47 - Chapter 47
“Hoo.”
Ryan sat on the sofa, shaking the moisture from his hair with a towel.
With the Summer Ball only two days away, Blissbury had no quiet moments from morning till night.
The garden was undergoing its final touches, the snip-snip of shears never ceasing from morning, and in front of the mansion, the pre-ordered ingredients arrived without a break.
Moreover, the ordered liquor had arrived this afternoon.
The reason he had just washed off the sweat was because of that liquor.
Just how enthusiastically were they all planning to drink, that fifteen Beer barrels were unloaded from the Baggage wagon?
To move those barrels, which looked twice as big as the ones he’d seen in the capital, every man in Blissbury had pitched in.
Of course, Ryan couldn’t be excluded.
Even the workers now looked for Ryan as a matter of course when heavy lifting was required.
As he unloaded the wooden barrels and moved the wine boxes, going back and forth between the first floor and the basement, his whole body became soaked with sweat.
Mrs. Parker had specially opened a Beer barrel for those who had moved the loads, pouring the cold beer into Pewter glasses.
The Pewter glasses, which had been submerged in cold water drawn from the deep well, quickly cooled the lukewarm beer. Thanks to this, exclamations of delight poured out from those who gulped down the beer in one go.
Those who had emptied their glasses in one gulp begged Mrs. Parker for another, and she eventually relented.
They chugged again, proclaiming that beer, which could be drunk comfortably, was better than wine.
“Let’s get really drunk at this year’s Summer Ball too.”
“Everyone will be excited since the beer is delicious again this year.”
“I wonder who will have the most fun this year.”
At the Banquet the day before the Summer Ball, they mainly drank wine, but at the Summer Ball, they would start with wine only to soon grab a beer glass.
Just listening to the workers’ stories, Ryan could imagine the atmosphere of the Summer Ball.
At the beginning, everyone would dance gracefully and elegantly. But as time passed, the elegant music would soon become faster-paced, turning into an exciting dance tune that required quicker footwork.
Amidst the increasing noise and laughter, the glass in hand would soon be replaced by a cool Pewter glass, and they would gulp down beer incessantly, stamping their feet in preparation for the next dance.
He would probably have to be there too. People wouldn’t leave the new manager of Blissbury alone.
It wasn’t that he couldn’t dance. In fact, his dancing skills were quite excellent.
He was confident in anything that involved using his body, and dancing was one of the things he had learned for infiltration missions.
Ryan briefly imagined himself mingling with people and dancing in that atmosphere.
He had attended all sorts of banquets in the capital. Most of them were formal affairs like banquets, but there were also quite a few balls where he had to dance.
However, he had never danced there. Unless it was an order or a mission, there was no reason for him to do such a thing.
Above all, he had never once thought about wanting to dance.
After roughly drying himself, he hung the towel on the chair and quietly began to hum.
It was the melody of the dance music that the orchestra, which had started staying here today, had been practicing all day.
As the roughly hummed tune became clearer, Ryan’s fingers lightly tapped his thigh.
The dance steps he had learned vividly came to his mind. Step. Step. Step. Turn.
Before he knew it, he was imagining himself dancing. As the music sped up, his movements also quickened.
In such balls, partners were bound to change constantly. But in the end, at the finale of the music, one would face the partner they had started with.
Unlike the past partners with whom he had lightly held hands, he could hold both hands and press his body closer to the final partner.
The moment the music in his imagination finally came to an end.
“……!”
Ryan startled and shuddered. The person smiling and looking at him with flushed cheeks, exhaling a rising breath in his imagination, was Eloise.
“Haa…….”
He let out a long sigh and ran his hands over his face.
He wasn’t an idiot.
Therefore, he soon realized what his imagination meant.
“……Eloise Suberton.”
Ryan called out her name, the name of the woman who was dancing joyfully in his imagination.
Then the emotion he felt became even clearer.
When he first heard that name here, he felt nothing.
