A Princess Prays Read online

  She wanted to see him and be with him as they had been last night.

  Lamos had laid their breakfast out in the same place where they had eaten dinner and as Attila walked over she saw Gesa come round the corner of the carriage.

  She waited for him and when he reached her it was impossible to do anything but gaze into each others’ eyes.

  “You are even lovelier,” he sighed, “than you were last night.”

  Attila slipped her hands into his, unable to find any words to express her feelings.

  They sat down and Kilkos came hurrying over with their breakfast that Lamos had just cooked for them.

  Attila did not want to eat, but she made a supreme effort feeling that this, like everything that had happened, was a moment she really wanted to remember and savour in every detail.

  Gesa did not speak but kept looking at her.

  “Are we going riding?” she asked.

  “It is what I would like to do, Lala, but at the same time I think it is more important for us to settle with your family when our marriage can take place.”

  The way he spoke made Attila feel as if her heart was turning a dozen somersaults.

  Then the myriad difficulties and problems waiting ahead for them seemed to rise up in front of her like a huge black cloud.

  “Must we go so soon?” she asked him pleadingly.

  “You know, Lala, that I want to stay here forever and you know I want to be by your side for always. How could I want anything else? But as we are both aware there are sure to be obstacles ahead and the sooner we face them the better.”

  Attila wondered what his difficulties would be.

  She felt that they could not compare with hers.

  She wondered desperately whether it would be best to tell him now what was waiting for her at the Palace.

  Or should she let him find out for himself when he met her father?

  She could not risk losing these last few moments of happiness with Gesa and it would mean bringing up such a controversial subject that they could both be torn apart by it.

  “I will do whatever you want,” she told him in a low voice. “At the same time it is so lovely and beautiful here.”

  She looked out over the grassland as she spoke and a large flock of birds rose into the sky, which she knew the peasants would think a good omen.

  She prayed that was what it would be for her.

  “Nothing could be more beautiful than you,” Gesa was saying. “I still find it hard to believe you are real.”

  Attila turned her face to look at him.

  “I want to kiss you!” he exclaimed. “God knows I want to kiss you again as I did last night. But I think we must settle this matter of our marriage at once because I cannot wait for you without feeling I am going mad!”

  ‘I must tell him that there will be great difficulties ahead for us,’ Attila said to herself.

  But she could not find the words.

  Gesa pushed aside his plate.

  “Come, I am feeling just like you. I can read your thoughts so I know that we both have to face the music. We will face it together and I will tell you one thing; under no circumstance will I give you up. You are mine, you are part of me and I have no wish to go on living without you.”

  He said the words firmly and distinctly, almost as if he was not only addressing Attila but a large audience.

  Then before she could even move, he turned and walked away, whistling, as he did so, for Zeus.

  The stallion came trotting up to him and Attila went back to the carriage.

  Lamos had the horses between the shafts and she walked to his side and said to him in a low voice,

  “Listen to me, Lamos!”

  “I am listening,” he answered.

  “We are now going back to Valdina and I want you to take us to Father Jozsef’s house. I am intending to leave Mr. Gesa with you there while I go and see my father.”

  She glanced back to see if he was approaching.

  “Mr. Gesa has no idea who I am and you are still not to tell him.”

  “I’ll keep my mouth shut and so will Kilkos.”

  “I shall not be away for long, but he is not to know where I have gone. I have to see His Majesty alone first.”

  “I understand,” said Lamos. “Leave the gentleman to us. We will make him comfortable.”

  “Thank you, Lamos. I knew you would help me.”

  Attila whistled for Samson who came galloping to her at once. She felt he knew he was going home, back to his own stable, and was looking forward to it.

  Lamos saddled and bridled him and Attila collected a few items she had left inside the carriage.

  When she went back to Samson, Gesa was already mounted on Zeus who was behaving rather obstreperously.

  Lamos helped Attila onto the saddle, hurried back to the carriage and climbed up onto the box.

  As Attila joined Gesa, their horses both broke into a gallop and they rode off together over the grassland leaving the carriage moving slowly along the river bank.

  They had gone quite far before the horses slowed to a trot.

  Then Gesa enquired playfully,

  “Has that blown away the cobwebs?”

  “I felt as if we were galloping to the very end of the world!” answered Attila.

  “That is just what I intend to do with you,” he said. “When we are married we are going to explore all the places that fascinate us both. Anything I do with you will be more thrilling and more exciting than anything I have ever done before in my life.”

  “How can you be so sure of that?” asked Attila.

  “I think you already know the answer. I am convinced that we have met before and been together in many, many lives. Our souls know each other. I knew when I left you last night that we will be married in no more than two or three days!”

  Attila gave a little cry.

  “No one could be married as quickly as that!”

  “Except us! You will find out, my lovely one, that when I want something as desperately as I want you, I always get my own way.”

