CHAPTER~21
A Certain Premonition
9:20 a.m.
The carriage carrying Blan arrived at the Glaston estate.
Just before getting off, Blan checked his pocket watch.
It was a habit he had developed after working under Cedric Glaston.
His superior did not tolerate even the slightest mistake when it came to schedules and work.
Even though Blan sometimes felt suffocated by those blade-sharp standards, there was only one reason he never left Cedric’s side.
Money.
And not just money—big money!
His employer was strict because he pursued perfection in everything, but also had an excellent philosophy that nothing improved a subordinate’s efficiency like money.
Fueled by that philosophy, Blan had once again come energetically to pick up his boss today.
“Good morning.”
After exchanging greetings with the servants and walking through the familiar corridor, he soon reached Cedric’s room.
“Sir, I’m coming in.”
After knocking and entering, he found Cedric standing half-dressed in front of the mirror, wearing only his trousers.
Blan froze for a moment.
He had seen that body hundreds of times, yet it amazed him every time.
As he was once again lamenting the gods’ unfairness, Cedric’s voice suddenly flew toward him through the mirror.
“What are you doing? Aren’t you reporting the schedule?”
“Ah—yes!”
Snapping out of his thoughts, Blan hurriedly pulled his notebook from his coat.
“In the morning you have the monthly meeting at headquarters, and at lunch you have a meeting with Mr. Lindemann.
In the afternoon we’ll move to the port to inspect the construction progress of the Valentine.”
As Cedric buttoned his shirt while reviewing today’s schedule, his quick-witted secretary spoke again.
“You haven’t read the newspaper yet, right? Should I read it for you?”
Seeing Blan holding out the newspaper through the mirror, Cedric nodded while tying his cravat.
Soon, the sound of paper unfolding echoed behind him.
“Let’s see, the front page… a riot in the Kingdom of Rox.
It seemed quiet for a while, but I guess not.
The King of Rox has evacuated to the northern fortress.
This might very well lead to a civil war.”
Cedric, who had been fastening his cufflinks, paused when he heard the news.
As wealth became a new form of status, winds of change were sweeping across the entire continent.
Countless people, unable to endure the irrationality of the old hierarchy, began to harbor resistance.
The nation hit by these winds first was the neighboring Kingdom of Rox.
Unable to endure their incompetent king, the people of Rox began to riot.
The royalists quickly suppressed the riot, but that was only the beginning.
Since then, clashes between revolutionaries and royalists became a regular occurrence, and now public opinion said it could escalate into civil war.
It was, at the end of the day, another country’s problem, yet Cedric could not dismiss the news as something unrelated to him.
The first reason was because such events would bring both positive and negative changes to his business.
The second reason was…
With a faint frown, he finished fastening his cufflinks and muttered,
“I have a really bad feeling about this.”
“A bad feeling?”
“For example…”
His words were cut off by a knock from the butler.
“Sir Cedric, a summons has arrived from the palace.”
His premonition was correct.
With an irritated sigh, Cedric finished his sentence.
“Yeah. Just like this.”
Around lunchtime, the carriage carrying Yvonne departed the Duke of Leroy’s estate.
Its destination was, as always, the Glaston estate.
This was her first time going there since what happened at the opera house.
‘Derrick Glaston… I might run into him today.’
The thought of facing Derrick made her uneasy, but remembering Cedric’s words—that Derrick was the one who had been rejected—made it somewhat bearable.
It was even a little relieving.
Since Derrick had made the mistake of revealing his true nature, it wouldn’t seem strange if she avoided him.
While she was steadying her heart, the carriage entered the plaza, as it always did.
Yvonne tapped the carriage wall to make it stop.
As usual, the newsboys approached.
Among them was the boy who sometimes ran errands for a detective agency.
“Thank you.”
She naturally accepted the newspaper the boy handed her, and the other newsboys, having failed to win a customer, soon returned to their places.
Yvonne unfolded the newspaper.
The front page featured news of a revolutionary riot in the neighboring Kingdom of Rox.
