Translator: Nox

The Mansion Awaits Spring

Chapter 24

As April laughed, thinking back to her childhood, Fezin crossed his arms and arched an eyebrow.

“You’re laughing? You can actually laugh right now?”

“It was ages ago. Am I supposed to stay genuinely angry about it forever?”

“I was trampled enough to justify it. Though, I suppose having such a harsh first dance partner paid off. I’ve mastered every dance since then.”

“Stop praising yourself. It’s making you more eyesore by the second.”

“I’m shocked there was ever a time when I was less of an eyesore.”

“I’m shocked too. To find out there’s a basement beneath the rock bottom.”

Trading barbs like that, April held out the necklace toward him.

Fezin skillfully undid the intricate clasp. With a tilt of his chin, asking if he should put it on her, he remarked, “Do you have any idea how much your friends teased me back then? Asking why a girl was wearing a tuxedo instead of a dress.”

April pointed to her own neck and lifted her hair with both hands. “Is it my fault you look the way you do?”

“Then whose fault is it? Mine?”

“It’s your face, so you’re responsible for it.”

In the meantime, the sapphire necklace settled around April’s neck.

April picked up a jewel-encrusted hand mirror from the jewelry box and looked at her reflection.

She studied the mirror intently, then let out an involuntary laugh.

“It finally feels real—that I’m twenty-two.”

“Don’t you have mirrors at home?”

“It’s not that. It feels real now that I’ve seen other people’s faces too.”

Seeing an adult woman reflected in the glass felt strange. The sapphire, which had felt overwhelmingly large at eight years old, now looked perfectly suited to her.

She saw an overlap with the twenty-year-old Heidi Basanta, whom she had looked down upon when she was fourteen.

It wasn’t that she had forgiven her in her heart, but it was true that a flicker of pity rose within her.

When people spoke of her family as nothing more than pirates, that girl—who had been much younger than April was now—might have felt even her last shred of morality crumble away.

If she couldn’t understand her at all, she would only feel rage. But because she felt rage yet understood her a little, she pitied her; and because she pitied her yet knew she wouldn’t have acted the same way herself, she felt rage all over again.

The feelings April held for the woman who was both Heidi Basanta and Heidi Dieus were never consistent.

April asked as if in passing, “How are the Grand Duke couple doing? I hope they’re miserable.”

“They’re still head over heels for each other.”

April glared at Fezin’s nonchalant answer.

Regardless, Fezin continued.

“If you’re so curious, see it with your own eyes. Don’t put me in the middle.”

“I intend to. I’m going, don’t you worry.”

April looked back into the mirror.

Fezin was watching April’s face reflected in that glass.

“You look like the sun.”

At Fezin’s words, April turned around.

“In what way?”

“The color combination.”

Fezin shrugged as if it were nothing.

Blonde hair that seemed taken from the sun, red eyes that seemed taken from the sun.

April spoke. “Is this about the witch stories?”

Fezin let out a deliberate, loud scoff.

“What are you talking about? No matter how you look at it, isn’t it the opposite combination?”

“I suppose so.”

“Don’t be so scared of the Church. You’re the type of person who would burn even the flames themselves.”

Fezin pulled out a cigarette and added, “Besides, the day the Church defeats me isn’t going to happen.”

April looked up at Fezin as he spoke.

Perhaps because he had mentioned the sun, Fezin momentarily looked like the night to her. A dark sky and a sea whose depths were hidden, shimmering under the moonlight.

If you win, is that good for me?

To put it another way, are you saying you’ll protect me?

April wanted to ask those questions, but she feared looking as though she were clinging to him, so she remained silent and turned her head away.

“Fine. I’ll try to worry about it less.”

“Yeah, you do that.”

Fezin turned to head out for a smoke. Just as he was about to leave the room, he looked back at April.

“When do you want to go to the amusement park?”

“Did everyone survive?”

“Fortunately. The fog cleared, and we searched the lakeshore, but we didn’t find anything else, and there are no missing persons reports.”

“What about the ones who caused the carriage accident?”

“The judge will decide that.”

