inquished. Everything else has gone from me, little by little, but I
have kept this. It was the subject of the only determined resistance I
made in all the wretched years."

"Is it to be built on?"

"At last, it is. I came here to take leave of it before its change. And
you," she said, in a voice of touching interest to a wanderer,--"you
live abroad still?"

"Still."

"And do well, I am sure?"

"I work pretty hard for a sufficient living, and therefore--yes, I do
well."

"I have often thought of you," said Estella.

"Have you?"

"Of late, very often. There was a long hard time when I kept far from me
the remembrance of what I had thrown away when I was quite ignorant
of its worth. But since my duty has not been incompatible with the
admission of that remembrance, I have given it a place in my heart."

"You have always held your place in my heart," I answered.

And we were silent again until she spoke.

"I little thought," said Estella, "that I should take leave of you in
taking leave of this spot. I am very glad to do so."

"Glad to part again, Estella? To me, parting is a painful thing. To me,
the remembrance of our last parting has been ever mournful and painful."

"But you said to me," returned Estella, very earnestly, "'God bless you,
God forgive you!' And if you could say that to me then, you will not
hesitate to say that to me now,--now, when suffering has been stronger
than all other teaching, and has taught me to understand what your heart
used to be. I have been bent and broken, but--I hope--into a better
shape. Be as considerate and good to me as you were, and tell me we are
friends."

"We are friends," said I, rising and bending over her, as she rose from
the bench.

"And will continue friends apart," said Estella.

I took her hand in mine, and we went out of the ruined place; and, as
the morning mists had risen long ago when I first left the forge, so the
evening mists were rising now, and in all the broad expanse of tranquil
light they showed to me, I saw no shadow of another parting from her.

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