Yet he had been observing this woman closely.
Something unusual, something vital in her had drawn his attention, fixed
it, held it. He knew that, but said to himself that it was the attention
of the novelist that had been grasped by an uncommon human specimen, and
that the man of the world, the diner-out, did not want to eat in company
with a specimen, but to throw off professional cares with a gay little
chatterbox of the Mousmé type. Therefore he came over to be presented to
Hermione with rather a bad grace.
And that introduction was the beginning of the great friendship which was
now troubling him in the fog.
By the end of that evening Hermione and he had entirely rid themselves of
their preconceived notions of each other. She had ceased from imagining
him a walking intellect devoid of sympathies, he from considering her a
possibly interesting specimen, but not the type of woman who could be
agreeable in a man's life. Her naturalness amounted almost to genius. She
was generally unable to be anything but natural, unable not to speak as
she was feeling, unable to feel unsympathetic. She always showed keen
interest when she felt it, and, with transparent sincerity, she at once
began to show to Artois how much interested she was in him. By doing so
she captivated him at once. He would not, perhaps, have been captivated
by the heart without the brains, but the two in combination took
possession of him with an ease which, when the evening was over, but only
then, caused him some astonishment.
Hermione had a divining-rod to discover the heart in another, and she
found out at once that Artois had a big heart as well as a fine
intellect. He was deceptive because he was always ready to show the
latter, and almost always determined to conceal the former. Even to
himself he was not quite frank about his heart, but often strove to
minimize its influence upon him, if not to ignore totally its promptings
and its utterances. Why this was so he could not perhaps have explained
even to himself. It was one of the mysteries of his temperament. From the
first moment of their intercourse Hermione showed to him her conviction
that he had a warm heart, and that it could be relied upon without
hesitation. This piqued but presently delighted, and also soothed
Artois, who was accustomed to be misunderstood, and had often thought he
liked to be misunderstood, but who now found out how pleasant a brilliant
woman's intuition may be, even at a Parisian dinner. Before the evening
was over they knew that they were friends; and friends they had remained
ever since.