Mrs.Morel sniffed with satisfaction at this arrangement.
He would not have it that they were lovers.

The intimacy between them had been kept so abstract, such a matter of the soul, all thought and weary struggle into consciousness, that he saw it only as a platonic friendship.

He stoutly denied there was anything else between them.
Miriam was silent, or else she very quietly agreed.

He was a fool who did not know what was happening to himself.

By tacit agreement they ignored the remarks and insinuations of their acquaintances.
"We aren't lovers, we are friends," he said to her.