Beneath the Dover Sky (53 page)

“I’m not a chore, surely.”

“I’m distracted by the day’s events. Even Fairburn, the former groundskeeper who quit and worked for another family, warrants more attention than I do. They’ve rehired him as groundskeeper here.”

“He doesn’t warrant my attention!” She kissed Skitt on the lips and darted her hand into his pocket. They wrestled briefly, but she pulled away and ran off towards the water. She opened her hand, and the moonlight glinted off the ring. “Oh!”

Skitt watched her. “It’s not much.”

“Not much? It’s adorable. I utterly love it.” She smiled at him. “Who’s it for? Norah Cole?”

“Don’t be mad. You know who it’s for. But what’s the point?”

“What’s the point?”

“We can’t do anything about it. You shall go to Plymouth, and I shall wind up in northern Scotland or Wales or the Isle of Man, for all I know. I might as well be on the moon and you on Neptune.”

“We’ll work it out, my love.”

“How?”

She came back to him and put the ring in his hand. “I don’t care about
how
right now. I just want to receive my ring properly, that’s all. If it is to be my ring.”

“Of course it’s your ring. There’s no one I love half so much as you. But it’s such a small thing…all I could afford.”

“It’s a great thing. I want to wear it with all my heart.”

“Very well.” Skitt turned the ring over in his hand and watched the wink of light hit the diamond. “I’m at a loss for words, really.”

“Come on, Skitt. You can go on about rugby scores till everyone’s asleep in their ale.”

“Rugby scores are easy. It’s just numbers. A beautiful woman is something else again.”

“Well, that’s a good start. Carry on.”

Skitt put his hands behind his back. “I’ve asked for some help.”

Montgomery looked around quickly. “From whom? Not Harrison.”

“From William.”

“What! Lord Preston?”

“I have it here.” Skitt unfolded a piece of paper. “Shall I go ahead?”

“Yes, yes, go ahead. I’m going to die if we keep up this dance.”

Skitt squinted and read the words slowly as one of the swans, waking up, flapped its wings.

Let me not to the marriage of true minds

Admit impediments. Love is not love

Which alters when it alteration finds

Or bends with the remover to remove

O, no! It is an ever-fixed mark

That looks on tempests and is never shaken

It is the star to every wandering bark

Whose worth’s unknown, although his height be taken

Love’s not Time’s fool, though rosy lips and cheeks

Within his bending sickle’s compass come

Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks

But bears it out even to the edge of doom

If this be error and upon me proved

I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

Montgomery smiled. “Wonderful. Your voice is perfect. And you did write it out, after all.”

“So I did.” Skitt brought the ring out from behind his back. “Your eyes flash just like it flashes, you know.”

“Do they?”

“Black jewels. I’ve been fascinated by them ever since I first saw you years ago when you came to Dover Sky with Michael and Libby and Jane.”

“Really?”

“They dazzled me. I used to have a fancy for Lady Catherine y’know. But not after I had a look at you.”

“I’m astonished and flattered. But was it just the eyes that brought you to me, Skitt?”

“You know it wasn’t. You have a beauty like a starry night, yes. But a spirit just as brilliant.”

“Ah, now that’s sweetly said. As good as anything from your friend William Shakespeare.”

“I don’t have anything else to add. Will you marry me, Montgomery?”

“You know I will.”

She held out her hand, and he slipped the ring over her finger. It was loose.

“Arrr,” he growled. “It doesn’t fit proper.”

She twined her arms around his neck. “There are ways to fix that.”

“I don’t want you fat. I love you exactly the way you are.”

“I have no intention of getting fat.” She ran her lips over his. “Enough talk. We’re to be married. Let’s kiss to that for the rest of the night.”

Gloom descended on Skitt once again. “What good is all this, Montgomery? We can’t do anything about it. How can we be married if we can’t even live together?”

“You must pick up the habit from the Danforths. They seem to be very good at that sort of thing. The husband’s in the one place and the wife’s in the other. Like Ben in Africa and Victoria here. Or Kipp in Jerusalem and Caroline pining away for him at Dover Sky.”

“I don’t want to be good at that sort of thing. I want you in my arms every night.”

“And I want to be there. Now no more of this.” She began to plant short, sharp, fiery kisses on his lips and cheeks. “We shall be happy, you and I. Something will work out, my lovely man.”

“I don’t see how.” But Skitt closed his eyes and responded to the sparks landing rapidly on his face and mouth with pleasant stings.

Terry showed up at Dover Sky the day before Guy Fawkes with bags of sweets and strings of firecrackers for everyone at the estate. As far as children went, with Caroline and Kipp living in London, only Jane remained, who at fifteen thought of herself as a woman, not a girl. Nevertheless, she grabbed candy and firecrackers with a squeal, popping the first in her mouth till her cheeks bulged and tossing the others all about her as they exploded overhead and in the grass.

“Skitt!” Terry called as the butler stood on the front porch of the manor. “Harrison is busy with pruning. Will you give me a hand with the effigy?”

