Chapter 196. I Have… Something to Tell You
Crash!
The hand turning the page froze at the loud noise echoing in the middle of the night.
Another sound immediately followed.
Due to the unusual atmosphere, Jade eventually got up from his seat and walked to the window.
It was when he looked down at the entrance where the noise came from for a long time.
Finally, the outline of something emerged through the dark night.
A carriage.
It was only natural to wonder who could possibly be a guest arriving at this late hour without any prior notice.
Just as Jade’s brow narrowed slowly, a knock resounded.
Jade’s eyes immediately shifted toward the opposite side, and at his command to enter, the door opened right away.
The person who came through the open door was the butler, Kyle.
“What is that noise?”
Jade’s question deepened as he noticed the fluster on the face of the butler, who was always calm.
Omitting any greeting, Kyle opened his mouth in response to Jade’s question.
“I think… you need to go out and see.”
“…….”
Not only were his words blunt without any context, but his somewhat anxious appearance amplified the sense of unease.
Just who is the visitor… Just as he was about to ask, Kyle opened his mouth first with perfect timing.
However, the words that came out of his mouth were utterly unbelievable.
Words that Jade had never once thought of in his entire life.
“……The Duke of Cheister is currently here on the first floor.”
“…….”
An uninvited guest who visited the mansion in the middle of the night.
The moment he finally learned the identity of that uninvited guest, Jade’s heart began to pound wildly.
***
He hurriedly climbed onto the carriage he had taken, but he was instantly at a loss as to where to search first.
A lonely woman with no family to visit and no friends.
His chest throbbed for a moment, but now was not the time to be soaked in such idle sentiment.
After a brief struggle, Raymond gave the coachman his destination.
‘Jade Wilkins’ house.’
The only person connected to that teacher named Helena, whom the woman considered like her family, was that bastard Jade Wilkins.
Since she was also there when she left Elfengreen last time, he thought she must have definitely gone there this time as well.
No, he desperately hoped she would be there.
Having dashed down the dark night road like that, he finally arrived at Jade Wilkins’ house.
Crash! Crash!
After pounding on it as if to break it, someone opened the door and came out, and Raymond strode straight into the mansion.
Late at night, barging into someone else’s house like this was a rude act that should not be done, but he had no room to care about such things.
After lightly overpowering someone who tried to stop him, Raymond strode toward the room where Deborah had previously stayed.
The man, who was standing with a dazed face wondering what on earth this situation was, had a surprised expression as if realizing something along the way, and soon vanished into nowhere.
And not long after, Jade Wilkins appeared before him.
“What on earth… is the meaning of this?”
Raymond quickly stepped up in front of Jade, who asked with a stiffened face.
“Tell me where that woman is.”
At the action of grabbing him by the collar with one hand and threatening him, the body of the butler standing behind him shuddered.
However, it was not such a thing that caught Jade’s attention.
Those words that came out of his mouth.
Jade’s brow immediately crumpled roughly.
“What do you mean… right now… don’t tell me you are talking about Deborah?”
At Jade’s words, who retorted in turn, Raymond’s fiercely swaying gaze paused for a moment.
“Deborah, what happened to Deborah?”
“…….”
Seeing those same blue eyes swarming as if shaken in an instant, Raymond realized.
That in this place—the woman he was looking for was not here.
No, the fact that she had never even come.
For a moment, he felt like his feet were sinking into the dark abyss of a cliff.
Feeling the strength drain from the hand clutching the shirt, Jade’s expression grew stiffer and stiffer.
“Could it be… did Deborah leave again? Is that so?”
“…….”
What returned this time was silence as expected.
However, as if Jade had guessed the entire situation from that alone, a sharp, bitter laugh burst from his mouth in an instant.
“Ha, is this what you wanted? Dragging away a person who refused, like a dog against her will, and making her… escape again like this, is this what you wanted!”
As he poured out each and every word, the anger that had been layered inside him also seemed to explode all at once.
At Jade’s action of rushing over and grabbing him by the collar in an instant, the butler and Robin, who had been watching with anxious faces all along, quickly rushed to the side of the two men.
They say it is terrifying when a gentle person gets angry once, and even though the two used all their strength to pull him away, Jade’s anger did not cool down for a while, to the point where it was not enough.
Until he left the mansion again a short while later.
Raymond simply endured Jade’s actions silently.
