A Princess Prays Read online

  “We are in fact leaving at dawn tomorrow morning and we would be grateful if no one was informed that we are missing until we are some way away from the Palace.”

  The King smiled.

  “I can see you have thought it all out very carefully and of course you are right. It is always wise to go quickly and avoid explanations.”

  “That is just what Princess Attila felt and therefore no one will have the slightest idea of what has happened to her except Your Majesty.”

  “I am so glad that I have been let into your secret, but I cannot believe you are making your pilgrimage on foot.”

  “That is correct,” replied Father Jozsef, “because as Your Majesty well knows I am not as young as I was.”

  His eyes were twinkling as he added,

  “My carriage, where the Princess will sleep, is drawn by two excellent stallions from the Royal stables. We are also taking a mount for me and Samson, which I gather is Her Royal Highness’s favourite mount.”

  The King threw back his head and laughed.

  “I might well have guessed, Father, that you would choose the best and you are right to do so. I understand from what you have just told me that you have no wish to take a Royal Guard with you.”

  “Certainly not, Your Majesty. We are just two very unimportant people to whom no one will give a second glance going on a pilgrimage to the Shrine of St. Janos.”

  “I can see how well you two have thought it all out, Father. You have my full approval and I promise you no one will guess where you and Attila are, but I shall be quite content because she is in your hands.”

  “There is something else I would now wish to say to Your Majesty about yourself.”

  “I am listening, Father.”

  “I expect Your Majesty will have heard of Salem, the village which is about ten miles from here?”

  “Yes, it is a small village on a large lake.”

  “That is right, but I don’t know if Your Majesty is aware that the people of Salem are the healthiest people in the whole country!”

  “If I was told it, I cannot remember it.”

  “Well, they are, and what is so strange is that there has never been any illness to any of the people of Salem. When their ages were last counted, there were three men of over a hundred years of age and a large number of men and women nearing ninety.”

  The King stared at him.

  “Is there any reason for it?”

  “The reason I believe comes from the water in the lake and the land where the locals grow their food.”

  “Surely that is nothing unusual?” asked the King.

  “I know of no other place where the people are so healthy and where those who join them are cured of many different diseases.”

  The King now realised that this information was of personal interest.

  He was listening intently as Father Jozsef went on,

  “Two years ago I sent two young chimney sweeps to Salem, suffering from a strange growth on their skin due to their being continually in contact with soot.”

  “And they were cured?”

  “Completely, and the same applied to the workers in a tar factory who spent several weeks there bathing in the lake and drinking the water. The growths on their skin vanished completely before they left.”

  “I do know why you are telling me this, Father, and I thank you, but in my case the doctors think that the fatal growths are somewhere near my heart.”

  “I sent a woman to Salem six months ago, who had unceasing pain in one of her breasts. The doctors told her it was a growth of some sort, but they had no idea how to cure it and she left them with no hope.”

  “And what happened to her?”

  “She returned after only three weeks to her family, saying that the pain had gone. She was quite convinced that she was completely cured of whatever was hurting her and making her so miserable.”

  There was silence before the King asked,

  “Are you seriously suggesting that I go to Salem?”

  “I think it would be very difficult for Your Majesty, but as I am convinced it is the water of Salem that works these miracles, I see no reason why the waters cannot be brought to the Palace in bottles, so that you can drink it. The water could also be put in large containers so that you can bathe in it.”

  “Father, you are a magician! And of course I will do as you suggest.”

  “I also believe that the vegetables grown in Salem and the animals that come to the lake must be influenced by what they eat and drink, so Your Majesty should purchase your meals for the next month or so from Salem.”

  The King realised that there was no real difficulty about the Father’s suggestion. He only had to give the order to his chefs.

  “I must thank you very humbly, Father, for giving me hope when I thought the only thing left for me was to say my prayers and die.”

  “I hope Your Majesty will still say your prayers, and of course Princess Attila and I will be praying for you at St. Janos’s Shrine. I am absolutely convinced that all our prayers will be answered, but they will certainly be helped by everything Your Majesty obtains from Salem.”

  “I thank you more than I can put into words,” said the King, “you have given me hope and that at times is something very hard to come by.”

  “I think what is more important that anything else, if I may say so, Your Majesty, is that you should be back ruling your people and leading them into the prosperity this country so richly deserves.”

  Father Jozsef rose to his feet.

  “Before you leave, I would ask for your blessing, Father. It is something you have given me ever since I was young and I have never failed to be grateful for it.”

  Father Jozsef smiled and putting his hands together he said a prayer and blessed the King.

  Only as he reached the door did he turn back to say,

  “Your Majesty will not forget, please, that no one is to know about Princess Attila’s and my secret.”

  “Cross my very heart, I will keep it absolutely and completely to myself,” the King promised.

  As the Father left the King felt a surge of hope, just as he had after talking to Attila.

