Chapter 31

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Translator: Harry Potta
Chapter: 31
Chapter Title: London (2)
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Miss Pendleton rested her chin on her hand for a moment, lost in thought as she gazed down at the letter. After a short while, she rose from her seat and headed upstairs.

When Miss Pendleton opened her grandmother’s door, the dim room came into view. Her grandmother was lying in bed, stroking her cat, Annie, while a maid read a sonnet aloud. Lady Abigail, whose health had declined sharply of late, could no longer sit up properly and spent all her days lying down like this.

Miss Pendleton first dismissed the maid, then briefly explained the contents of the letter from her uncle.

“So, this Mr. Price is a friend of Gerald’s?”

“Yes.”

“And Gerald is coming to London with Charles? And they will be visiting this townhouse?”

Miss Pendleton nodded.

Her grandmother was silent for a moment. Miss Pendleton stood anxiously, her heart pounding with the fear that her grandmother might erupt in anger at any moment. However, Lady Abigail said something Miss Pendleton had never imagined.

“Prepare the finest guest room. And impress upon the servants that they are to attend to them with the utmost courtesy.”

Miss Pendleton’s eyes widened in surprise. The words that continued to flow from her grandmother’s lips were one astonishment after another.

“And first, we must host Mr. Price with the greatest care. Send an invitation for a formal dinner and tell Monsieur Germain to display his full skill. A friend of the head of the house deserves to be welcomed in this home.”

Lady Abigail noticed her granddaughter’s bewilderment. She held out a hand to Miss Pendleton, a gesture to come closer. Miss Pendleton went to her grandmother’s side and sat down, taking her hand. Her grandmother stroked her granddaughter’s hand.

“Do my words bewilder you?”

“...Yes.”

“And you must despise it, don’t you? That I would ask you to treat Gerald, who has tormented you so, with such great care.”

Miss Pendleton shook her head.

“I don’t despise it. He is the head of the House of Pendleton, after all.”

“Then does it not bother you at all?”

“It’s just… I’m a little nervous, Grandmother.”

“Laura, may I ask just one thing of you?”

“What is it?”

“Will you endure it for just a few days? For my sake.”

If she had to, she would do anything. She was not one to shy away from her duties, especially if it was something her grandmother wanted.

But Miss Pendleton could not answer easily. She could not fathom her grandmother’s intentions. To be honest, Miss Pendleton wasn’t even sure if her grandmother had made this decision in her right mind.

Lady Abigail understood the meaning of Miss Pendleton’s hesitation. She spoke softly.

“...I do not have much time left. Dr. Webster may prattle on about me living to be a hundred, but I am no fool. I will not see the end of this year. I am certain of it. Before then, I wish to reconcile with your uncle. With my only son… and I want to see my grandson, too.”

She was surprised, but she calmly asked back.

“Do you truly wish to reconcile with Uncle, Grandmother?”

“I do.”

Miss Pendleton was stunned. Her grandmother wanted to reconcile with her own son. She wanted to see her grandson’s face to her heart’s content.

Miss Pendleton gazed at her grandmother’s face for a moment. In the darkness, the wrinkles covering her face seemed endlessly deep and dark. When she had first seen her, her hair had only been sparsely gray; she had been a youthful and dignified lady, incomparable to her present state.

Yes, that much time had passed. Her grandmother was no longer the middle-aged woman who had first taken her in. Now, her grandmother was weak. She was ill. And… she was dying.

“What must I do?”

“Just carry on as you have been. The duties you have performed as the lady of the house. Not only for the Pendleton men, but for Miss Jane and Mr. Price as well. It seems those two are important people to Gerald.”

Miss Pendleton nodded her head.

“Yes. I understand. I will prepare everything without omission.”

Lady Abigail took Miss Pendleton’s hand.

“I am sorry to ask this of you, Laura.”

Miss Pendleton shook her head.

“Please don’t be sorry. You have every right to ask this of me, Grandmother. You became a mother to me when I was all but an orphan. I will show them how well you raised me. I will treat them with more courtesy than anyone.”

Miss Pendleton kissed her grandmother’s forehead, properly arranged her bedding, and left the room.

For the rest of that afternoon, Miss Pendleton spent her time planning for the reception of her uncle and cousin Charles.

The guest rooms to be given to them, the servants who would attend to their needs, the meals and carriages tailored to their tastes. She even planned to finally take care of the house repairs she had been putting off, so that nothing would displease their eyes.

The plans were put into action immediately. Soon, Miss Pendleton was dizzyingly busy.

With a major cleaning of the mansion, repairs to the stairs and roof, and arranging new furniture in the guest rooms, Miss Pendleton spent her days in a frantic rush.

Not a single plan could be executed properly without her attention and direction. Countless servants and workers sought her out, and she had to move without a moment’s rest to get everything done on time.

