I'm not sure whether I first read it too young to find Jervis creepy, or if it's just that he's more or less irrelevant to what I like about the book!

I still don't *really* - I mean, however badly he behaves, I don't think he had any original intention either of falling in love, or of picking out a girl to become a suitable wife. I'll allow him the first visit out of sheer natural curiosity, and Judy kind of forces the first Lock Willow summer on him by refusing to go back to the home - it's the summers after that that get a bit dubious.