She knew not how long a time went by thus; it seemed to her to stretch its slow length over an age. But it is a merciful provision that acute sorrow soon exhausts itself. The mind, like the body, has beneficent limits to its power of endurance. In due time, Astra exchanged the anguish of wretchedness for its torpor. Her sobs died away, the convulsive trembling of her frame ceased, she sat up and looked around her with a face of quiet misery. Perhaps it was a little hard, too. Her pride was coming to her aid in bearing the burden for which, she told herself, she was largely accountable, and must therefore struggle along with as best she could. It was miraculously heavy, it would tax all her strength and resolution, she saw that plainly enough; but she forgot to look into it for any sign of divine origin, or promise of divine help. The baleful effect of Doctor Remy's influence still followed her, making God an overhanging Law, instead of a surrounding Love. She could not even read aright the lesson of her own fragments of clay!
She was struggling up to her feet, when Mrs. Lyte hurriedly entered, holding an open letter in her hand, and looking both frightened and bewildered. Perhaps nothing could have been better for either mother or daughter, at that moment, than to see the other's troubled face. In both countenances, there was a quick change of expression,—something of sorrow and anxiety gone, something of loving sympathy in its place,—as each uttered the eager inquiry;—
"What is the matter?"
Fortunately, Astra was not obliged to answer. Mrs. Lyte instantly discovered the fallen statue, and connected it, though not without a degree of surprise, with her daughter's woe-begone face. For Astra had been wont to bear disaster with more fortitude! Still, this was the largest work that she had yet undertaken; besides, she had seemed so far from well, of late! Mrs. Lyte's heart thrilled with motherly sympathy.
"I am so sorry!" she said, pityingly. "Is it an utter ruin?"
"Utter," replied Astra, with dreary emphasis. "But never mind about it now. What has happened to distress you?"
Mrs. Lyte put the letter into Astra's hand. "Read that," said she, "and see what you can make of it."
It was not without difficulty, under the pressure of her own misery, that Astra made herself comprehend the purport of the document before her, through the disguise of the legal terms wherein it had duly been couched by the lawyer employed by Major Bergan. With enlightenment, however, strange to say, came a quick sense of relief. Here, at least, was a necessity for action; and the trouble which is attended by that, is never so great as one which calls only for patient endurance. Besides, how glad would she be to leave Berganton at this juncture, to escape at once from its curiosity, its sympathy, or its censure, to be spared the pain of meeting Doctor Remy's altered face, and the irksomeness of going on with the old life, in the old scene, after it had lost all the old color and substance. Her face brightened so much, as she looked up from the letter, that Mrs. Lyte gave a sigh of relief.
"Then it is not so bad as I thought," said she.
Astra's heart smote her for her selfishness. She reflected what grief it would cause her mother to be thrust out from the home endeared to her by so many and sacred associations. Her face fell, and her heart sank again. Covering her eyes with her hands, she burst into a sudden passion of tears,—a softer agony than had shaken her before, but still so plainly an agony disproportionate to the occasion, that Mrs. Lyte's eyes suddenly opened to the perception of some hitherto unsuspected sorrow. She put her arms round her daughter, and drew her head on to her bosom, as in the days of her childhood.