One day when the parson was abroad on parish matters, and the Rectory empty, she went out for a stroll, and reached the high steep bank where the primroses and violets grew. Looking over, she saw Jack and Alice seated below; Jack’s arm round her waist.
“You are to be my wife, you know, Alice, when we are grown up. Mind that.”
There was no answer, but Aunt Dean certainly thought she heard the sound of a kiss. Peeping over again, she saw Jack taking another.
“And if you don’t object to my being a farmer, Alice, I should like it best of all. We’ll keep two jolly ponies and ride about together. Won’t it be good?”
“I don’t object to farming, Jack. Anything you like. A successful farmer’s home is a very pleasant one.”
Aunt Dean drew away with noiseless steps. She was too calm and callous a woman to turn white; but she did turn angry, and registered a vow in her heart. That presuming, upstart Jack! They were only two little fools, it’s true; no better than children; but the nonsense must be stopped in time.
Herbert went back to Oxford without coming home. Alice, to her own infinite astonishment, was despatched to school until midsummer. The parson and his sister and Jack were left alone; and Aunt Dean, with her soft smooth manner and her false expressions of endearment, ruled all things; her brother’s better nature amidst the rest.
Jack was asked what he would be. A farmer, he answered. But Aunt Dean had somehow caught up the most bitter notions possible against farming in general; and Mr. Lewis, not much liking the thing himself, and yielding to the undercurrent ever gently flowing, told Jack he must fix on something else.
“There’s nothing I shall do so well at as farming, father,” remonstrated Jack. “You can put me for three or four years to some good agriculturist, and I’ll be bound at the end of the time I should be fit to manage the largest and best farm in the country. Why, I am a better farmer now than some of them are.”
“Jack, my boy, you must not be self-willed. I cannot let you be a farmer.”