Thus Began Your Regret - Chapter 25

Edward, who had been talking with Jeffrey for a while, suddenly closed his eyes at the piercing red light.

When he opened his bleary eyes to look out the window, the sun was already setting outside.

“It’s already this late.”

As he muttered, Jeffrey, who had been writing down various ideas with his pen, said:

“Are you going to the telegraph office?”

At his words, Edward fell into thought for a moment.

If he was going to be late, he should send a telegram.

‘Should I stop here and go home, or should I keep working as usual and then go?’

The image of a dark living room and an empty chair flashed through his mind.

His wife no longer waited for him. The time when sending a telegram had meaning had already passed.

But still, he had promised his wife. That he would send a telegram if he was going to be late.

He hesitated, then decided to send a telegram.

Edward called another employee and relayed the message.

“Go and send a telegram to the Allen mansion. Tell them I’ll be home a little late today, so don’t wait up. Do that and then you can go home.”

“Yes, sir.”

The employee, excited about the early dismissal, went to gather his things.

Watching the employee’s retreating back, Edward turned his gaze back to the paper in front of him. He snapped at Jeffrey, who was looking back enviously:

“What are you doing? Hurry up and look at this.”

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Late at night, long after dusk had fallen.

A pair of dazzling headlights entered through the mansion’s main gate.

With a clunk, the garage door opened and Edward’s car slid in. Parking his car next to his wife’s space, he turned off the engine and got out of the driver’s seat.

Soon, Edward grabbed the doorknob to open the mansion’s front door.

But instead of opening the door, he stepped back. Then he started walking back the way he had come.

“The backyard, she said.”

He decided to go see what his wife’s vegetable garden looked like.

When he came home, he rarely even opened the front door, let alone took a walk. Because of that, the back of the house had been completely outside his awareness until now.

It was barely a few dozen steps from the garage. Once he started moving, it wasn’t far to the backyard at all.

When he arrived, there really was a small vegetable garden.

It was a tiny plot of land, maybe half an are at most. A cute little fence surrounded what might have been even less than that.

He approached right up to the fence and crouched down in front of the garden. Then he reached out and touched one of the clumsily driven stakes.

If she had cut and driven them in herself, the heights and shapes were all different. Meanwhile, the ends had been sanded smooth to prevent injury, which was just like his wife.

Seeing how the shapes became somewhat more uniform from the middle, it seemed that Paul must have stepped in to help with the rest of the work when he couldn’t stand watching anymore.

“Why do you have to get your hands dirty with things like this again? What if you get hurt?”

He let out a deep sigh.

It would be nice if she had hobbies like other ladies – dressing up nicely and going to the opera, hosting musical soirees. But forget about such refined cultural activities, what on earth was this?

He noticed the lumps of soil that had been recently turned over and were now sprouting up. His wife must have gotten her hands on it again, no doubt about it.

“…If you want to see crops growing so badly, you should hire a gardener.”

Then the gardener would do the work and get paid, and she could comfortably see what she wanted to see. Wouldn’t that be good for both of them?

But why she insisted on doing it this way, he really couldn’t understand.

‘This is how you scratch at my insides until you’re satisfied, isn’t it.’

It would have been better if she hadn’t learned, if she didn’t know how and thus didn’t do anything at all.

Traditionally, nobles were the kind of people who elegantly listened to music played by others, appreciated paintings painted by others, enjoyed food prepared by others and gardens tended by others.

They were a class far removed from the word ‘labor’, but his wife alone was different. No, she had become different.

Everything she had learned to do, she had learned after becoming entangled with him.

Including tending this vegetable garden, everything that made her the subject of gossip was something she had picked up by jumping into the frontlines of life herself, in order to give a chance of recovery to an insignificant man instead of prioritizing her own immediate well-being.

That fact made his chest ache terribly.

If he had his way, he wanted to make her stop this right away. He wanted to tell her he would hire a gardener for her, so please stop getting dirt on her hands.

But as always until now, he knew he wouldn’t really be able to do that. He didn’t have the confidence to persuade his wife, and the only way to separate her from such things without her understanding was to literally tie her hands and feet.

So all he could do was to continuously express his opinion that he wished she wouldn’t do it.

His wife probably wouldn’t listen to his request anyway, and he would end up clutching his festering heart again, but there was nothing he could do.

As he looked at the traces his wife had left all over the small garden, he added one more item to the to-do list recorded in a corner of his mind.

If there was anyone who ridiculed her for being a lady who tended a vegetable garden, he would find that person and somehow make them shut their mouth.

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5:00 AM.

Edward suddenly woke up from his sleep. His clothes were strangely damp and clinging to his body, as if he had broken out in a cold sweat while sleeping.

