"It seems like sothing they did without thinking they'd be tracked... but there must be soone buying them."
"That's probably a regular custor too."
Then it might be surprisingly close by. The black market would be for laundering the source. But seeing how rumors spread, their work wasn't very clean.
"The people who stole them probably don't know who the custor is either, right? Since it went through the black market."
At those words, Cider frowned.
"Ah. That's the worst-case scenario. We should hope for better results than that."
True, there was no point in debating this and that right now. Esperanza rested her chin on the window fra and looked outside.
"What if we go there and everyone's already fled with no evidence left..."
"Then Havenly will have a hard ti."
"Ah, right. There's soone to work to death."
Esperanza, who had been giggling, suddenly looked back at Cider.
"I think I've caught so of your nastiness."
"You were always like that."
"I don't think so."
"Don't you trust my mory?"
"I trust your mory. I don't trust your value judgnts."
"How regrettable."
Cider replied in a tone that wasn't regretful at all. Then Esperanza pressed firmly on the inside of his shoe with her toes. Cider reached out and lightly tapped Esperanza's nose bridge.
"Even though I specifically chose a train with an automaton that makes excellent desserts in the dining car?"
Esperanza's eyes widened. An automaton makes desserts? She grabbed and pulled down Cider's hand that was tickling her nose bridge, then covered it with her own hand and patted it.
No. No, that's not it.
He chose the train?
"Wasn't it because there were no tickets available?"
The overlapped hands flipped. Cider, who drew a rock-paper-scissors symbol on the back of her downward-facing hand, answered as if nothing had happened.
"There's no such thing as 'no tickets available.' There's only the difference between whether you can get them at the ticket office or whether you have to pay extra to get them."
The sensation of lightly sliding with fingertips was vivid. Esperanza slowly clenched her hand.
"I see... I want to go see it."
"Shall we go together?"
"No. I'll bring so back."
Cider smiled broadly and brought Esperanza's hat to tie the ribbon for her. The hand wrapped in black leather lightly brushed past her chin.
At the sa ti as the door closing sound, a magic bullet burst from a silenced gun. Esperanza's footsteps slowly faded away.
Finding out who had sent an assassin was Cider's job.
??????°??☆????°??????
As the assassin's body went limp, Esperanza left him and headed to the dining car without hesitation.
This train had two dining cars. One was in the front near the engine, and the other could be reached after passing ten passenger cars back from there. Esperanza's cabin was in a car two spaces away from the rear dining car among those ten cars, so going to the back was faster. The automatons would be on either side anyway.
Only after walking for a while did Esperanza reach the passage connecting the cars. A conductor standing guard at the passage spoke kindly.
"Good day, madam. Where are you going?"
"To the dining car."
"I see. Our train has excellent bartenders and an automaton chocolatier standing by at all tis. Have a pleasant journey."
The conductor removed his hat and bowed deeply. Esperanza nodded, then spoke as if sothing had just occurred to her.
"Oh, there was a strange sound coming from cabin 5. Like groaning sounds. Could you check it out?"
"Yes, I'll check imdiately. Thank you."
When the conductor entered cabin 5, the open door completely blocked the passage. Esperanza confird the sound of the door to cabin 12 where Cider remained opening and closing, then moved to the next car.
She seed to have encountered an assassin on the train to Mabelwood too. After all these years, to et an assassin on a train again.
'But who could it be?'
Randomly collecting rare magic stones had made quite a few enemies. It could be a competitor of the company they'd contracted with this ti, or it could be Pri Minister Tempton's political enemy...
Well, Cider would handle the interrogation. Esperanza just had to bring two plates of dessert to the cabin.
With sowhat lighter steps, she entered the dining car.
The entire spacious car was a dining car. On one wall was a bar displaying all kinds of alcohol, and in front of it, an automaton chocolatier was producing identical chocolate desserts with flashy skill.
'This is practically a factory?'
Though they had put a plausible white head covering on it, the glass bead-like eyes probably had no function. Cider had once told her that they originally just made the appearance plausible.