No, that was a lie. He had been quite annoyed when he heard the name of the woman who had shouted at him, thinking he was a vagrant.
But he couldn’t be bothered to hold onto such feelings for long and soon became indifferent. He thought he wouldn’t run into her again anyway.
But what about now, after several months?
Ryan clenched and unclenched his fists for no reason. Just calling out her name once a moment ago had made the inside of his palms feel ticklish for no reason.
At the same time, his neck became hot, and he couldn’t keep his body still.
He swept back his slightly damp hair with his hand.
Even though it was a deep night when all the work was done, his mind was restless, as if he hadn’t finished anything.
His gaze, wandering around the room as he stood up, unsure of what to do, landed on the bundle of letters that Mr. Palmer had left behind during the day.
He let out a short sigh, as if relieved, and sat down at the desk.
He needed something, anything, to divert his mind elsewhere.
Most of the letters were addressed to the ‘new manager of Blissbury.’
The contents of the letters varied. Summer greetings from Cambon’s shops, or wealthy tenant farmers managing estates belonging to Blissbury, as well as invitations to gatherings or letters encouraging donations from nearby cities.
Among those letters was one from ‘Sergeant Stanley’ looking for Private Ryan Thornton.
The moment he saw that letter, Ryan immediately straightened his body and looked around.
The night in Blissbury, when everyone was asleep, was quiet, but he checked for a long time to make sure there was no one around before finally drawing the curtains and sitting back down to examine the letter.
Sergeant Stanley was the name Lord Stanford used during missions.
Moreover, the postmark was not from the capital but from another city near the capital.
He could have just sent it under the name Lord Stanford, but he had bothered to go to another place and send a letter under an alias.
Ryan carefully opened the letter.
His eyes quickly read through the letter. After a moment, Ryan let out a sigh of relief and put the letter down.
Fortunately, it wasn’t a letter summoning him.
Strangely, he felt relieved just by that fact. Until recently, he had only been thinking about returning to the capital before autumn.
Ryan looked at the letter again.
The letter, which began with simple greetings, scolded him for his indifference and laziness in not sending a single letter since going to Blissbury, and in the middle, there was an explanation as to why he had bothered to send the letter this way.
……I don’t know why, but I’ve been feeling strange lately. Like I’m being followed. And recently, I even confirmed a carriage subtly following me on my way to work. Of course, I know that these things are commonplace for us……. Somehow, my gut tells me that this surveillance is directed at someone other than me. Yes, somehow I have a feeling that this surveillance is looking for you.
‘Looking for me.’
Ryan thought for a moment about who might be looking for him.
The first people who came to mind were, of course, the people from the Disciplinary Committee.
They were hell-bent on diminishing the achievements he had been recognized for.
Everyone thought that even the enemy didn’t hate Ryan as much as they did.
They always followed Ryan around. As if trying to find any fault in him.
As evidence of this, Ryan had been dragged by Richard to a bar in the back alleys of the capital amidst the summons from the Disciplinary Committee.
The next day, the newspaper ran an article saying that he was wandering around the back alleys looking for women who sold laughter.
Thanks to Richard going to the newspaper company, kicking up a fuss, and even mentioning his family, the newspaper company posted an apology the next day.
But his article had been prominently displayed on the front page, while the apology was only posted in a very small corner of the newspaper.
Still, it was something. Even though they were estranged, he was still a nobleman’s son who the Count would eventually accept again, so the protest must have been accepted.
Since they were such people, they must have been anxious to know where Ryan, who hadn’t shown a single strand of hair for several months, was hiding.
Ryan wondered if there were any others.
Besides them, newspaper companies or magazines could be looking for him for articles on their own. But if that were the case, they would rather go to Lord Stanford’s face and bother him than do surveillance like this.
‘Then…….’
Ryan rubbed his forehead with his hand for a moment.
Weren’t there those who held a grudge against him?
Namely, Gilia, the enemy country that had lost in this war.
