A Mad Lady’s Confession - Chapter 59

Edric’s gaze shifted to the flower shop window Eleanor had been looking at.

With a hint of curiosity, she asked, “You want to buy me a flower?”

“Yes, I truly mean no harm, it’s just… I thought you would suit holding a single flower….”

As he spoke, Edric’s face turned as red as a rose. It looked as if it might burst if poked with a finger.

Before Eleanor could even respond, the hesitant young man slipped into the flower shop. When he came back out, he held a single full summer hydrangea in his arms. Eleanor accepted it absentmindedly as he thrust it toward her.

“It’s just a single flower, so please don’t feel burdened! And… you are even more beautiful than that bloom.”

Having barely finished speaking, the young man bowed again. He turned sharply and started to walk away quickly, then suddenly turned back and called out.

“Please don’t forget my name!”

With that, he crossed to the opposite side. There, cadets who seemed to be his friends cheered, slapping his back and shoulders.

Eleanor stared blankly down at the single hydrangea in her hand. The pale purple petals clustered like droplets were fresh and lovely.

“Madam!”

Lise, who had just come out of the lace shop beside them with her purchase, spotted the flower in Eleanor’s hand and hurried over.

“What’s that flower? Nothing happened, right?!”

The master had warned her repeatedly. Take good care of madam. Back at the capital residence, when she and Marien had recommended that strange invitation, it had nearly caused serious trouble, and they had only barely gotten past it.

Gammelstad was a place with good security, and she had only stepped into the shop next door for a moment, so there was no real problem, yet Lise felt anxious.

“No, Lise. It’s nothing, just….”

Eleanor glanced toward where the young man had disappeared.

“People here are all so kind.”

She said it lightly, smiling as she brushed it off. The scent of flowers carried on the breeze felt fresh and pleasant.

***

Apart from receiving the flower, which had been a bit unusual, most of Eleanor’s days in Gammelstad passed without any major incident.

No one gave her sidelong glances or urged her to observe strict etiquette. It wasn’t as if she behaved improperly, but the tension she had always felt in the capital residence, walking stiffly so as not to become a flaw in the eyes of the servants, was gone.

Here, many things allowed Eleanor to be free. During the daily tea time she shared with Matthias, she drank milk tea brewed strong with three cubes of sugar, and sometimes she wore the same dress from morning until evening.

Thanks to the lord, who seemed to lack any sense of taste for sweetness and never sought out sweet foods, the chef, who had been using only a fraction of his talent, now joyfully demonstrated his full abilities through desserts because of Eleanor.

As a result, even the servants of Solvikviche began to enjoy sweet pies and ended up praising their new mistress, though Matthias knew nothing of it.

“How can our madam look like that? Are all women from the capital like that?”

“As if! Didn’t I tell you? I once went to the capital residence because they urgently needed staff. Oh, don’t even start. All of them with powder and paint caked on their faces, goodness….”

“And besides, a beauty like our madam isn’t common anywhere. Doesn’t she look like someone made out of cream?”

“Right, right.”

“But then… how could someone like that have done such a thing?”

Silence fell over the corner of the kitchen where the maids were sharing slices of pumpkin pie.

They knew as well. News that spread in the capital reached here too. No matter who became the new mistress of Nielsen, even the size of her feet and the shape of her nails would be talked about in detail. So it was only natural they found it puzzling.

That such a soft-looking, pale and rosy, pure flower-like mistress, who seemed like she couldn’t even kill a single fly, had attacked someone.

“Could it be that the people in the capital got it wrong?”

One of the maids cautiously voiced her opinion. As if waiting for it, others quickly chimed in.

“Right, right. People from the capital are always making things up anyway.”

“Yeah, I heard there’s even some cheap gossip paper going around.”

“Yes, yes,” they agreed with one another, quickly changing the subject.

Standing by the kitchen doorway, listening to the maids’ conversation, Head Maid Melissa briefly wondered if she should scold them harshly, but soon turned away.

Melissa liked the new mistress. She was quite different from the image she had always imagined for Nielsen’s lady of the house—she had pictured a very strict, rigid woman who wore dresses that covered her neck—but she suited Matthias remarkably well.

