A Mad Lady’s Confession - Chapter 65

Eleanor left Giela behind and headed toward the reception room.

Matthias, upon seeing her, immediately rose from his seat and approached. Seeing her once-wet cheeks and reddened eyes, he asked in a low voice,

“What happened inside? Perhaps—”

“No, it’s nothing like that.”

Eleanor shook her head slightly and looked up at him.

“Young Lady Düsseldorf… treated me well. I… would like to return now.”

Matthias, who had been looking down at her for a moment, nodded. Following the head maid, who still wore a displeased expression, they left the red-roofed manor.

Inside the carriage retracing their path, the sun was already setting low.

Looking at Eleanor, whose face was darkened and stiff, Matthias didn’t know what to ask first. Postponing questions had never existed in his life. If he wanted to know something, he had to know it, and he lived in a world where he could know anything.

However, with the small woman sitting beside him, that was not easy. Asking questions, or even bringing up other topics, had at some point become difficult. He had become cautious.

“Have you ever heard that the truth can be comforting?”

It was Eleanor who broke the silence with an unexpected topic. Still looking out the window, her manner, as if she were turning something over in her mind, clearly showed that her thoughts were not inside this carriage.

What happened? Tell me everything. Matthias felt the urge to say that.

But he hesitated. Suddenly, he wondered if he even had the right. If she told him everything, could he truly bear it, no matter what it was?

After a moment of deliberation, his lips slowly formed words.

“I suppose it depends on what kind of truth it is.”

Eleanor turned her head to look at Matthias.

As the sun began to set, the inside of the carriage remained dim, with only a faint light lingering.

Thinking that it resembled a confessional, Matthias continued, “…There was once a hunting dog I treasured greatly. I raised it from when it was a pup, so it wasn’t just an animal, but something I considered like a brother.”

He had fed the motherless creature milk with his own hands and raised it with small, clumsy hands.

“When I took it out for its first hunt, it bit Princess Daphne’s wrist. A piece of flesh was torn away and left a scar. If you’ve met her, you’ll know… that’s why she wears long-sleeved dresses or gloves even in summer.”

Eleanor recalled Daphne Fram wearing long lace gloves that reached up to her elbows.

“A beast that has bitten a person cannot be left alive.”

It was a natural decision, and Matthias could not cry. Not because he wasn’t sad, but because he was the Young Duke of Nielsen, who had to set an example.

“They said they would shoot it with a hunting rifle. It looked at me from inside the wooden cage as if begging to be spared, but I couldn’t stop them.”

Rules that are broken do not deserve to survive. Whether it is a beast or a person, if one bears the name of a noble, and even more so if it is something belonging to Nielsen, the standards must be stricter. Matthias licked his dry lips as he recalled that time.

“That night, I went to the storage where the game was kept… and I let it out.”

Even though I knew I shouldn’t, I did it. I couldn’t bring myself to watch something I had raised since it was a pup die before my eyes.

After hugging it once as it licked my cheek, I drove it out into the forest at night.

“I lived thinking that was the best I could do. I told myself it must be living well somewhere in the forest.”

Because he was Nielsen, he could not carelessly give his affection, and in truth, there were not many beings worthy of it. The one dog that had always shared its warmth by his side remained in his mind for a long time, occasionally stirring feelings of longing.

Whenever that happened, he would imagine a single dog with sleek fur running freely through the forest.

“After that, I never went back to the hunting grounds. I didn’t raise another hunting dog either. Then, around the time I graduated from the academy, I happened to pass by that area with a few friends. That’s when I ran into the family’s gamekeeper.”

The bearded man was overjoyed to see Matthias. Then, all of a sudden, with a regretful look, he said something unexpected.

“‘Why don’t you come see where Finn is buried?’”

“….”

“After that incident, I left the hunting grounds the very next day, but it seems that dog returned. Because it wanted to see its master.”

