“Of course, Sir. The woman must come with it, I reckon. That I cannot help.”
“Marry come up!” exclaimed Rachel. “Thou art a very man. Those be right the man’s ways. ‘The woman must come with it,’ forsooth! Jack, my fingers be itching to thrash thee.”
“Such matters be done every day, Aunt,” observed Jack, smiling graciously,—not with reference to the suggested reward of his misdeeds.
“Black sin is done every day, lad. I wis that without thy telling. But that is no cause why thou shouldst be the doer of it.”
“Nay, Aunt Rachel!” retorted Jack, in the same manner. “’Tis no sin to wed an heir.”
“It was a sin, when I was a child, to tell lies. Maybe that is altered now,” said Rachel dryly.
“What lies, Aunt Rachel?” asked Jack laughing.
“Is it no lie, Jack, to lead a woman into believing that thou lovest her, when, if she plucked her purse out of her pocket and gave it thee, thou wert fully content, and shouldst ask no more?”
“You have old-fashioned notions, Aunt Rachel,” said Jack, still laughing.
“Jack! I do trust thou wilt not wed with any but one of good degree. Let her be a knight’s daughter, at the least—a lord’s were all the better,” said his step-mother.