The Mansion Awaits Spring
Chapter 66
“They’re your aunt’s.”
“Do you think Mrs. Morrow lent you those shoes just so you could harass people?”
“Yeah. I think that’s exactly why.”
April answered nonchalantly and pulled her foot away. Then, perhaps feeling embarrassed by her childish behavior and response, she averted her eyes.
Fezin feigned ignorance of her embarrassment and followed April as she led the way.
“The funeral preparations seem a bit excessive.”
“How do you know?”
“Every furniture store is in an uproar. Word is a big spender is making the rounds.”
“I used a pseudonym.”
“Oh, I know. Miss May Lucere.”
April had started purchasing furniture with the help of Millet Virta, the bank employee.
Fearing that merchants might refuse to sell if they knew a ‘witch’ was the buyer, the two of them had invented a fictional bourgeois woman from the Empire named May Lucere from the very beginning.
As Fezin said, Miss Lucere was buying up an enormous amount of goods. It was necessary to make the Lunos estate look respectable again.
Fezin spoke.
“If you keep spending money like that, you’ll be bankrupt before the year is out.”
“I won’t go bankrupt. I consulted with the banker. I’m leaving enough to send the kids to school.”
“Bank employee, not banker.”
“……Is there anything about me you don’t know?”
“Nothing. I’m the investigator in charge of you. I know everything.”
He replied casually and sat down at the table prepared for their meal in the room where April was staying.
Fezin looked around the room and said,
“It’s decorated exactly like you.”
“Yes, like me when I was young.”
“It suits the current you, too.”
“Isn’t it too flashy?”
“You have a flashy face.”
Fezin responded dismissively as he pulled off his gloves.
April noticed the ring on his hand, which allowed her to stare intently at his white, sturdy hand.
It was a man’s hand, with strength felt in every finger. Yet, it was smooth and beautiful.
It was a hand that resembled his face. That face and hand, holding a teacup with an indifferent expression, were still beautiful.
“I wonder until what age he’ll stay pretty….”
April, who had been observing his hand, muttered to herself without realizing it. She lifted her head a moment too late, noticing the excessive silence.
Fezin was wearing an incredulous expression.
“Why are you looking at me like that?”
“Maybe keep those thoughts to yourself?”
“What did I say?”
“‘I wonder until what age he’ll stay pretty.’”
“Who?”
“You. You just wondered until what age I was going to stay pretty.”
“……I did?”
How could her inner thoughts just pop out like that, without even considering the owner of the body?
Heat rushed to the back of April’s neck at the realization that she had blurted out her thoughts while looking at Fezin’s hand.
She wished Fezin would at least tease her about it. Then she would have something to say back.
But Fezin said nothing more. He just stared at April with a strange look, like someone who had heard the most bizarre thing in the world.
By the time the heat from her neck had conquered her cheeks, Fezin finally spoke again.
“For the time being, I plan to stay looking like this.”
“It wasn’t a question, so you don’t have to answer.”
“I know. I just said it because it was something I really wanted to answer, even if it wasn’t a question.”
“Right, for the time being. Well, you might turn ugly as soon as next year.”
“That won’t happen.”
“You never know.”
“When a handsome man grows old, he becomes a handsome old man. Theoretically, that’s how it works.”
“Why are you bringing theories into this?”
Fortunately, Fezin continued to talk nonsense, allowing April to finally escape her embarrassment.
To blurt out such a thing.
It was lucky the recipient was Pezin Dieus; if it had been any other man, he would have seen her as a very strange person.
The conversation about prettiness ended there, and the two began to discuss the flowers to be used for the funeral. What was beautiful, and what flowers were not meant for funerals.
Having talked about flowers throughout the meal, she felt the illusion that spring had briefly come to the Grand Duchy, where the only scenery was fallen snow.
As the two were sharing a meal and discussing flowers, a loud crashing sound—unbelievable for a noblewoman to make—echoed from outside.
April hurriedly stood up to see Eleanor running toward her room.
“April, I think Jeff has found the strength to speak\!”
“He’s speaking?”
The one who asked back was Fezin, who had known for seven years that Jeff Morrow had become unable to speak.
Eleanor nodded with an overwhelmed expression, and April immediately headed to the study where her uncle was.
As Eleanor said, Jeff was ready to say something.
Jeff, who was about to speak the moment he saw April’s face, widened his eyes upon discovering Fezin appearing behind her.
“This…….”
Jeff pointed at Fezin.
“Dieus…….”
The hand he used to point was trembling with rage.
It sounded as if he had dragged those five letters, ‘Dieus,’ out from the depths of the agonizing pain in his heart.
Hatred dwelt in his eyes. It was a wonder where such massive anger had been stored within a man who had been as withered as a tree in a drought.
“I’ll wait outside.”
Fezin whispered to April, who was just as bewildered as he was, and then tactfully left the study.
Only after the man of Dieus had disappeared did Jeff’s hand, shaking with fury, finally stop.
And his eyes slowly turned toward April.
Jeff vividly remembered how much the Lunos couple, who had struggled to conceive for a long time after marriage, had cherished the daughter they finally had.
Jeff, who was unmarried at the time of April’s birth, recalled that day in April when he first met his niece.
To April, who sat holding his hand, he shared that emotional moment before the words he had intended to say.
“The sky was clear. On the day you were born.”
At his sudden words, April blinked without answering.
Jeff continued.
“It had rained like that all through April, but on the day you were born, the sky was deep blue. There was a brief shower, but the clouds passed so quickly that it cleared up again in no time.”
“Um, was it?”
“The weather was so beautiful that day. How wonderful my brother’s and sister-in-law’s expressions were. And how happy I was…….”
April smiled silently as she listened to him.
Since her confinement, this was the first time she had met someone who missed the Lunos couple—her parents.
Some might have missed them, but they couldn’t speak of it for fear of offending the Grand Duke.
Miller Dieus was a soft and kind man, but he was still the ruler of the Grand Duchy.
April thought of Jeff Morrow—no, Jeff Lunos—who had been strict with his own sons but infinitely generous to his niece.
She gradually remembered that she had grown up surrounded by so much love. Though that had led her to a rather turbulent adolescence.
Fortunately, thanks to that, she knew what a life of being loved felt like.
Eleanor, knowing how much Jeff loved April, stood turned away, weeping, before wiping her eyes with a handkerchief and scolding him.
“Did you wait seven years to open your mouth just to say something like that? If that was the case, you should have spoken sooner instead of worrying us so much.”
Affection was mixed in Eleanor’s words, but Jeff, feeling guilty, rolled his eyes and observed her. He only smiled once he saw a sense of happiness radiating from her face.
Jeff had to take a deep breath before he could say what he really wanted to say. It was a story too heavy to spit out.
April, noticing Jeff’s breathing had become ragged, said,
“If it’s too hard, you can tell me later. I’ll come again.”
“Di, Dieus.”
“Yes, Dieus. Are you talking about Miller?”
She had a certain premonition from the moment she saw the anger radiating from him when he looked at Fezin.
April knew that Jeff had something he wanted to say regarding Miller Dieus.
April gripped Jeff’s trembling hand tightly.
“Take your time. I’m listening.”
“That man argued with my brother often. It was clear what he wanted.”
“Do you mean the marriage with the Grand Duchess?”
“Yes. The conclusion must have been there. And there was only one way.”
“…….”
“For that marriage, Miller Dieus absolutely had to destroy the Runos family.”
The warmth in April’s eyes slowly went cold.
