Episode 117
At first, regardless of her own will, she had lived her entire life telling lies wholly because of someone else’s will. And that man, Isaac Pinscher, was the one person Sasha had resolved to deceive by her own choice alone.
After sizing things up in her own meticulous way, she had chosen him thinking that a man of his caliber met the conditions and that she could bring it all to a clean end. She had been confident she could deceive him to the very end.
A marriage begun without love, looking only at the benefits each of them would gain through it. Once the term was over, without any troublesome procedure such as divorce, she had intended to quietly disappear from his life by suitably fabricating an illness, an accidental death, or something of the sort. That had been the original plan.
But thinking back on it, the plan had gone awry from the very beginning. From that clumsy date carried out under the excuse that they needed to get to know each other, from the moment she discussed the contract and was so pricked by her conscience that she could hardly even meet that man’s eyes. Perhaps it had simply gone wrong from then on.
Sasha realized that she had liked Isaac from far earlier than she herself had thought. She realized she had been drawn to him before she had even become aware of it. He was a man who fell short of Sasha’s expectations. At first, he had been arrogant, but far from being as despicable as she had expected, he was not even indifferent, nor was he calculating like her.
The deeper her feelings for him grew, the more her insides burned, and the reason she had unconsciously denied those feelings was because she herself knew that their circumstances were far too different. At the very least, that man had lived his entire life with nothing to be ashamed of. He never hid even the smallest shameful, awkward parts of his past; rather, he affirmed them more than necessary, and even if he was misunderstood because of it, even if he was isolated because of it, he never lied to others.
His circumstances and hers stood in far too stark a contrast. In her eyes, he was too dazzling, someone she should not even dare think of touching.
And so, when he said he liked her as well, she had been so unable to contain her joy, so overcome with greed beyond her station, that rather than firmly cutting him off, she selfishly held on to him because she did not want to do that either.
It felt as though she had received the punishment she deserved for it.
A grand humiliation known to everyone in the country. That man would now be mocked along with her because of her.
‘Because of me.’
“Why are you out here in this heat?”
Sasha did not answer Isaac’s words and merely looked up at him with an expressionless face.
It was the same as that chilling atmosphere she had felt the moment she entered the room. It was plainly visible from Isaac as well.
“Captain Pinscher.”
Sasha could no longer bring herself to call him by his name. She felt she did not even have the right.
“I’m sorry. On such a fine day.”
“……Sasha.”
Whether Isaac called her or not, Sasha continued speaking.
“On the glorious day when you, more than anyone, should have shone the brightest, I made you suffer humiliation…….”
“Sasha!”
The apology that had continued like a machine, regardless of whether the other person reacted, came to a stop.
Sasha looked at Isaac, who had at some point knelt down to meet her eyes. His vivid blue eyes and hers met in a way she could not avoid. At that, she felt shamelessly as though she might burst into tears.
“I’m sorry for raising my voice. ……Sasha.”
“……Yes.”
Isaac’s brows twisted as he looked at her face, which was openly lowered to avoid his gaze.
He barely managed to say,
“We should go back for now.”
‘Back where?’
I don’t want to. I don’t want to go back. I don’t want to go anywhere.
If she had been a little younger, she might have burst into childish tears and said such things. But Sasha calmly nodded at Isaac’s words and rose from her seat.
The Summer Palace was radiant in itself. Isaac and Sasha passed through a garden where flowers were in full bloom and walked down an entirely white corridor.
Along the way, their eyes met those of a woman. She seemed to be one of the women who had been in that room earlier. The woman stepped aside so they could pass, took out a fan, and lowered her face. Through the gap, she looked back and forth between Sasha and Isaac. Her gaze was excited purely by interest and gossip.
The moment Isaac noticed her, he pulled Sasha in as if wrapping an arm around her shoulders and threw the woman a fierce look. He glared coldly, as if to say that he knew perfectly well she was watching them through that gap. As always, there was no moderation in him. The woman, her face gone pale, flinched and looked elsewhere as though she had never seen them in the first place.
The road back to Erishall by carriage was silent. In the meantime, the sun had slanted, the blazing sunlight had faded, and the sky had begun to darken, but Sasha merely stared endlessly through the window at the sight of the sky turning pink and then deepening into red.
The rain no longer fell.
Sasha thought it would be better if it did.
＊＊＊
When they arrived at Dilton Manor, the sky was entirely red. It was so deep as to seem ominous, and darkness was slowly settling in.
