A Miracle of Love Page 7

  “I know you have a long journey in front of you, but you should reach the coast in three days at the most.”

  “Do you think,” the Prince asked, “we will be able to find a ship to take us down to Rome?”

  “I am sure you will. There should be no difficulty in reaching Rome or anywhere else you wish to go.”

  “That sounds excellent,” the Prince enthused.

  There was more information he wanted to obtain from the Duca, but he was obviously very charmed with Sacia and insisted on talking to her.

  She was astute at drawing him out on his favourite interests whilst praising the Castle and its contents.

  The Prince reflected that she must have had a good deal of practice with her father and his friends.

  He could not remember a girl of her age having so much to say or being so intelligent not only in what she related but in handling the man listening to her.

  When girls of her age had come to the Palace, he had invariably found them incredibly dull and he had made every excuse not to have them sitting next to him at a meal.

  But now the Duca was listening intently to Sacia as if he found every word she uttered entrancing.

  The Prince felt that they were certainly paying for the hospitality they were gratefully receiving.

  “I am afraid we must go to bed early,” he said as soon as politeness allowed, “as we have a long way to go tomorrow, we should start as soon as possible.”

  “I will order breakfast for you at seven o’clock and you must forgive me if I don’t appear until later,” the Duca replied.

  “We will want to say goodbye to you,” said Sacia, “and to thank you for all your kindness.”

  “But it is you who have been kind to me,” the Duca insisted. “I am often very lonely here even though I have my pictures to keep me company.”

  “I am sure if you listen to them they will talk to you just as well if not better than we can,” Sacia told him.

  “I will remember you said that to me, Noemi.”

  As they said goodnight, he kissed Sacia’s hand and she curtsied to him again.

  Then she and the Prince walked on up the stairs to their bedrooms.

  The Prince went into Sacia’s room with her to see that everything was in order for her.

  She was ecstatic at the very pretty new dress that was waiting for her on a chair.

  “You will be surprised how different I will look tomorrow, Nico. This dress is much too heavy to be worn riding and I was only made to put it on to impress the man who was coming to propose to me.”

  She gave a little shiver as she spoke and the Prince admonished her sharply,

  “Forget him! Don’t think about it! Every mile we travel we will be further away from him.”

  “I know, Nico, and you are being so very kind and wonderful to me. And what is more, I am enjoying every moment of it!”

  She smiled at him.

  He wondered if he should kiss her goodnight on the cheek as a brother would have done.

  Then he told himself it would be a mistake as he might scare her as so far she had not been the slightest bit frightened of him.

  He walked to the door as he remembered that the Duca had kissed her hand and it was something he should not have done to an unmarried girl.

  He turned back.

  “Don’t forget to lock your door,” he urged her.

  Sacia’s eyes widened.

  “Lock my door, but why? We are not in a hotel and it is something I have never done in a private house.”

  “You are in a strange Castle now, Sacia, and I want you to lock it.”

  He looked at the lock on the door as he spoke and then he realised that the key was not there.

  He looked down to see if it had fallen on the floor, but there was no sign of it.

  Without saying anything he walked next door to his own room.

  Opening the door he looked at the lock and as he expected the key was there.

  He went back to Sacia.

  “We are changing rooms,” he announced, “collect your things and move into mine.”

  She looked at him in astonishment.

  “Why?” she asked, “I like this room and I am sure the bed is very comfortable.”

  “Perhaps it is, but it’s always right to lock yourself in. I should have told you last night.”

  “Mama always made me lock my room when we were staying in a hotel, but, as I said, I have never done so in a private house. I expect if the key is not in the lock, it has been lost.”

  “Well, fortunately we don’t have much to move,” the Prince persisted. “I will fetch my bag.”

  As he spoke he went to fetch it and he pushed into it his sponge and a few other items he had used while he was having a bath before dinner.

  When he went back to Sacia, she had collected her new dress as well as his comb and brush.

  “I still think you are being a little foolish,” she said, as she went into his room. “I just cannot imagine anyone would come into my room in the Castle.”

  “You never know,” the Prince warned. “There are a large number of men below. I saw them when the Duca took me to the Armoury.”

  “I had forgotten them, Nico, but I am sure that they would be far too frightened of the Duca to insult one of his guests.”

  “I will not allow you to take any risks, Sacia, now goodnight, lock the door and when I wake at six-thirty, I will knock and you can let me in.”

  “Goodnight, Nico, and I am praying that we will be as lucky tomorrow as we have been today.”

  The Prince smiled.

  “I am sure your prayers will be heard and I will add mine to them.”

  “It is so very very exciting being with you,” Sacia enthused.

  The Prince left the room and stood outside until he heard her turn the key.

  Then he went into the room that had been assigned to Sacia, undressed and climbed into bed.

  He took one item from his bag he had not bothered with the night before and put it under his pillow.

