A Mad Lady’s Confession - Chapter 42

In the afternoon, with the long day still lingering, the couple returned to the familiar Nielsen residence. On days like today, when there was a summer event hosted by the imperial family, it was often designated as an official holiday for the nobles of Belgar. That didn’t mean Matthias could rest, however.

“The projected expenses for the additional private soldiers are expected to increase by about 1.5 million marks annually.”

Sir Guiel, who was in charge of managing the finances of the Nielsen family, pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose and placed the documents on the desk.

“And we’ll need to build new barracks for the increased number of soldiers. What about that?”

“I’ve calculated the construction costs on the following page. Sir Aston in Gammelstad also suggests taking this opportunity to renovate the existing barracks as well.”

“Send him a letter and have him draw up a rough budget.”

Sir Guiel nodded and wrote something down in the notebook he was holding.

Matthias traced through the figures written in the documents. The reinforcement of private soldiers in Gammelstad, which had been included as a condition in his deal with Crown Prince Klaus, was now translated into a considerable sum that would have to come out of his own purse.

The imperial family enforced fairly strict standards on the number of private soldiers maintained by regional lords. They seemed to be concerned that if Matthias increased the number of troops in Gammelstad, he might build an army and attempt some grand rebellion. Not a chance.

Gammelstad bordered the Upoello Ocean and faced an enemy nation. They would sometimes appear at sea and seize cargo ships bound for Römern’s trade ports, and at other times, they would boldly show themselves right in front of Gammelstad’s harbor.

It was effectively a region that had to remain constantly on guard for conflict, so there was no such thing as too many private soldiers. He had repeatedly requested the imperial family to increase their military forces, but nothing changed, and as the lord of Gammelstad, he bore the responsibility of keeping it secure.

The imperial family neither provided a single coin of support for reinforcing the private troops nor acknowledged the matter, yet they remained wary of Matthias’s intentions, even though he had no ulterior motive beyond defending Gammelstad.

“So I’m essentially paying to be suspected.”

Matthias skimmed through the expense report and scribbled his signature in the final section.

While Sir Guiel placed more documents for him to sign, Matthias’s gaze drifted toward the window of the study.

The garden, where the sun had softened, was dyed in a variety of colors, not inferior even when compared to the imperial palace. As he rested his eyes briefly on that greenery, a woman entered the edge of his vision.

With her hair neatly pinned up and her slender, long white neck exposed, the woman wore a refreshing water-colored dress. Seeing her stride across the garden without even a parasol on a day like this, carrying something in her hands, Matthias unconsciously furrowed his brow.

“Your Grace, what amount should we allocate for the madam’s personal expenses?”

At the question, his head turned back toward Sir Guiel.

“Shall we set it at the same level as what the former Duchess used?”

Matthias’s brow narrowed with a hint of confusion.

“…Are you saying that not a single expense has been incurred for the Duchess so far?”

Even in a household as well-provided as the Nielsens, where everything from small consumables to food and drink was abundant, there were still personal expenses that needed to be handled individually. Among them, the household allowance for maintaining the dignity of the lady of the house was a fixed expense in the family’s finances. Yet it meant that, in the nearly three months since Eleanor had entered this household, not a single allocation had been made for her.

“As for the expenses for purchasing dresses and accessories, since they come from establishments that have long handled work for the Nielsen family, we processed them by having the invoices sent directly to us, just as the former Duchess did. However, regarding an amount that the madam can withdraw and use personally, that has not yet—”

“Why?”

“….”

Every week, he received reports from the financial manager. There were many businesses operated under the Nielsen name, and even in a single day, sums of several million marks flowed in and out.

And Sir Guiel, who had been in charge of financial management since the previous generation, was an extremely meticulous man. Yet that man had not reported on the financial matters of the lady of the house.

“I suppose she looked like someone who would be thrown out at any moment,” Matthias muttered darkly.

Sir Guiel’s slightly hunched shoulders twitched faintly. In other words, Sir Guiel, a loyal retainer of the Nielsen family, had not acknowledged Eleanor Brynhill as the mistress of the Nielsen household. The moment he grasped that hidden intention, anger boiled up from deep within him.

“Since when did guessing your master’s affairs become your hobby, Sir Guiel?”

“I have committed a grave disloyalty….”

