A Mad Lady’s Confession - Chapter 16

By the time he recalled the incident from that morning, quite a bit of time had passed.

In the carriage returning to the estate, after stopping by the theater to watch a demonstration performance by the orchestra that would participate in this joint concert and receiving reports from the Gammelstad side, he naturally found himself thinking of the young woman’s face.

Facing his aunt, who knew etiquette so thoroughly it might as well be worn down, the woman had suggested they check an etiquette book together. What kind of expression was she wearing now? The curiosity was unlike him.

However, when he returned home, his curiosity wasn’t immediately resolved. As always, Eleanor wasn’t among the people who had come out to the mansion stairs and lobby to wait for him.

Instead, the white-haired butler, the head maid, and an elegantly silver-haired noblewoman stood in her place.

Matthias’s eyes briefly swept over those who had come to greet him before confirming the empty spot. Lady Jules welcomed him warmly.

“Your timing is perfect. Let’s have dinner together.”

“Yes, Aunt.”

As he answered and began to walk, the butler quickly approached and spoke in a low voice, “Madam is in the cabinet (a lady’s study).”

What could be so important that she couldn’t even fulfill the duty of a wife she had spoken of so confidently? But he chose, as always, to suppress his interest.

He passed the corridor where the cabinet was and headed straight to the dressing room.

After changing into indoor wear appropriate for dinner, he went to the dining room and pulled out a chair for Lady Jules, yet his gaze still lingered on the empty seat.

Perhaps noticing that gaze, the old woman’s voice came from across the table.

“The Duchess has something else to attend to, so she won’t be joining us for dinner today.”

“Something else to attend to?”

As if she had been waiting, the old woman began to speak.

“It seems the Count Brynhill household didn’t provide sufficient training for a bride. She doesn’t even know proper dress manners.”

“….”

“She came to lunch still wearing the dress from this morning, so I gave her a proper scolding. Even though there was ink on the hem. And then, quite improperly, she started shedding tears.”

“…She cried?”

“You’re aware that I’ve long served as a chaperone to young ladies. Even younger girls than her never showed tears under instruction. And yet the mistress of the house, the mistress of House Nielsen, shedding tears over rightful correction?”

Matthias pictured Eleanor in tears. The woman who, wearing that fresh dress embroidered with blue flowers from earlier that morning, must have let those droplets fall under his aunt’s scolding.

“….”

“Was I excessive? In a household where even the previous Duchess is absent, as the eldest of the family, are you saying my reprimand was excessive?”

There was something ironic about those words. No matter how newly married she was, Eleanor was now the mistress of House Nielsen. While they elevated and acknowledged the position of mistress, the one sitting in that position was scolded as if she were an immature young lady.

No matter how great the lady of a house might be, without her husband’s support and backing from her family, such things were commonplace. All the more so when she had taken the position at a young age.

So his aunt’s behavior was both excessive and not excessive. Matthias concluded that no one understood that better than the old woman herself.

“So then, what punishment did you give for those tears, Aunt?”

“I told her to copy the etiquette book.”

“…The whole thing?”

“There isn’t a single unimportant passage, so of course.”

The noble etiquette book ran over two hundred pages, printed in tiny, grain-like letters.

Here, Matthias had a choice between two options.

As a husband, he could say the punishment was far too excessive, dissuade the old woman, call the lady of the house to this table, seek reconciliation, and urge her to eat.

The lady of the house, who had yet to secure her position, would gain her husband’s tacit support through that process. If that happened, even his strict aunt wouldn’t be able to make Eleanor cry as she had today.

Again, Lady Jules could be harsh to the point of cruelty in certain situations. Considering that, the first option would be an excellent choice for Eleanor. It would reduce not only future discord within the household but also the burdens of the mistress.

There was also a second, simpler option.

To quietly finish this meal, go to the bath as he always did, and end the day with a glass of wine while listening to Ravel on the newly acquired gramophone. Just like before, as if marriage and a wife didn’t exist.

He could choose. One of the two.

He tapped the table with his index finger out of habit and thought for a moment. Then he was startled at himself.

To think he was even considering it, wasting unnecessary emotion on a wife who would only remain for a year, one he had taken on almost as a burden. Was it because they had shared a bed? Had he been assigning too much meaning to that? The thought suddenly disgusted him.

