"
If Hermione had silently told Artois reasons such as these for hating
him she would have roused him to battle with her, to defend himself
with some real hope of holding his own, even of eventual conquest. But
other reasons, too, did they not come from her, creeping out of her
brain and heart and soul into his, reasons against which he had no
weapons, against which he could make no defence?
He had claimed to understand the psychology of women. He had believed
he comprehended women well. Hermione best of all women. But these
reasons, creeping out of her into him, set a ring of illuminating fire
about his misconception. They told him that though perhaps he had
known one Hermione in his friend, there were other Hermiones in her
whom he had never really known. Once in the garden of the island by
night he had seen, or fancied he had seen, a strange smile upon her
face that betokened a secret bitterness; and for a moment he had been
confused, and had faltered in his speech, and had felt as if he were
sitting with a stranger who was hostile to him, or, if not actually
hostile, was almost cruelly critical of him.
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