"Yes, child, I know the place," said Ugo. "A fair city indeed, on
the blue and beautiful Lake Lemanus, walled in by mountains, and
rich in corn and vineyards."
"Then let us fly thither," said the girl. "My uncle Godegesil I
know will succor us, and I shall be freed from my fears of King
Gundebald."
Though it seemed at first to the good priest only a child's
desire, he learned to think better of it when he saw how unhappy
the poor girl was in the hated palace, and how slight were her
chances for improvement. And so, one fair spring morning in the
year 486, the two slipped quietly out of the palace; and by slow
and cautious stages, with help from friendly priests and nuns,
and frequent rides in the heavy ox-wagons that were the only
means of transport other than horseback, they finally reached the
old city of Geneva.
And on the journey, the good Ugo had made the road seem less
weary, and the lumbering ox-wagons less jolty and painful, by
telling his bright young charge of all the wonders and relics he
had seen in his journeyings in the East; but especially did the
girl love to hear him tell of the boy king of the Franks,
Hlodo-wig, or Clovis, who lived in the priest's own boyhood home
of Tournay, in far-off Belgium, and who, though so brave and
daring, was still a pagan, when all the world was fast becoming
Christian.
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