When the animal that had bitten a person was seen wandering around the hunting grounds, the people who remained there immediately shot it. Since it had been something the young master cherished, the gamekeeper, out of pity, made a grave for it.

“…Did you go?”

“No, I never took a single step there.”

It had only been something that happened in his childhood, and by the time he learned of its death, he was already an adult. Though he might add such explanations, in truth, there was another reason he never went.

“I decided to think of it this way. That the black dog didn’t die and is still running somewhere out there.”

“….”

“But it didn’t work. Because I already knew the truth.”

Letting out a low sigh, he asked Eleanor, “What do you think? Do you think the truth the gamekeeper told me truly brought me comfort?”

It would have been better not to know. Even now, after facing countless brushes with death and overcoming so much as an adult, that memory remained like a bruise in a small corner of his heart. If only he hadn’t known. Perhaps that would have been more comforting.

“Some truths are more comforting when they are buried.”

“….”

“Sometimes it’s better to pretend not to know.”

Better to bury it, better not to know. Eleanor quietly turned over his words in her mind.

Matthias gazed at the woman’s conflicted eyes, then slowly continued, “I don’t care about your past.”

Her trembling eyes met his. His lips were dry, his throat parched with unease. He hoped she wouldn’t feel anxious. He didn’t want her to look as though she were standing unsteadily on a buoy. That wish took shape in the words that left his mouth.

“I only think about the present, about what’s right in front of me now.”

She was a mad woman, and even now she was strange. It looked as if she were hiding something.

If it was something the guileless Eleanor could not bring herself to say, then it must be something that could not be said. He decided not to pry into it.

As long as she could listen to him, answer him, and share her thoughts like she did now right in front of him, that was enough for him.

“…If you wish, there’s no need to set a time limit of one year.”

“….”

“If that’s one of the things making you uneasy, then you don’t have to think about it.”

That was the conclusion Matthias reached. To create an environment that would not aggravate the woman’s condition. He did not think about why he wanted to do that.

“Don’t go back to Belgar. Stay here with me.”

“…I….”

“Then nothing will go wrong.”

“….”

“Everything will be fine.”

Everything will be fine. If she just buries it all and stops trying to learn more of the truth. If she simply lives on like this without knowing.

Something inside Eleanor whispered that.

And it was incredibly tempting.

Just leave it buried like this, Eleanor. Please.

Whose voice was that?

At the whispering voices, Eleanor closed her eyes.

***

Editor-in-Chief Albern took off his glasses, speckled with water, and wiped them on the hem of his clothes. Not wanting to get scolded by his wife, he removed his wet raincoat, hat, and shoes and hung them in the vestibule beside the entrance.

“Honey!”

The small house where he lived with only his wife suddenly became noisy. His wife, who rarely ran unless it was something significant, hurried toward him, lifting the hem of her skirt. Director Albern flustered and spoke in defense first.

“At least this time I didn’t soak the carpet with rainwater.”

“Oh my, that’s not what this is about.”

His wife held out the paper in her hand to him. As Albern adjusted his glasses and read through the single sheet, his expression grew increasingly serious.

The Son of Gold Falls in Love with a Vicious Sinner?!

The Empire’s Little Gold has fallen in love with a villainess.

According to an informant, the two are so heated for each other that they even enjoyed a secret rendezvous during the fishing tournament hosted by the Imperial family.

Moreover, the villainess in question was the central figure of the incident that shook the capital several years ago, and even back then, rumors of an affair with Gold had circulated. It is widely believed among gossipers that this woman, who is now the elegant wife of a high-ranking noble of Römern, has in truth never been able to forget Gold even after that incident.

Voices of condemnation are rising against the villainess who holds both her husband, called the Blessing of Römern, and the Empire’s Gold in her hands while continuing such vulgar games.

At the same time, the capital’s sympathy is also being directed toward the greatest man of Römern, who has been toyed with.

Where will this sordid love affair lead?