It's true. Even friends can feel excited. Feeling a montary flutter for soone close was more common than one might think. Most of the ti it was just a feeling that lted away like early snow.
So it needed to be clarified. Whether that trembling was just being caught up in the atmosphere, or if it was a mistake from being too conscious of it. She didn't want to make a mistake. As precious as he was, she didn't want to hurt him with uncertain emotions.
'No. Maybe I'm already hurting him?'
What was he thinking while helping Esperanza return?
When she said she was soone who would return, he said nothing as if he hadn't heard. She couldn't tell what he was thinking at all. If Esperanza returned, would that be fine with him? If she didn't return... what was he planning to do then?
Should I ask?
Even now, she could go out, knock on the door just a few steps away, poke her head out and quickly ask. He would give an answer, and that would end her curiosity. Just like earlier.
But if she went out to see him now, if they t eyes while facing the night air like at Mabelwood, wouldn't she mistake a montary feeling for sothing real?
She had been excited by friends several tis at night, caught up in the atmosphere. Night air had the magic to make people feel elated. How easy it was to mistake that elated feeling as being because of a person.
Of course, the mistake never lasted long. When she saw her friend's face again under bright morning sunlight, she would realize how trivial that feeling had been. So Cider Claiborne too...
The next morning, Esperanza was experiencing terrible disappointnt. Even when seen with a clear mind, his flawlessly graceful face discovered Esperanza and broke into a bright smile. He looked at Esperanza's face, which seed like its fire had gone out, with concern and asked.
"Did you have a nightmare?"
"No, it's not that."
Was it because of his face that she got excited easily at night and sobered up easily in the morning, not because of the air or anything else? Back then, was she excited because she couldn't see his face at night?
If that was the case, unfortunately, he was one of the few people who looked better under bright light.
"Really? You don't look well."
"...I think I had trouble sleeping."
"Oh my."
Cider, who had been carefully examining Esperanza's sohow gaunt cheeks, soon smiled with creased eyes.
"Then let's skip research today and just tour the mansion."
"It's not like we'll spend all day touring a mansion."
When she smiled back in response, Cider shrugged.
"We could spend all day on it. Tourists only see about ten, Mrs. Denver! How many rooms were open?"
Mrs. Denver, who was directing the maids, sohow heard that from far away and responded equally loudly.
"Exactly twenty-two, Count. Including the dressing rooms and halls."
"We should count without the dressing rooms. Anyway, even if tourists only need to see those twenty rooms, you can see much more."
She rembered the Palace of Versailles, which was so vast that she couldn't see everything even after spending a whole day and had to return. Of course, this mansion wasn't as huge as a palace built by a king with absolute royal power at the height of luxury.
"What are you planning to show ?"
"Actually, it's nothing special."
Leaving the apartnt, they could see people touring the mansion following employees. They seed to have spotted Cider too. The employees bowed nimbly. Cider nodded and led Esperanza to a corridor where they couldn't be seen.
"Where are we going?"
"Anywhere there are no people."
Cider really did lead Esperanza to a place where no one was. The place where no one was, however, had a reason for being empty. Naly, there was nothing to see. Cider crossed the arched passage with a troubled face. The next room and the room after that were the sa.
"Surely not all hundred-sothing rooms are like this?"
Esperanza said while slightly lifting dusty cloth. An antique table coated with marble was revealed. Looking at each one individually would be interesting, but it was work that produced too much dust. Esperanza, who had brushed off the old dust on her hands, followed Cider across the passage.
"There's nothing to see."
"Unfortunately so. When mother was alive, it wasn't this bad."
"Really? She must have managed things well."
"Rather than that, she loved parties."
The previous countess. A sowhat peculiar person who had the hobby of collecting lots of clothes that didn't even fit her body. That was about all Esperanza knew about Cider's mother.
"She would fill about half of this mansion with guests. Even though her husband and son both ran away saying they hated it."
"You should have socialized with her. After my parents passed away, what I regretted most was not being able to socialize with them."
Cider replied heartlessly.
"I wonder. I think the mories of mother remained relatively good because I didn't socialize with her."
"Ah, yes."
There really was nothing to say. Still, you should have socialized a bit, she muttered, and Cider added.
"Mother didn't like taking
to your parties either. Because it's boring. When she lost her precious necklace as collateral in betting poker, she even woke up sleeping people to take them out."
When the previous countess was alive, Cider wouldn't have been even twenty yet. A countess who pushed her young son into a betting poker ga to retrieve a necklace.
"Well then. Should I say I can see where your personality ca from... Did you win?"
"They say I look like father but have mother's personality. I won."
Well, winning was natural. He looks like his father? Esperanza suddenly looked up at Cider.
"Do you have portraits of your parents?"
"I do, but that area is currently open for tourists."
Then even if she went now, she wouldn't be able to see them properly. There would be nothing good about encountering guests while bringing the house owner. She'd have to sneak out at night to see them.
"What about your parents?"
Cider, who asked in passing, took out a spare key and opened the next door. Everything else was an ordinary room, but only a fierce-looking deer mount was glaring with bulging eyes. Like the room they'd seen earlier, all other furniture was covered with cloth, but this room seed to be cleaned periodically as it was clean.