Even without this, there were countless matters that required Matthias’s attention.

She said she would fulfill a wife’s duties. If enduring the stubborn and difficult temperament of her in-laws could be counted as a duty.

He picked up the fork he had set down and continued speaking.

“…It will probably take time for her to adjust.”

“And it seems we should assign her a lady-in-waiting. Everything is more of a mess than I expected.”

Once again, the image of the woman with hair the color of candy rose in his mind. Her pale, soft cheeks flushed red as she looked at him.

This wasn’t good. Not for him, nor for the woman.

Just as there were things he had to endure for a year, it would be good to make it clear that the woman also had her share to endure. Matthias quietly continued the rest of his meal.

“She was served dinner, but it seems she didn’t touch it at all.”

When the butler reported this, Matthias was reading. As planned, he had relaxed his body in hot water and was spending the end of his day leisurely with a glass of his preferred wine.

“I thought you might be curious.”

“….”

The butler had served the Nielsens since the time of the previous count. From the moment young Matthias inherited the title until now, he had remained by his side, observing him more closely than anyone else.

He was so experienced that he could tell what his master wanted or thought from even the smallest gesture.

Matthias turned his gaze back to his book as if to say he could leave.

After the butler left, he tried to enjoy his quiet again, but the words wouldn’t settle in his mind at all.

In the end, he got up, thinking he might take a walk before going to bed.

Before stepping down to the landing, his gaze fell on the corridor opposite his own quarters.

He should’ve just gone straight downstairs, but once it caught his eye, it bothered him too much to ignore. He turned his steps and headed toward the lady of the house’s quarters.

‘Does she always cry that easily?’

She’d cried over his gift as well. And today, he’d been told she cried because she was scolded.

For the mistress of a household, both tears and smiles were virtues only when kept in moderation. Excessive laughter was considered improper, and so were tears. Even more so when it was simply a reprimand from an elder of the family.

“Ha….”

This was exactly why her young age had bothered him. Thinking that, he stopped in front of the cabinet door.

What should he say? That it was already late and she should just go to sleep? Or that it might be better to at least have a late meal?

While he was hesitating, click, the door opened. Unexpectedly, it was the head maid who came out.

“Master?”

“Is my wife inside?”

“She just went to her bedroom. I was about to tidy up the last of things….”

“Go on. I’ll take a look around here before I leave.”

As the head maid stepped back, Matthias entered the room as if it were only natural. After the head maid gave a silent bow and left, the study was filled with nothing but quiet.

Why did I come in here?

For a moment, Matthias questioned his own actions, but since he was already here, he decided to look around the woman’s space a bit.

Her clothes, makeup, living space, hobbies, none of that had ever been of interest to him. But the woman who was now his wife had a strange way of making people curious.

‘Because she’s a woman you can’t quite understand.’

He casually concluded that about his own curiosity and slowly looked around the room. It was smaller than his study, and the atmosphere was different, but there was something cozy about it.

He had only been in his mother’s study a few times when he was very young, when she was working, but even that felt different from this. He could somewhat agree with what a certain architect once said, that a space comes to resemble the person who uses it.

When he looked at the desk, the etiquette book was open about a third of the way through, and beneath it was a notebook filled with diligent copying.

Still a long way to go, he thought with a teasing smile. Even so, his chest felt strangely unsettled.

He pictured a woman gripping a pen in her small white hand, skipping dinner to write this. He pictured the woman who must have let tears fall at a single word from his aunt.

He was, by no means, a man weak to tears. If he were, he would’ve long since become the possession of one of the many women of Lemren.

A long time ago, Matthias had once raised a puppy. Small and cute things naturally stirred a person’s instinct to protect, and he’d been quite fond of the dog.

After his loyal ‘Finn,’ who had just reached adulthood, died, he never kept a dog again.

That must be what this feeling is, Matthias thought. Simply that the woman is smaller and more fragile than him, too gentle, and only looks to him. Just like Finn.

…I should have the head maid prepare something light for her upstairs.

As he turned his body with that thought, his eyes caught the gap of a drawer, left open just a couple of finger widths.