Now what DO you think I have come for?'

Mr. Pickwick put this question as though he were persuaded that it
was morally impossible that I could by any means divine the deep
purpose of his visit, and that it must be hidden from all human
ken. Therefore, although I was rejoiced to think that I had
anticipated his drift, I feigned to be quite ignorant of it, and
after a brief consideration shook my head despairingly.

'What should you say,' said Mr. Pickwick, laying the forefinger of
his left hand upon my coat-sleeve, and looking at me with his head
thrown back, and a little on one side, - 'what should you say if I
confessed that after reading your account of yourself and your
little society, I had come here, a humble candidate for one of
those empty chairs?'

'I should say,' I returned, 'that I know of only one circumstance
which could still further endear that little society to me, and
that would be the associating with it my old friend, - for you must
let me call you so, - my old friend, Mr. Pickwick.'

As I made him this answer every feature of Mr. Pickwick's face
fused itself into one all-pervading expression of delight. After
shaking me heartily by both hands at once, he patted me gently on
the back, and then - I well understood why - coloured up to the
eyes, and hoped with great earnestness of manner that he had not
hurt me.

If he had, I would have been content that he should have repeated
the offence a hundred times rather than suppose so; but as he had