Episode 53
What an utterly irritating woman.
Her appearance alone looked fussy enough to anyone, and that attitude of hers—strangely unfriendly only toward him—was already uncomfortable and annoying, but the occasional glimpses of this softer side made Isaac even more perplexed.
After Isaac accepted her proposal, she made him even more uncomfortable than before. The woman was, at her core, considerate. There were times when she acted as if she thought only of herself, but fundamentally, she was the type to pay close attention to other people’s moods, keenly taking care of things others had not even managed to say. Yet it was different in nature from the goodness or kindness people often mistook it for.
At times she seemed unable to control her emotions and acted clumsily, but then the woman would return to her essential attitude. Yes. If he had to put this ambiguous point into words, then the correct expression would be “calculating.”
“It’s really fine. Speak comfortably.”
The woman was calculating. In truth, she had been that way since they first met. She rarely ever revealed what was inside her, and always behaved artificially, as if cutting off at the source anything that might give others a hold over her.
This woman was now extending the most calculated kindness imaginable. It was obvious. She was likely doing this in case he wavered as before and tried to make her proposal as if it had never happened. That was how important this fake marriage was to her.
For Isaac, who had spent half his life in an organization called the military, at times on battlefields, and perhaps his entire life surviving other people, such intuition could not help but develop. That calculating side of the woman resembled him, in a certain sense.
Perhaps that woman, too, had become that way in order to survive.
“……The servants here are far too wary of me.”
He had sensed it from some point onward, but the reason he had not thought much of it was because it made no sense to begin with. Sasha Grayson had lost her parents at a young age, but she must have grown up dearly cherished under the care of her grandmother, Lady Rosalyn.
“……Ah, come to think of it, I failed to tell them about that. I’m sorry. Have they perhaps been unkind to you?”
“No. They are kind. Kind, yet defensive. As if they are afraid I might harm you.”
At Sasha’s face twisting as though she were troubled, Isaac quickly added, as if to explain.
“As their master, you must be pleased. To have people so loyal.”
“……Loyal, you say.”
“Yes. They are not knights, and servants who are protective of their master in that way are rare. They seem quite united among themselves as well.”
“……That isn’t being protective.”
“Every one of them seems to care for you a great deal, Miss Grayson.”
“That’s—”
Sasha’s voice, which had been refuting him quietly, suddenly rose. The moment she spoke, she realized it and closed her mouth.
Isaac, who had been about to smooth things over by saying wasn’t that rather a good thing, merely raised his brows as if puzzled.
“……If I said something wrong, I apologize.”
“No.”
“It seems I spoke out of turn. What do I know of them, when I have only just seen them?”
“No. No, that’s not it. Don’t apologize!”
As Isaac apologized quickly, Sasha abruptly leaned forward as if to stop him.
They were close enough that their lips could have touched. But the atmosphere was by no means romantic.
“Do they look as though they care for me?”
“……I misspoke, when it has only been a few hours since I arrived.”
“I told you, you don’t need to apologize, Captain.”
Not romantic at all.
“Miss Grayson.”
“…….”
“……Are you all right?”
Sasha did not answer right away. She simply stared at Isaac with an expressionless face from which all trace of laughter had vanished. Isaac now knew when she made that sort of expression.
Right before she suddenly acted foolish, or when she was very angry.
And now.
“No.”
It was neither.
“I don’t know. Ordinary people would be happy to hear something like that, wouldn’t they? They would say I’m too blessed for my own good. You’re right, Captain. It isn’t a hundred years ago, so where would one find such well-trained people these days? All of them. ……All of them.”
“…….”
“It’s thanks to her. She educated them that way. So that none of them would ever disobey their master, no matter who that master was.”
Why was it that whenever she spoke with this man, she became emotional? That man had no way with words. If anything, he was the opposite. He was a man whose casually tossed-out remarks were so honest they bordered on rude.
Sasha pulled the corners of her mouth downward and looked at the floor. With an expression as though she were holding back sorrow.
“I don’t have much attachment to them. Whatever they may think of me, I have no attachment to them.”
Memories of childhood she had buried away came to mind.
Memories of when she had only recently arrived at the mansion, when the young her had struggled desperately to survive in this luxurious hell.
Back then, she had been less tamed, and thanks to that, she went around every day with switch marks on her calves. Some days, merely hearing the voice of her governess, Mrs. Maugham, would make her scream hysterically and run out to hide.
The servants here had been the same. They were people carefully chosen by Lady Rosalyn, who hardly ever changed her staff, and they still worked here, only a little younger then than they were now.
When Mrs. Maugham looked for the young girl, they had pointed without hesitation to where she was hiding. When Mrs. Maugham grabbed the young her roughly and dragged her out, they merely exchanged awkward glances among themselves and hurried to leave the place.
It was always like that. Even when she was slapped by Lady Rosalyn in anger for no reason, even when she was subjected to verbal abuse, they existed only like part of the background.
Yes. They were simply the background. Would one feel attachment to the background, let alone interest? To Sasha, they had only ever been the background. People attached to the mansion. That was all.
“Even though I know better than anyone that it’s unreasonable to feel this kind of resentment toward them.”
Sasha murmured while looking at the floor. As Isaac had pointed out, they were merely well-trained people, rare these days. They were Lady Rosalyn’s people.
They were her people.
“That can happen. In fact, there are many people like that, Miss Grayson.”
Like the mansion and the foundation that had now been thrust upon her, they were people thrust upon her. To Sasha, that was all they were.
When Isaac spoke as if trying to smooth things over, Sasha lifted her gaze from the floor and looked at him. Seeing the man, who had been unfamiliar and uncomfortable ever since coming here and had been silently struggling, now at a loss, she felt sorry, yet also found it amusing.
“That isn’t what I meant.”
“Pardon?”
“Never mind. Just forget it.”
After saying it, she thought, Ah, but as the mistakes she made in front of Isaac kept piling up, she gradually grew numb to them.
Isaac would not care much anyway. He was indifferent to her, and to begin with, they were merely bound by a contract.
Someone she would never see again after a year. Thinking that, Sasha found she was not as bothered as before.
“More importantly, where were we? Ah, yes. I’ll call the butler and speak to him separately. He’ll take care of it. He is quick-witted in matters like this.”
Sasha spoke with a composed face. As if she were simply sweeping the matter aside, her expression clear all on its own. As if she had shaken off even the troubled emotions from earlier.
“If there is anything else you need, or anything else that makes you uncomfortable, don’t hesitate to tell me. Even if it’s only for one year, Captain, you will be acting as the master of this place, so it would be better to make things clear now.”
“There is nothing besides that. That will be enough.”
Isaac answered clearly. However, he kept glancing at Sasha as if something still did not sit right with him.
Whether he did or not, she flipped through her notebook.
“Good. Then.”
Sasha picked up her pen.
“Let’s make a proper plan for this fake marriage.”