32.
Freya stepped out a short distance from the jewelry district, craving the liberty of a walk.
The afternoon was balmy, brightened by a cloudless June sky. Carriages circled the plaza, their wheels rhythmic against the stones, while gentlemen and ladies wandered by with canes and parasols. Music drifted from an unseen source, weaving through the chatter.
The peace held until two men, walking a few paces behind, recognized her.
“The black lady has vanished, and now the lady in white—the Blanc—has appeared, has she?”
The man in the bowler hat sneered. His mustachioed companion stroked his whiskers and hummed in agreement.
“Now that you mention it, I haven’t seen much of the black lady lately.”
The first man, who had been raking Freya from head to toe with a lewd gaze, let out a bitter, sharp laugh.
“Hmph, didn’t you hear? That woman finally went away.”
“Where to?”
Instead of answering, the man tapped his temples with both index fingers and twirled them, raising an eyebrow.
“Ah. Well, even if she was the Emperor’s mistress, one shouldn’t have allowed someone in that state to roam the city.”
“Looking at how things are, it seems another woman will soon follow in her footsteps.”
The two men passed by Freya, cackling.
“Who is the ‘black lady,’ Ma’am?”
Milla, who had overheard the exchange, asked with a clouded expression.
‘La Femme noire’ of Bangtong Square. The ominous rumors about a woman who wore nothing but black from head to toe were a notorious ghost story in the district.
“The black lady despises her own ugliness. She covers herself in black and never leaves the house during the day, terrified that someone might see her. She only emerges in the dead of night. Clad in mourning, hiding in the shadows, she drifts through the streets humming the poems of Delavere.”
Come to think of it, I had forgotten. Another connection, tangled within the repeating time.
‘…Should I pay her a visit as well?’
Persuading her would be no easy task, but if I succeeded, she would be a more reliable ally than anyone else.
‘Besides, it seems I will be away from the capital this summer, anyway…’
Freya, lost in thought as she passed the jewelry store displays, came to a sudden halt.
“Ma’am, why are you stopping?”
As Milla turned, following Freya’s line of sight, Freya pulled her away with sudden urgency.
“It’s nothing. Let’s keep moving.”
Freya bit her lip, hurrying her pace. She hadn’t been mistaken. Her husband was inside the jewelry store. A faint, soft smile lingered on Max’s lips as he wrote something on a slip of paper handed to him by a clerk.
‘To come to a jewelry store himself—and with that expression on his face…’
Even after all this time, the suspicion sprouted in Freya’s heart like a deep-seated rot.
For whom? The question habitually summoned one specific face.
The woman who seemed to be her exact antithesis. The woman Max Russell had admitted, with his own lips, that he loved. Perhaps… the woman to whom her husband had given both his body and his heart for the first time.
“Ma’am?”
Her feet had frozen. Her gaze, once fixed on the sky, fell to the ground. Her eyes stung.
That couldn’t be. Not yet. The season when they were destined to meet hadn’t arrived. Even as her mind repeated the logic, her body felt anchored to the spot, paralyzed.
‘I have someone I love. I want to go to that person.’
If I had sent you to her back then… if I had, would I have never betrayed you? Would you have never resented me, and would I have never ended up losing you right before my eyes?
“Ma’am!”
I must have closed my eyes for a moment. Freya blinked at Milla’s shout. The sunlight was piercing; she squinted and turned her body away.
“Milla, I’ve changed my mind. I don’t need jewelry. Let’s stop by the bookstore before we head back.”
✦ ✦ ✦
The atmosphere in the president’s office had been stifling for days. Auguste lifted his gaze from his documents to cast a wary glance at the woman. As always, she sat on the office sofa, silently flipping through pages related to the railway business.
‘She used to chatter away so well. Did a cat steal her tongue? Why is she so quiet lately?’
It wasn’t that she seemed angry or moody. She had simply become strangely, unnervingly taciturn.
‘Is she doing this on purpose?’
Like a new tactic to garner attention? Though the person she would actually want to attract was buried in his documents, it only served to irritate Auguste’s own nerves.
“Madam Rus…”
“Ah, look at the time. I shall be heading back now.”