Feeling stifled, Matthias rose from his seat and walked toward the window. Beneath the shade of a crape myrtle tree in bloom with white flowers, the woman sat. She appeared to be writing something in a notebook with a serious expression.

At the sight, his chest felt suddenly tight. Once again, he didn’t know why he felt that way.

He moved on impulse. He strode out of the study and climbed the stairs. The maids who encountered their master’s uncharacteristically angry steps showed surprise on their faces, but he paid them no mind as he headed toward his destination.

He flung open the door of the innermost room, and inside were three maids cleaning the mistress’s dressing room. At Matthias’s sudden appearance, they stopped what they were doing and immediately bowed.

Instead of speaking, he swept his gaze over the woman’s dressing room.

When the former Duchess, that is, Matthias’s mother, used this room, it had been filled so tightly that not a single space was left empty, as if fitting together pieces of a puzzle.

Even though his mother had lived relatively frugally, that had been the case. But now, looking at the dressing room the woman was using, he couldn’t even guess what this space had originally been.

There were many dress boxes. Since she had to change clothes three times a day, there must have been plenty of spare dresses and shoes, as she had been pressed by Lady Jules. Even so, they seemed to have been purchased as ready-made garments rather than reflecting the woman’s personal taste.

He opened a drawer of the cabinet where accessories would be kept. Even as a man, he possessed more cravats and pins than he could count.

However, inside the woman’s accessory drawer, there were only two pairs of earrings and a single necklace. There were two lace gloves, and only one parasol with a slightly torn edge.

What had the woman usually worn? He couldn’t remember. Rather than her dresses, there were far more times when the person named Eleanor Brynhill herself drew his interest, for one reason or another.

He stood there for a moment, slightly stiff, then suddenly asked, “Do you know where the belongings my wife brought when she first came to the estate are?”

The maid, who had been hesitating, flinched when Matthias looked at her and hurriedly brought out a box from the deepest part of the dressing room. The contents were so meager that they didn’t even fill the box completely. There was only a single dress with garish color combinations and a small embroidered handbag. Remarkably so.

The maid spoke hesitantly, at a loss, “There were a few more dresses, but Lady Jules told us to throw them all away….”

He stared blankly down at them for a moment. Even if there had been a few more dresses, they would probably have been just as shabby as these.

He could roughly guess why she hadn’t gained the favor of the maids. To bestow the kind of things a new mistress would usually give her servants, Eleanor Brynhill must not have had a single coin to her name.

The anger, which had begun with Sir Guiel for daring to impose his personal judgment on his master’s affairs, spread to Lady Jules.

She had taught the woman like a punishment, telling her to uphold the virtues of a noble lady, yet had not given her any advice about what a noblewoman was entitled to enjoy.

The anger that spread like a wick burning down next turned toward the Brynhill family. What kind of family sends their daughter off to marriage with such pitiful belongings?

Even in poor commoner households, when they married off a daughter, they prepared as much as they could so she wouldn’t be looked down on. And the Brynhill County was not even in difficult circumstances.

“….”

At last, the blazing anger turned toward Matthias himself. Toward his own indifference to all of it.

She committed a crime. This kind of treatment is only fitting.

Something cowardly within him justified it. Something like the noble pride of Matthias Nielsen, so exalted and accomplished, telling him there was no need to get this angry, that she was a woman who didn’t match his standing anyway, so she could endure this level of treatment.

But what crime did that woman commit against you, Matthias Nielsen? What wrong did she do to you?

Nothing.

At least toward Matthias, she had done nothing wrong.

His emotions surged like a storm. Countless feelings he couldn’t even name began to form tiny cracks within him. He felt like he had to see her right away.

Scratch, scratch, the dull tip of a pencil brushed over white paper. Beneath the tree where crape myrtle petals drifted down softly, Eleanor was deeply focused for a long while.

When she lifted her gaze again to check the neatly trimmed vine wall, she sensed a presence.

As Eleanor tilted her head up, her eyes met the man’s. The gaze that seemed to fall straight down on her felt somehow angry, and without realizing it, Eleanor shrank back slightly.

As if to soothe her, a voice far gentler than the man’s cold aura was directed at Eleanor.

“There’s something I want to ask you.”

Had Matthias ever asked her a question before? Other than asking why she did such a thing, not with a face that couldn’t understand her, but a question that seemed as if he truly wanted to understand.

“Ask me anything.”

Eleanor nodded obediently.

“Are you really Brynhill?”