When I went into the other room, dinner being over at last, I found a letter lying on the table addressed in a neat hand to Mr. and Mrs. Goode Shepherd, and, knowing it was public, I opened and read a well-worded note of regret from my grandmother. As she could not write I knew what Jo meant when he said I would that day detect him in a mean action; he had written it himself. * * * * * In order to avoid the leave-taking, and because I was uncomfortable at the Shepherds’ house, I drove over to the mill with Agnes in the middle of the afternoon, where we spent several hours in putting the house in order for the coming of Jo and Mateel. I had not been in the house since it was remodelled, and was pleasantly surprised at its arrangement. The old house had but two rooms, but Jo had added two others, and furnished them neatly and comfortably and in good taste. The room in front was transformed into a pretty parlor, and opening off this was a sleeping apartment. The old kitchen remained, but I would not have known it, so great was the change, and adjoining it, and connecting with the parlor, was a dining-room, which completed the number Agnes admired the house as much as I did, and complimented Jo so much that I regretted I had not expended my energies on one like it. I think I resolved to look about when I returned to town for an old house, and fit it up by degrees, but I have no doubt I forgot it entirely within an hour. The mill had been completed a month before, and had been in successful operation since. I can only remember now that it was a very good one for that day, and that it was an improvement on the one belonging to Damon Barker, for its machinery was of late and improved make. Jo had never told me, but I believed he was greatly in debt, for in addition to the amount due on the machinery he had rebuilt and furnished the house where he was to live, therefore I was not surprised to find the mill in full operation in charge of his assistant, as that was a busy season. Agnes and I went through it after we had finished at the house, from the great wheels in the cellar to the small ones in the roof, and complimented Jo so much that his ears certainly tingled.