Chapter 8: Rumors in High Society Have Their Own Temperature
On the fifth day after moving to the greenhouse estate, my older brother Cedric came to visit.
As the current head of House Weiss, my brother had never been very expressive.
And yet, the moment he entered the entrance hall and saw my face, he let out a deep sigh.
“So you’re alive.”
“That’s your first sentence?”
“When I sent the carriage, I assumed one of three things had happened.
You had collapsed from anger, collapsed from grief, or collapsed from overexerting yourself while carrying Lucy.”
“You have very little faith in me.”
“You put too much faith in your own limits.”
After saying that, my brother lowered his gaze toward Lucy, who stood nearby holding her stuffed rabbit.
“Lucy.
I am your uncle.”
“Uncle?”
“That’s right.
Your mother’s older brother.”
Lucy thought for a moment, then looked up at me.
“Mommy’s big brother?”
“That’s right.”
“Then… are you important?”
For once, my brother was at a loss for words.
“I don’t know whether I’m important or not, but I do have the responsibility to protect you and your mother.”
“Protect?”
“If someone does something unpleasant to you, tell me.”
Lucy nodded with a serious expression.
“Lucy doesn’t like being cold.”
“Understood.
That will be my highest priority.”
My brother answered in complete seriousness.
Afterward, we left Lucy in Martha’s care while we spoke in the reception room.
Cedric placed several sheets of paper summarizing the current rumors in noble society onto the table.
“There are already three versions circulating.
First, a jealous wife ran away with her daughter because of her husband’s sickly childhood friend.
Second, House Weiss retrieved their daughter because the marquis house abused her dowry.
Third, Lady Lilia stole the marchioness’s room.”
“The third one spread quickly.”
“Servants have loose tongues.
Especially when they fear they may become the villains themselves.”
I lowered my eyes to the papers.
Rumors were like temperature.
If left alone, they flowed toward colder places.
Toward whatever entertained people.
Toward whatever made it easiest to speak ill of someone.
Toward whatever benefited the powerful.
Even so, while they could never be fully controlled, the direction of the wind could still be changed.
“Brother.
I will not cry in noble society.”
“Were you planning to?”
“No.
But there are certainly people who want to see a crying wife.”
Whether she was abandoned by her husband or abandoned him herself, society loved a tragic woman.
Pity and criticism alike were easy things for them to consume.
I had no intention of indulging them.
“I will hold a small tea gathering.
I’ll invite the physicians who helped support Lucy’s recovery, people connected to the court, and several ladies who were close to Mother.
The purpose will be to let them observe the recuperation environment of the greenhouse estate.”
“So you’re going on the offensive?”
“It’s defense.”
“Your defenses have always leaned slightly forward.”
My brother sighed, but he did not oppose me.
“There has also been a visitation request from the Leivelt marquis house.”
“I’ve heard.”
“Gilbert personally signed it.
The stated reason is to confirm his daughter’s health condition.”
I closed my eyes for a moment.
Confirm her health condition.
It could be interpreted as concern from a father.
And yet nowhere in those words was there an apology to Lucy.
“I’ll decide after asking Lucy.”
“You’re going to let a three-year-old decide?”
“I’m not throwing the responsibility entirely onto her.
But I will not ignore her when she says she dislikes something.”
My brother remained silent for a while before finally nodding.
“Mother would be pleased to hear that.”
“Mother?”
“When you were little, you were terrible at saying no to things you disliked.
Mother worried about that constantly.”
That surprised me a little.
The mother in my memories had always been gentle and never strongly demanded anything from me.
But that did not mean she failed to notice.
“Brother.”
“What?”
“I don’t want Lucy to learn the same kind of endurance I did.”
“Then stop enduring things yourself first.”
The answer came instantly.
I could not help but laugh.
That evening, I wrote invitations for the tea gathering.
I avoided overly ornate wording and described it simply as a small gathering to observe Lucy’s recuperation environment and the Winter Bellflowers of the old greenhouse estate.
The sender’s name read:
Noelia Weiss.
Officially, I had not yet severed ties with the Leivelt name.
But these invitations were being sent from my family’s estate.
For the first time in a long while, I wrote the name of the house where I was born.
My hand trembled slightly.
Not from fear.
But from the feeling of opening a door with my own hands.