Auguste, unable to watch any longer, tried to intervene, but the lady stood up and began organizing her papers.
“Very well.”
Max nodded, his quill dancing across the parchment. The woman, looking more like a bourgeois lady than a high noble, tidied her skirt.
“Then, see you next week.”
Wearing a reed-woven bonnet with ribbons tied neatly, the woman offered her usual bright farewell and exited the office.
“Max, that woman has been a bit strange lately…”
Auguste, who had watched her until she vanished, turned toward Max. Those blue eyes, which had been fixed on the documents a moment ago, were now staring intently at the door.
It seemed his assumption that she wasn’t drawing any attention had been a mistake.
✦ ✦ ✦
She had resolved to do anything to save her husband. Yet, to be this shaken just from seeing Max buying jewelry for someone else.
She had thought she was mentally prepared, but her obsession for him was clearly rooted deeper than she’d imagined. Freya scoffed at herself and turned to the person who had abruptly entered her bedroom.
“Freya.”
Mathilde had always summoned her through the butler. Perhaps sensing that no longer worked, she appeared in person, her smile a brittle mask, bringing the butler in her wake.
“As you may know, I am holding a salon tomorrow.”
Freya had felt fine when Mathilde wasn’t in front of her, but the moment they faced one another, she found herself reflexively wary. Her pride bruised, Mathilde lifted the corners of her mouth awkwardly.
“Max said he would come… it would look better if the couple attended together. I know well enough that you dislike me, but it doesn’t cost you anything. Can’t you at least show your face to the guests?”
To the request, ambiguous as it was between a favor and a reproach, Freya nodded obediently.
“Yes, I will be there.”
“Good. You’ve thought it through. Then, I shall see you tomorrow.”
With the look of one who had expected nothing less, Mathilde left the bedroom with the butler, as if she could not bear to linger.
Left alone, Freya opened her bedside drawer and retrieved the slip of paper tucked inside. A list of dates, names, and locations was written there. Having scanned it, Freya looked up at the moon hanging outside her window.
They say the moon has a backside that no one can see.
“Mathilde, thanks to you, I’ll be able to reveal the backside of the moon at the perfect time. Thank you.”
✦ ✦ ✦
While cafes and cabarets were emerging as the new meccas for culture and art, salons remained the premier social conduits for noblewomen who had to remain cautious of scandal. For women of the bourgeoisie, such salons were the perfect stage to showcase their wealth and prestige.
Freya had expected today’s gathering to be held for the same reason.
Yet, as she surveyed the tables and chairs set up in the mansion’s garden, the other guests exchanged confused glances.
There was no parlor where famous works were hung.
There wasn’t a single renowned poet, novelist, or critic in attendance.
It was a gathering consisting entirely of women. Though called a “salon,” it was little more than a grandiose tea time for married women.
Furthermore, consider the guest list. These were women infamous in high society for spreading malicious rumors about Lady Blanc—along with the most notable figure among them.
“I still lack much to hold a proper salon. But today, as a member of the Russell family, I wanted to arrange a place to clear up any misunderstandings.”
Mathilde wore a gentle smile as she looked at a woman sitting to one side.
“Madam Rossignol, it might have been inconvenient, but thank you for accepting the invitation.”
“Inconvenient? Not at all. An invitation from Madam Russell is always welcome.”
The guests were all people hostile to the only daughter of the Blanc family, centered around Madam Rossignol—the very catalyst for last winter’s incident. And the host, orchestrating the room, was the noble lady’s mother-in-law.
‘Have the two of them finally fallen out?’
She had never heard rumors that the relationship between the Russell mother-in-law and daughter-in-law was poor, but… one lady, surveying the tense air, lifted her teacup to break the silence.
“What does it matter if it’s a salon or not? Besides, there ought to be some good news for the Russell family soon as well.”
“It’s been… five years since you were married, hasn’t it? Madam Russell must be very worried.”
Mathilde took a sip of tea, the corners of her mouth curling upward.
“Indeed. Freya is so proactive, I thought a child would come quickly. Even I found it unexpected.”
Oh my. The ladies, as if on cue, raised their hands to cover mouths curled into dark, knowing smiles.