Paul was very gentle and good to Maggie all that summer, better to her than any human being had ever been before.She became very fond of him, and yet it was not, apparently, her affection that he wanted.He seemed to be for ever on the verge of asking her some question and then checking himself.He was suddenly silent; she caught him looking at her in odd, furtive ways.
He made love to her and then suddenly checked himself, going off, leaving her alone.During these months she did everything she could for him.She knew that she was not satisfying him, because she could give him only affection and not love.But everything that he wanted her to do she did.And they never, through all those summer months, had one direct honest conversation.They were afraid.
She began to see, very clearly, his faults.His whole nature was easy, genial, and, above all, lazy.He liked to be liked, and she Was often astonished at the pleasure with which he received compliments.He had a conceit of himself, not as a man but as a clergyman, and she knew that nothing pleased him so much as when people praised his "good-natured humanity."She saw him "play-acting," as she called it, that is, bringing forward a succession of little tricks, a jolly laugh, an enthusiastic opinion, a pretence of humility, a man-of-the-world air, all things not very bad in themselves, but put on many years ago, subconsciously as an actor puts on powder and paint.She saw that he was especially sensitive to lay opinion, liked to be thought a good fellow by the laymen in the place.To be popular she was afraid that he sometimes sacrificed his dignity, his sincerity and his pride.But he was really saved in this by his laziness.He was in fact too lazy to act energetically in his pursuit of popularity, and the temptation to sink into the dirty old chair in his study, smoke a pipe and go to sleep, hindered again and again his ambition.