The Whipping Maid of House Calley - Chapter 129

At some point, Cedric, who had entered the alley where she was, called Sheila’s name. Then he pried off Duker’s hand gripping her wrist, shoved him away, and pulled Sheila into his arms.

“Ugh!”

Crash-!

Duker lost his balance and fell forward. At the same time, the bottle he had been holding shattered with a loud noise.

“Fuck! What bastard was that!”

Duker shouted as he staggered to his feet. Then, spotting Cedric in his neat attire through his blurred vision, he sneered.

“What is a noble lord like you doing here?”

In the past, he wouldn’t have dared to go up against a noble. But with not much time left to live and alcohol in his system, he had nothing to fear.

Duker had completely fallen apart not long after Sheila visited, when Fred came by with a friend named ‘Ernie.’

After getting beaten badly by a young man and having his money taken, Duker drowned himself in alcohol out of resentment.

In the end, he shut down his butcher shop, his reputation worsened, and he moved to a neighboring town.

His life here wasn’t much different.

For two or three years, he drank every single day. At some point, no matter how much he ate, he kept losing weight, and there were more and more days he writhed in pain.

That was when his appearance changed beyond recognition. People said he had a terminal illness.

Even so, he couldn’t stop drinking.

Rather, the more it hurt, the more he sought alcohol. Ironically, the illness was caused by alcohol, but the only way to forget the pain was also to get drunk.

Duker knew it too. Like people said, he wouldn’t live long like this. But he couldn’t turn back the years that had already passed.

And yet, to run into Fabiola’s younger sister here of all places!

“I’ve got something to discuss with my dear sister-in-law, so why don’t you be on your way, sir?” Duker said, spinning the jagged neck of the broken bottle in his hand.

“Young Count, you should get away! That man… he doesn’t seem right in the head,” said Sheila as she grabbed Cedric’s clothes. Her hand was trembling violently.

The sensation of being grabbed and dragged by Duker still lingered on her wrist.

It was a rough strength she had never felt anywhere else, not even the day Fred hit her.

Cedric moved the trembling woman behind his back.

“Stay back. It’ll only take a moment.”

Seeing that, Duker lost his reason and charged, thinking Cedric was taking her away.

“Aaah!”

With death already looming over him, a broken glass bottle in hand, and alcohol in his veins, he feared nothing.

Cedric quickly grabbed Duker’s wrist and subdued him. With a sharp pull, Duker was thrown to the ground.

“Ugh!”

“Fuck!” Duker cursed as he tried to grab the glass he had dropped, but Cedric kicked the shards far away.

After rolling on the ground twice, Duker charged again with his bare body.

Cedric swung his fist at his drunken face.

Thud!

“Ugh!”

“Aah!”

As the fight turned into a full-on fistfight, Sheila screamed.

“Young Count!”

At that moment, Rufus’s voice was heard. When Sheila lowered the hands she had been using to cover her face, what she saw wasn’t Rufus, but Louis.

Louis subdued Duker, who was recklessly trying to charge at Cedric, with clean, efficient movements.

“Miss Sheila. Young Count!”

From behind Louis, Rufus appeared and raised his voice loudly, stirring up the commotion. When Cedric suddenly started chasing Sheila, Rufus had followed behind, having Louis, who had been about to drive the carriage, take the lead.

While Louis subdued Duker, Cedric approached Sheila again, who was still trembling.

“Are you alright?”

He was breathing heavily, a rare sight. Even he had been flustered by Duker’s unexpected appearance.

Sheila, who had grown noticeably thinner and was acting like a completely different person in the time she hadn’t seen him, looked at him with unfamiliar eyes.

Then, when Cedric reached out his hand toward her face, Sheila flinched and slapped his hand away.

“Ah!”

At the sound that escaped his mouth, Sheila thought he was making a fuss that didn’t suit him. But it wasn’t an act. Seeing the dark red liquid smeared on his hand, Sheila was startled.

“Blood….”

As Sheila’s mouth fell open in a daze, Rufus’s voice was heard.

“Young Count, your hand is bleeding.”

Cedric raised his hand and examined it. Blood was dripping from his right hand.

It was from when he had been cut while subduing Duker, who had charged at him with the glass bottle.

“It’s nothing.”

As if it were no big deal, Cedric took out a handkerchief from his pocket. It was the white lace handkerchief Sheila had embroidered during the appointment ceremony.

‘Why is that there…?’

Don’t tell me he’s been carrying it around? Considering its shape and material, the lace handkerchief she made wasn’t something he would normally carry.

As Sheila stared blankly at the handkerchief, he stuffed it back into his pocket instead of wrapping his hand with it.

“Rufus, give me your handkerchief.”

“Yes, Young Count.”

Only then did Cedric wrap his bleeding hand tightly with the handkerchief Rufus handed him.

Louis, who had subdued Duker, asked, “Young Count, what should we do with this man?”

“Hand him over to the guards.”

