After that, he started cleaning the small garden by himself even though no one asked him to do so.
The head maid returned to the kitchen after asking him about various things. She seemed to have given up halfway due to his stinginess with answers.
"Hmm."
Standing inside the kitchen, the maid looked at Rue through the window with worried eyes.
Meanwhile, Rue was communicating closely with someone we didn't know where he had brought him from. But considering the words they were using—garden trees, fountains, carps, etc.—it seemed they were planning a major reconstruction project.
What the hell did it mean when a gardener who was hired to take care of the garden hired a professional to plow it?
"I'm jealous."
He was suspicious, but also handsome, very rich, and a homeowner. On the other hand, I previously dedicated myself to world peace, currently live as a maid, and barely had enough to fill my mouth.
"I mean, he didn't kick the assassin out of his house."
Was Rue the client who requested surveillance on Viscount Weatherwoods? It was necessary to check.
I pointed at Rue on behalf of the helpless maid who had many restrictions on what she could and couldn't do as an authority figure.
"Fire him."
The maid looked at me. "Who? Mr. Rue?"
"He's suspicious."
"Isn't that just like you?"
Me...? But it wasn't comparable to that.
"Of course, Mr. Rue is definitely not a normal person. I don't think I've seen anyone as singular as him in this job in years. Except for you."
"So fire him."
"You don't have to rush, Miss Daisy. If there is a dangerous man in the mansion, Viscount Weatherwoods will kick him out. Don't worry too much."
How could a Viscount who didn't exist get rid of that man? The head maid was too complacent.
I wanted to say: "At dawn, an assassin entered the house, but I beat him up and locked him in the house across the street. But today I saw that same assassin next to Rue. The two must be in cahoots and sent to spy on Viscount Weatherwoods!" But I kept quiet.
If I said it, it would make me look suspicious. In fact, I didn't care how I looked in the eyes of others. However, if the opponent was the head maid of the Weatherwoods mansion, my position was different.
You have to be a family as strange as the Weatherwoods to accept me.
If they kicked me out of a house like this, I would have nowhere to go. Money was a very dangerous thing. I couldn't even reveal the existence of something that threatened the owner's life.
"Besides, wouldn't it be a waste to fire a gardener who says he will directly reconstruct the garden for half price? That amount of money is scarce even for the Weatherwoods. Let's wait and see for a while."
The maid was a true slave to capitalism.
Money was a very dangerous thing. Enough to leave a man in the house who could be a scoundrel.
"Well then, shall we get to work?"
Today's schedule was to clean the second-floor windows. For your information, it was the type of cleaning I liked least. It was the second most difficult after cleaning the ceiling.
As an obedient maid of this era and loyal to her master, I didn't forget to keep an eye on the gardener while I cleaned the windows. What would I do if I lost my precious and only job?
The gardener was picking dead weeds in the garden. Even the sight of him picking weeds was very suspicious, so I watched him even more.
Originally, in this situation, you should start a fight with the person over something trivial, have a physical confrontation, and induce them to reveal their true feelings.
Like I did with the assassin at dawn.
However, with Rue, I rarely had the opportunity to do this. Surprisingly, Rue didn't even show the slightest gap.
It's beyond ridiculous. Are you handsome, rich, a homeowner, and even perfect? What is the purpose?
It was then, while he was clearing the weeds he had been pulling all this time, that Rue suddenly looked up.
"Do you have something to say?"
It was a normal voice, but Rue's voice could be heard so clearly it was as if he were speaking directly into my eardrums.
In a white shirt and a light yellow vest, he was working hard at gardening... it suited him. But then, what didn't suit a beautiful man?
I couldn't have a physical fight with him, so I guess it was better to pretend nothing happened.
I asked him while resting my chin on the window. "Who are you?"
"If what you're asking is my name, I must have said before that it's 'Rue' as well, Miss Maid."
Miss Maid. I felt annoyed even though he was just teasing me.
"Not your name."
Rue's eyes narrowed. He had an expression on his face that was supposed to look happy, but he didn't look very happy.
"Do you mean you want to know more about me? I don't think we're in that relationship yet."
"Stop acting like a scoundrel and answer me. Who are you? Why are you here?"
It had been so long since I spoke so much that I was out of breath.
"Because I'm your fan."
What?
He smiled as he looked at my face with his head tilted. "Last night you caught a pervert and tied him to my house. It was quite impressive of you to lock a stranger in a place you had never been before. I would like to grant you the 'Brave Citizen of Midwinterre' award..."
"Are you saying that's why you came to this mansion?"
Again. It was so ridiculous that I spoke for a long time without realizing it. My shoulders shook at my unfamiliar voice; Rue shrugged with a wicked smile.
No way.
Don't want to open your mouth? Fine, I have no choice but to open it myself.
I jumped into the garden through an open window. "You."
