Chapter 24

Nick’s eyes widened. Unknowingly, he looked at the customer with big eyes.

“Are you really the third prince?”

“No. But I’ve heard a lot of that. I should have looked a bit like that Third Prince.”

Nick stared blankly at him. 

The man was very confident in his appearance. 

Nick thought that if he was the Third Prince, then his confidence would have crossed the sky, and if not, he wasn’t really the Third Prince.

“Because we resemble each other so much, I had a lot of doubts here and there. But no, I’m not, and I can say it confidently. Oh, yes. Someone also said that the Third Prince and I are very different from each other.”

“…Ah.”

“What’s the matter?”

“Oh.”

After confidently answering his question, Nick took a deep breath and asked him.

“Are you, by any chance, close to my mother?”

“…Mother?”

He tilted his head.

It was an unexpected point. 

He continued to talk.

“Is the owner of that gallery your mother?”

“…Yes.”

“She said you were just a temporary employee.”

Nick felt briefly bitter that his mother had just introduced him as an employee, but then spoke up again.

“Yes, I am an employee and… her son. To be exact, she is my father’s new wife and a stepmother to me.”

“I see.” 

“Let me ask you again. Are you close with my mother?”

“..Well.”

“Yes?”

“I want to get to know your mother. At least I’m thinking of being friendly, and I don’t know what your mother thinks.”

“…Then I would like to ask you a favour.”

From a close look, the atmosphere emanating from him was unusual, Nick said timidly.

Irwin replied.

“Favour?”

“Yes.”

“What is it?” Irwin asked. 

Nick looked at him, and took a deep breath.

He trudged and sat down with his back against a tree, looking at the clear view of the swaying rice fields.

Irwin came and stood next to Nick. 

Nick spoke slowly.

“…I came to Lawrencia here because I wanted something from my mother.”

Nick’s story continued.

“My mother now… was a close friend of my biological mother. However, long ago, my mother died suddenly in an accident, and my stepmother remarried my father to take care of us when we were still young. And as soon as I came of age, she left the mansion.”

“…”

“My mother said it was natural for her to leave because my brother and I have already become adults. But I don’t want to let her go like this… So, I was trying to persuade her to go back with me.”

Surprisingly, the stranger was listening to Nick’s story quite seriously. 

He sat down next to Nick and continued.

“So, what exactly do you want to tell me?”

“If you’re really close to your mother, I thought you could convince her.”

“…Were you going to ask me to convince your mother…?

“Yes. There’s a limit to my persuasion. Since you are close to my mother, I think you can naturally talk about it and persuade her.”

Nick looked up at Irwin. 

The man began to look hopeful. Nick hastily grabbed the hem of his cloak.

“If you succeed in persuading, let’s make sure you don’t regret it. What do you think?”

Irwin didn’t answer, and he just looked at Nick with an unknown look under his hat. Then he opened his mouth.

“Are you done talking? I think it’s my turn to answer. Let’s talk slowly.”

“Please speak.”

“First of all, I refuse your offer. I have no intention of persuading your mother as you wish.”

“What?”

Nick opened his mouth in vain. 

It was a cold voice. 

Irwin continued.

“You don’t seem to know anything because you’re still a kid, but persuasion is not something you can borrow from others. Persuasion is when the person you want to persuade turns to the person you need to persuade by talking to them in line with their own logic.”

What…?

“And second, I don’t understand your logic of trying to convince your mother.”

“I don’t understand. Why does your stepmother have to take care of someone else’s family, who is not even her blood, for the rest of her life?

“…”

“She said until you are all grown up, and when the time is over, she will leave the house, right? So, how do you that would matter to her?”

“Before you beg your mother to return home, ask yourself first. There is no logic in what you say. You don’t have an answer as to why your mother has to go back, and you are just getting caught up in your emotions.”

“There is no logic. Although she is not my real mother, she is a true mother who took care of me until I was grown up. Why doesn’t it make sense for a son to tell his mother to come back to her house?”

“Do you think you’re like a son to your stepmother? You’re not even a child born from her womb. Had she really thought you were her son, she wouldn’t have left the mansion in the first place.”

Nick tried to counterattack, but it didn’t work at all in front of Irwin. 

Nick couldn’t answer and looked at him with eyes full of resentment. 