Discovering the familiar mount, Cider's expression darkened slightly. He could only regain his original composure by holding Esperanza's fingertips. Esperanza looked up at him questioningly, then opened her mouth.
"When I was twenty, both of them died together in an accident."
It was a traffic accident. An ordinary traffic accident that took parents away from two daughters but wasn't even newsworthy. She rembered crying more sadly on the day they sold the house where she lived with her parents and moved to a smaller house than on the day of the funeral.
"Nothing particularly special. Maybe that they often tried to take my older sister who was almost thirty and
who was at school on trips?"
"So you ran away?"
"I didn't run away, I made excuses and skipped out a few tis. It was exactly adults' style of travel."
Travel where you climb mountains when you go to mountains, fish when you go to the sea, wake up at dawn and move non-stop until night. Honestly, it was enough to make one sick. Cider answered as if he understood.
"My father was the sa. He was a hunting fanatic. School holidays unfortunately overlapped with hunting season, so there was no corner to hide in."
"You too? Why are all fathers like that?"
How could they be so identical when the era, situation, and people were all different?
"So that was also caught by your father?"
"...Right. He tornted
so much about having to catch a big one."
Cider said this while lifting the cloth covering furniture to cover the deer mount decorating the center of the wall. She glanced at Cider's eyes shrouded in shadow. Coming out to the corridor and closing the dusty room door, Cider suddenly asked.
"Don't you want to go et your parents?"
"Pardon?"
"If they died seven years ago, they'd be alive now, wouldn't they?"
Her head seed to stiffen. Right, that's true.
"If eting them is burdenso, you could at least see their faces."
Right. Esperanza nodded blankly and thought. That's correct. If Esperanza's parents existed in this world. And Cider knew it that way.
"Don't you want to et them?"
Since they weren't making eye contact, he couldn't tell anything from just her pale complexion. Esperanza gripped his fingertips and nodded slightly. Cider tilted his head askew.
"I said sothing unnecessary."
"...No. As you said, I just don't particularly want to see them. Since they're people who have passed away."
The tongue that lied was heavy as stone.
Cider didn't know that Esperanza was from another world. It wasn't that there hadn't been opportunities to tell him, but she absolutely couldn't say it. Esperanza bit her dry lips and lowered her eyes.
Cider, who had been looking down at that sight, bent down to et her eyes. He tapped Esperanza's cheek, who seed upset, with his fingertips and said.
"Instead of that ugly thing, I'll show you sothing you'll like."
Esperanza smiled with effort and asked. She couldn't make him be considerate after doing wrong to him.
"What's that?"
"A weapon collection from a hundred years ago. Interested?"
This man really knew Esperanza well. Esperanza shook her head and chuckled.
"I'm interested. Very much."
There would be a ti to tell him soday. Enjoying the present a little more wouldn't be too bad. Though it was cowardly. Thinking this way, Esperanza stuck close to Cider and followed him.
Old art pieces, ancient books, weapons, ceramics. The items collected by past Avondale counts were diverse in both type and era. The collection itself didn't contain only trendously valuable items. This was even more true compared to her experience visiting world-class museums and art galleries. But unlike in museums, here she could directly touch the collection items.
"Originally it's not allowed though."
Cider smiled mischievously.
Esperanza's eyes sparkled endlessly as she touched lances from when mounted jousting was thriving, rifles from when gunpowder had just arrived, and magical weapons from the dawn of magical engineering. When looking at artworks that would sell for millions of terot at auction or ancient books that nearby universities begged to borrow, she was just amazed, but now she was almost ready to devour the curator.
Her dampened mood gradually lifted. By the ti they had spent the whole day making a complete circuit including the garden, her mood was better than usual.
Cider watched this sight with pleasure. But neither of them could completely shake off the uncomfortable feeling as if sothing was stuck to their hands.
Though it got better as they toured the mansion, Esperanza seed to have a lot to think about. There was no doubt it was because of what Cider had said in the room with the deer mount. Though she didn't tell him, he could guess.
Cider also had sothing he hadn't told Esperanza.
Returning alone to the study, he beckoned to a servant who was organizing the study with his fingertip.
"Bring Coleman."
The count, who had no interest in what employees did, was soone who rarely called for the butler. Thinking there might be so matter, the aged butler hurried over.
"Did you call for ?"
"Father's mount, I'm sure I told you to throw it away, so why is that thing still in this mansion?"
Coleman stamred with a pale face.
"Didn't the previous count hunt it himself? No matter how unpleasant the incident was..."
"Of course that thing didn't kill mother. But since father told you to throw it away, you should have thrown it away. If you have lingering attachnt, take it to your house. I won't stop that."
The old butler looked tearful but had no choice. Being able to disobey the count's order to imdiately throw it away and not get caught was thanks to both the previous count and the current count being mutually indifferent.
Coleman left the study with drooping shoulders. Really, an old man with too much sentint and attachnt. Pitifully so.
It wasn't that he couldn't understand that attachnt. But that mount was unpleasant.
Reviews
All reviews (0)