She nodded. “But that’s in the opposite direction to your house.” She lowered her lids and watched his face through her lashes. “You don’t have to escort me all the way there, you know.” She’d been walking the streets of Bristol for the past two years without incident; she had very little fear of the areas she had to traverse.
He started them strolling toward the nearby intersection with Wine Street. His expression was unperturbed as he replied, “I do, as it happens—both know that and yet have to escort you to your door.”
Her lips curved more deeply, and she looked ahead. After a moment, she murmured, “Ah—I see.”
He steered her across the busy intersection, and they continued down High Street.
Somewhat sternly, she told herself not to read too much into what he very likely saw as common courtesy. Or at least the sort of gentlemanly attention he would bestow on any lady he knew were she to set out to cross a city the likes of Bristol.
Still, it was impossible not to feel a fillip of happiness that he was willing to go so far out of his way to see her safely home.
Her pleasant mood made the icy chill that slithered across her nape all the more noticeable. She tensed, then quickly looked around.
“What is it?” Kit halted, every instinct on high alert. He scanned the crowds behind them—a bustling throng jostling along the pavements of Corn Street to the left and Wine Street to the right, with people dodging and weaving through the equally strong flow of pedestrians going up and down Broad and High Streets. “The watcher?”
“Yes.” Sylvia’s tone was quietly furious. “And whoever he is, he’s a coward—as soon as I look, he stops.”
Kit drew her to the side of the pavement, putting their backs to the building while he searched the scurrying sea of humanity.
Beside him, Sylvia, doing the same, huffed disgruntledly. “There’s so many people, yet not one of them looks out of place.”
He had to agree. There were businessmen of all stripes as well as hawkers of this and that, a chestnut vendor, and the ubiquitous men carrying placards advertising one or other chapel. There were messenger boys darting in and out, weaving their way through the throng, and older women as well as girls trudging home after working as shop assistants or the like.
After a moment more of fruitless searching, Kit closed his hand over Sylvia’s, now gripping his arm. “Come. Let’s walk on.”
She nodded tersely and settled into step beside him. “Maybe he’ll follow us, and we’ll get a better sighting in the less-populated streets.”
He glanced at her. “Tell me the instant you sense him, but don’t stop or look around.”
Briefly, she met his eyes and nodded.
They remained on high alert all the way to Mrs. Macintyre’s house. As they approached the gate, in response to Kit’s inquiring look, her lips tight, Sylvia shook her head. “Nothing. He didn’t follow.”
Kit escorted her up the steps to the porch and waited while she hunted in her reticule and found her latchkey. She inserted it into the lock, then paused and looked up at him. “Thank you. It was less...bothersome because you were with me.”
She couldn’t have said anything better designed to soothe his flaring instincts.
He searched her eyes, then stated, “Obviously, your watcher isn’t Bill Johnson.”
“No.”
“And I doubt it was the Stenshaw lads, either.” He paused, then admitted, “My groom, Smiggs, and I caught up with the Stenshaws on Tuesday night. I wanted to make sure they hadn’t been behind the sabotage at the warehouse. But I seriously doubt they had any involvement in that incident, nor had they been watching you.”
She sighed, her gaze going past him to the street. “I wonder who it is—and even more importantly, why? A clergyman’s daughter already on the shelf is hardly an attractive target for abduction and ransom.”
He nearly disputed her description of herself, but decided how he saw her wasn’t germane to the discussion.
He debated doing something to appease his clawing instincts—such as demanding she allow him to escort her everywhere—but that, he felt sure, would put her back up. He was forced to settle for capturing her gaze and saying, “Please promise me you’ll take care when out walking and that you won’t venture out at night alone or anything similar.”
The look she bent on him was the same long-suffering, “don’t be foolish” look he’d seen Mary bestow on Ryder times beyond counting.
“Of course, I won’t do anything senseless. Besides,” she said, finally turning the key, “I have no nighttime excursions planned other than Friday’s concert with you.”
The reminder of that event improved his mood considerably. Enough for him to share a last smile with her and bow gracefully in farewell. He waited on the step until she was inside and had closed the door, then swung around and strode quickly down the path and along the pavement to where he’d seen a hackney idling.
After hailing it, he climbed up and dropped onto the seat. As the jarvey turned his horse toward Queen’s Parade, Kit frowned into the softly gathering twilight.
Could the person who was watching Sylvia with malignant intent be somehow connected to the break-in at the workshop? No matter how he twisted the facts, he couldn’t dismiss the possibility.