Greathill, darkened early by the grim weather, felt eerie.
Diane, who had been tracing the toe of Yohan's shoe with her downcast gaze, slowly raised her head.
He never gave it a second glance when it was hanging there.
He was a truly strange man. Though, that was part of Duke Johann Leopold's charm.
She reluctantly chose a drastic measure.
"That's a painting by that artist."
His neat eyebrows lifted as if asking, "Who?"
"Andreya Nikolai. The one I mentioned before."
The artist she mentioned before...
Yohan frowned, staring at the spot where Olivia's portrait had hung. The Duke of Edinburgh, now in its place, seemed to say with a dignified expression, "You fool."
"Ah, that artist."
One of the names he had dismissed, thinking it didn't matter as long as it wasn't Edgar Lancaster Lancelot, came to mind.
About three months after the wedding, the Crown Prince, seeing the bare walls of the Leopold ducal family's Greathill, which lacked any history, clicked his tongue and recommended the artist.
He added that he was a talented artist who graduated at the top of his class from the Royal Academy of Art and won the grand prize at the Salon Exhibition.
Anyone would have been fine. Such a bothersome task. So, he entrusted everything to Maurice.
He had merely commissioned three paintings and received a report that a contract was signed with the condition that he would stay in the annex for five months to work.
Yohan slowly turned his head from the spot he had been rubbing, as if chasing Olivia's afterimage, and glared at his own portrait.
He recalled the face of the man who had painted him.
He remembered him as having a pretty face, like a bookish scholar who knew nothing but art. After seeing the finished painting, he had judged that the guy had talent.
In the annex for five months...
Ha! Yohan scoffed.
He was a complete fool.
"Those things."
His gaze, filled with annoyance, fell upon the paintings.
"Get rid of them all."
Yohan, his face devoid of any emotion, returned and ascended the stairs toward his study.
The leaves of the ornamental tropical plant decorating the corner of the landing seemed to cast a broad shadow, pulling at his ankles.
'I love you.'
He felt a sense of emptiness.
His wife's 'I love you' might not have been a confession to him.
A woman sold for money, caught in the dirty trap set by her maternal grandfather. In Olivia's eyes, he was merely a buyer who had purchased a damaged item to obtain a title.
So, there was no reason at all to love him.
Shortly after the small commotion caused by the portraits, Maurice summoned Diane Brooke to his office.
"Please, sit down."
Could anyone perfectly hide their expression? If anyone could, it would be Diane Brooke, Maurice thought as he watched the woman sit in the chair opposite him.
Whether she knew she was being presumptuous or not, her attitude of acting as if nothing had happened was brazen.
He had disliked her acting as the mistress of the ducal family in place of the Duchess ever since she had been there.
"I asked you to come because there are a few things I need to confirm."
"Please, speak."
"That day. The day of the lake incident."
Diane Brooke looked at Maurice with a surprised expression.
"Why suddenly that day?"
"Could you tell me your schedule for that day in chronological order?"
Diane forced herself to erase her stiff expression and asked casually.
"It's not difficult to tell you... It's just sudden. Is something wrong?"
"The Duke has ordered it."
"His Grace?"
Maurice nodded.
"That's strange. Why would he be interested in that day's events now?"
Diane's heart was beating fast as she slowly lowered her gaze as if recalling the past. The lakeside, shrouded in darkness, unfolded before Diane's eyes. The air grew heavy. The mist clinging to the lakeside was damp.
Olivia didn't know. Diane had made up her mind when she saw the ducal family's secretary recruitment ad in the newspaper.
Thoroughly, perfectly.
A decision to destroy her.
"...It rained that day from morning."
Diane slowly began to speak.
"The road was blocked due to a carriage that had slipped on the wet road, so I was about thirty minutes late for work. It was the first time I had been late since starting work at the Duke's residence, so I remember it clearly. But it was an uneventful day. The same went for the Duchess."
Diane continued her story as if carefully scanning through it, and Maurice occasionally glanced at her while taking notes in his notebook.
"When I got to work, there were two letters addressed to the Duchess. One was a letter of greeting from the Count's family, and I don't know the other because the sender wasn't written. As far as I remember, she seemed angry after seeing that letter."
"Do you have any idea who it could be?"
"Of course, I do. But if you think about the Duchess's honor, please don't ask any more. It's just my guess, after all. My opinion isn't important, is it?"
