Chapter 60
It had been ten days since Mother stormed into Madam Becker’s chambers and turned everything upside down.
The count would soon be returning, and yet Mother still hadn’t uncovered a single shred of proof of theft.
She had ransacked the entire estate in an attempt to find out who had written the anonymous letter, but clearly, it was all in vain.
How could she possibly track someone down by memory of handwriting alone?
The day she had read the letter aloud before everyone, I had seized a brief moment to swap it with a blank sheet identical in appearance.
For the next stage to proceed smoothly, no one other than Mother must have seen that letter.
Thanks to my pickpocketing skills, which were still sharp as ever, the switch had gone unnoticed.
Which meant handwriting analysis was impossible.
And I had already confirmed with my own eyes that none of Mother’s people had read it either.
Now, to move things along, I needed to meet Madam Becker once again.
The moment she heard my footsteps, she called out in her sharp, unpleasant voice.
“Where’s the blanket? And the meat pies—surely you brought fruit too?”
Some people never change.
Despite her fall in standing and how clear our roles of master and servant had become, Madam Becker immediately went back to treating me as a subordinate the moment I began bringing her things.
“And the champagne? I told you I wanted that too.”
I shrugged.
“Settle for orange juice.”
“You can’t even bring that? Truly useless—you never change.”
She knows perfectly well I can’t get into the wine cellar, and still she makes such requests.
After losing face to me in the recent incident, she was desperate to assert her superiority, desperate to remind herself she was above me.
She wanted to insult my pride, to drag me down.
I could have easily put her in her place, but I didn’t feel the need right now.
Clearly famished, she stuffed sandwiches into her mouth as she spoke.
“And what’s your lady up to?”
“Mother? She’s been pouring all her energy into preparations for the ball these past few days. Her attendants, however, are still scouring for evidence of your theft.”
Her eyes narrowed.
“You did the job properly, didn’t you? You’re always so useless—I won’t find out later that you made some stupid mistake, will I? If proof of theft suddenly surfaces, after you shackled me with this bracelet, I’ll—”
“Try not to talk with your mouth full.”
“That letter—you wrote it, didn’t you? What if you’re caught? If they compare handwriting or something and it’s traced back to you, then I’m done for!”
I said flatly, with just enough clarity for her to remember my words:
“Doubt it. It won’t matter even if they look. I already swapped the letter with a blank page. There’s nothing left to compare. And no one but Mother has read it, nor will they.”
I handed her the orange juice. She gulped it down noisily.
Not that I have any taste for indulging her hysteria.
Just yesterday, Malea had reported something curious to me:
“Right before Madam Becker was imprisoned, she mentioned her monthly cycle was unusually late this month. I asked if it was from stress, but she said she’d never once been late in her life. Then she just laughed and said she must be busy.”
The revenge period had been too short; I had thought even the lemon tea trick might not be enough to use against her.
But fortune had walked right into my hands. A little hysteria was nothing compared to this.
“If you need anything else, just tell me,” I said.
“Are you dense? What’s the point of saying all this? Go beg Sasha to release me already! There’s no evidence—so why am I still locked up here? That crazy woman!”
Her hatred for Mother seems to be deepening quite nicely.
“That’s true enough,” I replied smoothly.
“If there’s no proof, then I’m not a thief. That means they can’t throw me out, right?”
“They can’t brand you a thief without proof. But dismissal? That’s another matter. A lady of the house has full authority to dismiss her own maidservant. Not even her husband can interfere.”
Madam Becker’s eyes went wide.
“Even without proof, she can dismiss me?”
“In such a case, the contract tied to that bracelet would be nullified, so you needn’t worry. No one expects me to share my authority over personnel matters to that degree.”
“H-how could she…?”
Her reaction was like one who had lost the world.
“I hold so much authority here—how could Sasha dismiss me just like that? Do you know how hard I worked to rise to this position? And she can simply cut me off if she wishes?”
It wasn’t even worth answering—pure shamelessness.
It’s precisely because you’re an outsider who can be so easily dismissed that no mistress would ever bestow real authority or responsibility on you.
When the mistress of a household fails to manage properly, nobles traditionally pass authority down to old retainers: the butler, the housekeeper, or the head maid. That custom didn’t appear out of thin air.
It was a right granted only to those who had proven loyalty across generations. That was why tongues wagged when Mother granted such authority to Becker, a nobody, simply because she disliked Fernand.
And the count, instead of correcting it, had turned a blind eye because she was his mistress. A truly broken household.
“That’s just how it is,” I said. “The only reason Mother hasn’t already dismissed you is because she doesn’t want to lose face. She worries that outright dismissing you would only lead to more quarrels with my brother. Which means—if no evidence surfaces, she’ll likely fabricate it.”
“F-fabricate it?”
She looks so aggrieved—as if it wouldn’t be deserved at all.
“Mother has plenty of jewels. With just one secret servant willing to obey, it’s easy enough to make you look like a thief.”
“H-how could she—!”
“In that case, my hands are tied as well. I’d release the bracelet, of course. But the only one who could save you then would be Father—the true master of this house.”
I made sure to invoke the count deliberately, so the letter’s effect would carry smoothly into the next stage.
Even after that, Madam Becker hurled curses at me and Mother, venom dripping like poison.
I didn’t particularly mind. I only thought vaguely that it couldn’t be good for the baby to hear.
The Barcheha social season began in summer. And on the very first day, the Imperial Palace hosted a grand ball.
Countess Becker had never once received an invitation in her own name.
Always, she had attended only as the companion of an invited family member—whether the count, Fernand, or Odette.
Having quarreled with Fernand, she expected once again to be shut away when this year’s palace ball came, and had been despondent.
Who could have foreseen such luck? A fire at the laboratory, of all times!
With Fernand and the count now absent from the estate to handle the matter, the age of the countess had finally arrived.
That the laboratory had lost rare herbs worth millions in damages—such things did not concern her.
I received a dowry hundreds of times larger than this. I never had a chance to spend it properly—what a blessing this is.
The Emperor and Empress always attended the palace ball. To the countess, it was the perfect opportunity to make up for her failure to attend the Empress’s salon.
So she poured out money with desperate abandon to prepare for the night.
Now, with just three days to go, the estate’s lobby bustled with designers and tailors she had hired.
Finally, I can breathe. How could I go on living timidly in my own house?
Now that she could strut about like the true mistress, life suddenly seemed worth living again.
“My lady, how about this gown? It matches your tastes perfectly.”
“Paula, that looks just like the dress Madam Becker wore a few days ago. How could I demean myself by wearing something similar to a mere maid? Put away all the red dresses—I only think of that wretched woman when I see them, and it infuriates me.”
“Yes, my lady.”
“Malea! Pin my hair higher, and tighten this corset properly! Didn’t you see last year’s fashions? The skirts must be voluminous and dazzling to stand out.”
Unlike Fernand, who had been obsessed with dressing Odette up as his personal doll, the countess had no interest in her stepdaughter at all once the ball drew near.
All her money went to adorning herself, not a thought spared for Odette’s gown.
To her, Odette was nothing more than a ticket into the ballroom—no more, no less.
And that indifference was precisely what Odette had hoped for.
The less attention the countess paid her, the more time she could spend with Carl.