But as if it didn’t end there, Iriwn continued.

“Lastly, third. I personally don’t want that woman to be your mother again.”

“…Why?” asked Nick. 

Irwin smiled bitterly.

“To me, she is an artist with more talent than anyone else in the world.”

“…Artist?”

Nick, who thought it was a word that came out of nowhere, wrinkled his eyebrows. 

“How much do you know about your mother? Did you know that she’s talented in painting?”

“…My mother has a talent for painting?”

It was something Nick had never heard of or even imagined. 

Nick blinked his eyes. Irwin looked slowly behind him and pointed to the paintings that were visible through the glass door.

“All those pictures on the wall, all painted by your mother. You didn’t know that?”

At his words, Nick looked inside the glass door. The paintings were hung on the wall as if they were originally in the gallery.

‘…Did my mother draw all those pictures? It was something I hadn’t thought of at all.’

“These were all the things my mother drew? I didn’t know because you never painted in front of me.”

“It’s a natural talent, and it’s a skill that’s too good to be hung in a remote gallery here in the countryside.”

The gaze of a stranger looking at the paintings through the glass door was warmly coloured. He looked at Nick.

“Look, you don’t even know what your mother is good at and what she likes. And yet, do you really think you deserve her?”

Nick bit his lip at his words.

It was a word that kept hitting the bone.

“…I just have to work hard from now on, and I can do it. Somehow I will convince my mother.”

After speaking to him as if screaming with a red face, Nick turned around and walked to the gallery.

“Oh, my. I’m going crazy.”

Irwin, a stranger in the cloak, looked at Nick’s back as he moved away. Kicking his tongue and looking at Nick, he suddenly realized something.

“Oh, it’s ruined.”

‘I didn’t mean to, but I know too much about you.’

***

Irwin went home muttering, ‘It’s ruined, it’s ruined’ the whole time. 

After he met Count Allison, he needed some time to think. He didn’t visit the gallery because he wanted to have time to think alone without seeing her for a while. As Count Allison said, he needed to make sure that he wasn’t approaching out of his little interest. 

Oh, of course, it was also because he didn’t want to see Count Allison and her laughing ‘hahahaha’ together. So, this was all a matter of slight excitement. At her welcome greeting, his heart first trembled and made a fuss.

[Irwin! It’s been a long time. Why haven’t you been to the store? I’ve been waiting.]

The problem was that she showed excessive excitement because she was happy to welcome him, who had visited her store after a long time.

[Something happened. In the meantime, it seems that there has been a new employee.]

[He’s a temporary employee who helps with chores. Come here and have a cup of coffee with me.]

Irwin wondered who the new employee was at the store he visited after a long time. In fact, the employee had a familiar face as if he had seen it somewhere. At least he didn’t feel like an ordinary commoner.

Nobles recognize each other. The atmosphere was different from ordinary people because they lived a high-class life. The kid seemed to think the same about him. The curiosity that started made Irwin listen to the little boy’s story.

And in the process, he heard too much.

About her background. 

About her past.

The stories that the child, who appeared to have just become an adult, told him were full of clues about her identity. That Cassia was the new member of a family, and recently left the mansion…

In fact, surprisingly, Adolf was not so bright about the circumstances of the nobles. 

He didn’t enjoy playing with nobles since childhood. 

Such Adolf was also a topic of discussion in the social world, and also he had heard countless times through rumours. 

Seven years ago, the year he was just coming of age. He, too, knew the tragic story of the Whidrians that year and the new Duchess. 

Duchess Diana Whidrian, who ended her life at a young age in a sudden accident.

And her friend who had married Duke Whidrian after she died. 

Was it really a coincidence that things got so close?

“Then does that mean that the kid is the young master of the Whidrian family, and she is the Duchess who left the Duke’s family…?

“…No way.”

Irwin shook his head. 

A reasonable guess immediately came to mind, but no one knew if it was true.

In the first place, she may not be a nobleman, and family life with a stepmother was not uncommon in the Empire.

Above all, Irwin didn’t want to know more.

In particular, even if he didn’t want to hear about the woman’s past through someone else’s mouth, he really wanted to hear her past through her mouth someday. 

Irwin thought so and shook off the thoughts that were engulfing his mind.

***