his power to hold her.

And so the months rolled by, with a trip abroad now and then to relieve the
tedium of existence. For a woman to know that she comes to be tolerated
only because she is decorative, is a consummating blow. Pell soon reached
the point where he told Lucia he had bought her, body and soul. He had
determined to win her love. When he saw that he could not, he swiftly
forgot the integrity of her part of the bargain, the honesty of her words
to him before they were married; and he practised subtle cruelties to tame
her and bring her at last to him.

He began to drink too much. Only a certain pride in his business affairs,
the desire to keep a level head, a clear brain, kept him from sinking
definitely to the gutter. He became irritable with her. Nothing she did
pleased him. He found he could not wound her sufficiently when he was
sober; so he fortified himself with alcohol, gained courage to speak flat
truths, and left her alone for days at a time, thinking such absences were
a punishment.

Had he but known it, they were the only bright oases in her monotonous
life. She blessed those hours when he mercifully remained away on the
pretext of business. What he did gave her little concern.

Once she ventured to talk frankly with him about the wisdom of a legal
separation. It was foolish to go on in this way. It was dishonest; it was
the only immorality.

He laughed her to scorn. "You're too useful to me, my dear," he sneered. He
always added that "my dear" to any statement when he wished to be
thoroughly sarcastic.