  In addition he felt pleased that the Father had skilfully, without upsetting anyone but the Queen, arranged to spirit Attila away before Prince Otto arrived.

  Now he thought about Otto the King found it hard to understand.

  How could the Queen even contemplate marrying his precious daughter to a man for whom apparently no one had a good word?

  He decided, however, he would not make a fuss. By the time Otto arrived, Attila would have already disappeared.

  Therefore whatever festivities were arranged for the visit of Prince Otto, she would not be around to participate in them.

  When Attila came to kiss him goodnight, he said in a low voice,

  “I think really, my dearest, you are saying goodbye to me for quite some time.”

  “Father Jozsef and I are going to pray for you and I know, Papa, that you will get well.”

  The King had already given his orders to bring food and water from Salem as Father Jozsef had suggested.

  He did not discuss it with Attila, merely saying,

  “I am so very grateful to you for undertaking this pilgrimage on my behalf and I just cannot believe that your prayers, and those of Father Jozsef, will not be answered.”

  “I expect as soon as I return I shall be able to ride with you again, Papa, and there is a new horse which I am sure you will find irresistible.”

  “I shall be looking forward to it and do take care of yourself, my precious daughter.”

  “Father Jozsef will be doing it for me and I expect because I am travelling with him that there will be a dozen invisible angels hovering over us.”

  The King laughed.

  “I am certain you are right and because it is such an important pilgrimage, I am only surprised that you are not flying to the Shrine on angels’ wings!”

  Attila laughe
d and hugged him.

  “I knew you would understand, Papa, and not make a fuss because I am going alone with Father Jozsef. If we had other people with us, it would spoil the pilgrimage and make it difficult for us to concentrate on you.”

  “I shall be thinking about you all the time you are away, my dearest Attila, and carrying out yours and Father Jozsef’s instructions to the letter.”

  Attila kissed him affectionately before going to her own bedroom.

  She knew that the King was feeling better already because he was not taking the doctors’ medicine and because Father Jozsef would have blessed him.

  ‘I cannot think why we waited so long and listened to what those stupid doctors had to say,’ she said to herself. ‘It is all my fault, I should have remembered Mama’s herbs earlier and not been frightened by the doctors.’

  It took her some time to go to sleep.

  *

  As she had not drawn back her bedroom curtains, the first gleam of light in the sky woke her.

  It was dawn and Father Jozsef would be waiting for her.

  After her lady’s maid had left her last night, Attila had put out the clothes she was going to wear to travel in.

  She had carried in her large bag and case from the bedroom next door and dressed herself in the clothes she had found in the attic.

  Then, holding on to her luggage, she crept out of her bedroom and down the stairs. There was no one about and she unbolted one of the doors into the garden.

  It was not difficult to find her way across the lawn and under the trees.

  She was glad when she reached the little valley where Father Jozsef’s Chapel was situated.

  Attila had only taken a few steps when Kilkos, the young man who was travelling with them, came running up to her and took her case and bag.

  Then they hurried along the twisting path that led towards the Chapel.

  There was no time for her to go into the Chapel this morning and beyond Father Jozsef’s garden she could see that there was a carriage drawn by two horses with Lamos already holding the reins.

  Father Jozsef was standing beside the two horses he and Attila were to ride and before she reached him, Kilkos had already put their luggage into the back of the carriage.

  Attila greeted Father Jozsef and then Kilkos helped her on to the saddle of Samson.

  She bent forward to give the stallion she loved an affectionate pat and she thought that he was as excited as she was about the unexpected adventure.

  Father Jozsef mounted the other horse, which was almost as handsome as Samson, and Kilkos sprang up onto the box of the carriage and they were off.

  Father Jozsef led the way followed by Attila and as it was so early there was no one to see them riding through the quiet streets near the Palace.

  Very shortly they were out into wide country where there were no people and no horses. There was only wild grassland which slipped away into an indefinite horizon.

  They were riding in an area Attila knew resembled the Steppes of Hungary.

  The horses needed no encouragement to gallop and as Attila rode every day, she found no difficulty in riding in a plain long garment rather than her riding habit.

  She forgot about herself as they galloped over the high grass teeming with wild flowers on which the butterflies were beginning to flutter.

  As the sun came up, its rays touched the tops of the mountain on one side of them and shimmered on the river that ran for many miles through the grassland ahead.

  It was only when they had galloped for what seemed to Attila a long time that she spoke to Father Jozsef.

  “We have got away, Father,” she said with a note of triumph in her voice.

  Father Jozsef smiled at her.

  “Yes,” he replied, “we have got away. By the time they send a search party for us we will be in a different world where no one will find us.”

  “I am sure Papa will tell them I am quite safe and with friends, which is, of course, true.”

  Father Jozsef looked around him.