He and Skitt, a rough tweed coat over his black and white uniform, stuffed large pants and a large gray coat with straw, filling both sleeves, as well as a tall hat that bulged to reveal a head with button eyes and a button mouth. Keeping Guy Fawkes upright with a long wooden pole they ran through his back and up to his neck, they placed him in the middle of a large mound of brush that Harrison had been collecting all week as he cleaned up hedges and groves and thickets.

“Do you think it needs anything else, Skitt?” Terry asked.

“Well, Commander, perhaps if we could find logs and some thicker limbs the bonfire would burn a great deal longer.”

“Good idea. Let’s fetch a barrow and see what we can find.”

As Skitt pushed the barrow along, twice having to take it back from the naval officer dressed in corduroy pants and coat and shirt, Terry clapped a hand to his shoulder. “Libby tells me you’re engaged.”

“Yes, sir.”

“That’s wonderful news. Congratulations.”

“Thank you very much, Commander.”

“Now that you’re settled on Montgomery and I’m settled on Libby, perhaps we can let the Catherine business go the way of the wind. What do you think, Skitt?”

Skitt’s face quickly turned scarlet. “Lady Catherine was a young man’s fancy and folly, sir.”

“And I was the unwelcome rival.”

More blood filled Skitt’s cheeks and he kept his head down, pushing the barrow ahead with renewed vigor.

“I don’t mind, Skitt. Lady Catherine is a fine woman. But I’m head over heels with Libby’s ginger-blonde hair and ocean-blue eyes, just as I expect you can’t get enough of Montgomery’s shining black locks or flashing dark eyes.”

Skitt couldn’t keep himself from smiling. “Aye, there you have it, sir.”

“I have a proposal for you. Once we’re living close to the Royal Navy docks, I shall be entertaining considerably. Captains, commanders, leftenant commanders, commodores, even the odd admiral. There will be some busy seasons when I’m ashore. Too much for Libby to handle on her own, and Montgomery will have her hands full with Jane turning sixteen and seventeen and, eventually, twenty-one, Lord help us. What do you say? Is butlering that sort of crew something that piques your interest at all?”

“What, sir?”

“Do you want to work for me, Skitt? I could use you, and heaven knows I trust you with the lives of everyone in my family. You can think it over if you’d like, but I’ll be shipping out in a couple of months and it would be nice to know how you feel about it one way or the other before the
Hood
weighs anchor after New Year’s Day.”

“Think it over?”

“Certainly. We’re not going to be one of the large Danforth estates you’re used to serving, but you’ll still have a lot to look after, not to mention—”

Skitt dropped the barrow handles and seized the commander’s hand, forgetting for a moment where he was and who he was. “With all my heart! With all my heart, sir. Montgomery and I shall be married and serve your family together with pride and distinction. It’s a brilliant plan if you don’t mind me saying so, sir. Absolutely brilliant.”

Terry laughed and pumped his hand. “Why, then, the bargain is sealed…sealed and done. You’re a Royal Navy butler come Easter, Skitt. A butler in the tradition of those who served Nelson and Rodney and Jellicoe, though I am a minnow compared to those leviathans. You shall have an outfit suited to your station—dark-navy trimmed with deep burgundy all set off by the crisp white of your shirt. How does that sound?”

“Capital, sir, capital! May I leave you for a moment? Only for a moment, mind. I must run and tell Montgomery. She is just on a walk with your daughter along the northern boundary of the estate. I must catch them up. I must tell her what’s happened.”

“By all means, go, man. Faint heart never won fair lady. Run as if your life depended upon it.”

“I will do, sir. Thank you. Bless you!”

Terry saluted as Skitt vaulted the barrow and raced for the stone fence to the north of them. “England expects every man to do his duty!” he called after him.

British East Africa, Kenya

“May I open my eyes now, Ben? Honestly, we’re not youngsters in the stables anymore playing our silly games.”

“Just a moment. I have to position you just so. There. All right, Lady Victoria, you may take a good look.”

She opened her eyes to a tall mountain peak rising out of the jungle and grasslands white with snow at its summit. She put her knuckles to her mouth.

“My heavens, Ben! How high is that?”

“More than 19,000 feet—almost four miles.”

“It’s magnificent. I never expected something like this. And what are those beasts moving across the fields? Not giraffe?”

“What other creature has such a long neck?”

“I’m amazed. Utterly shocked and amazed. Have the boys seen this yet?”

“Not at all. They’ve been with the bishop—Stevenson. He’s introducing them to some of the African children. I wanted us to look at Mount Kilimanjaro together.”

“Kilimanjaro. What a beautiful name. What does it mean?”

“I’ve heard so many stories about that: mountain of caverns,
mountain of whiteness, mountain of greatness. I prefer mountain of greatness.”

“Of course you would.”

He put his arm around her. “Though calling it mountain of whiteness ties in with the name Whitecross much better.”