"I have a present for you, too, Jo," said Dan, producing a Bible.
Joshua opened it, and read on the first page, "From Dan, to his dearest friend and brother, Joshua. With undying love and confidence."
"With undying love and confidence," mused Joshua. "Nothing could ever change our friendship, Dan, could it?"
"Nothing, Jo."
"Come, now," said Joshua, "suppose, for the sake of argument, that I was to turn out bad."
Dan smiled. "That couldn't happen, Jo."
Thereupon Joshua told Dan the adventure he had had that day with Susan and the Lascar. "And, do you know, Dan, when I knocked him down, and saw his mouth bleeding. I was glad--savagely glad, I am sorry to say. Yet afterwards when I thought of it, and when I think of it now, it seems as if it was a bad feeling that possessed me."
"It doesn't seem so to me, Jo; it gives me greater confidence in you. If you had not acted so, what would have become of poor Susan?"
"That's true," said Joshua.
"I knew all along, Jo dear, that you were loving and tender and good, but I did not know until now that you were so bold and brave. And so strong too! I am proud of you. You can't tell what may happen. Think of this strange new world you are going to now, Jo, and of the strange things the Old Sailor has told us of it. You have no more idea of the wonders you will see than I have. But you will see them, and I shall see them through you. Listen now to me, Jo. I love you, my dearest friend and brother, and you have my undying love and confidence. I, a poor helpless cripple, had no future of my own; and you have given me one. I live in you. I shall follow you in my thoughts, in my dreams. Somehow, Jo, our minds have grown together, and I smile at your words that you might turn out bad. Could you believe it of me, if I was strong like you even?"