(She) could have read for hours, except that recently she had discovered holes and crevices between the words which she immediately had to fill with her own ideas until she was fed up with patching up the makeshift constructs.

To her amazement, she realized that the way of life of these people was nothing more than an indeterminate fiction, casually knotted together at particular points that were used again and again. With four or five remarks, and a couple of facial expressions, she had mastered it with no problem at all.