After toiling all day, she would return to her room utterly exhausted, wanting nothing more than to collapse into bed. But Miss Pendleton could not easily go to sleep.

After Anne had done her hair, she would be left alone. Dressed in her nightgown, she would pace before the window. Her chest felt tight, constricted by the presence of her uncle, who was drawing ever closer.

It was a contradiction. To spend all day bustling about to welcome her uncle, only to feel fear at his approach.

But Miss Pendleton felt no irony in it. She knew the truth that lay in her heart—a truth that was becoming clearer as her grandmother’s death drew near.

If she had to name the person she loved most in the world, it would be her grandmother, Lady Abigail Pendleton.

Another mother, who had raised her in place of the one who had died before she could even babble. A warrior who had fought against her own son for her sake. And a steadfast patron who had allowed her to live as a lady. Miss Pendleton truly loved the grandmother who had given her everything.

However, whether the life her grandmother had provided was a happy one was another matter entirely. There was a secret she would never tell anyone. A truth whispered only in the solitude of her own heart.

Miss Pendleton had been much happier before she began living the life her grandmother had given her.

In her memory was the life with her father. A life with a wandering artist. The vagrant path she had walked hand in hand with her father throughout her childhood.

Long train journeys spent playing cat’s cradle and listening to the harmonica while leaning against her father. The large and small galleries they frequented to sell his paintings. The mansions they visited to paint portraits for a living. Country roads. The worn cobblestones of the city. Strange people. Strange towns.

The countless roads she had walked alongside her father were still vivid in her mind’s eye.

Miss Pendleton had never resented her father for leaving her with the Pendletons. His life was one with too many constraints for raising a young daughter. For a girl to grow into a proper adult, she needed a home and a guiding hand. She knew her father’s choice to send her to the Pendletons had been for the best.

Nevertheless, she often wondered. What if her father had not left her with the Pendletons back then? She wouldn’t have been as educated or lived in such comfort, but might she have been a little happier?

Miss Pendleton often—no, honestly, whenever things were difficult—found herself lost in such thoughts. Imagining herself living a completely different life.

She would be reading quietly by her father’s side as he painted, sitting across from him in a train’s dining car drinking coffee, or freely making friends in town while he painted a portrait in a nobleman’s mansion. She would have walked as she pleased, wherever her feet took her, becoming a part of the scenery.

A life of freedom. What would that feel like?

Lost in such vacant thoughts, she would be pulled back to reality by the voice of a servant calling for her. When her senses returned, the first thing she always felt was guilt.

She felt sorry toward her grandmother. To give her this life, her grandmother had given up most of what she had. She had forsaken the bulk of her fortune, chosen to part ways with her own son, and abandoned the splendid life at the Pendleton estate.

And in a townhouse not even a quarter of its size, she lived looking only at her granddaughter, at her. Because she loved her so much. And yet, she herself…

Miss Pendleton tried harder to hide her true feelings. To be a better granddaughter, she went to balls as her grandmother wished, and hosted dinners, concerts, and tea parties for guests.

She tried to recreate the image of a lady her mother might have shown, had she not met her father. And she played that role exceedingly well. She became her grandmother’s pride and comfort.

And yet, the undeniable truth pricked at her constantly, like a thumbtack in her pocket.

She was not happy living the life of ‘Miss Pendleton.’ A life of being gossiped about in a society that did not accept her, of being treated as a half-measure, of always having to watch her every move, of having to maintain a smile even before those who despised her.

‘What would it feel like to live not as anything special, but simply as ‘Laura’?’

Miss Pendleton sometimes thought, and the thought gave rise to imagination. Imagination gave rise to a wish, and that soon became a dream.

And now, that dream was on the verge of coming true. Sadly, through the death of her most beloved grandmother.

When her grandmother passed away, she could never remain with the Pendletons. Her uncle would never take her in. Nor was that something Miss Pendleton herself desired. She had enjoyed things that were not hers to begin with, for far too long.

She would have to leave the Pendleton house with only a few of her clothes. To any observer, it would be a miserable downfall. The daughter of a noble family, cast out onto the streets without a penny to her name. But for her, it was the beginning of a life not as ‘Miss Pendleton,’ but as ‘Laura.’

Miss Pendleton had made many preparations for that day. She reviewed what she had learned to secure a livelihood and had even looked into employment agencies where she could ask for a position.

The current preparations to welcome her uncle Gerald were part of her preparations for a new life. No matter how unhappy she had been, she knew the debt she owed her grandmother.

She wanted to help the grandmother who had loved her like a mother to pass on with a peaceful heart. To let her depart in peace, reconciled with her son and surrounded by the faces of those she loved. Only then, it seemed, could she herself shake off even the last vestiges of guilt and begin her new life.

As she rushed through her work all day, in her heart she prepared for her separation from the House of Pendleton. Calmly and composedly.