Cedric gave the order to Louis as if it were nothing.

‘So Louis was Young Count’s man.’

Only then did all of Sheila’s questions fall into place. She realized that Louis had been following her from the beginning and had bribed the Mario couple.

“Let’s go, Sheila. It’s dangerous here.”

Cedric carefully wrapped an arm around her back.

Sheila, unable to even think of rejecting him, let herself be guided by his touch and began to walk. Then suddenly, she realized her hand was empty.

“My things… my bag! I lost my bag.”

“For now, let’s go. Rufus will find it and bring it.”

Cedric urged Sheila as if trying to quickly get out of the dark alley.

“No!”

Sheila stopped in place and shouted.

If nothing else, her sister’s keepsakes were inside that bag.

As Sheila stopped, Cedric gave an order to Rufus.

“Rufus! Find Sheila’s bag first!”

“Yes, Young Count!”

Rufus retraced the path they had come.

“Don’t worry. He’ll find it soon.”

Cedric pulled Sheila’s shoulders close and kissed her head.

‘Is he… trembling?’

Feeling the faint tremor in his hand, Sheila was flustered.

On top of that, the man she thought would ignore her words had followed her wishes. Even adding words that sounded like comfort.

She was only briefly flustered by his unfamiliar behavior when Rufus’s voice rang out from the next alley.

“I found it!”

“Ah! My bag!”

As Sheila heard the voice and ran over, Cedric grabbed her hand.

Sheila’s steps halted for a moment. She wanted to ask what he was doing, but there was no time. Holding his hand, Sheila ran again toward the sound.

As she turned the corner, Rufus approached holding the bag.

“Someone had picked it up and was about to run off with it, but they threw the bag and ran.”

Hearing that, Sheila shook off Cedric’s hand and snatched the bag from Rufus. Then she sat down on the ground and rummaged through it.

When Sheila found the doll Fabiola had made by hand beneath the clothes, she collapsed onto the ground.

“Ugh!”

A sob escaped Sheila’s mouth as she hugged the doll tightly.

The sound of her crying soon grew louder.

It was the same sorrowful crying that had once leaked out from her attic room.

***

Once inside the carriage, Sheila fell asleep as if she had fainted. Cedric was careful not to tighten the arm wrapped around her.

Having regained his woman after a long time, Cedric felt the urge to hold Sheila so tightly her body might break.

But he quietly suppressed the impulse and stroked the forehead of the woman sleeping with a tired face.

‘What a woman with truly terrible luck.’

In truth, if Sheila had been a little more stubborn at the general store, harsh words might have come out of Cedric’s mouth.

‘Do you even know where you came? Didn’t you know your brother tried to sell you to Baron Hayek? Seems that guy Jerry didn’t tell you that.’

He had barely swallowed those words, only for her to run into Duker….

He’d left the man alone since he didn’t have long to live anyway, but Cedric had never expected something like this to happen.

Cedric wanted, if possible, to possess everything about the woman. Even her misfortune.

But in reality, his very existence was nothing more than one of the many misfortunes that had befallen her life.

Thinking that, Cedric felt bitter.

The carriage carrying Cedric and Sheila raced through the night, lanterns lighting the surroundings.

And Cedric held her carefully the entire time without getting a moment of sleep.

***

The carriage arrived at House Calley before dawn.

Even though no one woke her, Sheila stirred awake on her own.

Then she gently pushed Cedric’s body away and got out of the carriage.

When Rufus opened the front door, Cedric and Sheila entered the mansion and crossed through the still-sleeping house, heading up the stairs.

“Then, I’ll go in.”

When they reached the attic on the third floor, Sheila lowered her gaze and spoke.

“Sheila.”

Cedric called her name. But her blue eyes did not turn toward him.

Sheila kept her gaze lowered stubbornly, her face worn and haggard.

Cedric quietly held back what he wanted to say. He had brought Sheila back to where she belonged, so they could talk slowly.

Having even given up marriage because of Sheila, Cedric had many things he wanted to say to her.

At the same time, he had no idea where or how to even begin.

So Cedric put off what he was not used to.

Even so, he’d intended to speak once Sheila finished paying off Judith’s debt….

“You don’t have to work, so don’t worry and get some rest.”

At the words that she didn’t have to work, Sheila’s body flinched.

Without noticing her reaction as she kept her head lowered, Cedric added that her outings during that time would be treated as having joined him late in Lotas to attend him, so she didn’t need to worry about that either.

At his words, Sheila gave a small nod, then hugged her travel bag and slipped into the attic.

The door to her room shut firmly in front of Cedric.

Cedric stood there for a long while, staring at the attic door.

In truth, he didn’t want to let Sheila go like this. He wanted to open the attic door right away, go in, and pull her into his arms.

But he couldn’t do it.

It was a place he had always entered without hesitation….

Unable to open the maid’s door, which didn’t even have a lock, Cedric suppressed his impulse once again.