Cruella de Vil from school, though it is mentioned that they were not friends and that she frightened the young Mrs. Dearly. She was a menacing student with black and white plaits, and was expelled for drinking ink. However, she appears to be on friendlier terms with Mrs. Dearly when they encounter each other at the beginning of the novel, before Cruella steals Dearly's puppies. In all her incarnations, Cruella kidnaps 97 or 99 Dalmatian puppies for their fur. In the live-action version, it is revealed that the reason Cruella chooses to skin puppies is that when short-haired dogs grow older, their fur
Cruella de Vil has made her husband adopt her surname as his own, in an effort to carry on her family name. She and her husband have no children. Cruella is portrayed as the tyrannical figure in the marriage, and her husband as a meek, subservient man who seldom speaks and obeys his wife entirely. He supplies Cruella with extravagances, such as the white mink cloak she often wears with skin-tight satin gowns and ropes of jewels in contrasting colours, such as a black dress with ropes of pearls, or a green dress with ropes of rubies. Cruella's chauffeur-driven car is black-and-white striped,