  “That is just what I want you to have,” murmured Attila.

  But she was still frightened.

  They turned back towards the carriage, which was only a dot in the distance, but it did not take them long to reach it.

  Now Attila could see the first towers and spires of the City of Valdina and as they journeyed on they passed one or two peasants’ cottages.

  The mountains on the other side of the river were very familiar – she had climbed them all with her father.

  As they drove nearer still to the Palace she felt her heart soar. There was the high peak she could see from her bedroom, which had always been a symbol of inspiration to her.

  When she had been a little girl her mother had said,

  “You must always strive in life to reach the top of the mountain and not be content with sitting at the bottom.”

  At the time she could not quite understand what her mother meant.

  As she grew older she realised that, as Father Jozsef had once said, she must raise her eyes to the stars.

  “If you seek the best in life,” he told her, “then you must look up towards the sky. For that is where we believe Heaven to be and which gives us the inspiration we need because we live on earth.”

  She thought now of all the things she had desired in her life, some of which she had already attained.

  What she wanted now was not only more important but greater and so high that it was almost out of her reach.

  Gesa had spoken very little since they had turned their horses towards Valdina and she thought that perhaps he was praying, as she was, that everything would turn out for the best and that they really could marry each other as soon as possible.

  She looked up at the peak of the mountain.

  ‘Am I asking too much?’ she sighed from her heart.

  Then as she prayed the sunshine seemed to glitter for a moment on the peak.

  She felt it
was an answer to the one question that seemed to consume her.

  It took them a little less than two more hours to reach the outskirts of the City.

  Lamos turned his horses towards the little valley in which Father Jozsef’s small house was situated.

  When it first came into sight with the spire of the Chapel rising above it, Gesa spoke after what had seemed a long silence.

  “Is that your house?” he enquired.

  Attila shook her head.

  “No, it belongs to Father Jozsef who, as you know, died when I was at the Shrine.”

  “Why are we going there?”

  Attila felt herself trembling because what lay ahead was going to be so very difficult.

  “I want you to stay in Father Jozsef’s house, while I go first to speak to my father.”

  “Do you live nearby?”

  “Just a short distance, which will not take me long,” replied Attila.

  She swallowed and went on,

  “I want first to tell Papa that Father Jozsef has died and second how kind you have been in bringing me home. It might have been much more difficult if I had been alone with the servants.”

  She thought what she was saying sounded sensible and it would be difficult for Gesa to refute it.

  She sensed that he was debating whether he would insist on accompanying her to her father.

  Then he said,

  “Very well, my darling, if that is what you want to do. But do not be long and if you disappear back into the Heaven from which you have just come, you can be quite certain I will follow you!”

  “I am certainly not going to disappear. I want to be with you. Oh, Gesa I love you, you know that. But – there may be – difficulties.”

  She stumbled over the last few words and Gesa said almost fiercely,

  “Whatever they are and however impossible they may seem, we will surmount them.”

  He paused for a moment before he continued,

  “We also have the real answer to anyone who tries to prevent our marriage.”

  “What is that?” asked Attila wide-eyed.

  “It is quite simple. We love each other and it is a love which is unconquerable and irresistible. No one shall take it from us.”

  Attila put out her hand towards him.

  “That is just what I feel and what I too believe. Oh, Gesa, I am praying to Father Jozsef and to God to help us.”

  Gesa reached out and touched her hand.

  Their horses were too far apart for him to kiss her as she longed for him to do.

  They rode on and a few moments later Lamos drew the carriage up outside the door of Father Jozsef’s small but very attractive house.

  Gesa’s eyes were twinkling when he looked at it.

  “I am sure it is really a doll’s house, or perhaps a Fairy Palace which will disappear when we touch it!”

  “It is very real, Gesa, dear Father Jozsef has given people who call on him such happiness that you will find the atmosphere inside will make you feel that there are no troubles, no difficulties and no danger ahead of us.”

  “That is just what I wish to believe, my precious one.”

  They dismounted and left the horses with Kilkos.

  Then they walked up the steps to the front door.

  Lamos had given Attila the key and she opened it and they went straight into the small sitting room.

  It was where Father Jozsef had always welcomed his guests and Attila felt for a moment as if he was waiting for her.

  Gesa followed into the room looking, she thought, rather tall in the low-ceilinged room.

  “I can quite understand your Father Jozsef being so happy here. In fact you are quite right, my darling, I can feel all the holiness and peace he gave to so many people in the atmosphere.”

  “I knew you would understand,” Attila murmured.

  “Of course I do. Have you not realised by this time that because we belong to each other, our feelings are the same as are our brains?”

  As he looked back and realised they were alone he put his arms round Attila.