Melissa had known Matthias since he was a young boy, before he inherited the title. She knew him well. She remembered the boy, then the young man, who always remained expressionless, quietly fulfilling the responsibilities and duties given to him.

Even when he inherited the title at a relatively young age and took responsibility for the family, nothing about him had changed. Only the titles attached to his name had increased, and as he grew older, he became more and more beautiful, yet his expression remained the same.

And now that same man smiled in front of his wife, made jokes, and at times simply gazed at her when her attention drifted elsewhere. As if she wouldn’t understand what that meant.

‘Perhaps he’s found his match perfectly.’

Melissa had thought with a pleased smile that since her respected master had found a suitable companion, Solvikviche would remain peaceful from now on. At least until that afternoon.

“Um, madam took a walk in the garden around noon, and then… she had dried apricots, cinnamon bread, and a cup of milk tea as a snack.”

Matthias continued signing documents related to the construction of the private soldiers’ quarters within the estate while listening to Lise’s report.

“She enjoyed it, and… she asked Mrs. Melissa if there was any small work she could help with, but Mrs. Melissa said there was no shortage of hands yet. In the afternoon, she said she needed lace to add to a handkerchief, so we went to the Turebaton shopping district while sightseeing.”

“How did she seem? Was she in a good mood?”

“Ah, yes! She said the weather was very nice today and smiled lightly. She also asked me various things she was curious about. While I went into the handicraft shop to buy lace, she looked at flowers in front of the flower shop.”

Every evening before dinner, Matthias received a report from the maid Lise about Eleanor’s day. What she did, what she ate, how she felt.

‘In case there’s even the slightest sign of something unusual.’

He simply wanted to prevent that.

“When I came out after buying the lace, madam had a flower in her hand, and she said a gentleman gave it to her. She seemed very pleased, saying it smelled nice. Then we returned by carriage, and she read in the cabinet.”

“…What?”

Matthias set down the pen he had been moving.

“Ah, even while reading, her mood was—”

“Not that.”

Leaning back in his chair, he looked at the maid standing across from him with her hands clasped, tense.

“In the city, you bought lace and came out, and then someone gave her something?”

“Ah… I didn’t see it myself, but madam said a kind cadet passing by gave it to her….”

“Cadet?”

Lise shrank in on herself, wondering what mistake she had made.

“Yes, yes…. Madam only said that much, so I didn’t see him myself….”

A vein rose at Matthias’s temple. After thinking for a moment, he soon picked up his pen again.

“That’s enough, you may go.”

“Yes, Your Grace.”

Lise bowed and carefully opened the door before leaving.

The study, now left with only him inside, fell silent. Amid the faint scratching sound of the pen gliding over paper, he dismissed it as nothing serious.

‘A cadet. At most, just a young, green boy.’

He could picture it clearly in his mind. Probably someone like those young men who had been sneaking glances at Eleanor during the imperial fishing tournament, a foolish youth who hadn’t even grown into himself yet.

‘She must have had no choice but to accept what was pushed on her. Still, it seems I should reinforce security within the estate. For a cadet to flirt with a lady alone in broad daylight… I’ll need to tighten discipline.’

Matthias’s thoughts shifted toward inspecting security in Gammelstad, particularly in the Turebaton district, and reinforcing discipline among the cadets under the governor’s command.

Up until that moment, Matthias Nielsen had still been entirely himself. A man who had never once experienced having something taken from him against his will, nor even faced anyone daring to covet what was his.

And there was something he had always believed without realizing it. That Eleanor Brynhill, more than anyone, would not place any meaning on anything other than him. That she would not dare, while being with him.

Letting out a faint scoff that was almost a sneer, he returned to his work.

Matthias’s smile shattered to pieces half an hour later in the bedroom.

“…What is that?”

On the table by the terrace window, a pale blue flower was arranged in full bloom. A sweet fragrance drifted from the open terrace on the breeze.

“It’s pretty, isn’t it? A kind gentleman gave it to me today.”

Eleanor looked at the flower with warm, affectionate eyes. As she lightly brushed it with her fingertip, the smile on her face made something crack sharply inside Matthias’s head.