It was a remark that took Olivia's lover into consideration. There was no way that the quick-witted Maurice wouldn't understand.
"There were often such things before, so I didn't pay special attention to it."
"A letter with no sender?"
"That's right. There were about two times."
Diane made it seem as if the letters were from lovers saying goodbye. She had an excellent talent for creating stories that were advantageous to her in any situation.
"She skipped lunch, so I took some food up to her, but she seemed to be crying. It wasn't a good sight, so I didn't go in and just came down."
"Is that letter still kept somewhere?"
"No. She burned it."
"I see..."
Maurice trailed off with a disappointed look.
"She stayed in her bedroom until she called me, and when I went up, she said she needed to have a summer dress made."
"Was she alone in the bedroom?"
"She was with the maid."
"Anything strange?"
"She was such an emotionally volatile person that I didn't feel anything particularly strange. You know that, don't you?"
"Is the maid the one who is currently accompanying the Duchess?"
"Yes. Her name was Anne, I think."
"What time did Madam Gabriel arrive?"
"She arrived around three o'clock. She looked at the new product catalog, chose a dress, and said that she seemed to have lost some weight since last time, so she re-measured her size and left. It was probably a little before five o'clock."
Hmm, Maurice hummed and scratched his temple with the end of his fountain pen.
"And the incident happened three hours later, is that right...? What were you doing during that time, Miss Brooke?"
"As I said then, I was organizing the statements in the office and left work a little before six o'clock."
"So, you don't know about the Duchess's whereabouts after that."
"Unfortunately. I should have stayed..."
Diane frowned as if blaming herself.
"I know that you usually sleep at the mansion when it rains. Like a few days ago."
"Of course, that's right. But I had to go to my family's house that day because there was something going on."
A moment of silence passed between the two. Maurice was looking at his notebook. The more he looked into the incident, the more suspicious things there were.
"Isn't it strange?"
Diane swallowed hard and forced herself to ask back.
"What's strange?"
"That someone who is going to commit suicide would have clothes made."
That was Maurice's common sense. He speculated that the Duke had ordered the investigation because he was concerned about that part. Such a reaction was also natural.
"I guess she felt like dying after having the clothes made. She's a hard person to figure out. The former Duchess, I mean."
Diane spoke in a subtly sarcastic tone, as if it were nothing.
Right. That's why I hated this woman. Maurice realized anew and continued with the next question.
"There was a maid who quit a few days after the incident. Do you know anything about her?"
She was said to be one of the assistant maids who helped the head cook, Hannah.
"She eloped, didn't she? The maids said she seemed to be pregnant. Isn't that a common thing?"
There were often cases where servants fell in love with each other. Most of them formed families, but in cases where the other person was married, maids would often run away like this.
"Hoo..."
Maurice let out a long breath.
He had started the investigation and met with the butler, the head maid, and even the Duchess's secretary, but there were no particular gains.
"You can go now."
Diane stood up. As she turned to leave, Maurice said.
"Delight, is it?"
Diane turned her head and looked at Maurice.
"The perfume."
"Yes. That's right. How did you know?"
Maurice didn't miss the woman, who had been imitating an elegant Duchess, flinching.
"I chose the Duchess's birthday present. With the recommendation of a department store employee."
"..."
"The Duke is such a busy person."
Maurice smiled brightly.
Diane smiled, greeted him, and left the office. She straightened her back and walked down the hallway with a graceful gait.
The moment she entered the room, her face turned red in an instant. Diane rushed to the dressing table with a violent step and picked up the blue bottle and threw it into the trash can.
Madam Lauren barged in again with the completed dress. It was around five o'clock in the afternoon, an hour before the ball.
"Oh my! Eve Lauren!"
Elaine exclaimed with a moved expression.
The waist decoration of the green dress, neatly placed on the bed, scattered iridescent light in the fading sunset.
Olivia, who had requested a simple silhouette and minimal exposure, stared at the dress with a somewhat troubled look. For some reason, there seemed to have been a slight problem in communication with the designer.
"What are you doing? Why aren't you putting it on? You'll be late."
Elaine, who had already finished getting ready, gave Marie and Anne a look.
"But..."
"Come on, hurry."
Elaine grabbed Olivia's arm, who was hesitating, with great spirit and handed her over to Anne.
A moment later, Olivia came out of the dressing room.
As expected.
Exclamations of admiration poured out from here and there. The dress was nothing short of perfect.
Olivia's figure was dazzling in the golden sunlight.