  It was his revolver.

  Then he blew out the candles and the room was in darkness.

  An hour later he was sure that Sacia was sleeping and it would be expected that he was too.

  He heard the door opening very quietly.

  The Prince closed his eyes.

  He became aware that someone was walking slowly across the carpet to the bed.

  There was a candle in the hand of the newcomer and only as he reached the bed did he realise who was in it.

  For a moment he stood very still as if he found it hard to believe his eyes.

  Then slowly and silently he went back the way he had come.

  The Prince did not move.

  The door closed quietly behind the intruder.

  He was aware that the footsteps he could still hear had stopped outside the door next to his.

  If hands tried to open the door, he could not hear it and he remembered with satisfaction he had heard the key turn in the lock.

  Then there was complete silence.

  He turned over, closed his eyes and went to sleep.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  The next morning the Prince and Sacia departed before the Duca had come down to breakfast.

  They went to the stables and asked for their horses to be saddled.

  Then, having tipped the grooms, they led them over the drawbridge and through the wood.

  When they reached the open fields by which they had approached the Castle last night, the Prince helped Sacia to mount her horse and he mounted his.

  “That was very unexpected,” Sacia piped up, “and we never guessed when we thought we were looking for a small house that we would find that huge Castle.”

  “It was certainly interesting,” the Prince agreed, “and I very much admired the Duca’s pictures.”

  “So did I and as you were so fascinated by them it is obvious to me that you have some of your own.”

  “I have a few,” the Prince
admitted.

  He guessed she was longing to ask him questions, but thought he might think her curious and did not wish to seem inquisitive.

  They must remain anonymous to each other until he found her a safe hiding place.

  He was thinking it was lucky his instinct as well as his eyes had warned him what the Duca might attempt last night.

  He had noticed how much he was admiring Sacia and then he had the idea that he was not often alone in his Castle whatever he might say about how much he enjoyed his pictures and his books.

  ‘I suppose,’ the Prince said somewhat frantically to himself, ‘it was one roué recognising another!’

  At any rate he had rescued Sacia and he was glad that they were escaping without any undue unpleasantness – it might easily have been a very different story.

  They rode as far as possible on rough roads in the direction of the high mountains and deliberately avoided all towns.

  They stopped for a quick luncheon on the way at an inn in a small village.

  The food served to them was very poor – the veal was tough with no vegetables and the bread was stale.

  “This is a bit different from last night!” said Sacia.

  She was not grumbling at all, but laughing and the Prince appreciated how good she had been so far on the journey in never complaining.

  He had travelled in far greater comfort with other women who found fault at the slightest inconvenience and then they would draw attention to themselves by forcing him to pay them endless compliments.

  He wondered if it was the way Sacia had been trained since she was a child or whether it came naturally and by the end of the day he was certain that naturally was the right answer.

  She was, he was sure, very sensitive to what other people said or felt and he would not have been surprised if he found that she was clairvoyant.

  They had ridden some way from the inn when the Prince asked her,

  “What do you think is happening at your home?”

  Sacia flinched.

  “I think everyone my father employs and probably others are all searching for me. They will have dragged the Canal just in case my body was still there. But they will never guess that I was lucky enough to find you!”

  “It was certainly a very unconventional meeting.”

  “I think my Guardian Angel had sent you there although you were not aware of it.”

  “I was asking my Guardian Angel to give me an adventure and he has certainly answered my prayer!”

  “He?” Sacia questioned. “How can you be so sure it’s not a beautiful lady angel watching over you?”

  “Then I think that must be you, Sacia, and if I am in trouble I will expect you to rescue me.”

  Sacia laughed.

  “I should have thought you were too clever to fall into a trap or even, as we feared yesterday, to be arrested for trespassing.”

  “I think we were very lucky to escape as easily as we did.”

  He was thinking that if the Duca had found Sacia in the room from which he had removed the key, they might have had a very different story to tell.

  He could in fact understand that the Duca had not for a moment believed that Sacia was his sister and he had thought when he introduced her that there was a look of suspicion in his eyes.

  It was obvious to the Prince that from the moment the Duca had decided to take Sacia from him, he would have been prepared to bribe her to agree.

  She was outstandingly pretty – glorious was really the right word.

  She was also intelligent and the Duca had quite obviously thought, if she was really the sister of a Count, she would not have been travelling about alone with him, as there would have been a lady’s maid and doubtless an older woman to take care of her.

  ‘Well, we did avoid that pitfall rather easily,’ the Prince pondered. ‘But I must be very much more careful of Sacia than I thought necessary until now.’

  He gazed at her sitting gracefully on her horse.

  She was clearly extremely happy, looking eagerly ahead and from side to side as they rode on and he thought that any great artist would have been thrilled to paint her portrait.

