He recovered, and the young Countess, in the first bloom of her youth, entered the convent north of and near Blankenburg, where now two large lindens stand close by the bleaching-place.
The maiden obeyed her father's command with a heavy heart, for a young knight contested with heaven his claim on the bride; and however much the novice knelt before the altar in burning tears and hand-wringing, and besought heavenly aid in renouncing all she had hitherto held dear, still her thoughts would wander beyond the dark convent walls and lonely cell to her lover. Nobis pacem only awakened a more bitter pain, and the Ave, the Laudamus, the Gloria, and all the Penitential Psalms only called up his image before her soul.
Lindor was not less unhappy; in vain he sought to approach his Braut, wandered round and round the convent walls, climbed the trees, and watched to catch a glimpse of her, all in vain. The Abbess knew of the love of the young novice, and watched her with Argus eyes, not out of holy zeal, for the convent had long been ill-renowned for the impure life of its inmates, but out of hatred to the maiden whose father she had loved, but with an unrequited affection. She rejoiced in the deep sorrow of the daughter of the now hated Earl, whose pure, pious, unsoiled character enraged her still more, in striking contrast to her own depravity and corruption. One day the sorrowing novice, unhappily, by accident discovered how unworthily the Abbess filled her sacred office, and how great the immorality of the nuns had become, and the Abbess, to render Lina powerless to injure her, resolved to destroy her.
She called together those nuns who were in her full confidence, represented to them how they had to fear betrayal from the novice Lina, and to defend themselves they must destroy her.
This would be most easily accomplished by permitting a meeting with her lover after she had assumed the veil, surprise her, accuse her of breaking her vow, and then wall her up alive.
The reprobates approved of this diabolical plan, and as soon as Lina's novitiate was ended, and she had taken the final vows, they embraced the first opportunity, when Lindor was seen in the convent grounds, by giving Lina permission to walk in the garden.
It was a sultry Saturday evening, the sun had set, and had left, instead of a golden twilight, only a grey, cloudy veil, which, increased by the mountain mists, spread gradually over the entire heavens, proclaiming a coming thunder-storm.
Lina, although she had long languished for fresh air, found no relief. She glanced toward heaven, but both moon and stars were hidden behind the dark clouds; the flowers hung sadly their drooping heads, as if in sympathy with the maiden doomed to a convent life. She sat down much shaken on a seat of turf shaded by two lindens, and the tears streamed from her eyes. Suddenly she felt herself embraced. A cry of delighted surprise escaped her, for it was Lindor, her beloved. All sorrow and pain were forgotten in the bliss of the meeting, and Lindor kissed the tears from her burning cheeks.
A blissful moment the lovers embraced each other; then came a feeling of duty, of assumed vows before the soul of the bride of heaven like a fiend of darkness. She tore herself from his arms.
"Lindor! Lindor!" she moaned, "I am lost to thee; our embrace is sin! O God! God of Love! have mercy on the sinner! Lindor! Lindor! have thou also pity! Leave me."