Carolina's Walking Tour Read Free Page B

reputation is not precisely damaged. But there has been a good
deal of talk."
    Carolina was astonished. She had not, at any point, thought that anyone would take
notice her activities or diversions. And she would never have believed that anyone could
possibly find something in her about which to gossip.
    Two days later, Quainton himself was telling her of his imminent departure. They met in
the Pump Room where the two older ladies settled down for a comfortable gossip over their
glasses of restorative water.
    The baron offered his arm.
    Carolina placed her gloved fingertips on it with carefully simulated indifference. It was
an unexpected pleasure. When they walked on their expeditions, they had not observed such
niceties. Of course, that he had but one useful arm made the action perilous. He had told her his
balance was occasionally unsound.
    "I am escorting my mother into Lancashire on Tuesday next," he said without
preliminary.
    "Lady Chersham told me that Lady Quainton was soon to reestablish her residence in
the country." Carolina was proud of her unemotional response.
    "I shall return to Bath to see to the closing of the house here for the winter. I have
bespoke a chamber at the Bell Inn where I shall stay while seeing her residence put in Holland
covers."
    He seemed at a loss for further conversation.
    Carolina could not find a word to offer. Her newfound assurance had deserted her and
she was as shy and tongue-tied as ever she had been in the spring before their meeting. Finally
she said, "My grandmother has begun to make her farewells. Of...of course not because she
departs the town but because others do." She was appalled by her own inanity.
    "Of course," he said with no more than a quiver of laughter in his deep voice.
    "You need not mock." She lost all vestige of awkwardness and resumed their normal
mode of discourse. "You were offering no conversational gems. Anyway, you shall go home to
Wakeridge and administer your estates and be busy about your affairs...and I...I..."
    "What shall you be about, Caro? Shall you return to Beckon Hall, or perhaps London?"
He had never used the diminutive of her name before, indeed despite their time together he had
only one or twice called her 'Carolina'. It was an age since she had begun to think of him as
Alexander, though she had never voiced her thoughts. She always addressed him as 'Lord
Quainton'.
    "I?" She sounded as bewildered as she felt, she knew it. "I...don't know. How can I
know? I never know what to do..."
    "You do, you know." He contradicted her with the ease of friendship. "You knew what
to do that day we found the injured dog in the Orange Grove. And also the day the child fell in
the canal at Sydney Gardens. You even knew exactly what to do when we found that young
woman thinking to cast herself from Pulteney Bridge. You are exceptionally capable, and
remarkably unaware of it."
    "We have had our adventures, have we not?" Carolina ignored his last words and
recalled some their more extraordinary experiences.
    "Well, those were the most dramatic, but yes, our walking tours have
been...stimulating." He hesitated, bowing and smiling to acquaintances while Carolina did the
same. He paused before the wide windows that overlooked the street. "My mother tells me that
our excursions have excited comment. I hope I have not caused you any difficulty..."
    Carolina was horrified to think that he might feel under some obligation, some duty to
her. "No. Oh, no! It has been a pleasant diversion, nothing more...and people will always
talk...no where more so than Bath..."
    "Lady Chersham has expressed no concerns?"
    Carolina crossed the fingers of her left hand behind her back. "No, none."
    "All is well then," he said in a strained voice.
    Carolina risked one quick look at his thoughtful face, but could not read his expression.
They returned to the older ladies without delay, and he was all amiability for the rest of the
morning. Nevertheless, she had the notion that somewhere in