Keeping his mouth tightly shut, unable to say a single word.
***
“Then, you mean he hasn’t eaten anything all this time?”
At the sharply ringing voice, the expressions of Charlotte and Greig sank low.
It was already the tenth day since Deborah disappeared, leaving the baby behind.
The atmosphere of Elfengreen was truly like thin ice.
Whether he actually slept or not, except for briefly closing his eyes once in a while, the Duke wandered outside during all his awake hours.
There was only one reason.
To find the traces of the missing woman.
The problem was that in the meantime, he was not swallowing anything down his throat.
No matter how earnestly Charlotte or Greig pleaded, he was unyielding.
Except for barely swallowing a glass of milk reluctantly, they had not seen him eat anything for ten full days.
Although it remains to be seen what would happen immediately to a sturdy man, that too was a day or two; if such time continued to persist, a time when something would surely go wrong was bound to come.
So everyone was burning with anxiety.
Among them, the person whose heart was burning the most was the Dowager Duchess, Eleanor von Cheiste.
How grieved would a mother’s heart be, watching her son wandering outside like a madman without putting anything in his mouth for ten days?
However, even she had no immediate choice.
She had already gone in front of him several times to try to stop and persuade him, but what returned was only those words that he would definitely find her and bring her back.
Even so, she thought he would at least take care of his meals after a few days passed, but instead, it only grew worse as time went on.
Indeed, even if she said it, it was useless, so there was no way he would listen when the two people in front of her urged him.
Even so, it was something that could not be left alone as it was.
Eleanor, who thought so, suddenly stood up from her seat and looked back at Greig.
“Where is the Duke now?”
“……He is in the study.”
As soon as those quietly uttered words ended, Eleanor quickly took a step forward in front of him.
“Let us go.”
***
“…….”
Looking intently at the markings carved on the map spread out on the desk, Raymond’s brow narrowed increasingly fiercely.
Centering around Elfengreen, he had thoroughly searched the nearby inns, the servant registration offices, and all other places where a woman might work, but nowhere was a trace of Deborah to be found.
Just in case, he also sent people to the Rosewick Farm where Chambrin was, but what returned was also the message that she had not come there either.
Ten days, ten days had already passed.
Where on earth could a woman who left empty-handed without a single penny have gone?
As the time where not even a single hair was visible continued to increase day by day, his mind became even more anxious and uneasy.
Could something ominous have happened to the woman……?
However, whenever that happened, Raymond shook his head violently again.
As if trying to sever his expanding thoughts.
Just imagining such an ominous thought choked his breath, and he was engulfed in the feeling of being sucked into an endless abyss under his feet.
‘It can’t be…… She’s just, somewhere safe…… doing well.’
Continually repeating such words like a prayer to himself.
Fervently hoping that today, even a small thing would be fine, there would be a clue to find the woman……
Raymond’s gaze turned toward the map again.
Just as he was picking out a few places to look back over, wondering if there was any place he had missed among the places he had searched so far—
Knock, knock.
“…….”
At the sound of the knock breaking the silence, Raymond’s golden eyebrows twitched for a moment.
He thought it was Charlotte or Greig.
Because whenever he returned briefly, they followed him around as if some grand event had occurred, making all sorts of entreaties.
Since it was bothersome, and assuming they would come in on their own, he turned his gaze back to the map with effort to ignore it.
However……
Knock, knock.
The knock that sounded again.
It was then.
When an odd feeling struck him.
At the knock that sounded even more carefully than before, an inexplicable, strange feeling arose.
Only then did Raymond stand up from his seat.
The moment he stood up, he felt a slight flickering before his eyes, but that too was only for a moment.
Raymond strode across the study and pulled the door wide open.
“…….”
At the unexpected figure standing in front of his eyes, Raymond’s face momentarily turned into a puzzled expression.
A familiar face.
The reason he remembered that face, which was merely one among hundreds, was distinct.
Deborah.
The counterpart whom Deborah had stayed close to as her only companion here at Elfengreen.
It was none other than that maid who was her roommate.
“I, have…… something to tell you. Your Grace.”
Looking at the maid who carefully brought out her words with a stiffened face, he felt such a feeling for a moment.
The thought that inside the words this maid was trying to say, there was a hidden story that he did not know.
Tension began to gather tightly in Raymond’s jaw.