  “You are mine, my darling,” he asserted fiercely. “Mine completely. Whatever troubles may lie ahead of us we are together and we will never lose each other.”

  Then he was kissing her, kissing her as he had last night.

  His lips met hers first gently then as her body seemed to melt into his, possessively and passionately.

  For what seemed an age it was impossible to move.

  When at last Gesa raised his head, Attila said,

  “Let me go now and see Papa. I will not be long.”

  “Would it not be easier if I came with you?”

  Attila shook her head.

  “As I have told you, Papa has been ill and I would not wish him to be upset. I am sure if I tell him my way, it will not be such a shock to him.”

  Gesa gave a little sigh, but he released her.

  “I understand, but please be as quick as you can. I am frightened to let you out of my sight.”

  “I shall be even more scared in case you have run away while I was gone,” added Attila.

  “Do you really think that is possible?”

  He did not wait for an answer, but pulled her close to him once more.

  Almost roughly he kissed her again and again and then he took his arms from her.

  “Go now and hurry or else I shall have to come and search for you.”

  She ran out of the room and hurried through Father Jozsef’s garden.

  She would have liked to have stopped at the Chapel to say a prayer, but she knew it would delay her.

  Gesa might indeed carry out his threat and come to find her!

  She ran through the valley and up into the wood.

  Then she moved through the trees until she reached the Palace garden as usual ablaze with flowers and blossom with the fountain throwing jets of water up into the sky.

  She did not dally as she usually did to look at the goldfish in the bowl with the water falling down on them like glittering diamonds.

  She reached the garden door of the Palace, and as she did so, she noticed an aide-de-camp at the end of the passage going into a small sitting room.

  She stood very still, hoping he would not see her and then, before he closed the door behind him, she saw him make a Royal bow.

  This told Attila to her surprise and delight that her father might be there.

  She had thought he would still be in his bedroom, but knew he often used this sitting room when he wanted to sit somewhere quiet.

  As soon as the aide-de-camp had disappeared, Attila hurried along the passage.

  She paused for a moment outside the door to make sure that if her father was there he was alone.

  There was no sound of any talking and after a few moments she opened the door very quietly.

  She was right.

  Her father was sitting in a large red armchair next to the fireplace which was filled with flowers.

  He was reading a newspaper.

  Attila ran in closing the door behind her.

  The King looked over the top of his newspaper and gave an exclamation.

  “Attila!”

  “I am home, Papa,” she cried, running towards him, “but I did not expect to find you here.”

  She flung her arms round his neck and kissed him.

  “I am home, Papa, and it is wonderful to see you.”

  “I am so thankful that you are safely back home, my dearest daughter. Was everything all right?”

  Attila gave a little sigh.

  “I have very sad news, Papa. When we reached the Shrine, Father Jozsef died.”

  “Died!” the King echoed in surprise.

  “We cannot really be sad, because, when he died at the Shrine, he loudly called out the name of the woman he had always loved and I know she was waiting for him.”

  Her father put his arms round her.

  “I am very sorry, my precious girl, you should have gone through anything so upsetting as Father
Jozsef’s death.”

  “He said you would get better, Papa, and you must be as you are out of bed and down here.”

  “I am much better, but actually this is the first day I have come downstairs, so I must have had a premonition that you would be returning.”

  Attila slipped to the floor so that her arms were on his knees.

  “I have something to tell you, Papa.”

  “What is it, my dearest?”

  “When I was at the Shrine with Father Jozsef,” she began slowly, “I prayed for two things – that you would get well and that I would find love.”

  “Well, your first prayer has been answered and I knew while you have been away that you were praying for me. I was also conscious once or twice that Father Jozsef was helping me, which of course he must have been.”

  There was a silence and then he asked,

  “Who have you fallen in love with?”

  Attila drew in her breath.

  “You may find this rather hard to believe, Papa, but I know that I have found the man who the Greeks believe is the other half of oneself. I love him so with all my heart and soul just as you loved Mama and Mama loved you.”

  The King stroked her hair.

  “This is just what I have always wanted for you, but you have not yet told me who this lucky man is.”

  “You may find this even more difficult to believe, Papa, but I do not know his name any more than he knows mine!”

  The King stared at her.

  Then Attila told him exactly what had happened.

  How Gesa had run to her asking her to save him.

  How she had hidden him in Father Jozsef’s side of the carriage.

  How having shaved off his moustache the man who was trying to kill him had luckily, because it was growing dark, not recognised him.

  The King listened without making any comment.

  “He has come back with me and he is waiting in Father Jozsef’s house. I said I must tell you first what had happened before you met him.”

  “That was very sensible of you, my darling, and of course I will see him.”

  “I love him, Papa, and he loves me. However many difficulties there may be about us marrying, please, please because you are so brilliant, think of a solution for me.”

  The King’s hand touched Attila’s cheek.