought so much havoc in the household of his wife's relatives.
"However," he remarked to Mark Easter, as they went towards the committee-room at the appointed hour, "I really do trust Fuller's judgment, so far as the good of the College goes, though I haven't his own implicit belief in his absolute infallibility."
"He thinks the whole show rests on him," said Mark Easter, and added with belated justice, "And for the matter of that, I really don't know where we should get another man like him. He's a nailer for work."
"I hope his protégée will be a success. If he talks to the directors about her being practically a lady, as distinguished, I suppose, from a 'young lady in business,' he'll fetch that old snob Bellew."
"He probably won't mention it," said Mark Easter shrewdly. "He looks upon it as a disadvantage in the abstract, but he told me yesterday that he thought he could explain it if any objection were raised."
"Fuller would think he could explain it," Sir Julian rejoined drily, "if the creation of the world were in question."