12 - Chapter 12
Unbeknownst to Eloise, who was hidden beyond the thicket, her friends stopped in their tracks and continued their conversation.
“A rival? Julia, why are you talking nonsense?”
Another friend, sensing the tense atmosphere, tried to stop Julia.
But Julia, as if determined to say everything she had been holding back, continued without paying attention.
“You don’t have to pretend to be nice either. Honestly, when Eloise told us everything about Captain Thornton, weren’t you all relieved? That Eloise didn’t have feelings for him, I mean.”
“……”
Julia’s words silenced her friends. Because they were true.
In fact, when Eloise came of age, women in Feltham, and even Camborne, were on edge.
Even though they lived in this rural area, the Servertons were people from a distinguished family.
Wealthy intellectuals from the capital.
Moreover, Mrs. Serverton had frequented Newnham society.
In other words, her daughter, Eloise, could go to Newnham society at any time without needing an introduction.
If Eloise decided to go, Mrs. Serverton’s relatives and friends would take her there immediately.
Therefore, Eloise was the only person in this village who could use the title of Lady.
Besides, Eloise was Mr. Serverton’s only daughter.
If Mr. Serverton were to die, Eloise would receive a lump sum of 5,000 pounds.
Family and money. That alone made her an attractive bride, and even her appearance was appealing.
Mrs. Serverton lamented that she ran around the fields like a wild pony, but when Eloise ran up the hill with her hair blowing in the wind, the young men of the village were mesmerized.
Their gazes were full of affection.
As much as that, the hearts of the village girls were filled with worry.
They couldn’t shake the fear that the young man they had their eye on might propose to Eloise.
But in the year Eloise turned twenty, she fell seriously ill again.
She had a fever that brought her to the brink of death, and her cough wouldn’t stop. Then, on the day the doctor from Camborne visited with a serious face, rumors spread throughout the village.
That Eloise could no longer have children due to her illness.
Everyone had been worried because Eloise had been seriously ill as a child, but when the rumor spread that the doctor had said so, the young men who had been loitering near the Serverton’s house disappeared.
The world was changing, and the number of people in the capital who didn’t marry was increasing, but Feltham was a village that still cherished values that had been passed down for hundreds of years.
In other words, a woman who cannot bear children is not considered a marriage prospect.
So Eloise was living unmarried, half by choice and half by circumstance.
“Anyway, I think it’s a good thing. And… I’m guessing, but Captain Thornton is likely to stay in Blissbury. So if she marries him, she could essentially become the mistress of Blissbury, right?”
“What? What are you talking about all of a sudden?”
At another friend’s question, Eloise nodded without realizing it. That was exactly the question she wanted to ask.
“Mr. Serverton is managing it now, but he can’t manage Blissbury forever, can he? He’s getting older now, so he’ll have to step down from the manager position at some point.”
That was true. Eloise was also feeling that her father was changing year by year.
“Then who will they entrust Blissbury to after that? They won’t entrust it to Eloise, who can’t even get married.”
“That’s… true.”
Her friends nodded slowly.
“But this time, Captain Thornton, who is a distant relative of the Baron family, came. Honestly, I think Lord Stanford has appointed Captain Thornton as the new manager of Blissbury. Otherwise, why would he have come here when there hasn’t been any talk of another manager for the past ten years or so?”
Silence fell again at Julia’s words. Amidst the sounds of spring birds, their minds were working busily.
Seeing her friends only rolling their eyes, Julia smiled triumphantly.
“Anyway… if Captain Thornton becomes the manager, Eloise won’t be able to act so high and mighty.”
Julia’s voice became sharper. Her resentful heart had spilled out.
“Just because her father is the manager, she goes in and out of Blissbury as if it were her own. Now that Captain Thornton is appointed as the official manager, and if he gets married, she won’t be able to do that.”
She was speaking as if she were nonchalant, but each word was filled with deep inferiority.
Every young lady in Feltham and Camborne longed for Blissbury. The most beautiful place in this rural village. A place where overflowing wealth and refinement were gathered, a place that even people from the capital admired.
Eloise freely went in and out of that place like her own home, a place that they could hardly enter unless they were invited to the summer party once a year.
What twisted Julia’s heart even more was that Eloise didn’t think of that fact as particularly special.
As if it were a right she should naturally enjoy, as if that place were really her home…
“I’m going now. My mother told me to come home early.”
Perhaps she realized that the feelings she had suppressed deep inside had come out. Julia, seeing her friends’ stiff faces, made an excuse about her mother and hurried home.
As Julia left first, the remaining friends glanced at each other, exchanged awkward greetings, and scattered to their respective homes.
Only Eloise, huddled in the thicket, remained in the place that had been filled with the sound of conversation until just a moment ago, along with the sounds of spring birds.
“Haa…”
After a long time, Eloise moved her body with a sigh.
Then she made the sign of the cross towards the sky. God, I almost ran out and grabbed her by the hair, but I let it go this time. Please praise me for that.
In the past, she would have run out and pulled her hair.
But Eloise decided to show Julia mercy today.
‘She must still be reeling from the shock of the broken engagement… This is really just this once.’
Julia’s engagement was broken last winter.
To be honest, it was ambiguous to call it a broken engagement since they weren’t engaged. But everyone thought they were practically engaged since he had been visiting her house for almost two years.
It must have been a big shock that the engagement ultimately fell through, but the words the man uttered at the end hurt Julia.
<If you had as much pension as Miss Eloise, or even as much as your sister, my parents wouldn’t have opposed it.>
Abigail said that Julia didn’t come out of her room after hearing those words and cried all day.
A week later, Julia, pressing down on her swollen eyes, came out of her room and became obsessed with two things.
One was marriage, the other was wealth.
And she took the resentment towards Eloise and Abigail as a bonus.
To hear from the man she thought would be her fiancé that he wished she was as good as another woman, along with her name.
There was nothing particularly wrong with what she had done, but after hearing those words from Abigail, Eloise felt sorry for some reason.
So she decided to overlook today’s remarks, thinking of them as the groans of someone whose wounds had not yet healed.
Of course, if she continued to talk nonsense like that, she would eventually have to grab her hair once like they did when they were kids, in a place where their mothers weren’t around.
Eloise thought about it again as she returned home.
In fact, Julia’s words weren’t far off. Her father couldn’t be the manager forever, so Lord Stanford would send someone new someday.
‘I could do it well too.’
It’s not like Father is doing the physical labor himself anyway.
Even now, she writes letters on behalf of her father and chooses the people of Blissbury. Sometimes, she even repairs the cabins on the Blissbury estate herself, avoiding her parents’ eyes.
But no matter how much she said that, Lord Stanford wouldn’t make her the manager.
‘If Captain Thornton really becomes the manager of Blissbury…’
Eloise frowned as she imagined it.
“I don’t want to…”
That man would never try to bring her into Blissbury. He could even pretend it was a mistake and leave her off the invitation list sent to everyone in Feltham.
If he married a woman from the capital, he might not even invite the villagers at all.
‘As Julia said, would it be better if Captain Thornton married someone from this village?’
Julia was hateful, but if she married Captain Thornton, she might invite her to Blissbury just to show off.
Eloise looked at the sky in the direction of Blissbury.
Hoping that whatever happened, she would be able to visit Blissbury in the future.
I thought that was an absurd wish.
“I need you to go to Blissbury.”
A week after his confinement was lifted, Mr. Serverton called Eloise and said.
