It is not to be doubted but Louisa gave her all the assurances she could desire of an inviolable secrecy; after which, know then, resumed this sweet-condition’d lady, that your lover, monsieur du Plessis, is not only living, but as faithful as your soul can wish, or as you once believed:—­the cruelty of the abbess, and some of the sisterhood in the plot with her, have concealed the letters he has sent to you, in order to persuade you to become a nun:—­I tremble to think of their hypocrisy and deceit:—­but what, continued she, is not to be expected from bigotry and enthusiasm!—­To increase the number of devotees they scruple nothing, and vainly imagine the means is sanctified by the end.

Little is it in the power of words to express the astonishment Louisa was in to hear her speak in this manner; but as she had no room to doubt her sincerity, only asked by what means she had attained the knowledge of what the persons concerned, no doubt, intended to keep as much a secret as possible; on which the other satisfied her curiosity in these terms: 

To confess the truth to you, said she, I stole this afternoon into the chapel, in order to read a little book brought me the other day by one of my friends; as it treated on a subject not allowable in a convent, I thought that the most proper place to entertain myself with it; and was sitting down in one of the confessionals, when hearing the little door open from the gallery, I saw the abbess and sister Clara, who, you know, is her favourite and confidant, come in together, and as soon as they were entered, shut the door after them.  I cannot say I had any curiosity to hear their discourse; but fearing to be suspected by them in my amusement, and not knowing what excuse to make for being there, if I were seen, I slid down, and lay close at the bottom of the confessional.  They happened to place themselves very near me; and the abbess taking a letter out of her pocket, bad Clara read it, and tell her the substance of it as well as she could.  I found it was in French, by some words which she was obliged to repeat over and over, before, not perfectly understanding the language, she could be able to find a proper interpretation of.  The abbess, who has a little smattering of it herself, sometimes helped her out, and between them both I soon found it came from monsieur du Plessis, and contained the most tender and compassionate complaint of your unkindness in not answering his letter;—­that the symptoms he had of approaching death were not half so severe to him as your refusing him a consolation he stood for much in need of;—­that if you found him unworthy of your love, he was certainly so of your compassion; and concluded with the most earnest entreaty, you would suffer him to continue no longer in a suspence more cruel than a thousand deaths could be.

Oh heaven! cried Louisa, bursting into tears, how ungrateful must he think me, and how can I return, as it deserves, so unexampled a constancy, after such seeming proofs of my infidelity!—.  Cruel, cruel, treacherous abbess! pursued she; Is this the fruits of all your boasted sanctity!—­This the return to the confidence the generous du Plessis reposed in you!—­This your love and friendship to me!—­Does heaven, to increase the number of its votaries, require you to be false, perfidious, and injurious to the world!