  He himself would always remember how beautiful she was and he wondered when he left her with her teacher in Rome where he would then go.

  Sooner or later he would have to consider returning home.

  He would have to give Ruta time, if he was clever, to make the most of his new title.

  Then he would be forthright enough to make it very clear that the Prince Nicolo of Vienz had not the slightest intention of getting married.

  And so the Princess’s father might accept Ruta.

  Ruta was in any case a rich man. His family had an estate in the North of the country where, the Prince knew, they were of great social influence.

  The Comte had actually suggested to him that he should come and stay there for the next shooting season and he had provisionally agreed that it would be enjoyable.

  If he went there, the Prince knew that the whole neighbourhood would go out of their way to entertain and amuse him.

  He was indeed certain that Ruta and the Princess were very much in love with each other and she would be exceedingly happy with Ruta if her father allowed her to marry him.

  ‘If I have done nothing else,’ the Prince thought as he remembered the conversation he had overheard, ‘I have at least made two people happy and that should be a good mark in my favour.’

  “You are very looking serious,” Sacia quizzed him. “What are you thinking about, Nico?”

  The Prince had for the moment forgotten her and then without thinking, he answered her,

  “I was thinking of marriage.”

  “I thought that was why you had run away.”

  “Did I tell you that?” the Prince asked.

  “No, you just said you had run away, but I guessed because you are so good-looking that there must be many women who continually pursue you.”

  “Now how could you think that about me?”

  She looked rather shy before replying,

  “Maybe I am being inquisitive and should not have said that. But it is obvious that you are an aristocrat and, from what I have seen of my father’s friends and of Papa himself, they are always thinking about marriage and who they would unite with whom.”

  “Which is what they have done in your case – ”

  Sacia shuddered.

  “It was not originally Papa’s idea. He was trying to find me someone young but naturally from a distinguished family.”

  “So it is the other man’s fault you are now in this predicament,” the Prince remarked.

  Sacia shuddered again.

  “I don’t think Papa had thought of anyone who was so old and at the time so important. But of course he and all my other relations thought how fortunate I was to have the chance of marrying someone so distinguished.”

  The Prince was racking his brains as to who this person might be.

  Actually he had never been particularly interested on his visits to Venice in calling on the numerous families who he had always understood gave themselves airs and graces.

  Now he was curious as to who was pursuing Sacia and before he could speak, she suggested,

  “We are so happy as we are without knowing much about each other. Please let it stay that way.”

  “Of course, if that is what you want, Sacia.”

  “If we begin to reveal why we are here and tell each other exactly why we have run away, then I am sure all the misery and fear will come back again.”

  She smiled before she continued,

  “I have been so ecstatic since you saved my life and so very kindly took me away with you.”

  “Let’s talk about other things, Sacia, and I promise I will try not to be curious about you as long as you are not curious about me.”

  Sacia gave a laugh.

  “Of course I am intrigued about you, but I cannot believe, as you are a man, that your predicament is as bad as mi
ne.”

  She threw up her hands.

  “Anyway don’t let’s talk about it. When I think about what I have left behind, I feel as if a deep black cloud is creeping over me. At any moment I may wake up and find this is all a dream.”

  “I assure you it is very real and may I say that I think you are behaving wonderfully well in very difficult circumstances. In a crisis most women scream and burst into tears!”

  “I know that only too well, Nico, and I have learnt not to cry except when I am alone.”

  The Prince thought if she did cry she would look so pathetic and at the same time so beautiful that it would be impossible for any man not to sweep her into his arms and kiss her.

  That evening they found a small inn in a village in the foothills of the Apennines where they had quite a well- cooked supper and a reasonably comfortable night.

  *

  The next day they took a packed lunch with them and spent the day crossing the Northern slopes of the high mountains by a route that was easier than they might have expected.

  On the way they spent the next night in another inn in a mountain village, which was much less comfortable.

  They were told that they would reach the sea the next afternoon.

  Feeling exhausted they rode down to find quite a large harbour and a number of fishermen standing about.

  The Prince pulled in his horse and enquired,

  “Will you please tell me exactly where I am?”

  One man told him the name of the small fishing village and then the Prince spoke to another who seemed a little less rough than the others,

  “I am wondering,” he said, “if there is any chance of finding a ship here to take us to Rome.”

  The fishermen looked at each other as if they were not sure of the answer and then one of them chipped in,

  “I’ve got a friend who expects a ship to be stoppin’ here tomorrow as he be goin’ South.”

  “That is good news and I hope there will be a place for me and my sister on board.”

  “I be sure there’ll be a place for anyone as pretty as her.”

  The Prince ignored this comment and continued,

  “As my sister and I will be staying the night, maybe you will advise me of the most comfortable inn here?”

  There was some altercation about his request and finally they told him the name of an inn that was a short distance away from the village itself.