Chapter 37
Chapter 37
~Chapter 37~
“Your fault or not, are you really saying you’ll just accept that dishonor?”
“I can’t shake it off right away. And as you said, this scandal has made me famous—so I figured it’d be better to make use of it.”
Trisha’s brows remained furrowed. Fame could be useful, but allowing the misconception that she was frivolous to spread uncontrollably could be dangerous.
“I’m worried you’re still too naive. Society has two faces. You can be immoral at night, but you must appear pure by day.”
Once you crossed an invisible line, people would turn their backs on you in an instant. Everyone would point fingers and shove you out. If that happened, Harriet’s return would lose all meaning.
But Harriet saw it differently.
“I came away from the Vanderbilt party with one certainty—curiosity is an unbelievably powerful force.”
She hadn’t felt certain that night, but after the party, several invitations arrived for her. They were for small tea gatherings, and curiously, every one included a request to “keep this invitation secret.”
Even though being seen with Harriet could blemish their own reputations, they couldn’t hold back their curiosity.
“I was known as a scandal-monger even before, so I wondered why these invitations were only starting to come now. Then it hit me—back then, I was so filled with grievances that I just kept making excuses left and right. I didn’t look like someone who’d say anything interesting.”
“And now?”
“People think I spent a year in the convent reflecting on my past, so now I must seem like I’ve resigned myself to it all. That’s why they finally see me as someone they can talk to.”
“Isn’t it just that they want to hear the juicy backstory to your scandals?”
“Exactly. Otherwise, why invite someone with such a bad reputation? I’m happy to attend and take a look around.”
Trisha tapped the armrest of her chair and asked again.
“But those scandals weren’t even things you did. What exactly do you plan to say at those parties?”
Harriet’s eyes sparkled at that.
“Maybe I can twist those stories in a way that works in my favor.”
Right now, people trusted Bella and her uncle far more than they did Harriet. Spouting the truth outright could easily backfire.
But words had a strange magic—you could tell people what they wanted to hear without lying and steer the story toward the outcome you desired.
That was the strategy Roxana had drilled into her.
Trisha fell silent for a moment after hearing that, then slowly nodded.
“Hmph. It’s your life, so do as you like. But keep this in mind—people will try to use you to get to me.”
“I promise I’ll never do anything to embarrass you, Great-Aunt.”
“We’ll see.”
With that, Trisha rose from her seat and left the drawing room.
Left alone, Harriet let out an awkward little laugh. Before heading upstairs, she decided to tidy the room a bit and began returning the chairs to their places.
That was when she spotted a thick blanket under the chair Trisha had been sitting in.
It’s summer—why’s there a lap blanket here?
It struck her as a little odd, but Harriet simply folded the blanket neatly and set it on the chair.
“Here is the information you requested on the Listerwell Viscount family. It contains records mostly from the past twenty years.”
The man who’d been smoking a cigarette on the Vanderbilt Terrace returned after a week and handed Cedric a thick binder.
“Good work. The next promising party is at Count Sheldon’s estate. Investigate it ahead of time.”
“Yes, Your Grace.”
Less than five minutes after they met, the man vanished once more.
This was how Cedric’s personal intelligence network operated. Only his co-founder Edgar kept in close contact—the other agents worked mostly independently. They didn’t even know each other’s identities, and their meetings to exchange information were brief affairs of business only.
No one even knew it existed. And yet, it was likely the most powerful information-gathering network in the empire.
Twenty years’ worth of data… not as thick as I’d have thought.
Cedric flipped through the pages like a novel.
He’d never taken interest in the trivial histories of other families—but for some reason, the Listerwell records read smoothly.
There were astonishingly dramatic events, so much so that he wondered if everyone lived through moments like these.
The first was undoubtedly the tragic death of the former family head, Arthur Listerwell.
“June 28, 1866—Arthur Listerwell and his wife drown. Location: Center of Tasia Lake, Albrecht Park.
One week later, bodies discovered at Saint Antoine Park across the lake.
…No official will, so the title passed not to his daughter Harriet but to his younger brother John.”
Cedric vaguely recalled hearing about the drowning accident at Albrecht Park. He remembered boating growing less common after that.
The documents recorded the circumstances of the accident in considerable detail.
“John Listerwell was the first to witness the accident and called for help. However, by the time the rescuers arrived, it had already sunk…”
Boat accidents weren’t uncommon—but fatalities were rare, since people usually stayed near the shallows.
Yet for some reason, the Arthur couple had rowed out to the deepest part of the lake.
Perhaps they’d been so entranced by the scenery that they hadn’t realized how far they’d gone.
Cedric could picture a pleasant outing turning into a site of tragedy.
But had it truly been a tragedy for everyone?
“It must have been a stroke of luck for John Listerwell. Arthur, who doted on his daughter so much, died suddenly without leaving a will.”
Two years before Arthur’s death, the law had been amended to allow daughters to inherit titles—but only if the previous head left a clear will.
Even then, distant relatives often opposed and overturned such decisions.
The law was still new, and Harriet had been just twelve at the time, so she likely hadn’t even known she had a claim. In the end, her uncle took it all.
Cedric skimmed the pages until Harriet’s name appeared again.
But from age twelve to seventeen, she barely featured in the records.
Instead, Bella was mentioned frequently.
“Bella Listerwell was famous for her beauty from childhood and enjoyed great popularity thanks to her kind and bright personality. Even before her father inherited the Listerwell title, she often appeared at parties alongside Harriet…”
“Around age fifteen, Bella began drawing serious interest from men, with early proposals following…”
“Bella frequently socialized with these men, taking a central role in society…”
In short, Bella had been the center of attention since childhood.
She was constantly surrounded by people of both sexes and the object of everyone’s envy.
People even measured their own social standing by how close they were to her.
Typical queen bee, Cedric thought.
But others didn’t seem to see her that way—negative rumors about Bella were almost nonexistent.
“On the contrary, most of the bad rumors swirled around Harriet Listerwell… starting from the year she turned eighteen?”
When both cousins turned eighteen, Harriet suddenly started drawing notice—but not the good kind.
“…The man’s name was Julian Pace (second son of the Pace Viscount family). Harriet Listerwell, who secretly admired him, intercepted a letter Julian sent to Bella and replied in her place…”
It matched exactly what Cedric had overheard at the party.
After that, Harriet was frequently tangled up with men.
Just like with Julian, she’d pretended to be Bella in letters to deceive them—received flowers and gifts from them, and even used Bella’s invitations to attend masked balls, impersonating her and entering improper relationships with men.
Even Tez Locke, who’d claimed at the polo match that “Harriet humiliated me,” said he’d mistaken her for Bella at the masked ball, met with her, and entered a deep relationship.
After reading through it all, Cedric tilted his head in puzzlement.