The servants greeted the master and mistress with their usual faces, but Sasha had no room to pay them any mind. Sasha and Isaac soon entered the room they shared. After letting Sasha in first, Isaac checked around the door as if to see whether anyone was loitering nearby, as if he would chase away even a single servant if one was there, then firmly locked the door. He then locked the windows leading to the terrace, just in case.
It was a habit ingrained in his body. As though preparing for an extremely confidential military discussion, he checked everything meticulously several times before finally turning toward where Sasha stood.
Sasha untied the ribbon of the hat fastened under her chin. Holding the hat she had taken off in her hands, she said,
“I’m sorry it came to light like this.”
Isaac stared at her, who had become far calmer than before—so calm it was unpleasant.
“Was this what you said you would tell me someday?”
“Yes.”
“That you were…… adopted, and have been all this time…….”
“Yes. I’ve lived pretending to be the real Sasha Grayson.”
Standing with an incomparably upright posture, Sasha looked at Isaac and spoke calmly.
“I’ll explain. Would you like to sit?”
“…….”
“……If you don’t mind. If you’re ready to hear it.”
As if she had expected even his silence, she spoke with a face that showed no agitation at all.
“If you need some time to think, I’ll step out.”
“That’s enough. Sasha. I…….”
“I’m sorry I couldn’t tell you from the beginning. Since the term was only one year anyway, and as long as I wasn’t found out, I thought it would be fine because it wouldn’t harm you in any way. It was deception. I’m sorry.”
“What do you mean, harm me? Because I might be shocked?”
“No. Because if it became known on such a large scale, it would blemish your reputation as my spouse. I didn’t take into consideration the sense of betrayal you might feel. At first, you were not merely uninterested in me, but found me troublesome.”
Isaac could not hold back and took one step toward her.
Then she, who had been wearing an incomprehensibly calm expression all along, took one step back.
“I didn’t know we would become this close. Captain. But you were right. In contracts and transactions, trust must come before anything else. ……So I have truly done something unforgivable to you.”
Isaac clenched his teeth.
Seeing the woman before him spouting only what she wanted to say made his teeth grind of their own accord.
“How much of it was true?”
“…….”
“The things you said to me. Tell me how much was true and how much was a lie.”
Whether she stepped back or not, Isaac once again approached her.
At some point, they were close enough that he could touch her if he reached out.
The setting sunset stained her face. Her face, awash in rich color, was utterly expressionless, which only heightened the sense of strangeness.
“……The matter regarding the inheritance is true. The reason I intended to marry you was solely that. If I marry you and maintain the marriage for one year, I can receive an inheritance of twelve thousand ond. It was written that way in the will.”
“A will written not to you, but to ‘Sasha Grayson’?”
“Of course the name written is Sasha Grayson, but the will was indeed addressed to me. He was the one who told me to act as his false granddaughter.”
“……Your name. Then your…….”
“I don’t have any such thing as a real name.”
She said it calmly.
“It must be confusing. I’m sorry. ……Yes. ‘Anna’ would do. That was the name I was called before I was adopted here. Anna, or just ‘you,’ call me whatever is comfortable for you, Captain.”
“After all this, something like that…….”
Isaac muttered as if dumbfounded.
“Fine. Then what do you want to be called now?”
Isaac asked with a sigh.
Her face, expressionless all along, stiffened in a different way.
“…….”
She was simply silent. She could not find an answer.
She had never once thought about what she would like to be called after everything had come to this.
It was the moment when the reality of her situation, without even a name, struck her all the more. So that man had, in the end, come to know the bare face of herself, nothing but an empty shell. At that thought, she felt wretched and ashamed and wanted to hide.
“About the contract, I’m truly sorry. ……But the succession to the title, which was your original purpose, has been achieved. I know it sounds shameless, but we already obtained the marriage license a few days ago. So…….”
“You mean to say it can’t be annulled now?”
Isaac’s voice came, sunken more ominously than usual.
“And so, because things have become unavoidable, you want me to endure it for just one year?”
“……I don’t know if I dare calculate an amount equivalent to your damaged reputation, but as soon as I receive the inheritance, I will compensate you.”
Isaac could no longer endure it.
Without warning, his hand shot out and grasped her cheek, lifting her face as she deliberately avoided his gaze.
“That is not what I wanted to hear.”
As if chewing out each word, Isaac continued,
“You know, better than anyone, exactly what I want to hear right now.”