NM | Chapter 05

Chapter 5

The next day, and the day after that, the woman’s routine repeated exactly the same way.

She washed the laundry that had piled up overnight, hung it where the wind could pass through, folded the dry clothes neatly, and stacked them to one side. To handle alone what normally took at least three people, she had to move nonstop from morning to evening, never once able to straighten her back.

As she returned from hanging the laundry, she rubbed her aching wrist, which had begun to throb after only a few days. A faint bruise still remained where the duke had grabbed her wrist days earlier.

She worried that she might run into the duke again in the back garden, but thankfully, she had not seen him since that day.

‘I’m not sure if that’s something to be grateful for.’

Her gaze drifted to the spot where she had first run into him. Even though they had not met again, the ground there was noticeably worn, as if someone came often to smoke.

No matter how secluded the back garden was, there was only one person in the estate who would smoke there.

The Duke of Fraser, the only smoker.

‘Should I ask the head maid if she can change my work area?’

Unfortunately, the path from the laundry room to where she hung the clothes passed right through that spot. She always kept a careful watch to avoid him, but she could not guarantee that something like that day would never happen again.

Since she did not know when the guest would leave, all she could do was avoid him as diligently as possible.

“Haa…”

She let out a deep sigh and tightly wrapped a handkerchief around the yellowing bruise.

***

As if the walk to the back garden had never been quiet to begin with, Vincent kept talking to Logan, while Logan’s replies remained consistently brief.

A lawyer through and through.

Logan wanted to silence Vincent, who never stopped talking even outside work hours, but he knew that if he said anything, he would have to listen to Vincent sulk and complain the entire time they stayed at the estate. So Logan chose silence.

“There’s a noble called Count Denver who owns land around Ron Harbor. The location is excellent, but the old man is stubborn beyond belief. Even though his children want to sell the land, he won’t allow it. Since he’s attending this party, I was thinking of trying to persuade him—ah, I left my lighter behind.”

Frowning, Vincent rummaged through his pockets with a cigarette between his lips.

“You really are careless.”

Logan handed him his own lighter, thinking of the day he himself had forgotten one.

‘Come to think of it, I haven’t seen her since that day.’

His thoughts naturally drifted to the maid he had run into by chance. Though he had come to the back garden several times while staying at the estate, he had not seen her again.

It was not as if he had something particular to say if they met again. Yet each time he came out, his eyes searched the path where she had disappeared.

He could not forget the way she had looked up at him with those harmless eyes.

“Huh?”

Following Logan’s line of sight, Vincent let out a sound. Someone was walking toward them from the path leading into the back garden.

A woman in a plain, colorless maid’s uniform, her hair left long and unstyled. There was nothing remarkable about her clothing, yet her innocent face drew the eye strangely.

It was that maid.

Hearing Vincent’s voice, the maid looked up, noticed the two men standing together, and hurriedly turned as if to flee. But Vincent’s familiar greeting was faster than her attempt to escape.

“It’s been a while. How have you been?”

“Ah, hello, Young Master Vincent, and… Duke Fraser.”

She could not ignore the young master who greeted her first, so she approached with hesitant steps. Just like before, she seemed to be carrying dry laundry. She set down a basket larger than her torso and bowed to them.

“You were nowhere to be seen, so I thought you were at Grandmother’s place again. I came all the way to Rosedale and thought I’d leave without seeing you, but it’s nice to see you now.”

“The dowager has gone to the villa in Headwork to recover, so I’m helping out at the estate until she returns. It’s always busy during the month of the young lady’s birthday.”

The maid forced a smile, hiding her discomfort. After leaving the estate early for schooling, Vincent was not someone she saw often, but among the people there, he was one of the few she could say she was familiar with.

Unable to ignore his kindness, she spoke with him while ignoring the piercing gaze directed at her.

“You haven’t changed. You look a bit thinner, though.”

“I’m always the same. You, on the other hand… seem to have changed a little.”

As she spoke, her gaze, which had stayed on Vincent the entire time except when greeting, dropped to his hand. White smoke was rising from the cigarette between his fingers.

“I thought you didn’t smoke.”

“Haha, working in the capital, you know…”

Vincent awkwardly hid his hand behind his back and laughed. As if that was not enough, he crushed the cigarette butt on the ground with his heel.

“I’ve heard smoking isn’t good for your health, but that gentlemen sometimes can’t help it for social reasons.”

“I suppose that’s true. I don’t smoke much either. I just came out briefly for work. Right?”

Vincent turned to Logan as smoothly as water flowing.

At the excuse that made it sound like he was smoking because of him, Logan’s eyebrow twitched upward. Vincent met his gaze and laughed it off, then turned back to the maid.

“You were in the middle of work, right? I hope we didn’t interrupt the busiest person here.”

“Not at all. I was more worried that I might be interrupting your valuable time.”

“No, it’s nice to see you after so long.”

“Then may I take my leave?”

“Yes, go on. See you later.”

After bowing just as she had when she arrived, the maid lifted the basket filled to the brim and disappeared. Watching her leave, Logan stubbed out his cigarette in the metal case and lit a new one.

“You seem pretty close.”

He spoke quietly after lighting it.

“We grew up together in the estate. We were close in age, so we played together a lot. Mostly me teasing her, though.”

“When you were children?”

“Until I left for boarding school.”

“Were her parents maids at the estate?”

“No. My mother brought her back from an orphanage she volunteered at. She was supposed to stay at Grandmother’s place, but I insisted she stay here. When I moved to the capital, she went back to Grandmother’s.”

“I see.”

Logan exhaled a stream of white smoke as someone briefly crossed his mind. It could not possibly be that girl, yet he could not help wondering why he felt disappointed.

He had hoped, just once, that the maid talking with Vincent would look his way. Seeing her react so differently compared to when she faced him stirred something close to jealousy.

It was natural that she would be closer to Vincent than to him, since she was a maid of the Everett household.

Even so.

‘Jealousy.’

The absurdity of the feeling made him let out a hollow laugh. She was just a maid. Someone he had merely run into by chance.

And yet, once someone caught his attention, they did not easily leave his mind. The longer he went without seeing her, the more she seemed to grow in presence, feeding his curiosity.

Her hands, more chapped after only a few days. Her thinner cheeks.

That might have been what bothered him.

“That maid.”

“Hm?”

“I want her assigned as my personal maid.”