Two fair arms closed tenderly round his neck as he stooped down. “I am awake, George,” the poor child said, with a sob fit to break the little heart that nestled so closely by his own. She was awake, poor soul, and to what? At that moment a bugle from the Place of Arms began sounding clearly, and was taken up through the town; and amidst the drums of the infantry, and the shrill pipes of the Scotch, the whole city awoke.

Thus all the superior officers being summoned on duty elsewhere, Jos Sedley was left in command of the little colony at Brussels.

The following days were the grave ones. Only Rebecca had the heart to proceed with her affairs of flirting with Jos and searching for new sources of income. Darkness came down on the field and city: and Amelia was praying for George, who was lying on his face, dead, with a bullet through his heart.

The news which that famous Gazette brought to the Osbornes gave a dreadful shock to the family and its chief. The girls indulged unrestrained in their grief. The gloom-stricken old father was full of sorrow. Sometimes a shuddering terror struck him, as if he had been the author of the doom which he had called down on his son. There was a chance before of reconciliation. The boy’s wife might have died; or he might have come back and said, Father I have sinned. But there was no hope now. And it is hard to say which pang it was that tore the proud father’s heart most keenly – that his son should have gone out of the reach of his forgiveness, or that the apology which his own pride expected should have escaped him.

About three weeks after the 18th of June, Mr. Osborne’s acquaintance, Sir William Dobbin, called at Mr. Osborne’s house in Russell Square, with a very pale and agitated face, and insisted upon seeing that gentleman. He took out a letter sealed with a large red seal. “My son, Major Dobbin,” the Alderman said, with some hesitation, “dispatched me a letter by an officer. My son’s letter contains one for you, Osborne.” The Alderman placed the letter on the table, and Osborne stared at him for a moment or two in silence.

The poor boy’s letter did not say much. He had been too proud to acknowledge the tenderness which his heart felt. He only said, that on the eve of a great battle, he wished to bid his father farewell, and solemnly to implore his good offices for the wife – it might be for the child – whom he left behind him. He thanked his father for his former generous conduct; and he promised him that if he fell on the field or survived it, he would act in a manner worthy of the name of George Osborne. His English habit, pride, awkwardness perhaps, had prevented him from saying more. His father could not see the kiss George had placed on his letter. Mr. Osborne dropped it with the bitterest, deadliest pang of affection and revenge. His son was still beloved and unforgiven.

If the sisters had any anxiety regarding the possible recognition of Amelia as a daughter of the family, it was increased presently, and towards the end of the autumn, by their father’s announcement that he was going abroad. He did not say whither, but they knew at once that his steps would be turned towards Belgium, and were aware that George’s widow was still in Brussels.

As after the drive to Waterloo, Mr. Osborne’s carriage was nearing the gates of the city at sunset, they met another one with a couple of ladies and a gentleman, and by the side of which an officer was riding.

It was Amelia but how changed from the fresh and comely girl Osborne knew. Her face was white and thin. Her pretty brown hair was parted under a widow’s cap – the poor child. Her eyes were fixed, and looking nowhere. They stared blank in the face of Osborne, as the carriages crossed each other, but she did not know him; nor did he recognize her, until looking up, he saw Dobbin riding by her: and then he knew who it was. He hated her. He did not know how much until he saw her there.