Ashton Park (22 page)

“Before God, did you say? Do you mean yourself?”

“Don’t talk rot.”

Harrison pulled a pipe from his jacket pocket, placed it in his mouth, and lit it, puffing deeply and carefully to be sure the tobacco in the bowl caught. Then he waved the match several times to make sure it was out, tracing a pattern of light in the blackness. The flame in the bowl flared up. Norah took a step backward.

“You don’t frighten me, Mister Harrison. I shall scream if you so much as touch me.”

“Touch the likes of you? No, you go on to your bedchamber, Miss Cole, and see if your conscience will let you get any sleep. And while you’re staring at the ceiling and wondering what scheme to hatch next, bear me in mind. I’ve served the Danforth family since I was nineteen—that’s almost twenty-five years. Watched the little ones grow into handsome men and women. Watched them try to make their way. Then along you come. In the past, I’ve had to do many things to deliver this family from wickedness and harm. I’ll do so again, Miss Cole.”

Norah fought with streaks of fear and anger that shot through her body. “I’ve never been one to be afraid of the likes of you.”

“Or I the likes of you. Keep that thought close to what heart you have left.”

Michael Woodhaven IV’s casts were off.

Libby couldn’t resist clapping her hands. “Wonderful! You look splendid!”

“I do not,” growled Woodhaven, sitting on the edge of the bed in his blue hospital pajamas. “My arms and legs are as thin as pipe cleaners. I’ll never get my muscles back.”

Libby put her hands on her hips. “Of course you will, my Lord Woodhaven. You just need to get up and move about.”

“How do you presume I do that, my Lady Danforth, since I can barely stand on two legs?”

“You need four. Here. Up we go.”

Before Woodhaven could protest further, Libby had looped one of his arms over her shoulders and helped him to his feet. She began to walk around the room, half-dragging him with her.

“This is ridiculous!” he snapped. “You don’t have the strength!”

“Well, Yank, obviously I do have the strength or you wouldn’t be prancing about like this, would you?”

“Prancing. You make it sound like I’m ten lords leaping.”

“We’ll get you there.”

“It hurts.”

“I don’t care if it hurts. We’ll do this seven times. Like Jericho in the Bible. Then you can rest for five minutes. After that, we’re going outside.”

Woodhaven snarled. “I can’t go outside. I’ll look like a fool. Being hauled about like some big overstuffed toy.”

“Other men wouldn’t mind. Or do you think I’m an ugly, ginger-haired Brit?”

“Even during our worst fights I never thought you were that.”

“Well then, my Lord Woodhaven, the September air is lovely. Blue skies. Sunshine. A breeze. You’re a horrid white color. Let’s change that, shall we? Two more around the room and then you can sit on your bed and feel sorry for yourself a few minutes before we—”

“Outside.”

“What?”

Woodhaven scowled. “Take me outside now. Lord knows I’ve had enough of your taunts. And these four walls with their depressing green plaster.”

Libby steered him toward the door. “Right, my lord. So it’s out and down the corridor to our right. There’s a courtyard with a fountain and a rose garden where the nuns used to go to pray and meditate.”

“No one told me this was a convent.”

“It hasn’t been since 1915.”

They made their way down the hall to a door that opened on the grass and the fountain, Woodhaven leaning heavily on Libby. No one else was outside except two British soldiers who were sitting on a bench and smoking, their crutches resting beside them.

“Shall we sit then?” Libby asked.

“Why? You tired?”

“Not at all. You’re light as a feather. Are all Yanks featherweights?”

Woodhaven snorted. “My legs are burning but I’m not going to tell you that.” He glanced up at the sun, squinting. “The air does feel good. I haven’t seen blue sky since—”

He stopped. He bent his head. Libby stopped walking and saw him wrestle with his emotions. A feeling went through her she had never expected to feel for Michael Woodhaven. One of the many feelings that had surged through her during July and August and that she had tried to fight off. She stared at three robins cocking their heads to listen for worms and pecking at the earth in the garden, yellow and white roses hanging above them. Finally she put a hand to his cheek.

“You can fly again,” she said.

“With legs like strawberry jam?”

“You can fly again, Michael. And when you do your brother Mark will fly as well.”

“That’s crazy.”

“He will. Now do you want to have a seat on that marble bench?”

Woodhaven’s brown eyes glittered with light and he stared straight ahead. “I want to walk. If you’re not tired.”

“I’m fine.”

He continued to look in front of him. “You’ve never used my Christian name before.”

“I know.” They began to walk again. “Pretty soon we’ll have you in the pink.”

He gave a sharp laugh. “I didn’t know you knew American.”

