ill, and we talked of many things in the
desultory way born of easy intimacy, and I used silently to marvel
at the sharpness of his mind and the gentleness of hers. She was
very gentle. It even irritated me, faintly, to observe her complete
submission to him. Not that he bullied her, not exactly. But he had a
way of taking submission for granted, and so, I suppose, most people
accorded it to him. It irritated me to see how his wife had subdued her
personality to his, she who was of so tender and delicate a fibre, and
who more than anyone wanted cherishing, instead of being ridden down, in
that debonair, rough-shod way of his, that, although often exasperating,
still had something attractive about it. She and I used to discuss it
sometimes, in the evenings, when he was kept out late at his job--it's
an uncertain business, reporting--we used to discuss it with the
tolerance of fond people, and smile over his weaknesses, and say that he
was incorrigible. All the same, it continued to irritate me. Sometimes I
could see that he hurt her, when in his impatient way he swung round
to devastate her opinions with those sly and unanswerable phrases that
placed everything once and for always in a ridiculous light. What a
devilish gift he had, that man, of humiliating one! And he did it always
in so smiling and friendly a fashion that one could neither take offence
nor retaliate. In fact, one didn't realise that one had been attacked
until one felt the blood running warm from one's wounds, while he had
already danced away upon some other quest.

"I can hardly trace the steps by which my admiration of him grew to
affection, my affection to uneasiness, and my uneasiness to resentment.
I only know that I took to flushing scarlet when I saw her wince, and to
making about him, when I was alone with her, remarks that were less and
less tolerant and more and more critical. My temper grew readier to bite
out at him, my amusement less easily beguiled. I don't know whether he
noticed it. Most probably he did, for he always noticed everything.
If he did, then he gave no sign. His friendliness towards me continued
unvarying, and there were times when I thought he really bestirred
himself to impress me, to seduce me, he who was usually so contemptuous,
and seemed to enjoy stirring up people's dislike. It wasn't difficult
for him to impress me, if that was what he wanted, for he had, of
course, a far better brain than my own; the sort of brain tha