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You should see me dance a reel with Mrs. Major ODowd of ours; and a jigdid you ever see a jig? But I think anybody could dance with you, Miss Osborne, who dance so well. Is the Majors lady young and beautiful, Captain? the fair questioner continued. Ah, what a terrible thing it must be to be a soldiers wife! I wonder they have any spirits to dance, and in these dreadful times of war, too! O Captain Dobbin, I tremble sometimes when I think of our dearest George, and the dangers of the poor soldier. Are there many married officers of the th, Captain Dobbin? Upon my word, shes playing her hand rather too openly, Miss Wirt thought; but this observation is merely parenthetic, and was not heard through the crevice of the door at which the governess uttered it. One of our young men is just married, Dobbin said, now coming to the point. It was a very old attachment, and the young couple are as poor as church mice. O, how delightful! O, how romantic! Miss Osborne cried, as the Captain said old attachment and poor. Her sympathy encouraged him. The finest young fellow in the regiment, he continued. Not a braver or handsomer officer in the army; and such a charming wife! How you would like her! how you will like her when you know her, Miss Osborne. The young lady thought the actual moment had arrived, and that Dobbins nervousness which now came on and was visible in many twitchings of his face, in his manner of beating the ground with his great feet, in the rapid buttoning and unbuttoning of his frock-coat, &c.Miss Osborne, I say, thought that when he had given himself a little air, he would unbosom himself entirely, and prepared eagerly to listen. And the clock, in the altar on which Iphigenia was situated, beginning, after a preparatory convulsion, to toll twelve, the mere tolling seemed as if it would last until oneso prolonged was the knell to the anxious spinster. But its not about marriage that I came to speak that is that marriagethat isno, I meanmy dear Miss Osborne, its about our dear friend George, Dobbin said. About George? she said in a tone so discomfited that Maria and Miss Wirt laughed at the other side of the door, and even that abandoned wretch of a Dobbin felt inclined to smile himself; for he was not altogether unconscious of the state of affairs: George having often bantered him gracefully and said, Hang it, Will, why dont you take old Jane? Shell have you if you ask her. Ill bet you five to two she will. Yes, about George, then, he continued. There has been a difference between him and Mr. Osborne. And I regard him so muchfor you know we have been like brothersthat I hope and pray the quarrel may be settled. We must go abroad, Miss Osborne. We may be ordered off at a days warning. Who knows what may happen in the campaign? Dont be agitated, dear Miss Osborne; and those two at least should part friends. There has been no quarrel, Captain Dobbin, except a little usual scene with Papa, the lady said. We are expecting George back daily. What Papa wanted was only for his good. He has but to come back, and Im sure all will be well; and dear Rhoda, who went away from here in sad sad anger, I know will forgive him. Woman forgives but too readily, Captain. Such an angel as you I am sure would, Mr. Dobbin said, with atrocious astuteness. And no man can pardon himself for giving a woman pain. What would you feel, if a man were faithless to you? I should perishI should throw myself out of window I should take poisonI should pine and die. I know I should, Miss cried, who had nevertheless gone through one or two affairs of the heart without any idea of suicide. And there are others, Dobbin continued, as true and as kind-hearted as yourself. Im not speaking about the West Indian heiress, Miss Osborne, but about a poor girl whom George once loved, and who was bred from her childhood to think of nobody but him. Ive seen her in her poverty uncomplaining, |
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