Chapter 7…………………………………….
“Do you find me ridiculous, my lady?! Now you even give me fake jewelry as a gift!”
At the masked man’s words, the Marchioness of Devon’s face turned deathly pale.
“A fake? That can’t be true!”
“Unfortunately, it very much can.”
The man flung the necklace he was holding onto the table.
“It’s a necklace that seems to gather every hallmark of an imitation. I never thought you wouldn’t be able to tell even this much—or did you know perfectly well and still try to pass off a fake to me?”
“No, I—!”
“Either way, I think we need to reconsider our future.”
“Bill! Don’t go!”
In desperation, the Marchioness of Devon hugged him tightly from behind around the waist.
He was one of her more recent lovers, a servant of the Imperial Princess’s palace.
Though a nobleman, he worked in the imperial palace because of his debts, and thanks to his strikingly beautiful face, his pride was as high as one could imagine.
The Marchioness of Devon, too, found herself cherishing Bill more than the men who were always scrambling to please her, precisely because he remained cool and aloof.
Moreover, unlike her other lovers, Bill was popular among noble ladies, which meant he had a certain amount of backing.
Of course, it was nothing compared to hers—but since she couldn’t openly say she was seeing him while watching the emperor’s mood, she couldn’t simply use her power to keep him by her side.
‘Even if we only meet at small gatherings where I have to hide my face like this…’
To the Marchioness of Devon, he was one of the few people who could ease her loneliness.
The problem was that his pride matched his value—he wouldn’t even meet her unless she continuously offered him jewelry.
“It was a necklace Count Rosenthein the Elder supposedly gifted to his lover! I just wanted to put it around your neck!”
At her frantic cry, Bill hesitated.
“How do you know that…? Don’t tell me—the Grand Duchess herself handed it over?”
“Yes! It was my sister’s keepsake, but she said she regarded me as a mother and personally offered it!”
At that answer, Bill’s anger subsided somewhat, and he turned to face her.
If the Grand Duchess of Mason had given it herself, she wouldn’t have knowingly handed over a fake.
‘There’s no way the Grand Duchess would deliberately try to put the Marchioness of Devon in trouble.’
That was the general opinion—and Bill himself had seen enough to believe it.
Trisha Mason might be called a Grand Duchess, but in reality she was no better than the Marchioness of Devon’s attendant—no, practically a servant.
“To gift a fake necklace to the woman who even bore him a child… Count Rosenthein the Elder was truly a vile man.”
“Or perhaps he didn’t cherish the Grand Duchess’s mother as much as we thought.”
In the end, the two reached the same conclusion.
That Count Rosenthein the Elder had deliberately gifted Trisha’s mother a necklace set with fake jewels.
“The Grand Duchess’s mother may have been of low birth, but the Grand Duchess herself has terrible taste as well—imagine not even being able to tell fake jewels apart.”
“Exactly. If she was going to offer a bribe, she should at least have checked it properly.”
In truth, it had been taken by force, but the Marchioness of Devon continued shamelessly.
“Bill, I’ll buy you a jewel that suits you separately. Perhaps I should summon a jeweler as soon as tomorrow.”
“…Really?”
“Of course.”
The Marchioness nodded.
It was a bit of a waste of money, but if it meant placating Bill, it couldn’t be helped.
When she had previously ordered the maids to rummage through Trisha’s jewelry box, that fake had been the only thing remotely usable.
‘The rest weren’t even at the level that would catch Bill’s eye.’
Which was only natural.
While Edwin had been absent, the one managing the Mason ducal household’s assets had been the Marchioness of Devon.
With her ties to the Rosenthein family severed, Trisha would have had no way to secure funds on her own.
‘Still, I receive money every year from her brother, the Count of Rosenthein, under the pretense of investments—so I suppose this much satisfaction will have to do.’
As she reached that thought, the marchioness suddenly froze.
Wait.
‘Why didn’t I think of this before?’
A way to siphon off the Count of Rosenthein’s assets—legally.
After a brief moment of contemplation, the Marchioness of Devon completed a plan on the spot.
“What is it?” Bill asked.
“Oh, it’s nothing. I was just thinking about which jeweler I should introduce you to.”
She smoothly changed the subject.
“More importantly, I hear the Imperial Princess’s palace will soon be taking in new maids?”
Having decided Bill was sufficiently placated, she finally moved on to the real point.
In truth, this had been the reason she’d hurried to meet him—but the necklace affair had consumed far too much time.
“So you already knew?”