  “I had almost forgotten how very beautiful this part of the country is and our carriage is not far behind us.”

  The carriage was moving along a rough track at the side of the river as they rode on.

  As the sun rose everything around them seemed to be shining and turned to gold.

  Everywhere Attila looked there was a profusion of butterflies, which rose in front of the horses like an elusive cloud. The birds they disturbed soared up into the sky and she felt that each one carried a special prayer for her father.

  They stopped at noon for luncheon and by that time Attila, who had eaten no breakfast, was feeling hungry.

  The horses were watered and Lamos brought two picnic baskets out from the back of the carriage.

  The food was simple, but because she was hungry Attila found it delicious.

  She enjoyed talking to Father Jozsef while they ate and drank and to her considerable surprise he had brought a light wine with him and the men had cooled it in the river.

  “I never believed you would drink wine, Father!” exclaimed Attila.

  “I very seldom do, but as I thought I might need something to sustain me on a long journey, I considered it a wise precaution against you having to ride alone!”

  Attila gave a little cry.

  “You must not overtire yourself, Father. You can quite easily drive in the carriage and I can ride beside you.”

  “I am happy as things are at the moment, my child, but if I feel it is too much for me I shall be sensible enough to say so. As you know I have promised your father to protect you and that means I cannot leave you alone.”

  “No, of course not,” agreed Attila, “and it is very wonderful of you to come with me.”

  “You would certainly not be allowed to go alone,” commented Father Jozsef sternly.

  Attila knew this was very true and what was more if her stepmother had known what was about to happen, she would have prevented her from leaving the Palace.

  ‘I have just escaped,’ she mused gleefully. ‘I have escaped not only to save my Papa, but to save myself from Prince Otto.’

  Even to think about him made her shudder so she changed the subject and talked to Father Jozsef about the countryside.

  *

  That evening they took their second meal of the day in a far more secluded place.

  They stopped by a large wood and for the first time Attila looked inside their carriage. It was wide and well padded, but what Attila had not expected was that Father Jozsef had divided it very skilfully down the middle.

  There was enough room for two people to sleep on the floor at the same time. The seats had been taken out and the floor was covered with two thick and comfortable mattresses.

  There was one on each side of a long wooden board which divided the carriage completely into two tiny rooms.

  Attila looked at the side where she was to sleep and she was touched to find a small mirror fixed to the wall as well as a little shelf for her brushes.

  “How clever of you!” she cried to Father Jozsef.

  He proudly showed her his side, which was almost the same as hers.

  There was a place for his razor and toothbrush in front of the mirror and hooks for their clothes.

  Attila thought it was the cleverest transformation of a driving carriage she could ever have imagined.

  “Where will the two men sleep?” she asked.

  “They will sleep underneath the carriage and they have brought sleeping bags with them.”

  Father Jozsef sighed before he added,

  “It is something I would have done myself if I was young, but I thought it wiser to be beside you. Also at my age I am rather bad at crawling under anything!”

  Attila laughed.

  “Of course you must not and I do think our moving Palace is delightful.”

  They rode until the sun was beginning to slip down the sky and then it was time for their supper.

  This time Lamos insisted
on building a fire.

  They had hot soup to start with which Attila found delicious.

  She and Father Jozsef were seated some distance from the fire and the men who waited on them, and when they had finished the wine, which Father Jozsef had insisted she drank, Attila commented,

  “I have been thinking, Father, how lucky I am that you have taken me away from the Palace so that I will not have to meet Prince Otto.”

  “I hope you never meet him, my child.”

  “That is what I hope too, but I am sure Stepmama will find another suitor. She will force me to marry simply because she wants to be rid of me.”

  “You have not forgotten that one of our reasons for going to the Shrine at St. Janos is to pray that you will find love?”

  “I have not forgotten, Father.”

  There was a short silence and then she enquired,

  “Have you ever been in love, Father?”

  He looked at her quizzically and Attila thought he was debating whether he would tell her the truth.

  He might make an excuse to talk about something else, but he answered her,

  “The reason I entered the Church and became as I am today was because I loved someone with all my heart, but I lost her.”

  “How did that happen? Surely she did not have to marry someone else.”

  Father Jozsef shook his head.

  “No, no. I loved her and she loved me, but we were both very young. I had no money and there was no chance of us marrying until I could provide her with a proper home.”

  “Your father was not well-off?”

  “He had a little money and later made a great deal more, but I was just one of a family of six. Actually, as my brothers were older, my father had enabled them to acquire homes which cost him a considerable amount of money.”

  “So you were going to marry the girl you loved so much when you could afford it, Father.”

  “That was more or less the situation except that her father wanted her to marry someone much more important and certainly richer than I was.”

  “But she loved you,” questioned Attila.

  “She loved me,” Father Jozsef repeated, “and our love was the real love, which you, my dear Princess, are seeking.”