The one who suddenly threw cold water on the warm, harmonious atmosphere was Martin, a maid who had worked at a certain count’s household in the center of Ejon before coming here.
Martin, who was generally on the quiet side, had turned bright red with a face she had never shown before.
The other maids, seeing her eyes blazing with anger like flames, hesitated and eventually shut their mouths.
Martin shouted in an agitated voice.
“What do you know? You don’t know because this house has no young master. Men of the nobility don’t see maids as human beings. There is no good memory or romance to be found there.”
“…….”
“They’re all trash, worse than dogs. You know? The better-looking they are, the more arrogant and full of themselves they get, thinking they’re so great. Courtesans give their bodies and at least get paid; maids are worse than a chamber pot used for pissing. Don’t talk about what you don’t know.”
“…….”
The maids fell silent. Perhaps emboldened by Martin’s words, another maid, Geneviève, who had been silent until now, cautiously opened up about her inner thoughts.
“I know too. Young masters are all trash.”
“Geneviève, you too?”
Geneviève’s cheeks were flushed, and her eyelashes trembled. Clenching her fist, she calmly revealed her story.
“The young master at my previous household would pull me by the waist and sit me on his lap even while he was eating. Even when I cried and begged him to let me go, he didn’t care at all…….”
“Heavens, the scum.”
“They ought to chop his thing clean off!”
“But I luckily managed to run away; the problem was my friend who was caught after me.”
She let out a deep sigh, her eyes welling with tears as she muttered.
“She eventually fell for that devil’s temptation. Heavens, she ended up giving her heart to that crazy perverted bastard, you know? My friend said every day, ‘Geneviève, he’s kind to me. He treats me quite affectionately, at least to me…….’”
Amélie Garnier, who had been staring blankly at an empty plate, turned her head toward Geneviève.
“Geneviève……. What happened to that friend?”
“She…….”
A tear dropped plop from Geneviève’s eye.
“She threw herself into a well and died. On the day the young master got married. There wasn’t even a suicide note. But we all knew why she died.”
Everyone fell quiet.
“Do you know how shameless the young master and the madam were? They had the maids’ room searched thoroughly to see if she had left anything behind. A diary, letters, things like that. Then they had the footman take all her belongings and burn them.”
“Oh, Geneviève…….”
The other maids patted Geneviève’s shoulder with worried gazes.
“Martin is right,” Amélie said quietly. “To them, we aren’t even people. I don’t think someone like Olivier Dampierre would be any different. To look like a proper human being in their eyes, you’d have to be at least a noble young lady. A bunch of perverts will swarm here this time too, so everyone be careful. Especially you, the youngest.”
“Yes, Amélie.”
The apprentice maid, who had been chattering away happily just moments ago, quickly nodded her head in terror at the gruesome story.
“Tch. Who cares if he’s handsome? I’ve got my pride!”
Denise grumbled, tearing at a hangnail. Her fingertips, cracked and swollen from dish soap, were red and rough.
“For a maid’s lot, simply avoiding filthy harassment is blessing enough…….”
Heavy sighs flowed from all around.
Just then, a bell rang, signaling the end of break time. The maids rose in a bustle and returned to their respective positions.
* * *
“Dear. What in the world is all this…….”
The Countess Viche could not bring herself to close her mouth, staring up at the central hall of the annex.
The venue for the party was inside a hunting grounds owned by the House of Count Viche. A dense forest with a lake on one side moderately concealed the annex, so it was not easily visible from the main manor.
However, the Count and Countess Viche had been closely watching their daughter’s unusual party preparations for some time, so today they had personally come out to the annex, thinking that strict supervision was truly necessary, and were peering about the surroundings.
“It’s just like that caba…ret in Ejon.”
Count Viche surveyed the scene with a thoroughly stiff face.
In truth, given the state of the raucous main hall that looked as though a cabaret from Ejon had been lifted wholesale and transplanted, it was quite an apt assessment; however, having unwittingly uttered the word “cabaret” in front of his wife, the count flinched and glanced at her sideways to gauge her reaction.
He appeared to be a quite respectable head of the household, but in truth he had secretly spent time with dancers at Ejon’s cabarets a couple of times a week.
Fortunately, the countess had not heard a thing. Her gaze, lost in confusion, was fixed on the cancan dancers who passed before her with their chins raised high, not once greeting a noblewoman.