But to Yvonne, it was just a distant story.
Her real interest lay elsewhere.
Skipping past several sections, she stopped at the crime report page.
It was something she did every day, yet her heart always pounded anxiously at this moment.
In case she found something related to her mother.
Taking a small breath, Yvonne carefully read down the column.
Luckily, there were no articles involving women around her mother’s age today.
But relief lasted only a moment—unresolved anxiety soon surged up again.
‘Mother…’
After rereading the crime section thoroughly, Yvonne finally exhaled deeply and folded the newspaper.
At that moment, something slipped out from between the pages and fell onto her lap.
A small note.
Yvonne carefully unfolded it.
Scrawled handwriting read: “Royal Hospital, Room 203B.”
Yvonne’s eyes widened as she realized what it meant.
Her heart plummeted at the thought that her mother’s condition had worsened enough to require hospitalization, but then faint relief followed when she realized the hospital was nearby.
The Royal Hospital was close enough to reach within an hour.
She could visit after leaving the Glaston estate today.
The problem was that Yvonne, as Yvonne, could not go to the hospital.
If she did, Logan would surely hear of it.
‘If I go wrapped in a robe like this, I’ll only look suspicious…’
As she struggled to find a way into the hospital, she absentmindedly looked out the window.
The newsboys were still running about eagerly selling papers.
Staring at them, an idea suddenly struck her.
‘With that method…’
A way to enter the hospital without Logan finding out.
Cedric’s premonition was exactly right.
“Have you heard about the riot in Rox?”
King Robert V of Herrington began the conversation with the very topic Cedric had expected.
And everything that followed was equally predictable.
“Although relations between Rox and our kingdom have worsened recently, if you go back far enough, we once fought side by side as allies.
Perhaps that’s why this incident leaves a bitter taste.
Of course, I have no intention of defending the Rox royal family’s choices.”
“It is quite unfortunate news indeed.
The King of Rox was a customer with an excellent eye for recognizing the value of goods.”
Cedric set down his teacup and added,
“I wonder how public sentiment deteriorated so drastically… It is worrisome.
Though, in the end, it is another country’s matter.”
Though polite, King Robert V did not miss the sarcasm hidden beneath Cedric’s words.
This commoner businessman—young enough to be his son—had just reduced a neighboring king to a mere customer, and even jabbed at the very issue troubling the king himself.
The king searched for a gap in Cedric’s composure.
“So you do not share the radical views of the Rox revolutionaries, I take it?”
Peace-lover.
King Robert V almost laughed.
Cedric Glaston was no battlefield commander, but anyone who watched the way he expanded and absorbed businesses would never associate the word ‘peaceful’ with him.
Still, regardless of his true nature, this was a situation in which the king very much needed Cedric to be peaceful.
With a troubled sigh, King Robert V nonetheless continued,
“I am no different from you.
I do not wish to point guns and swords at my own people.
So I must rule wisely to prevent such things from happening.”
“A wise decision.”
“On that note, I wish to expand the Royal Hospital’s medical supplies and facilities.
As you know, every change of season brings fevers like an epidemic.”
Give me money.
In short, that was the entire meaning of his long speech.
But the king could not simply beg a commoner for funds—not openly.
Had the royal family possessed a princess, the king would likely have sold her to Cedric.
The absence of a princess in this generation was a tragedy for the royal family—and a blessing for Cedric.
For if there had been one, marriage would have become a leash around his neck.
Though he found the royal family’s constant requests inconvenient, Cedric had never refused a single one.
After all, they were a valuable customer capable of placing something on the negotiation scale that no one else could.
Of course, Cedric had once considered siding with those who rebelled against the existing order, like the radicals of Rox.
But he dismissed the idea quickly.
A businessman seeks maximum profit with minimum investment.
King Robert V had once been a war-driven monarch in his prime, but now he had become a cautious ruler who avoided unnecessary conflict.
In such times, revolution was a business with extremely low return.
Why break a peace that could be bought with a handful of gold coins?
And that belief held true even now.
