Rumor from Hungary

Nearly six years ago, Joseph Cardinal Mindszenty, Primate of Hungary, was sentenced to life imprisonment on charges of treason, espionage and black-market dealings. The world has not forgotten that it took the Reds 24 days to obtain his "confession" or that his own lawyer thanked the prosecution. Last week a report carried out of Hungary by a French businessman said that Mindszenty was free.

By week's end, the report was still unconfirmed, but rumors furnished some details. The Reds were uneasy as Mind-szenty's jailers. They moved him from prison to prison, maintaining a dummy "Mindszenty cell" in each of Hungary's five principal jails to keep his whereabouts secret. His mother, now 82, was allowed to visit him about ten times to bring him food. The jailed cardinal furnished a rallying cause for anti-Communist agitation and sabotage in Hungary. Finally the Reds decided it would be better to release him.

Freeing Mindszenty may prove harder than jailing him in the first place. Reportedly, Mindszenty long and stubbornly resisted two conditions which the Communists demanded as the price of his freedom: 1) his resignation as primate; 2) his submission to internment in the village where he was born. Whether the 62-year-old cardinal accepted the terms remained to be seen. A Vatican representative was still not sure at week's end whether Mindszenty was really free but said that "the news may well be true."

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