Fezin replied, looking at April as if waiting for her to name a date.

April tried to organize her schedule in her head, then realized she didn’t have one.

“Anytime is fine.”

“Then pick a day you want. A lot of police officers are coming along with us, so if you have people you want to bring, bring them.”

“What?”

“We’re renting out that huge amusement park; we can’t just have the two of us playing there. What fun would it be with just you?”

“Why would I play with you anyway?”

“You keep forgetting that I’m monitoring you.”

“Then just monitor me. Don’t ‘play.’”

“Just waiting around is even more boring.”

Fezin’s grumbling sounded so much like a child’s that April laughed out loud despite herself.

She continued, “Besides the two working here, who else would I have to bring?”

“Well, our police force will be enough then.”

“Listen to you, calling it ‘police force’ when you’re just coming along to play.”

“Don’t focus too much on the facts.”

Fezin said, turning away again and waving his hand in farewell.

April watched his retreating back for a moment before sitting down at the vanity again.

She scrutinized her face, which she hadn’t looked at properly in a long time. Perhaps because she secretly liked being told she looked like the sun, her face didn’t look so bad to her today.

---

Hannah was so excited to be out in the provincial capital with Bauman that she went skipping about, taking in the whole world.

Bauman gave a kind smile.

“Don’t trip while you’re running.”

“I won’t!”

Running here and there, Hannah stopped for a moment in front of a house she had to pass on the way to the factory.

Seeing the name ‘Koski’ on the nameplate—Hannah’s surname—Bauman asked, “Do you want to go inside for a bit?”

“Later.”

Hannah spoke bravely and tugged on Bauman’s arm to keep going.

Since Bauman was a builder of houses, he habitually scanned the Koski residence.

It was one of the houses built uniformly near the factory, closer to a room with a kitchen than an actual house.

The keyhole was covered in scratches from being fumbled with in a daily drunken stupor, and the stairs leading down to the room were cracked and left unswept for so long that moss had grown.

A drunkard would surely have slipped on them every single day, which likely explained the various gouges along the path down. It was a home the owner had simply given up on.

This drunkard would never recover. Otherwise, how could he send his young daughter to a factory, and then leave her be even after she lost a hand and came home with debt? This was a malice that went beyond mere indifference.

Bauman suppressed his anger and said to Hannah, “I shall teach you how to draw houses.”

“How to draw houses?”

“Yes. If you have that skill, you will never go hungry anywhere for the rest of your life.”

“Can I do it even with one hand missing?”

“Of course. It might be a bit harder than for those with two hands, but you were born more nimble than others, so in the end, it will be no different.”

“Was I born that way?”

Hannah looked at the spot where her hand used to be.

The child did not grieve for that hand to an excessive degree. She didn’t cry, nor did she feel resentful.

Bauman thought that she was simply considering all those emotions as things that didn’t belong to her.

He didn’t know what the young lady of the mansion thought of Hannah, but what was clear was that she had brought this child—whose status was unknown and who had tried to set fire to her house—into her home. That was something extraordinary.

Bauman continued, “You and the young lady were destined to meet like this.”

“And you too, Grandpa!”

“Indeed. That is very true.”

Bauman replied with a joyful face.

When they arrived at the factory, Bauman stood a step behind Hannah as she paid the money.

Though he had no idea who Bauman was, the factory owner saw a man who, despite his age, possessed a sturdy build, and he cleared Hannah’s name from the debt ledger without a word.

“Get out. And don’t you ever come back.”

“I won’t!”

Hannah shouted, spun around, and ran to Bauman.

The factory owner spat on the ground and muttered, “Unlucky brat.”

Having heard those words often since her hand was injured, Hannah pretended not to hear and excitedly pulled Bauman away.

“Let’s go back quickly. The young lady is waiting.”

“Yes, let’s head back.”

Bauman spoke, then looked back at the factory owner as they walked away.

He etched the face and the name into his memory. That was April’s command.

She had said she would make sure this debt was repaid in full.

“Including Hannah’s hand.”

April had said those words in a calm, steady voice.