My Year With Proust - Day 279

   The Duke's face darkened.  he did not like to hear his wife utter random judgments, especially about M. de Charlus.  "You're very particular.  His grief set an edifying example of everyone," he reproved her stiffly.  But the Duchess had in dealing with her husband that sort of boldness which animal tamers show, or people who live with a madman and are not afraid of provoking him."

Marcel Proust, The Guermantes Way, pp. 526-527

I don't have anything profound to add to this statement.  Mainly, I included it because it made me laugh.  It's probably exactly the same thought that people had of any woman who had the misfortune to be my partner.  Outsiders must have thought, "that woman will never have to prove her courage in any other way."