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After swimming back to the hangar, Matthias changed his clothes and left the annex. The sky was darkening as the sunset descended from its zenith. But Leyla was still there, crying on top of the tree, oblivious of his arrival.
Matthias eased to his feet under the tree. The hose wasn’t long before Leyla turned her head and looked at him from the top.
She didn’t seem surprised, nor did she try to escape his gaze. She also exhibited no signs of fear or worry either.
‘why’
Matthias soon found the reason: she wasn’t exactly looking at him. Her dim eyes seemed to wander somewhere far away, probably toward the place where the doctor’s son had left.
By the time Matthias slanted his lips, Leyla’s eyes had returned to focus. Her green eyes soon filled with a sense of shame. Her shoulders sucked in, and her face became stiff. She was back to the Leyla Lewellin that he knew.
Matthias casually peered at her teary eyes with his arms folded. He had a leisurely evening and wasn’t bound by any schedule, so Matthias had plenty of time to wait for her to stop weeping.
He saw Leyla’s eyes flashed with contempt when he had no intention of leaving, but her scathing arrogance only made him giggle.
“You know, Leyla. That boy is not coming.”
Matthias took a step closer to the tree in which she was sitting.
“Kyle Etman. The boy you’re waiting for. Ah! Should I now call him the one who left you?”
His lips smiled up at her. His tone was gentle and calm, though the sting in his words hadn’t dimmed in the slightest.
Leyla teared up at hearing those words. The twilight sky above her revealed itself—devoid of the birds that had returned to their nests. Her vision of the gradually swelling landscape soon turned into steamy tears and flowed down her cheeks.
Leyla bit her lower lip, she kept silent until the darkness slowly snuffed out her surroundings. She patiently awaited his leave but the wicked Duke was still standing beneath the tree. So Leyla decided to climb down the back of the tree, which was unreachable from his sight. Her head was slightly dizzy from all the crying. It’s fortunate that she didn’t stumble and was able to step on the ground safely.
Leaning against the tree, Leyla wiped her tear-stained face with her apron. She spruced up her tangled hair and straightened her posture. Only after that, she looked back, and the duke was still blocking the path to the cottage.
After building up some nerve, Leyla approached him one step at a time. She couldn’t care less about her scruffy face as her untamed tears were still sticking on it. As she couldn’t keep her tears hidden, Leyla chose to show it off with confidence.
This time she was determined to never again be his plaything.
“I apologize for my disrespect. Goodbye then, Duke.”
Leyla bowed her back with the greatest politeness from a distance of two steps away. At this point, giving the nobility the courtesy they wanted, has become as easy to her as breathing.
“Leyla.”
Matthias called out her name the moment she was about to pass by him. Leyla flinched, but her stride went undisturbed.
“Leyla Lewellin.”
Matthias laughed and turned. But Leyla ignored him and continued ahead as if she were deaf.
His brows wrinkled into a scowl at her rudeness that had crossed the line. He was about to stop her when Leyla suddenly collapsed.
“Arghh..”
She sat slumped on the ground, unable to get up. Her tiny hunched shoulders and frail back trembled intermittently.
Matthias scoffed and slowly approached her. Leyla Lewellin, the upright girl whose eyes never lost their boldness despite her tears, was now wailing terribly after taking her nasty fall.
Matthias squatted in front of her, bending one knee and picked up her dropped glasses.
Still, Leyla didn’t raise her head.
The tears that had always entertained him this time no longer did. Matthias now learned what to name this feeling after seeing her crying over the boy named Kyle Etman.
Hate…
A feeling of emotion he never had.
“Don’t cry.”
Matthias grabbed her chin. Leyla tried to dodge but was unable to escape his grip.
“Let me go!”
“Don’t cry.”
Matthias overlooked her protests and repeated his demand. With just one hand, he was able to tame her fully.
Layla threw a flout at him.
“Shouldn’t you be happy to see me cry?”
The dewdrops in her eyes became thicker and hotter as she endured his grip’s humiliation.
“Since when did you take an interest in my pleasure?” Matthias sneered at her, who sniffled frantically in front of his nose. “Why? You don’t like me having fun?”
“No.”
Leyla shook her gripped face, stubbornly trying to contain her sobs.
“Whether or not the Duke likes it, it has nothing to do with me. My tears are not related to you.”
“What is that Leyla?” Matthias tilted his head. “It does have something to do with me.”
“….”
“So, don’t cry.”
Over again. Matthias’s gentle look held her a moment longer. Leyla was stunned, and she groused.
“Do I need your permission to cry?”
“Perhaps?”
“Why should I? You have no right to do so.”
“I have no right…?”
“You don’t own me just because you’re the owner of Arvis!”
“Really?”
After a quick frown, Matthias’ face soon lit up with excitement.
“Then….shall I have you now?”
Emotion fled his face when his smile disappeared. Leyla cowered at the sight of the face that reminded her of the water’s still, windless surface.
