No, aunt and I would not agree permanently. Her innermost, innermost peculiarity (let it be never so well enveloped in amiability and gentle ways of speech) is that she is tyrannical. Therefore she wants now to manage my wedding, and therefore—which can now vex and disturb me, so that I haven't words for it!—she has in these days got my good-natured (but not especially strong-minded, it would be a pity to say that!) uncle to commit the act, which is far from being noble, of dismissing Grip from his position in the office. It is just like robbing him of half of what is needed to enable him to live and study here, and that only because she does not tolerate his ideas.
I let her know plainly what I thought about it, that it was both heartless and intolerant; I was so moved.
But why she pursues him to the seventh and last—for with aunt there is always something for the seventh and last—that I should still like to know.
Regard must naturally be paid to Inger-Johanna's wish to postpone the wedding. And so there was writing and writing to and fro.
But then came Rönnow's new promotion and with it the practical consideration, which weighed on the scales, that housekeeping must be begun on moving-day in October.
* * * * *
There was a general brushing up at Gilje from top to bottom, inside and out. The rooms upstairs must be whitened and everything put in order for the arrival of the newly married couple to remain this summer, the whole of July, after the wedding.
And when Inger-Johanna should come she was to meet a surprise—the whole of the captain's residence, by order of the army department, newly painted red with red-lead and white window sashes.
The captain's every-day coat had a shower of spots at all times in the day, as he stood out by the painter's ladder and watched the work—first the priming and now the second coat; then came the completion, the third and last. The spring winds blew, so that the walls dried almost immediately.
He was a little dizzy off and on during all this, so that he must stop and recover his balance; but there was good reason for it, because the parish clerk this year had not taken enough blood, since he had become so much stouter!—and then perhaps he pushed on too hard and eagerly; for he did long for Inger-Johanna's return.