“I know lots of American now, Michael. It’s been a good summer.”

“Spent nursing the cantankerous war veteran from Manhattan Island?”

Libby kept helping him move around the yard as he pressed down weakly with his feet. The British soldiers watched and smoked. The robins took flight. Libby and Michael watched them spin into the sun.

“It’s been one of the best summers of my life,” she said.

“Make me proud of you. But I already am proud of you. So don’t change a thing. Not the color of your eyes. Not the curl in your hair. Not one inch of your heart.”

Victoria’s sorrel mare twitched its left ear around to listen to her mistress’ voice. Horse and rider continued to walk slowly through ash trees that were turning to gold from the change of seasons while light the same color streamed through the branches. Victoria reached forward and patted Robin’s neck.

“I know. I am a bit mad, aren’t I? But I find it best to compose a letter in my head before I commit it to paper. And I can’t do that without speaking out loud. So riding through the woods with you is how I write my most important notes to people.”

An October breeze whirled a dozen leaves in a tight circle of yellow. They passed through it and two leaves came to rest on the arm of Victoria’s green riding jacket. She did not brush them off.

“Ben, autumn is lovely here as I expect it is in France. My father and mother have a row going on that is spoiling it for me. Not a screeching and throwing things row, which they have never done. Just long, cold, deadly silences. Of course, with Parliament sitting Father isn’t here much anyways. But when he is around they speak to each other in the most formal manner as if they were strangers at some reception in a stuffy mansion. Well, it will sort itself out. It always has. Though every time the sorting out sorts out differently.”

Victoria and Robin emerged from the gold of the ash forest into a field where Skitt was herding the sheep toward Danforth Brook. He did not notice her, too distracted by the antics of the flock—it tried to go in every direction possible at the same time. Victoria flicked the mare’s reins and headed toward the sea cliff several hundred yards away. There she sat on her sorrel and thought and finally made up her mind while gulls swept overhead and whitecaps flashed in long ragged rows.

“I am not to tell you this. But I shall anyways because I think the news will bless you as it has blessed me. Mother and father are worried it might drive you to do something rash but I know you better, I think. So this is what has come up—my parents will consider you a fit man to marry their youngest daughter, Victoria Anne, if you continue your upward rise. Stable boy to groom, groom to coach driver, coach driver to officer in the Royal Air Force, and so on up the ladder to heaven. They do not mean you should climb the ladder all at once. But suppose, my darling, you return a captain? Suppose you become squadron leader? What if King George comes by to inspect your aerodrome and your commanding officer points you out to him? Mum and Dad just want a strong indication that you are going to make something of your life. I think you only need to carry on just as you have been doing and it will all come out right as rain. You see, my dear? We really do have a chance to become man and wife with my family’s blessing. Isn’t that something to look forward to? So keep on going as you are going and we shall have a wedding at Ashton Park once the war is finished. Mum and Dad call it a friendly wager. I should like to win it.”

She closed her eyes and waited a few moments. Then she opened them again so that the blue of the sky and the blue of the sea filled her with color and light.

“Please, God,” she said.

Ben Whitecross looked gloomily at his Sopwith Camel, his face showing the cracks and fissures of hours of frustration. His eyes were as dark as the rainstorm that had just ended.

“What’s the problem?” asked Kipp, walking up to him.

“We’ve been mucking about with this since four. The armorer says the guns aren’t up to snuff. It could be another half hour yet. Maybe more.”

“Are they jamming?”

“Jamming would be nice. They won’t even fire long enough to jam in the first place. He’s worried about them being out of synch with the propeller as well.”

Three mechanics swarmed over the Sopwith’s guns and cockpit and engine cowling. Kipp glanced to the east and Germany, where a bright autumn sun was clearing the cloudbank over brown and gold fields. He clapped a hand on Ben’s shoulder.

“We can’t wait. Look for us due west near Cambrai. The troops are pushing the Hun back farther and farther every day.”

“The war will be over and I’ll not have made ace at this rate.”

“Why do you have to be made ace?”

“I…” Ben looked at the plane, not Kipp. “I should like Victoria to think well of me.”

“She already does. Making ace won’t get her to love you more than she already does.”

“I should also like your father and mother to think well of me.”

Kipp smiled. “They’re stuck in some of the old ways. Want you to be a duke or a knight. A lot of that rubbish will be cleared away by the war. So steady on, Ben. You’ve accomplished a great deal starting out as private in the infantry. But it’s all for naught if you don’t come home in one piece. My parents will give you the marriage once they see you at Ashton Park in your uniform and shiny leather boots.”