Read "In their Wisdom" by C.P. Snow online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
That summer, Liz was discovering for herself what had been written about, a generation or two before – that all resolutions are taken in a mood which will not last. People thought she had a strong will, but to herself it seemed to operate only in intermittences and often left her limp and unavailing. After her father's magisterial deployment of the intricate defensive, she heard no more from him through the weeks of August, and wasn't confident enough to ask again. As for telling Julian that he had to marry her – she couldn't do it now, whatever resolution she had made, any more than in the past.
She needed support from somewhere, and it was in that state, more or less carelessly, she telephoned James Ryle. She might have said that he seemed warmer and more forthcoming than most of her father's friends. She didn't give it any more consideration than that, and asked, could she come and see him, she wanted some advice.