A Mad Lady’s Confession - Chapter 34

It wasn’t an act. As her feather-light fingertips touched him, the dull heaviness in his head gradually eased. That much was true.

Each time her slender fingers moved gently, the soft, sweet scent of the woman tickled the tip of his nose. He lowered his eyelids and listened to her voice as it continued in a quiet stream.

“They say sleep is the best medicine in the world. I don’t know about anything else, but I’ve often been told I sleep very well.”

“…That seems to be the case.”

Matthias replied slowly, recalling how the woman had been sleeping without a care just moments ago. After a brief pause, he spoke again.

“…Where did you learn to do this?”

The woman’s fingertips, gently massaging his head, showed no hesitation or clumsiness. He hadn’t asked with any particular intention, only out of mild curiosity at a skill that seemed quite convincing.

“I didn’t learn it… I used to do this often for a friend.”

“…A friend?”

“Yes. That friend would complain about headaches whenever they couldn’t sleep. So I would do this for them.”

“You have friends? That’s a bit surprising.”

At what sounded like a half-serious joke, the woman gave a small laugh. It was like a cool droplet falling on a sweltering day, pleasant to hear, and the corners of Matthias’s lips relaxed slightly as well.

The lamp hanging on the wall by the head of the bed softly lit the bedroom, and outside, rain was beginning to fall again. The tension that had been stretched tight all day slowly loosened under the woman’s touch.

“That person had headaches often.”

Her voice carried deep affection when she spoke of them. As if it were a lullaby, Matthias closed his eyes and let his breathing settle.

“They would thrash around saying it hurt so much they might die, but if I did this, they’d calm down as if nothing had happened. Even when I tried to teach them to do it themselves, they said it didn’t work when they did it….”

Sounds like quite a handful of a friend, he thought. They must have been a young lady. He imagined the woman at a loss before a friend bouncing around like a puppy. A faint smile formed at the corner of his lips without him realizing it.

“Well, that person was very strong. Their hands and feet were huge, so when they massaged their own head, it looked like they were kneading dough.”

Matthias’s closed eyelids lifted.

“…Was that friend, perhaps a man?”

“Yes.”

The small, yapping puppy-like young lady from his imagination instantly transformed into a large, ferocious hound. Judging by the woman’s tone, it was clearly something from childhood, yet for some reason, he didn’t like it.

“…You must have been quite close?”

“Yes. That person was the only one who understood me.”

“….”

“I didn’t have many friends. No, actually… that person was the only one I could really call a friend. My only friend. The most precious one.”

For a moment, Matthias felt a complicated emotion. The way she said she had no friends, that there had only been that one person, sounded oddly lonely.

He regretted the remark he had made earlier, even if it had been meant as a joke.

Matthias was not a man with a rich imagination. Whatever he wanted or desired had always been realized immediately before it could even become a fantasy, so aside from practical plans for business, he rarely indulged in idle speculation.

However, at this very moment, a scene he had never once seen before surfaced in his mind.

A smaller, younger version of the pink-haired woman gently stroking the head of the one she called her only friend.

The fact that the person was a man made something cold settle in one corner of his heart, yet at the same time, it stirred strangely. He didn’t know why.

At the same time, he found it displeasing that she had added the modifier “very precious” to that person. He didn’t know the reason for that either.

A question he had never once held deeply before arose within him.

What kind of person was Eleanor Brynhill?

Why had she done something like that? Why, unlike someone who had done such a thing, did she seem so transparent?

“Um, Your Grace. About us….”

Her soft voice, which had been flowing steadily, faltered slightly.

“What if we… um…… tried to make up?”

At the unexpected suggestion, he looked up at the woman. When their eyes met, she lowered her gaze shyly. The hand that had been massaging his temples had already dropped, now resting around his broad shoulder.

“That day… I spoke out of turn. I shouldn’t have said something like that.”

Matthias slowly pushed himself up into a sitting position. The woman continued speaking with her gaze lowered, a faint flush around her eyes.

“What words are you referring to?”

“Saying I didn’t want to see you… I should never have said something like that.”

Matthias let out a low sigh.

Yes, of course, it was true that those words had upset him. But could that really be all there was to it?

