Laurent was infuriated.
"Oh, leave her alone," he cried.

"Can't you see that your services, and the very sight of you are odious to her.

If she could lift her hand she would slap your face." The slow and plaintive words of his wife, and her attitudes of resignation, gradually drove him into blinding fits of anger.

He understood her tactics; she no longer wished to be at one with him, but to set herself apart wrapped in her regret, so as to escape the clasp of the drowned man.

And, at moments, he said to himself that she had perhaps taken the right path, that tears might cure her of her terror, and he shuddered at the thought of having to suffer, and contend with fright alone.
He also would have liked to repent, or at least to have performed the comedy of repentance, to see what effect it would have.