iew of mankind there
was an affinity between him and Gwendolen before their marriage, and we
know that she had been attractingly wrought upon by the refined
negations he presented to her. Hence he understood her repulsion for
Lush. But how was he to understand or conceive her present repulsion
for Henleigh Grandcourt? Some men bring themselves to believe, and not
merely maintain, the non-existence of an external world; a few others
believe themselves objects of repulsion to a woman without being told
so in plain language. But Grandcourt did not belong to this eccentric
body of thinkers. He had all his life had reason to take a flattering
view of his own attractiveness, and to place himself in fine antithesis
to the men who, he saw at once, must be revolting to a woman of taste.
He had no idea of moral repulsion, and could not have believed, if he
had been told it, that there may be a resentment and disgust which will
gradually make beauty more detestable than ugliness, through
exasperation at that outward virtue in which hateful things can flaunt
themselves or find a supercilious advantage.

How, then, could Grandcourt divine what was going on in Gwendolen's
breast?

For their behavior to each other scandalized no observer--not even the
foreign maid, warranted against sea-sickness; nor Grandcourt's own
experienced valet: still less the picturesque crew, who regarded them
as a model couple in high life. Their companionship consisted chiefly
in a well-bred silence. Grandcourt had no humorous observations at
which Gwendolen could refuse to smile, no chit-chat to make small
occasions of dispute. He was perfectly polite in arranging an
additional garment over her when needful, and in handing her any object
that he perceived her to need, and she could not fall into the
vulgarity of accepting or rejecting such politeness rudely.

Grandcourt put up his telescope and said, "There's a plantation of
sugar-canes at the foot of that rock; should you like to look?"

Gwendolen said, "Yes, please," remembering that she must try and
interest herself in sugar-canes as something outside her personal
affairs. Then Grandcourt would walk up and down and smoke for a long
while, pausing occasionally to point out a sail on the horizon, and at
last would seat himself and look at Gwendolen with his narrow immovable
gaze, as if she were part of the complete yacht; while she, conscious
of being looked at was exerting her ingenuity not to meet h