The Sixth Plan. To Know Thy Enemy. (8)
“The letters, mostly on the journey to the South, were about how good the trip had been. Merilyn always dreamed about leaving the North, so I gave her as much detail as possible. It must have comforted the poor Merilyn—if she had been cherishing it so much…”
She avoided answering my question in a rather exaggerated tone as Charlotte simply ranted on. My doubts grew a little thicker, but I still let her go. The tea that I took a little sip seemed to have felt slightly cold. I glossed over it and asked her a direct question instead.
“Do you have any proof of what you just said so far?”
“Yes, of course. Now, if only Amanda would keep her promise as well.”
Charlotte lifted the teacup and moistened her lips before setting it back down soon. It was only her lips that had been slightly moistened and her gesture that looked down at the tea with her eyes cast down brought the meaning as if she was saying; ‘I wasn’t able to drink the tea because it had gotten so cold’. Since I had just partaken some of the tea, that light gesture also meant to say something like; ‘I’m completely different from you who could drink almost anything’. As I watched Charlotte acting like that really showed me how much she had actually been ignoring me.
“First of all, I’ll tell you all about Count Petrika’s people. Give me a piece of paper and a pen, then I’ll write down everything that I know.”
“Great. You would have definitely remembered the people who had been entrusted by the Count’s order this time as well as the person who gave you the poisonous weed, right? Write them all down. And the evidence?”
“I will give Count Petrika’s written orders after I have settled down in a safe place.”
Charlotte spoke to me as if she was the superior person right here.
“Charlotte, do you really have the proof? It’d amount to nothing if it was just about Count Petrika planting people all over the Duchy. You can’t even question that.”
She held out her hand. The hand of the woman who had killed my baby was so disgusting that right at the moment she touched me, I could feel chills all over my body straight from her fingertips. Charlotte tactfully withdrew her hand and tucked her hair behind her ear. As she sat in the chair with her legs crossed, she was just like a doll that had been fashioned out of arrogance.
“That’s just great. Then, I’ll show you a piece of the evidence. The tea is already cold, so could you bring me some more?”
She had been the direct type, but that was actually akin to an order to leave the room for a while. Also, she really asked me—the Duchess—to actually bring her a new pot of tea. Her smile, which curved along her eyes, was brighter than ever. She seemed to be very happy to swing me around.
* * *
I boiled the water and brewed some dark green tea in a blue teapot. As I poured the tea into a blue teacup and gently set it down on the left side of Charlotte, she, who had been writing on a piece of paper, raised her head and thanked me. I took a seat afterwards while suppressing the urge to pour the hot tea all over her at once.
“Hmm? It seems like the tea is a bit bitter.”
Cough—after she had taken a sip of the tea, she coughed with a slight frown between her brows.
“Oh, sorry. It’s been years since I actually brewed tea, so there must have been some kind of a mistake.”
“Oh, it’s okay. It could be like that.”
When the Duchess Dowager, Charlotte, and I drank tea together, it was usually Charlotte who brewed the tea with a suitable combination of herbs or tea leaves. She nodded her head with a gentle face and sipped the astringent tea well.
“Here, these are the people of the Count whom I know. For those whose names I don’t know, I wrote down some of their distinctive impressions.”
“I’ll give it a check.”
I pulled the string and handed the paper that Charlotte had written on over to the head maid. Charlotte emptied her teacup right away, so I poured a new cup of tea for her before pouring some tea into mine as well. Charlotte took another sip of her tea leisurely, but unlike her, my heart was pounding a little bit faster and I grew more and more irritable by the second.
“Charlotte, what about the evidence?”
She read the nervousness painted on my face and smiled. Without any worries, Charlotte stood up and opened the drawer to her dresser. I focused all of my attention on what she was bringing over.
It was a piece of paper that had been slightly burnt and the scorched marks made it look terribly ugly. After discovering that Charlotte was the culprit, the Duchess Dowager scoured through her room and found absolutely nothing. There must have been nothing in those drawers for she had returned to the room only after I had decided to get Charlotte out of the dungeon.
Charlotte did not go outside during the time I was away for a while and since it was on the second floor, it had been impossible to go out from the window. Therefore, it was utterly clear that the evidence, the Count’s written order, had been hidden somewhere in her room. She licked her lips that were dry with tension and held out her hand. Charlotte then gave it to me as if it was to patronize me.
[The daughter of Count Emile.
I salute you for your prudence. These are the qualities that a noble lady much deserves.
The seal on this letter belongs to me, Adolph Merilyn von Petrika and I am the Count of Petrika himself.
As I mentioned last time, I have plans to place you in a position of honor and your role will be absolutely important. From now on, I will use this seal to certify the orders that would soon be issued by this Count.]
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