Amanda Scott by Bath Charade Page B

apprehension was eased by the news several days later that Mr. Manningford had gone out of town and then eased even more when she learned from Cleves the next day after that that the gypsies had moved well to the south.
    “Near Uphill they be now, making their way into Cornwall for the winter,” he said as he tightened her saddle girth before their morning ride. “Can’t think why it should be warmer near the coast there than what it be here, but so it is. One would think all that air from over the water would be a sight colder.”
    “There is a warm ocean current that flows near the west coast,” Carolyn told him, greatly relieved by his news. “You are certain they are gone, Cleves?”
    “Aye, miss, and the folk in Cornwall be right welcome to them. Magic with horses, they be, but even more magic with making the belongings of others disappear, when all’s said.”
    She stared, wondering for a brief moment if he might have been one of the servants called to the library to subdue the gypsy. Then she realized that the notion was an absurd one, that there would have been no need to send to the stables for help with more than enough menservants at hand within the house. Odd though, she thought, that she had not seen so much as an oblique look from one servant to another to indicate secret knowledge. Not Ching Ho, of course, but one would expect at least one of the others to boast of having caught a burglar in the act, yet not so much as a wink had she seen.

VI
    N OVEMBER WAS UPON THEM at last, with Carolyn’s twenty-first birthday fast approaching, and the numerous festivities of the Christmas season to follow. Of primary importance to Miss Hardy, of course, was the anniversary of her birth, for on that auspicious day, she would at long last come of age.
    “Not that it means a great deal really,” she complained to Sydney when he mentioned the upcoming date as they indulged themselves one rainy afternoon in a game of chess in his library. “It is not as though I shall come into control of my fortune, after all, or even be able to set up my own household.”
    His eyebrows lifted in gentle inquiry. “I had no idea that you wished to leave us, Caro. Have you been unhappy?”
    “No, of course not.” She smiled at him. “No one could be unhappy under this roof. You are very kind to have us here.”
    “I see what it is,” he said, moving his queen’s bishop. “Not unhappy, merely addled of mind. You are generally more likely to reproach me than to call me kind, Caro. What’s amiss?”
    She laughed, thinking how comfortable a companion he was. “You may roast me all you like, but I shan’t allow you to provoke me only because I choose to thank you.”
    “There is no need to do so, however,” he said more seriously. “You are welcome here.”
    “I am glad of that, of course. Not that you had much to say in the matter when your mama decided to remove us here.”
    He raised his eyebrows again.
    “No,” she said, “don’t try to cozen me into believing you might have stayed Godmama from her purpose. I should not believe you. She was determined, you know, which means she would not have listened to your excuses or to any suggestion that she go elsewhere. Certainly, not to the Dower House.”
    “No, I suppose not. She might have accepted the lease of an elegantly furnished house in town, however.” His tone was musing, as though the notion had only just occurred to him.
    Carolyn laughed again. “Are you wishing you had thought of it at the time, sir. I assure you, such a scheme would not have answered even if such houses existed, which they do not. The only elegantly furnished ones are occupied by their owners, who are all so firmly entrenched that they have no notion of selling. The ones available to lease are shabby genteel remnants of the days when Bath enjoyed an influx of the beau monde each year, and those were not precisely elegant even then.”
    “I suppose not, but you have not explained why you