So could the starting point of this quarrel be reduced to just those words? Was what he wanted to tell her really nothing more than that his feelings had been hurt?

He chose his words carefully.

“Do you remember what I asked you back then?”

“If someone were to make you angry, would you act like that again?”

Eleanor moved her chin in a small nod. It was a face that clearly remembered what she had answered at the time. The man’s slow, businesslike tone continued.

“You’re aware that I’m not only a noble, but also a businessman, aren’t you?”

Even children in the countryside who still had runny noses knew of Nielsen. There wasn’t a single person who didn’t know that he was a very capable businessman. It was in Matthias’s generation that the already wealthy Nielsen family had been made richer than even the imperial family.

Even if Eleanor didn’t know those details, his daily schedule of constantly reviewing documents and overseeing his enterprises would have been enough for her to guess.

As if he had read the answer from her expression, he continued, “I’m someone who moves based on calculation. I married you after thoroughly weighing the gains and losses I would obtain. The same goes for you.”

It might sound a bit cold, but he thought it needed to be said clearly.

It had only been nearing three months since the woman entered his estate, yet things that he would never normally even imagine had happened to him one after another.

He also realized that he had been overlooking those things as if he hadn’t seen them, unlike his usual self. That wasn’t good. Not for his family or his business.

“I don’t like risk factors. And I believe you are sufficiently a risk factor.”

“….”

“So answer me clearly. If you become angry, will you cause something like that again?”

“…Does my answer change anything?”

Matthias let out a low scoff. The woman must be trusting in the one year that had been given to her. Thinking that, he found her insolent.

“I’m the kind of person who won’t hesitate to break a contract if I think the loss is too great.”

To begin with, if she thought of Matthias Nielsen as nothing more than a conventional gentleman, that too would be a misjudgment. If something harmed his family or his business, he cut it off without hesitation.

So he wanted the woman not to misunderstand either. Not to harbor the absurd notion that he would exercise courtesy just to keep that hollow promise.

“If I were to do something like that again….”

The woman hesitated as if even speaking it aloud frightened her, then continued, “Then… would I not be able to see you anymore, Your Grace?”

Matthias looked quietly into the woman’s eyes. Rather than losing the remaining time of the agreed period, or even the possibility of losing what might be her only chance to step into a new life, her eyes were clouded as if not being able to see him was the greater matter.

“So what I mean is, if I do something like that again, then during the remaining time, I won’t be able to see you? We would live separately like this…?”

The woman who had never been shaken by anything, who had behaved as if she had been born without even a trace of attachment, was afraid. Because of one thing, that she might not be able to see him.

His own form of punishment had worked on the woman. Realizing that, he felt as if blood surged through his whole body. His heart pounded violently, strangely stirred, yet he kept his expression neutral and gave a blunt, one-syllable answer.

“Yes.”

“….”

Eleanor recalled Dr. Milton’s words. That feeling anger wasn’t wrong, but the way it was expressed had to be right.

She shouldn’t act like that just because she was angry. The tally marks in her notebook kept increasing every day, and she had a duty to be happy.

Above all, not being able to see Matthias because of that would be a shame. That wasn’t happiness.

“…I’m sorry.”

Their eyes met. Her gaze was glistening with moisture, and Matthias’s throat bobbed visibly.

“I was wrong. I won’t… act like that again just because I’m angry.”

“….”

“I know that the way I expressed my anger was wrong….”

He had intended to just listen quietly to what she was saying, but contrary to his thoughts, his hand moved first. He lightly grasped her small chin and stroked her cheek with his thumb. The fragile softness made his fingertips tingle.

Like a master who knew how to use both carrot and stick, he spoke gently to the woman, “Promise me. That you will never become a risk factor again.”

At least for one year. He didn’t say the rest, but the woman seemed to understand fully. The head he held nodded slightly, and that pleased him.

“I swear. …I won’t become a risk factor again.”

Her words trailed off into a small whisper.

As if he had finally reached a peak he wanted to conquer, Matthias’s heart raced with exhilaration. Unable to hold back, he pressed his lips over hers. It was an action even he couldn’t understand.

The first marital quarrel between Matthias Nielsen and Eleanor Brynhill ended in Nielsen’s victory. Whether it was truly a victory, only a god who knew the future could say.