Peregrine Carey Below had fallen in love with his wife, and she had exploited his fall to the top of her bent. I say ‘fallen.’ To be more accurate, he had ventured to look in the pool, and his future wife had promptly kicked him in. Swiftly, though imperceptibly, the garlands which he had twined rapturously about his limbs had turned to fetters which he could not unloose. The garlands had been supplied by Mrs. Below. The man was in thrall to a personality—a vigorous magnetism, which sucked the marrow from his bones and, waxing fat on it, grew more exacting and savage every day. Physical bonds there were none. The two were childless: in her own right Marion Carey Below had not a penny piece. Yet so well had she wrought that full two-thirds of his income went into her privy purse, while of that which was left, her husband accounted to her for every farthing. For seven years she had bluffed him—with an empty hand: and he paid and paid and paid. . . . The bluff slid into torment—for the love of the thing: the torment, into the order of the day. Mrs. Carey Below had reduced nagging to a fine art. Her vocabulary was rich, her tongue fluent, her brain quick. Perversion, avoidance, falsehood were so many irons in the fire. It was a bad case. The lady was thirty-eight, handsome and as hard as nails. Always ruthless, she had appropriated Peregrine out of hand. The fact that he was betrothed to another girl did not concern her. I doubt if his marriage would have stood in her way. The best was good enough for her, no matter to whom it belonged. The idea of troubling to hold him never entered her head: the very sublimity of her self-confidence grappled him to her soul. There was no love in her—nor ever had been. Women disliked her with cause, but to men she appealed. The appeal was deliberate. To her, male admiration was the breath of life. ‘A born _vivandière_,’ says someone. Not at all. She would have loathed the job. The salt would have lost his savour. Male admiration must be won at another’s expense. To diminish all other women was her heart’s desire. Money, convenience—everything was offered upon this altar. Peregrine’s money, Peregrine’s convenience. Marriage had brought him indeed more kicks than halfpence.