In the meantime Frau Belier had hastened to the Stift Neuburg, and the news she brought caused not a little consternation to the Abbess as she sat in her dreary little room. "I shall immediately see the Kurfürst," said the old lady. "His grace will believe, that I know as well as this lewd Magistrate, whether a maiden who till lately was under the protection of these holy walls, is a child of light or espoused to the Devil. Oh! these _exercitia_, these _exercitia_," she added sighing, "they were the cause of all this misery."
A carriage was quickly harnessed and the good lady hurried together with the exiled Huguenot to the Castle as fast as the horses could gallop. "A rare visit, my Lady Cousin," greeted the Prince looking in astonishment at the two ladies. Quickly and earnestly did the Abbess explain the motives of her visit, and related what she herself had heard as the cause of Lydia's arrest. With a correct instinct she ascribed Lydia's adventure by night to the assignation made by Laurenzano, for the country people had immediately reported to the eagerly listening nuns the event which had taken place on the Kreuzgrund. The Kurfürst listened attentively. "That is a nice sort of fellow, that Pigavetta has brought into my dominions; but how did you come to know that he had a love affair with Erastus' daughter."
The Countess hesitated. But remembering that nothing less than the life of her darling pupil was at stake, she proceeded tremblingly and repentingly with her account of the dreadful _exercitia_ which had led her to find out Paul's sentiments towards Klytia, and she exposed the false Priest all the more as she suspected that he himself had forged this accusation against Lydia, to revenge his unrequited love. "I never gazed into a blacker soul," she said shudderingly.
"In other words, my Lady Cousin," replied the Kurfürst angrily, "a punishment is once more being inflicted on you and others for having turned your Institution into a refuge for Papists. What has been reported to me is then true; you permitted this black traitor to perform secret masses."
The Countess remained silent and looked down confused. The Kurfürst Frederic, enraged at this discovery was about to dismiss the two petitioners without another word, had not Frau Belier, whose husband he knew to be a stern Huguenot, beseeched him most affectingly, not to permit the poor imprisoned Lydia to suffer for the sins of the wolf in sheep's clothing, he therefore added he that he would order the Amtmann to report to him.