Violet saw that there was no use urging her about the money. The wound in her heart was mortal. She remained a few days at Golden Willows, until Judge Camden was out of danger, then returned to her home in Washington. A few weeks later her mother died, and she carried out her vow of entering a convent. The wonderful beauty that had proved her ruin was hidden beneath the black vail of the nun. When Violet donned the misty vail to become the adored bride of the man she worshiped, Lena Lavarre had already spoken the solemn vows that made her the pious bride of Heaven. After Violet had held that conversation with Cecil, she said to him: “I wish you to take me to see Amber. Although she has sinned against me, I forgive her, because I am so very happy; and I pity her for the jealous love that made her cruel and wicked.” “I will take you to the cottage. My mother is already there,” replied Cecil. Violet went to her grandfather. “I am going to see Amber. You must send her your forgiveness,” she pleaded. He demurred at first, but he could not refuse anything to Violet, who had forgiven so much to him; so he agreed that he would forgive Amber’s sins, and let her come home if she recovered. But the next day Amber came home to Golden Willows in her coffin. When Cecil and Violet reached the cottage, the beautiful sinner who had risked and lost all for the sake of a mad love, had just expired, without ever fully regaining consciousness. Violet kissed the poor, dead face, whose beauty was all marred by that ghastly scar, and wept bitterly on Mrs. Grant’s motherly breast. She had hoped so much that Amber would get well and repent, but it was not to be. The fiery heart and burning brain were stilled forever. So they robed her in snowy white, with flowers on her pulseless breast, and bore her back to her old home, and the secret of her sins was hidden in sacred silence in the breasts of the few that knew them. A few days later she had a stately funeral, and was laid to rest in the family grave-yard, under the whirling winter snow. The whole county mourned for beautiful Amber, who had come to so untimely an end, and the broken marble shaft that rose above her dreamless head, told no secrets of the wayward heart and mind that had driven her into sin and brought her to death. Judge Camden was deeply moved when he heard the story of Mrs. Grant’s attendance at Amber’s death-bed. He realized that she was not the proud, heartless woman he had imagined, and thanked her, in a brief, grateful note, for her friendship for his dead granddaughter. She replied by telling how Amber had saved Bonnycastle, and then he understood everything--how terribly the girl had fought for victory in all her aims. He always tried to believe that Amber had made some terrible mistake when she placed the arsenic in his glass. “She thought it was a sleeping potion, I am sure,” he said to gentle Mrs. Shirley, who sighed, without replying.