Having no intellectual resources wherewith to beguile the tedium of his idle prosperous life, he was fain to seek pleasure in the companionship of other men; and had thus become a haunter of tavern parlours and small racecourses, being always ready for any amusement his friends proposed to him.

It followed, therefore, that he was very often absent from his commonplace substantial home, and his pretty weak-minded wife.

And poor Georgy had ample food for her jealous fears and suspicions; for where might a man not be who was so seldom at home?
She had never been particularly fond of her husband, but that was no reason why she should not be particularly jealous about him; and her jealousy betrayed itself in a peevish worrying fashion, which was harder to bear than the vengeful ferocity of a Clytemnestra.

It was in vain that Thomas Halliday and those jolly good fellows his friends and companions attested the Arcadian innocence of racecourses, and the perfect purity of that smoky atmosphere peculiar to tavern parlours.

Georgy's suspicions were too vague for refutation; but they were nevertheless sufficient ground for all the alternations of temper--from stolid sulkiness to peevish whining, from murmured lamentations to loud hysterics--to which the female temperament is liable.
In the meantime poor honest, loud-spoken Tom did all in his power to demonstrate his truth and devotion.