He had not been seated there very long before he felt an arm thrust under his and a dandy little hand in a kid glove squeezing his arm. George had seen the absurdity of his ways and come down from the upper region.
A tender laugh of benevolence lighted up old Dobbin's face and eyes as he looked at the repentant little prodigal.
He loved the boy, as he did everything that belonged to Amelia.
How charmed she was when she heard of this instance of George's goodness!
Her eyes looked more kindly on Dobbin than they ever had done.
She blushed, he thought, after looking at him so.
Georgy never tired of his praises of the Major to his mother.
"I like him, Mamma, because he knows such lots of things; and he ain't like old Veal, who is always bragging and using such long words, don't you know?
The chaps call him 'Longtail' at school.
I gave him the name; ain't it capital?
But Dob reads Latin like English, and French and that; and when we go out together he tells me stories about my Papa, and never about himself; though I heard Colonel Buckler, at Grandpapa's, say that he was one of the bravest officers in the army, and had distinguished himself ever so much.
Grandpapa was quite surprised, and said, 'THAT feller!
Why, I didn't think he could say Bo to a goose'--but I know he could, couldn't he, Mamma?"
Emmy laughed: she thought it was very likely the Major could do thus much.
If there was a sincere liking between George and the Major, it must be confessed that between the boy and his uncle no great love existed.
George had got a way of blowing out his cheeks, and putting his hands in his waistcoat pockets, and saying,
"God bless my soul, you don't say so," so exactly after the fashion of old Jos that it was impossible to refrain from laughter.
The servants would explode at dinner if the lad, asking for something which wasn't at table, put on that countenance and used that favourite phrase.
Even Dobbin would shoot out a sudden peal at the boy's mimicry.
If George did not mimic his uncle to his face, it was only by Dobbin's rebukes and Amelia's terrified entreaties that the little scapegrace was induced to desist.
And the worthy civilian being haunted by a dim consciousness that the lad thought him an ass, and was inclined to turn him into ridicule, used to be extremely timorous and, of course, doubly pompous and dignified in the presence of Master Georgy.
When it was announced that the young gentleman was expected in Gillespie Street to dine with his mother, Mr. Jos commonly found that he had an engagement at the Club.
Perhaps nobody was much grieved at his absence.
On those days Mr. Sedley would commonly be induced to come out from his place of refuge in the upper stories, and there would be a small family party, whereof Major Dobbin pretty generally formed one.
He was the ami de la maison--old Sedley's friend, Emmy's friend, Georgy's friend, Jos's counsel and adviser.
"He might almost as well be at Madras for anything WE see of him," Miss Ann Dobbin remarked at Camberwell.
Ah! Miss Ann, did it not strike you that it was not YOU whom the Major wanted to marry?
Joseph Sedley then led a life of dignified otiosity such as became a person of his eminence.
His very first point, of course, was to become a member of the Oriental Club, where he spent his mornings in the company of his brother Indians, where he dined, or whence he brought home men to dine.
Amelia had to receive and entertain these gentlemen and their ladies.
From these she heard how soon Smith would be in Council; how many lacs Jones had brought home with him, how Thomson's House in London had refused the bills drawn by Thomson, Kibobjee, and Co., the Bombay House, and how it was thought the Calcutta House must go too; how very imprudent, to say the least of it, Mrs. Brown's conduct (wife of Brown of the Ahmednuggur Irregulars) had been with young Swankey of the Body Guard, sitting up with him on deck until all hours, and losing themselves as they were riding out at the Cape; how Mrs. Hardyman had had out her thirteen sisters, daughters of a country curate, the Rev: Felix Rabbits, and married eleven of them, seven high up in the service; how Hornby was wild because his wife would stay in Europe, and Trotter was appointed Collector at Ummerapoora.
This and similar talk took place at the grand dinners all round.
They had the same conversation; the same silver dishes; the same saddles of mutton, boiled turkeys, and entrees.
Politics set in a short time after dessert, when the ladies retired upstairs and talked about their complaints and their children.
Mutato nomine, it is all the same.
Don't the barristers' wives talk about Circuit?
Don't the soldiers' ladies gossip about the Regiment?
Don't the clergymen's ladies discourse about Sunday-schools and who takes whose duty?
Don't the very greatest ladies of all talk about that small clique of persons to whom they belong?
And why should our Indian friends not have their own conversation?--only I admit it is slow for the laymen whose fate it sometimes is to sit by and listen.
Before long Emmy had a visiting-book, and was driving about regularly in a carriage, calling upon Lady Bludyer (wife of Major-General Sir Roger Bludyer, K.C.B., Bengal Army); Lady Huff, wife of Sir G. Huff, Bombay ditto; Mrs. Pice, the Lady of Pice the Director, &c.
We are not long in using ourselves to changes in life.
That carriage came round to Gillespie Street every day; that buttony boy sprang up and down from the box with Emmy's and Jos's visiting-cards; at stated hours Emmy and the carriage went for Jos to the Club and took him an airing; or, putting old Sedley into the vehicle, she drove the old man round the Regent's Park.
The lady's maid and the chariot, the visiting-book and the buttony page, became soon as familiar to Amelia as the humble routine of Brompton.
She accommodated herself to one as to the other.
If Fate had ordained that she should be a Duchess, she would even have done that duty too.
She was voted, in Jos's female society, rather a pleasing young person--not much in her, but pleasing, and that sort of thing.
The men, as usual, liked her artless kindness and simple refined demeanour.
The gallant young Indian dandies at home on furlough--immense dandies these--chained and moustached--driving in tearing cabs, the pillars of the theatres, living at West End hotels--nevertheless admired Mrs. Osborne, liked to bow to her carriage in the park, and to be admitted to have the honour of paying her a morning visit.
Swankey of the Body Guard himself, that dangerous youth, and the greatest buck of all the Indian army now on leave, was one day discovered by Major Dobbin tete-a-tete with Amelia, and describing the sport of pig-sticking to her with great humour and eloquence; and he spoke afterwards of a d--d king's officer that's always hanging about the house--a long, thin, queer-looking, oldish fellow--a dry fellow though, that took the shine out of a man in the talking line.