The arm with all its internal gears exposed moved precisely. Cooling lted chocolate, putting it in molds, spreading different paste on top, adding decorations, and creating complex patterns with different colored chocolate to attach.
"Wow!"
A boy who had been gripping the counter and watching nervously burst into admiration and received the chocolate. The boy in shorts and white tights ran to a lady who appeared to be his mother.
Soon after, the young woman who had been standing in line behind him received chocolate and turned around.
"Oh my!"
"Sylvia. It's been a while."
"Goodness, to et you here!"
Sylvia Humphrey, who quickly put her chocolate down on the table, embraced Esperanza. Sylvia seed delighted by this unexpected encounter, and even after letting go of Esperanza, she couldn't hide her excited face, saying "Oh my, oh my" for a while.
"Esperanza, have you been well?"
"I'm always well. How about you? Are you returning to your estate?"
"No!"
The mont she spoke cheerfully, a languid voice followed.
"Sylvia, you need to lower your voice."
"Ah. Mrs. Humphrey."
"It's been a while, Lady Avondale. Where is the Count?"
"In the cabin."
"Oh my, sending a lady alone?"
The lady who had the sa voice and exclamations as her daughter winked. The ashtray was full of burnt Paoran cigarettes. Paoran would beco expensive too... Esperanza had such useless thoughts and answered a beat late.
"I lost at cards."
"At tis like this, losing is a virtue, but gentlen..."
"Actually, since I'm here, I'm trying to secretly eat one more."
Esperanza pressed for two chocolate desserts on the nu board installed in front of the automaton and asked the bartender for a light drink. When the automaton started moving, she turned her eyes back to Mrs. Humphrey.
"As expected, Lady Avondale doesn't even care about chocolatier automatons, does she? Well, when your husband is this century's greatest magical engineer, would such toy gas catch your eye!"
Her voice was too loud. Esperanza, who was about to restrain her, sighed when she realized Mrs. Humphrey had spoken for the surrounding people to hear. Sylvia smiled apologetically. Mrs. Humphrey was generally pleasant and a good person, but her vanity was a flaw.
"Lady Avondale?"
A gentleman who had approached with large strides from the opposite table bowed. Esperanza, who had extended her hand in confusion, looked down at the man who lightly kissed it and stepped back. It was a familiar face.
"This is the first ti I've seen you since we t at my aunt's mansion last ti. Ah, I'm Frederick Gordon."
"You're Viscount Sutherland."
Mrs. Humphrey let out a light sigh. He was really good marriage material, but there was an age difference with Sylvia.
"The shooting skills you showed last ti were truly impressive. So, wouldn't you visit our country house with Avondale?"
"That would be difficult for a while. We have busy matters."
Frederick Gordon was very disappointed but withdrew gracefully. Esperanza saw him off with an ambiguous smile. She couldn't bring herself to tell that pure goodwill that Cider had co to dislike him a little.
He hadn't disliked him from the beginning. Though there was so age difference, Frederick Gordon was Cider's alumnus, and when they t at Firth Mansion, they had all gathered to play gas together. Until then, Cider had shown no signs of avoiding him.
Esperanza had actually asked him about it. Hadn't he gotten along quite well with Frederick Gordon? Cider had answered like this:
'That was until that idiot took an interest in you.'
Viscount Sutherland, being the nephew of the strict Lady Firth, hadn't shown unpleasant interest in another man's wife. The problem was simply that the people invited to Firth Mansion had held a light shooting competition among themselves.
There were several officers who had served during the colonial war, and gentlen who had made their mark at shooting clubs. And Lady Firth had wagered a rare magic stone that was one of the late Lord Firth's collection items on that bet.
Esperanza had wanted it.
It wasn't really a big deal. However, after that bet, Frederick Gordon would only talk about shooting whenever he saw Esperanza. Until the very day they left Firth Mansion.
So what that man was interested in wasn't Esperanza but her being an excellent marksman. Though Cider wasn't unaware of this, such details didn't seem to matter much.
Reviews
All reviews (0)