“So that I can be your owner.”
Matthias fondled her lips with the tip of his finger. Leyla shuddered with dread when his touch rekindled the memories of her odious last summer. Her burning heart, which had been aflutter in sorrow at losing Kyle, seemed to freeze suddenly.
“…N-no, I-I don’t want to.”
Leyla heaved her body with all her might. She was sick to her core at the sight of herself groveling at the his feet. Matthias then let her go, much like a child who had become bored with his toy and threw it away.
Matthias rose first and stood there watching her crawl to her feet under his shadow. Soil dust and tears marred her shape, but not her eyes—the flame had not yet burned out in her irises.
“Duke, I really don’t understand you…You already have a fiancée but you always do such inexplicable acts… I hate all of this.”
“So what?”
Matthias asked back, fiddling with her loose glasses.
“What does your heart have to do with me?”
His tone was devoid of hostility.
“I just want to have you.”
He wanted it; then he had it. His principle was that simple.
Matthias von Herhardt wanted Leyla Lewellin. He wanted her, and he would have her. He believed; something could be thrown away only after having that ‘something.’ And he had to leave her after he had her so that his life would be complete again.
Matthias gently put the glasses on Leyla’s dejected face.
“Go on.”
He released his hand, and Leyla lost her balance and fell back on the spot.
Matthias stood peering down on her for a while before he left the riverside to continue his stroll.
Leyla stayed there alone for a long time, even after he was no longer seen.
*.·:·.✧.·:·.*
“Leyla! Leyla! Come here and look at this!”
Bill Remmer greeted Leyla excitedly after she returned to the cabin.
Leyla approached Bill merrily as he sat on the porch. She knew she couldn’t deceive her uncle with such a sloppy laugh, but she didn’t want to show him her stupid weeping face.
“What’s going on, uncle?”
“A telegram arrived. It’s for you.”
“Telegram?”
Leyla was puzzled when Bill gave her the telegram. It was a letter of notice about job openings for teaching positions at a rural school not far from Arvis estate. Beginning from the next semester, she would be able to work at the school rather than commute to a neighboring city.
“It’s weird. They said that there were no more openings at Carlsbar…”
The good news left her confused. Bill raised his hands and softly patted her head.
“It’s so hard for me to send you far away, Leyla, but I’m glad this kind of luck came in.”
Looking at Bill’s relief-filled gaze, Leyla giggled as she nodded. She could come every weekend to visit her beloved uncle despite her work in a nearby city. However, her heart was uneasy whenever she left Uncle Bill at the cottage alone.
But…
Leyla was unable to savor her bliss once the Duke’s visage loomed in her thoughts. She was grateful she didn’t have to part from Uncle Bill. But on the other hand, she loathed living under the same roof as the Duke.
What a stupid thought.
“Leyla, what’s wrong?”
Bill seemed worried, and Leyla realized her face appeared glum.
“No. It’s nothing.”
A rim of brilliant moonlight shone over her smiling face.
“It’s like a fluke, so I’m a bit shocked.”
“Really?”
“Yes.”
She twinkled, and her smile lit up a little more.
“Uncle, aren’t you hungry? Let’s have a nice dinner.”
*.·:·.✧.·:·.*
The draping curtains in the bedroom, which partially obscured the open window, swelled up in the night air before repeatedly sinking.
Inside the room, the tinkling piano tune played the transition of a music piece. The tapping chords flowed mellifluously, creating an extremely delicate and flashy symphony yet, to some extent, sounding depressed.
Matthias reclined on a chair near the window, tin scissors and a handkerchief in his hands. when he clicked his finger, the canary swooped down and perched on his hand. He learned that canaries, like people, could improve their singing by being trained often.
His lips rose into a smile when the bird was humming in tune with the piano being played. The canary wiggled its little body covered in soft feathers and cocked its head as if in deep study.
Matthias gently wrapped the bird with the handkerchief he had brought after the singing had stopped.
Knowing that the bird would be frightened of the person who cut its wings, the zookeeper always covered the birds’ eyes before trimming their wings. After entrusting the job to the zookeeper for so long, Matthias could now easily trim it overgrown feathers.
The first few times he cut its wing too short, the bird bled. It wasn’t severely injured, but seeing its golden wings splattered with blood wasn’t a pleasant sight. Matthias disliked it, so he grew more circumspect.
Matthias skillfully spread out and clasped the branches of the bird that trusted him. He grabbed the scissors from his lap after deciding which feathers were to be clipped. Strand by strand, the feathers were strewn along the slashed area. The plumages fluttered in accord and fell on his perfectly polished shoes.
Matthias then rolled up the handkerchief that had been shielding the bird’s eyes after he had done cutting off the last wings. The canary flapped its wing several times before sitting on his finger.
The canary began to sing again as if nothing had happened.
It was a beautiful song.