as for
her eyes, of course they were at their work.

But William could hold no more. "Amelia, Amelia," he said, "I did buy
it for you. I loved you then as I do now. I must tell you. I think I
loved you from the first minute that I saw you, when George brought me
to your house, to show me the Amelia whom he was engaged to. You were
but a girl, in white, with large ringlets; you came down singing--do
you remember?--and we went to Vauxhall. Since then I have thought of
but one woman in the world, and that was you. I think there is no hour
in the day has passed for twelve years that I haven't thought of you.
I came to tell you this before I went to India, but you did not care,
and I hadn't the heart to speak. You did not care whether I stayed or
went."

"I was very ungrateful," Amelia said.

"No, only indifferent," Dobbin continued desperately. "I have nothing
to make a woman to be otherwise. I know what you are feeling now. You
are hurt in your heart at the discovery about the piano, and that it
came from me and not from George. I forgot, or I should never have
spoken of it so. It is for me to ask your pardon for being a fool for
a moment, and thinking that years of constancy and devotion might have
pleaded with you."

"It is you who are cruel now," Amelia said with some spirit. "George is
my husband, here and in heaven. How could I love any other but him? I
am his now as when you first saw me, dear William. It was he who told
me how good and generous you were, and who taught me to love you as a
brother. Have you not been everything to me and my boy? Our dearest,
truest, kindest friend and protector? Had you come a few months sooner
perhaps you might have spared me that--that dreadful parting. Oh, it
nearly killed me, William--but you didn't come, though I wished and
prayed for you to come, and they took him too away from me. Isn't he a
noble boy, William? Be his friend still and mine"--and here her voice
broke, and she hid her face on his shoulder.

The Major folded his arms round her, holding her to him as if she was a
child, and kissed her head. "I will not change, dear Amelia," he said.
"I ask for no more than your love. I think I would not have it
otherwise. Only let me stay near you and see you often."

"Yes, often," Amelia said. And so William was at liberty to look and
long--as the poor boy at school who has no money may sigh after the
contents of the tart-woman's tray.

CHAPTER LX