Bill cast her a sulky sideways glance, not forgetting to show his disappointment that this might have been the real reason she sought him out.
“If I prosper, won’t I be able to place more in your hands as well?”
“I don’t meet you for compensation, my lady.”
As if.
Of course, she didn’t say that aloud. For now, she needed to coax him and get what she wanted.
“I know. But I want to give you even more. And for that, I need your help.”
“Well, if that’s the case, it can’t be helped. Just tell me what I should do.”
“Thank you, Bill. I knew I could count on you.”
Leaning against Bill’s shoulder, the corners of the Marchioness of Devon’s lips slowly curved upward.
“Your Highness… just how far ahead did you see all this?”
Jane finally seemed to realize what it meant that the head maid had lost to the Grand Duchess.
“There isn’t a single maid who picks a fight with me anymore by telling me to clean alone. Everyone’s become noticeably more polite.”
“That’s only natural. If you look at the result, my aunt chose my side over the head maid’s.”
Covering her mouth with her teacup, Jane lowered her voice and asked,
“When you told me to place the crow’s nest near my room… did you calculate this far ahead?”
“It’s not as if I can calculate everything.”
No matter how well she knew the future, that would be impossible.
“But if you consider as many variables as possible and act accordingly, you can reduce the margin of error.”
Trisha knew nearly everything that had happened in this mansion in her previous life, and she understood the personalities of the head maid and the Marchioness of Devon like the back of her hand.
Taking that into account, she could deal with most situations.
“I see.”
Still speaking softly, Jane asked again,
“Then… having tea at a different time every day here—is that also part of the plan?”
Trisha answered only with a smile.
Reading the room, Jane closed her mouth and soon raised her voice, chattering about the beauty of the garden and trivial daily matters.
It was convenient—not having to explain everything in detail.
‘Edwin and Lizaina should be returning soon.’
By then, the head maid would be released as well.
‘There’s now a crack between the Marchioness of Devon and the head maid—even if it’s not irreversible.’
Cracks are hard to mend—especially if there’s no one to seal them.
And in her previous life, Lizaina had played that role exceptionally well.
Unfortunately, that wouldn’t be possible in this life.
Returning from the villa with Edwin, Lizaina felt a strange sense of dissonance hanging over the entire ducal household and found herself confused.
‘It feels like the hierarchy between the head maid and the Grand Duchess has subtly reversed.’
But she had no time to think deeply about it.
The head maid—demoted beneath Trisha after losing to her—seemed to vent her anger by tormenting Lizaina instead.
Half-isolated in the mansion for being from Solten, Lizaina had no way of knowing what had happened while she was away.
The Marchioness of Devon had also deliberately silenced the servants, considering the matter one of her own disgrace.
In the end, overwhelmed with frustration, Lizaina confided in Leona—the most loyal and trustworthy maid she had brought with her from Solten.
“I think the head maid hates me.”
With everyone else dismissed and only the two of them present, Lizaina spoke more casually than usual.
“She keeps nitpicking over the smallest things and bothering me.”
「Why do you think the head maid dislikes you, Princess?」
Leona couldn’t speak, so she wrote her thoughts on paper.
To avoid being overheard, she wrote in the Solten language, then tore up the paper afterward and burned it later.
“I don’t know. Is it because she looks down on me for being a princess from Solten?”
Lizaina sighed.
“If anything, I thought the Grand Duchess would be more friendly, since her maternal grandfather was from Solten and she grew up there as a child.”
「The maids were whispering about that as well.」
“Right. Honestly, I’ve even thought about using her instead. If she’s as timid as the rumors say, she’d be easy to use and discard.”
「Would that woman cooperate with you, Lady Liz?」
“That’s the problem. I don’t know if she’s foolish enough to be manipulated by the woman who slept with her husband.”
Leona agreed with that assessment, and after a brief pause, she moved her hand across the paper.
「If you can’t eliminate the cause of the head maid’s hatred, how about redirecting the hatred instead?」
“Redirecting the hatred?”
Lizaina murmured absentmindedly—and then something flashed through her mind.
Her lips twisted into a gentle smile.
“Yes, that’s it. There was that way. Leona, you really are a genius!”
As she exclaimed and pulled Leona into a hug, Lizaina’s smile stretched endlessly upward.
“The emerald bracelet is gone!”
Several days later, a commotion broke out in Lizaina’s room.
“It was a gift from Eddie!”
At her tearful cry, not only the servants but also the head maid, the Marchioness of Devon—and even Trisha—
Everyone except Edwin, who was briefly out, gathered in Lizaina’s room.