He got up from bed and drew back the curtains of the outer window. With the shorter days, it was still quite dark outside.

When he opened the window, a chilly breeze blew in. The cold air brushing against his body made the hair all over his body stand on end.

Edward took a deep breath and exhaled.

He had had some bad dreams today. He couldn’t remember the exact content, but he clearly remembered feeling unpleasant.

Feeling somehow anxious, he suddenly thought he should go see Louisa. He quickly finished getting ready and left the room.

His wife’s room was right at the end of the hallway next door, with the study in between.

Click. Edward carefully opened the door and entered.

Beyond the thin canopy, Louisa was sleeping with a slightly furrowed brow.

He bent down and smoothed out Louisa’s frown with his fingertips.

“What kind of dream are you having?”

Perhaps it tickled, as Louisa frowned and stirred. Then she woke up and called out to him in a very groggy voice.

“Ed…?”

As her long eyelashes parted, the blue eyes he loved were revealed.

“Sorry for waking you. Go back to sleep.”

“What are you doing here…?”

“What do you mean? This is my house.”

Edward said with a chuckle.

“Well, I’m going now. I’ll make some time on the weekend, so decide today what you want to do then.”

Louisa raised herself up in bed. She leaned against the cushions at the headboard and rubbed her still hazy eyes.

“You should rest on the weekend. I’m fine.”

“If you don’t decide, I’ll decide for you, and you’ll have to follow that schedule without complaint. So if you don’t like that, decide.”

It was an absurd demand. Louisa glared at him with sleepy eyes.

Of course, she didn’t feel intimidated at all. Finding it cute, Edward couldn’t help but laugh.

“I’m going now, so sleep more.”

He left a brief farewell and exited the room.

But Louisa, whose drowsiness had already faded, thought as she looked at the door her husband had closed behind him.

Normally, he wouldn’t have come to see her before going to work, or made time for her on the weekend.

Her husband’s behavior was definitely changing, little by little. It wasn’t just her imagination, since even the servants had noticed.

He would act like he hadn’t heard when she said such things, but now he was coming and stirring up her heart like this after she had finally steeled herself.

‘Telling me to decide what I want to do…’

Could this be an invitation for a date?

She felt resentful of her husband who was belatedly approaching her.

But at the same time, the strange emotion that kept welling up continued to make her lost in thought.

Perhaps she had misunderstood him and made the wrong judgment.

Maybe there was still a man who loved her somewhere, not just a businessman trying to atone through success.

What she wanted to do lately was clear. Just one thing – to properly know her husband.

There were several reasons. She was bothered by the stories her husband didn’t share with her, and she was also anxious that if she spent more time with him like this, even her carefully hardened heart might waver.

They were reasons with completely opposite directions. But she really was concerned about both of those things.

Even to herself, she was weak and contradictory, but well. How should she define this?

If she dared to define it, this was love-hate.

She loved him. Truly, deeply.

But she couldn’t love the wounds he inflicted as well. Her capacity was too small to love him while accepting the fear and resentment he caused.

That’s why she resented him. She wanted to distance herself from him.

People would probably call all of this love-hate.

But if the gap between them could be narrowed like this, one by one, if her husband could really look at her with the same eyes as her, even if it was one in a million…

If he could look in the same direction as her, even if belatedly, even now.

‘Then wouldn’t it be alright…?’

Then it seemed like this pain would subside as well.

If it could really be like that, then it would be good to stay by his side and change things one by one, slowly.

Louisa decided on a place for their weekend outing.

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Something happened today at the Allen Research Institute, which had been operating in a relaxed atmosphere.

Gilford, who usually complained that the distance was too far, came to the institute in person for some reason.

Of course, if it had just been him alone who came, it would have been something to overlook as usual. But this time, he wasn’t alone.

“What brings you here without any prior notice?”

Edward narrowed his eyes and scanned the people in front of him with a deeply furrowed brow.

“I heard news that the institute has newly developed something. I have the right to check for myself what it is. Isn’t that right, Allen?”

The name of the person who had so boldly barged into the research institute was Gerard Ernst, commonly known as Lord Ernst.

“Of course, Lord Ernst. But that doesn’t mean you can come without notice, and even bring your daughter with her fluttering skirts, does it?”

“I heard you were acquainted with Emily. Is that not the case?”

Gerard turned to look at Emily standing beside him. She clutched her father’s arm tightly and said:

“We are indeed acquainted. I wanted to talk again today, so I came along. After hearing from Lord Theodore, I thought I must meet and talk again.”

Despite her downcast eyes, her tone was slightly excited. She showed her characteristic lively smile and said:

“So please don’t be too angry and explain your amazing achievements to my father, Mr. Allen. You can talk to me after that.”