The Villainess Builds a Department Store - Chapter 76

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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The Villainess Establishes a Department Store

Chapter 76

When Father came over to us, Mother visibly showed her discomfort and turned her body completely away from her chair so she could get up at any moment.

“My love.”

I quickly took Antoine and headed toward the fountain. However, my ears and all my attention were focused on my parents.

“Honey. Eleonore. Ellie, please look at me just once. Please?”

Father called Mother in the gentlest voice I had ever heard from him and sat across from her. Then he placed something wrapped in cloth on the table.

“I’m listening, so please speak.”

Her voice was so cold that even I felt hurt, but Father showed no signs of being upset and instead smiled as he began untying the knots in the cloth.

“I was wrong. As a pledge that I will never do it again… I brought a token.”

“…A token?”

At the mention of a pledge token, Mother only moved her eyes to look down at the table. What was wrapped in red and blue cloth was a pair of bird carvings made from wood.

“In Gawri, geese are birds that symbolize marital harmony and conjugal love. Once they pair up, they devote themselves to their mate until death. So they often give wooden geese as wedding gifts… Oh, I wasn’t trying to give this explanation. Anyway, um. So…”

Father’s face had turned bright red as he rambled on for a while. My goodness, my goodness! Father knelt down in front of Mother and held out the pair of wooden birds as if he were offering a ring!

“Older Sister, what is Father doing to Mother?”

“I think Father is trying to confess his love to Mother.”

So be quiet, shh!

“Will you live as husband and wife once more with me, not the pathetic me of the past, but me reborn? I’ll do better. Eleonore, I cannot live without you. You are my breath, my water, my sunlight. Without you, I am nothing more than a broken flowerpot in the shadows. Please let me live. So that I can spend the remaining future by your side with the name of being your husband.”

…True to being a man from Loire, Father’s confession was extremely grand and lengthy. But when you stripped away all the flowery words that followed, what remained inside was surely Father’s sincerity.

Instead of answering immediately, Mother silently stared at the wooden bird and then reached out her hand. After spending a long time just touching the wooden bird on her lap, Mother finally reached out again and pulled the remaining one into her embrace.

And finally Mother’s head nodded up and down.

“…I will always be Charles’s wife, Madame Charmeuze.”

There won’t be a second time. Adding that, Mother bowed toward Father.

And…

“Mother and Father are kissing.”

“That’s right. It seems the two of them have made up too.”

“Then can I sleep with Mother and Father now?”

Well, maybe for naps, but it might be difficult for a while? I smiled ambiguously at Antoine’s question.

Leaving Mother and Father to spend their sweet time in the garden, I came inside with Antoine.

“What should we play?”

“Ball games!”

Hmm, our estate corridor is certainly long enough to make you breathless if you run from end to end, and wide enough for a carriage to run through.

The ceiling is so high that you’d have to kick with all your might to barely reach the chandelier.

Along the long corridor, expensive porcelain, plates, and vases that could serve as targets are placed at regular intervals…

As I turned my head with leisurely thoughts, I was startled when I made eye contact with maids who happened to be passing through the corridor.

They were staring wide-eyed with expressions wondering what they had just heard.

The maids who made eye contact with me turned pale and shook their heads frantically with expressions that said this absolutely must not happen.

No, it mustn’t, absolutely not. It would be terrible if glass broke and someone got hurt!

“Something other than ball games?”

“Heaven and hell game!”

When Antoine obediently gave up on ball games, the servants each let out sighs of relief.

Whether he knew or not that he had just made the hearts of this estate’s servants travel between heaven and hell, Antoine just smiled brightly and flapped his arms.

“Heaven and hell game?”

“Yeah! You can step on white floors, but black floors are hell. If you step on them, you die.”

Ah, I immediately understood and nodded.

In the eyes of imaginative children, white and black floor tiles looked like heaven and hell, piles of cushions like rocky islands in the sea, and bookshelves like castle walls.

“The first person to reach the end of the corridor wins!”

Antoine carefully chose to step only on white tiles as if the black tiles were really holes connected to hell.

My younger sibling’s expression was so serious that even the servants stepped only on white tiles, respecting his imaginary world.

How long has it been since I played so comfortably with my younger sibling like this? I gladly accepted my sibling’s challenge without thinking it was childish even once.

“Miss! Do your best! At this rate, the young master will arrive first.”

At the voice full of laughter, a smile spread across my face as well. Looking carefully, it wasn’t just the maid who spoke to me whose eyes were curved like rainbows.

Starting with Antoine’s giggling breathless laughter, the entire estate was laughing.

The space that had been gloomy as if covered with sleet until just recently was now filled with the harmony and warmth of a fairy tale.

Tap, tap. As I stepped only on white tiles, black round shoe tips came into my view.

“Oh?”

When I looked up, a familiar lady with neatly combed hair was looking down at me with an affectionate gaze.

Camille smiled and took out a newspaper from her bosom. Then she tapped the article on the first page with her slender finger.

There, the forgery incident that had stirred up Loire was printed as big as a door.

“Oh my, the illustration came out well. Doesn’t it look thinner than the real thing?”

“He’ll look like this soon anyway, so let’s say they drew it a little early.”

Looking at Guillaume’s face drawn in delicate pen and ink, Camille and I each added a comment.

Weighing the benefits I could gain and what I would have to bear by stepping forward in front of people, I once again gave all the credit to Guillaume instead of stepping forward myself.

Excessive attention and adoration would only be bothersome for a young girl. And anyway, it was obvious that my foundation of modern knowledge would all be revealed in just a little while.

“The front page of a newspaper is not quite an appropriate place for a modest lady’s name to be mentioned. Using Monsieur Hedebeau’s name was an excellent choice.”

At Camille’s praise, I smiled while pressing down my shoulders that kept trying to rise like sprouting buds.

“But… are you really okay?”

“About what?”

Camille glanced once at Antoine, who had already reached the end of the corridor, then moved her finger to point at a corner of the article.

“Ah…”

It was content stating that Uncle, one of the suspects, was currently missing and that the Royal Family would find Uncle and bring him to court no matter what.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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