Chapter 67

Episode 67

For the past five days, Isaac had been staying at a hotel in the capital. There was no particular reason he had chosen it. It was simply the closest one to the courthouse.

Even amid the bustle of diligently preparing materials for the trial and writing out his testimony in advance as a script, Isaac kept checking from time to time to see if a letter had come from Sasha. For the past two days, there had been no particular letter from her.

I am staying at the Fenril Hotel.

That was the last thing they had exchanged through letters. Isaac, who had woken early that morning, was shaking off sleep with a bitter cup of black coffee. Just then, with a knock, breakfast arrived. As a bonus, the hotel employee handed him a letter that had arrived in his name.

Sasha Grayson. It was from that woman. Isaac, who had picked up his fork, set it back down on the plate and opened the letter first to read it.

As her letters always did, it began with an ordinary greeting. She said the weather had grown noticeably muggy, as if it were a sign that the rainy season would soon begin, and then she wrote that she had met a man named Osmond.

I saw him near the cathedral. And we exchanged greetings for a moment.

Unavoidably, the moment we met, we ended up speaking about Captain Pinscher. Fortunately, it seems neither he nor his friend Mr. Robert will be filing a separate lawsuit against you. Captain Pinscher. So I wanted to tell you that you need not worry that matter might have a bad effect on me.

After that, there was nothing much. All it said was that Osmond had shamelessly climbed into her carriage and escorted her home. Yes, truly. Shameless indeed. If he had any sense of shame, that man with nothing but a pretty face should have fled the moment he saw Sasha, let alone spoken to her.

Yes. If he was that shameless, no wonder he had come up with that absurd plan. There was a reason he was friends with a bastard like Robert Bloom.

Isaac took the letter and sat down at the desk. Then he immediately took out a fresh sheet of stationery and wrote a reply.

I hope you have been well, Miss Grayson.

As you said, the weather is growing hotter by the day, but compared to Lance Field, summer here is on the cool side, so it is tolerable.

My schedule ends today, as I write this letter. Today is the final day of the trial. Unless there is a separate retrial, I believe my role will be done for the time being. I hope you will understand that I cannot tell you the details of my circumstances.

Miss Grayson, you have already respected my wish not to speak of it to you and refrained from prying, but it weighed on my mind, so I felt I ought to say it once more. If I were to give you the reason, it is because this is also a matter of the military, and because it involves a certain person of high standing. You need not concern yourself with it, Miss Grayson.

Isaac paused there for a moment. Now that he had written it, it somehow made him sound like a fraud. In particular, the part where he had repeatedly emphasized that, for now, she need not worry.

With a groan, Isaac considered crumpling up the letter and throwing it away, then stopped. He had no extra stationery. Damn it.

Just write. Yes. Just write.

Was the man named Osmond all right? Did he, by any chance, try to lure you in, Miss Grayson? They were plainly a group that had conspired while aiming for your inheritance. I think it would be best if you were especially careful.

Could that man perhaps have appeared at the cathedral you attend, Miss Grayson, under the pretext of that “work”? It is suspicious how he appeared at precisely that time. If you could tell me the name of that accountant, I will look into it separately.

Isaac wrote that much, then fumbled through the drawer again as if searching for another fresh sheet of stationery. It was a futile motion.

Having no other choice, Isaac set his pen to the last sentence and scratched it out roughly, leaving marks that anyone could see were from writing and then erasing. There was nothing he could do.

In any case, please always take care. I will return to Lance Field as soon as today’s trial is over. I will write to you again from there.

— Isaac Pinscher.

＊＊＊

It was around three in the afternoon when the trial ended.

“Captain, thank you for coming. It must have been a difficult decision.”

“Not at all, Tommy. How is your leg?”

“Walking is much better than before. I still limp, though.”

“Focus only on your rehabilitation. I can introduce you to a doctor I know well.”

Until just a year ago, Corporal Tommy had run beside him, chattering so glibly it was almost irritating. Now he stood facing Isaac without his uniform. Isaac silently looked at his mother standing beside him with a gloomy face, holding his crutches for him.

“Thank you for your courage, Captain. Even though you’re still on active duty.”

“Enough. Strictly speaking, I’m not active duty either, Tommy.”

“I want to repay you for the help you gave me today. If, in regard to that person, you intend to do something, Captain……”

“Tommy!”

His mother, who had been standing beside him, could not hold back and shouted. Silence swept over their surroundings.

“I understand how you feel. It’s all right.”

Isaac said this as if smoothing things over to Tommy’s mother, who was looking at him with startled eyes, then turned his back and left the place.

In any case, Isaac had done his part today. He had testified honestly that Tommy had injured his leg because of Isaac’s mistaken relay of orders—in other words, because of the commanding officer and the higher-ups’ incorrect judgment of the situation—so unless the court was full of fools, it would side with Tommy for now.

In any case, it was as good as admitting that he himself was the perpetrator. At least, that was how it would look to others.

Isaac walked straight out of the building. Behind the courthouse, trees grew thickly, making it a decent place to stand in the shade. He took a cigar and a knife from his breast pocket. He cut the end straight across and put it roughly between his lips.

“Ah, I fucking hate that bastard. He creeps me out. There’s a limit to how much fun you can have, but when I see Grayson dragging that bastard around these days, I feel like throwing up.”

Seriously, why was it that whenever he took out a cigar, he kept hearing talk like this?

Of course, the fault lay with him for entering a place that, to anyone’s eyes, was perfect for gossip in the first place. Clicking his tongue as he put the cigar back into its case, Isaac stopped his hand just like that.

“Anyone can see he’s being toyed with, but that idiot doesn’t even notice.”

“That loser bastard probably thinks he’s the one using Grayson.”

Grayson.

With mechanical movements, Isaac finished putting the cigar into its case and tucked it into his breast pocket.

“So what the hell is that Jeffrey bastard thinking? Surely he isn’t actually trying to set up that loser with his cousin.”

Concealing one’s presence while approaching a target was the basics of infiltration.

He chose the side with less grass and stepped there as he walked. Since they were not conspiring like Robert Bloom had been last time in the first place, they were far less sensitive to noise.

The untended bushes had grown almost as high as his waist. On a bench left sitting forlornly among those bushes were two men.

“Well, according to that bastard.”

The man calmly took out a new cigarette and lit it, not knowing someone was approaching from behind.

“He said he wanted his cousin to learn how scary men can be.”

The man, who had been prattling on that it wasn’t even funny and that, when you looked closely, that family seemed like a complete mess, turned his head as if to ask what was wrong when his friend did not respond.

And following his friend, who had gone rigid and was looking behind him, he looked behind his own back.

A shadow had fallen over them. A certain huge man had placed both hands on the bench and was looking down at them.

Without warning, Isaac thrust his head toward them and spoke in an ominous voice.

“Tell me more about what you just said.”

＊＊＊

Incidents always arise from unexpected places. Yes. If one had expected them in advance, they would not have become incidents to begin with. And if you could predict everything, you would be a god, not a human.

It was Thursday. The afternoon just past noon.

“Master, a guest has arrived.”

Sasha, who had been planning to laze around all day and do absolutely nothing for once, unknowingly glared at the innocent Jason with displeased eyes.

“A guest? Who is it? I don’t have any appointments.”

“It is a person named Mr. Butler. He says he cannot leave until he meets and speaks with you, Master……”

The irritation that appeared on her face lasted only a moment, and Sasha soon became expressionless.

She seemed to ponder for a moment, then nodded.

“Show him to the drawing room.”