freshed and stronger yet, I was full of
my resolution to tell Joe all, without delay. I would tell him before
breakfast. I would dress at once and go to his room and surprise him;
for, it was the first day I had been up early. I went to his room, and
he was not there. Not only was he not there, but his box was gone.

I hurried then to the breakfast-table, and on it found a letter. These
were its brief contents:--

"Not wishful to intrude I have departured fur you are well again dear
Pip and will do better without JO.

"P.S. Ever the best of friends."

Enclosed in the letter was a receipt for the debt and costs on which I
had been arrested. Down to that moment, I had vainly supposed that my
creditor had withdrawn, or suspended proceedings until I should be quite
recovered. I had never dreamed of Joe's having paid the money; but Joe
had paid it, and the receipt was in his name.

What remained for me now, but to follow him to the dear old forge, and
there to have out my disclosure to him, and my penitent remonstrance
with him, and there to relieve my mind and heart of that reserved
Secondly, which had begun as a vague something lingering in my thoughts,
and had formed into a settled purpose?

The purpose was, that I would go to Biddy, that I would show her how
humbled and repentant I came back, that I would tell her how I had lost
all I once hoped for, that I would remind her of our old confidences in
my first unhappy time. Then I would say to her, "Biddy, I think you once
liked me very well, when my errant heart, even while it strayed away
from you, was quieter and better with you than it ever has been since.
If you can like me only half as well once more, if you can take me with
all my faults and disappointments on my head, if you can receive me like
a forgiven child (and indeed I am as sorry, Biddy, and have as much need
of a hushing voice and a soothing hand), I hope I am a little worthier
of you that I was,--not much, but a little. And, Biddy, it shall rest
with you to say whether I shall work at the forge with Joe, or whether I
shall try for any different occupation down in this country, or whether
we shall go away to a distant place where an opportunity awaits me which
I set aside, when it was offered, until I knew your answer. And now,
dear Biddy, if you can tell me that you will go through the world with
me, you will surely make it a better world for me, and me a better man
for it, and I will try hard to mak