Œuvres complètes de Guy de Maupassant - volume 15

A henpecked father finds his main joy in his young son while enduring a domineering wife's constant reproaches, and domestic life is sketched through tender play, household routines, and mounting small humiliations. A cantankerous long-serving maid and a longtime male friend complicate relations, the maid's hostility toward the wife and the friend's protective interventions creating escalating tension. The father alternates between anxious indecision and furtive plans for resolution, feeling trapped by social obligation and personal affection. A chance sighting of the wife with the friend and the child in public crystallizes his unease and forces a confrontation with the fragility of his domestic bonds.