He thought that
she had been attracted to him, but in a sisterly sort of way; that
he had come across her when she was feeling cramped and
dissatisfied, and that a friendship with him had seemed to offer
her a chance of expansion and interest.
He often thought of telling the whole story to his aunt; but like
many people who seem extraordinarily frank about their feelings and
fancies, and speak easily even of their emotions, he found himself
condemned to silence about any emotion or experience that had any
serious or tragic quality. Most people would have thought him
communicative, and even lacking in reticence. But he knew in
himself that it was not so; he could speak of his intimate ideas
very readily upon slight acquaintance, because they were not to him
matters of deep feeling; but the moment that they really moved him,
he felt absolutely dumb and tongue-tied.
He established himself at Windlow, and became at once aware that
his aunt perceived that there was something amiss. She gave him
opportunities of speaking to her, but he could not take them. He
shrank with a painful dumbness from displaying his secret wound. It
seemed to him undignified and humiliating to confess his weakness.
He hoped vaguely that the situation would solve itself, and spare
him the necessity of a confession.
He tried to occupy himself in his book, but in vain. Now that he
was confronted with a real and urgent dilemma, the origins of
religion seemed to him to have no meaning or interest.
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