To be precise, her eyes remained on their bizarre attire that openly exposed their undergarments below the navel, and the garter belts wrapped around their thighs.
“Oh, heavens…….”
The countess, flushing red and taking deep breaths repeatedly, inadvertently turned her gaze and gasped once more at the sight of a male dancer.
A male dancer in tights, revealing his muscular, bulging chest without hesitation, was stretching with his legs spread wide.
The countess, fanning herself continuously to cool her nervous sweat, barely managed to grab her husband’s arm.
“How could our daughter…… Dear, what do you really think of this?”
“Well, it’s very…….”
Count Viche tilted his head, staring at one spot. An exclamation of “wow” almost escaped his lips before he hastily clamped his mouth shut.
“Dear?”
“……Decadence! Yes, it’s decadence.”
The count swallowed dryly, murmuring as if entranced.
“They say this trend is all the rage in Ejon these days. Very free…… the very essence of humanity…… something…….”
A dancer wearing an outfit that clung tightly enough to reveal every curve of her body, with a rabbit tail attached to her bottom, was practicing choreography, wagging her tail.
Unable to tear his eyes from the bouncing buttocks, Count Viche nodded as if in conviction and added.
“Our daughter…… is leading the latest trend. Much freer than before. Very philosophical, stark, a projection of human desire.”
As he spoke, he subtly thrust his hand into his pocket and deliberately coughed several times in succession to adjust his swelling front.
“What did you say?”
The countess, looking at her husband with a bewildered face, spotted the cute rabbit tail, her husband’s flushed red face, and the protrusion below, and turned ashen.
“So we’ll see all sorts of vulgar trends! Yes, I hope your dog-shit philosophy serves you well.”
Seething with anger, the Countess marched away from the annex first. The count made a half-hearted show of going after his wife but ended up remaining engrossed in watching the dancers.
He briefly wondered if he might slip in among the young people later, but Katarina would be horrified if he did. Yet this delightful spectacle…….
“Father, Father!”
Katarina came rushing out. She was personally directing tonight’s event, holding the schedule and guest list in her hands.
“What do you think?”
When his daughter—who had applied pitch-black makeup all over her eyelids—asked with a bright smile, Count Viche felt as though all the blood were draining from his body.
“Hmm…….”
The arousal that had risen to its peak quietly subsided like a ghost, of course. With naked lowborns, the more they stripped, the happier he would be, but…….
If it was his family’s precious only daughter, the story was necessarily different.
“Lo-look here, my girl. You…….”
Had he said, “You mustn’t do that,” his daughter would fly into a rage, saying her father didn’t understand the latest trends. So the count could not hide his bewildered expression, fidgeting anxiously as he looked his cherished, beloved only daughter up and down.
In other words, his daughter was dressed no differently from those lewd dancers…….
“I asked what you think!”
Katarina held her head up high. A dress plunged so deep her nipples were nearly visible clung tight to her entire body, every curve on display.
“This is the hottest trend in Ejon these days. Everyone wants to come to my party. Count Monsau, Viscount Armand, Jacques Belpre, and such will all be attending…….”
Oh……? Count Viche’s expression grew ambiguous again. Names far too lofty to come from his daughter’s mouth popped out one after another, and he couldn’t help but prick up his ears.
“Even,” Katarina shrugged her shoulders with immense pride, “Viscount Olivier Dampierre has sent a reply that he will attend.”
“Who……?”
His heart, which had been devastated by his daughter’s insane getup, suddenly felt a little better. No, rather, it began to pound violently.
Olivier Dampierre……!
That name always had an enormous effect. Dampierre, Dampierre! Did not that house’s glorious history hold value nearly rivaling the imperial family?
It mattered little that the Viscount and his friends were rumored to be rakes. That house had enjoyed tremendous prestige both then and now. If he could somehow forge a connection, it would be advantageous for investment too.
What if his daughter ended up betrothed to Dampierre? Count Viche, beginning to make extravagant calculations, found all his complaints vanishing at that thought. So much so that he even forgot about his daughter’s black eye makeup.
Even if the Viscount ran around acting like the worst kind of scoundrel, if only they could secure him. To the point that he could tell his cherished daughter to simply endure and make do.
And so, in the end, Count Viche decided to more or less tolerate this debauched party.
Even the vulgar sight of his daughter scanning a half-naked male dancer’s body up and down, saying things like, “You, enter from here and shake your hips hard before exiting over there.”