“My uncle Cheriton comes back to us to-night. He had to leave us on the day after we saw you; Cherry has promised to speak to him, that we may come to an understanding before I go back to Oxford.” Mr Stanforth smiled a little.
“When do you come of age, Jack?” he said.
“I shall be twenty next week,” said Jack, in a tone of humiliation. “If I take a fair degree, I shall try for a mastership in one of the public schools. I should like that, and—and it is suitable to getting married,” concluded Jack blushing.
“Very well,” said Mr Stanforth. “Then you shall come and tell me of your intentions for the future in a year’s time from next week. Wait a bit,” as Jack looked exceedingly blank. “If circumstances had not so sadly changed, no other decision would have been possible for you. I have no objection, in the meantime, to see you occasionally at my house, as I think you should both have every opportunity of testing the permanence of such quick-springing feelings.”
Mr Stanforth smiled as he spoke; but Jack said after a moment,—
“You mean that I must earn her? Well, I will.”
There was a solemn abruptness in Jack’s manner that provoked a smile; but his self-confidence was tempered by a look of such absolute honesty and sincerity in his bright blue eyes, he looked such a fine young fellow in all the freshness and strength of his youth, that it would have been difficult to doubt either his purposes or his power of carrying them out.
“Don’t you think you might have asked Mr Stanforth to take off his coat and come into the library before entering on such an important subject?” said Cheriton, joining them.
“I beg your pardon,” said Jack. “Please come in; I was not thinking—”
“Of anything but your own affairs? No, that’s very unfair, for I am sure you have taken heed to every one else’s,” said Cherry, as he led the way into the library, where on the table was a great accumulation of papers, looking like the materials for a heavy morning’s work.