Moreover, Mrs. Lyte's death-bed had not been without its softening and salutary effect upon her mind, also. Although she had fallen, for a time, into that saddest of all infidelities--a distrust of God's goodness to His children--the last lovely moments of her mother's life, the last grateful, joyous words from her mother's lips, and the still brightness of her mother's dead face, had set her feet--for a little while at least--on those Heights of Contemplation, whence life is seen to be good and valuable, not for what it is, but for what it shapes out; not for the materials that it heaps together, or the tools that it uses, but for the character which it moulds unto perfection, the soul which it slowly chisels into beauty and dignity and strength. So viewed, these last months of adversity became but the fine, finishing touches of the Master's hand, to Mrs. Lyte's already lovely spirit, and Major Bergan but one of the blind, necessary instruments, operating better than he knew or willed. And come what would, Astra could nevermore forget that broad view of the real work and object of life's events; faith would ever after be easier for those moments of clear sight. She came back from her mother's grave with a bereaved heart, but with a spirit more at rest than it had been for many months; and her face wore the same expression of gentle, sweet resignation, which had been the prevailing characteristic of her mother's for years. She came back--but not to the dingy little house, nor the desolate rooms, and certainly not to the straitened circumstances. Miss Thane had taken Bergan into her confidence, on the day before, and asked the favor of his superintendence of certain final steps toward the accomplishment of a plan that she had conceived and partly executed. Money and good-will, working together, usually achieve wonders in comparatively short space of time; as the result of their present cooperation, Astra was set down at Miss Thane's door on her return from Berganton, late at night, and ushered into a suite of rooms, opposite Diva's own, handsomely fitted up for the accommodation of herself and Cathie. One was a studio, to which all her own pictures, statues, and other artistic belongings had been carefully transferred, and skilfully arranged to produce an accustomed and home-like effect. Another was a pleasant little parlor, with her books and her work-basket on the centre-table, to lend it a familiar grace; and in the bedroom beyond, her faithful old Chloe was waiting, with joyful tears in her eyes, to welcome and to attend upon her. Astra turned to her cousin, and tried to speak; but the too heavily freighted words were slow in coming forth, and Diva anticipated them by taking both her hands in hers, and saying gently;--