As I walked toward Rue, he shouted into the mansion while looking calmly with his arms crossed. "Head maid! Miss Maid keeps playing and flirting with me. Is that okay? Does Weatherwoods not protect the human rights of its employees?"
There was only one reaction I could show to the vulgarity of his tongue. Walking the same path, entering the kitchen through the mansion's back door. My teeth ground against each other.
"Suspicious and even mean."
Why would you report me to the maid?
I worked hard to clean the windows until my feet went numb. I broke a window by pushing too hard, but the maid didn't scold me much. Although this month's salary was partly cut.
Thanks to that, I felt very depressed at dinner. However, as usual, only the maid and I sat at the table.
"What about the chef and gardener?"
"He says he'll eat dinner separately. I guess our mansion has dinner after the official routine. In the future we'll have a separate table for dinner."
I couldn't believe there was nothing to see after sunset. I liked that thing.
I stuffed the bland vegetable stew down my throat with ease.
The next morning.
After briefly finishing the morning routine, I ran into Rue in the hallway to the kitchen. Just like yesterday, he greeted me with a clean appearance, unlike a gardener (which, to be exact, wouldn't be strange if I were the mansion owner).
"Good morning, Miss Maid."
I ignored him and went to the kitchen. I heard a small laugh behind my back. Rue was searching here and there in the kitchen and uttered only one word.
"Have the daily groceries not arrived today yet?"
The answer was replaced by the maid who had come down first and sipped her tea.
"We don't order ingredients; we go to the market and buy them ourselves, Mr. Rue, and today's groceries are over there."
Rue looked at the potatoes, carrots, and onions that were scattered in a wooden box under the table and let out a brief exclamation.
"Oh, I thought they were food scraps."
For the first time since he was hired yesterday, it seemed he was going through hardships. I felt a sense of similarity for the first time in Rue like that. Yes, this family was a decent poor family, with a good reputation. You came to a dog's dinner.
"We can't help it. Let's conclude today's lunch with this. But at least I'm glad the butter, pepper, salt, herbs, and milk seem good enough. Head maid, Miss Maid."
He smiled and pointed at the box. "Cut them."
I cut the ingredients without complaining.
There was something I had realized while living like a beggar for the last month: it was good to follow the words of the person who fed you. At least at the moment they were feeding you.
I peeled potatoes and looked at Rue. While he fiddled with the cupboard, he pulled out a square pan I had never seen before and then pulled out the condiment storage box that I also had never seen before.
Was there always something like that in this kitchen?
After cleaning the dusty container, he cut the butter from the paper and melted it slowly over the fire. After spreading butter in the pan, he skillfully took the kitchen knife and sliced them thinly.
He stacked the potatoes beautifully inside the pan, seasoned them with pepper and salt, and covered them with milk.
While I admired his incredible cooking skills...
"Miss Maid," Rue called me, breaking the dried herbs into small pieces. "Do you see that mouse on the fence beyond the window?"
So suddenly? I looked away from him and turned toward the window. As Rue said, there was a little gray mouse running on the window sill.
"That mouse peels potatoes better than you. Your potato-peeling speed is so slow it's explosive."
"Hmm."
The opponent was a cook. At least now he wasn't a gardener, but a cook. He was the only way to escape the head maid's hellish kitchen. Let's not get angry.
I peeled the potatoes faster. Rue waited silently while I finished peeling the remaining potatoes, repeating the same cooking process twice more in different pans. Now all that was left was to wait for them to bake in the oven.
And finally.
"Eat it."
The moment I tasted the potato gratin that smelled so good, my tongue was going crazy. I had no choice but to adjust to the strong "taste" that penetrated my mind.
"How is it so delicious?"
It was true. Incredibly, Rue was an expert cook. He was fully aware of how to use good and bad ingredients. The potatoes that seemed to be dying were reborn in his hands into a perfect potato gratin dish.
The taste was wonderful and couldn't be compared to the skills shown by the head maid in the same kitchen.
"You eat well."
Rue, who was looking at me, left those words and went out to the garden. Are you not hungry? I even emptied Rue's portion of potato gratin.
A pleasant life and satisfying meals went hand in hand. They were inseparable. The maid, wiping her mouth, murmured her admiration with a voice that sounded half-possessed.
"I haven't had such a satisfying breakfast in years; Mr. Rue's cooking skills are incredible. I feel bad for hiring you for half the usual salary."
When I saw the maid's eyes fall in love with the potato gratin, the sense of crisis that had diminished rose again.
No, at this rate, the maid will fall for that swindler's deception!
Perhaps because the other person was my opponent, even this delicious dish felt like a great masterpiece intended to throw me off my game.
You're a cunning little thing.
It wasn't in my nature to work in the same house as someone who worried me. I hate it even more when you're casting suspicion with your whole body. That showed confidence.
There were two assumptions about Rue's identity that I had in mind.
One: he's here to spy on Viscount Weatherwoods, just like the assassin.
Second: he knows about my past and has followed me here.
What are the chances it's the latter?