Ch#61
Ch#61
Ch#61
~Chapter 61~
The low winter sun slanted through the windows, scattering warm light as if trying to melt the cold air.
Under that pale golden glow, how long had they sat there in silence, waiting like that?
“Lady Harriet, I want to apologize.”
“Lady Viviana……?”
When Harriet turned her head, she saw Viviana biting her lip and furrowing her brow.
“I’m talking about that party where everyone was condemning you…… For some reason, the spot I was standing in that day felt strangely familiar. And then I realized—usually, you were the one standing there. And I…… I was one of the people standing across from you, criticizing you.”
Harriet said nothing.
“I judged you that day without even hearing your side of the story, and I’m truly sorry. I just blindly believed everything Bella said and treated you like a horrible person, spreading rumors without a second thought…… I…… Ha…… Saying it out loud like this, I can really see just how awful I was.”
Viviana covered her face with both hands in shame.
And when she finally lifted her head again to apologize properly— she froze.
Tears were welling up in Harriet’s eyes, shimmering there. The tip of her nose had turned pink.
“Thank you.”
“Yes? But I’m the one who should be apologizing—”
“No one has ever said they were sorry to me until now. All I wanted was for just one person to say, ‘Sorry for misunderstanding you.’ That would have been enough……”
Harriet could no longer hold back; she bowed her head, and her shoulders trembled faintly.
Viviana could only stare in a daze.
Ever since returning from the convent, Harriet had always appeared composed and full of confidence.
But now— her face was contorted with emotion, and tears were flowing endlessly.
“I’m sorry! I’m really, really sorry, Lady Harriet! For misunderstanding you……”
Viviana kept repeating that one phrase Harriet had so desperately wanted to hear.
It felt humiliating to only apologize after experiencing it herself—but those were the only words she could offer.
Harriet quickly wiped her face and lifted her head again.
“I’m sorry. I overreacted a bit. It wasn’t something worth crying over.”
“I’m not sure if I have the right to say this,” Viviana said softly, “but…… I think I understand why you cried. I’ll help you. I’ll let everyone know what Bella is really like.”
Harriet shook her head.
“Please don’t.”
“I know I wronged you before, but trust me just this once. Everyone’s still being fooled by Bella. We can’t just sit back and watch.”
“It’s not that I don’t trust you, Lady Viviana. It’s just…… now isn’t the time.”
Viviana’s expression turned confused, as if she couldn’t comprehend it.
Harriet felt sorry for her. Viviana still didn’t know the real Bella. She believed she could confront her head-on. But Bella had built up layers of defenses over years; she wouldn’t crumble just because a few truths were exposed.
“No one would believe it even if you said something now. Bella’s a genius at portraying herself as the victim.”
“Then we just have to stay silent and endure it?”
“If that were my plan, I wouldn’t have come back to Genoa.”
Harriet’s eyes gleamed with purpose.
“We need to make Bella drop her mask on her own. I think that party was the beginning of it—what do you think, Lady Viviana?”
“The party……?”
Viviana started to ask what Harriet meant— which moment she was referring to. But the instant their eyes met, she realized.
She had already experienced it.
Viviana’s mouth fell open in shock.
“Did you…… know I would end my friendship with Bella?”
“Of course not. I just hoped Bella would lose her composure and reveal her true colors. And that someone would witness it.”
Viviana began to imagine the things that must have happened beyond the situation she hadn’t noticed.
The cold expression on Bella’s face when their eyes had met.
Had no one else seen it?
The way everyone at the party had suddenly turned their backs on her……
The way Bella had acted like the victim in that moment— had no one thought it was strange?
Viviana couldn’t be sure.
But the seed of doubt had definitely been planted. And now, she wasn’t the only one harboring it.
“Maybe…… I wasn’t the only one who saw the crack in Bella’s mask.”
“That’s what I’m hoping for. But honestly, this is just the beginning. Truth be told, I didn’t expect someone—especially someone like you, Lady Viviana— to step forward this quickly.”
But Harriet didn’t feel only relief at that fact.
If Viviana was truly challenging Bella, Bella wouldn’t let it slide.
“I’m grateful, but…… you need to be careful from now on. Bella doesn’t forgive those she sees as having ‘betrayed’ her.”
“How is that betrayal?”
“From Bella’s perspective, it is. Betrayal. Disobedience.”
Bella had meticulously built herself up to become the most adored lady in high society.
Harriet had even acknowledged that effort to some extent.
Thanks to it, men fell for her charm, and women desperately wanted to be her friends. There was a reason she was called Genoa’s Golden Rose.
But her pride was enormous as well. She saw it as a personal affront if even one of her friends left her first.
“I know someone who publicly cut ties with Bella first…… and was completely ruined. Do you remember Diana McKeller?”
“McKeller? You mean the McKeller Earl family?”
“Yes. She’s their youngest daughter.”
The McKeller family was a powerful force operating businesses across multiple countries.
Diana McKeller had once been Harriet’s friend, but Bella had sown discord and stolen her away.
“Bella cherished her because her background was the most solid among her friends. But when a subtle rivalry developed between them, everything changed.”
It started with something trivial.
They both showed up to a party wearing the same dress from a famous designer.
Both wanted the other to change. They didn’t want to wear matching outfits. But neither wanted to discard the expensive dress they’d bought just to wear once.
The winner was, of course, Bella. Her dazzling beauty made the dress look far better on her.
It could have ended there—but Bella kept prodding Diana in subtle ways. She’d ‘accidentally’ let slip mean comments while pretending to talk about someone else, or make ‘slip-ups’ under the guise of fake concern.
Humiliated and hurt, Diana declared in front of everyone that she was done with Bella.
“That’s when the strange things started happening. The men who used to follow Bella around suddenly began fawning over Diana.”
At just sixteen, Diana must have been ecstatic.
If she’d stepped back and observed, she might have noticed something was wrong.
But the girl who had secretly dreamed of such attention lacked the clarity to be suspicious.
“She started getting drunk at parties and causing scenes…… She probably felt like a queen surrounded by her followers. But scandals are inevitable.”
“Good heavens……”
“And when the gossip reached its peak, Bella appeared at a party surrounded by the exact same men, as if nothing had happened. Diana was the only one left bearing the disgrace.”
Viviana’s eyes widened in horror.
“So Bella used those men to ruin Diana’s reputation?”
“Bella, of course, pretended to know nothing. But the McKeller family quietly sent Diana abroad before her reputation could sink further. No one’s heard from her since.”
Harriet let out a sigh.
She remembered the chill that ran down her spine when she’d overheard Bella and Aston laughing about it on the day Diana, her former friend, was exiled from the empire.
「Ah, so annoying! The McKellers sent Diana off to the Candia Kingdom. I had a perfect plan to humiliate her in public.」
「Hasn’t she already been humiliated? She won’t even be able to show her face in front of Aston now.」
「That’s nothing. If things had gone according to my plan, she wouldn’t have had any choice but to kill herself.」
Even now, Harriet remembered the terror she’d felt then.
A sixteen-year-old girl plotting her friend’s suicide— using men as tools.
Was she really human?
“Diana had a better family and higher status than Bella, but she was still ruined. So what do you think Bella would do to a lady she considers ‘beneath’ her?”
Viviana blinked.
“Beneath? She thinks I’m beneath her?”
