Chapter 92
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 92
“You thought I’d just roll over and follow your orders back then, didn’t you? Isn’t that right?”
Harriet’s gaze shifted to Trisha for a brief moment. The older woman showed no sign of surprise, looking as though she had known the truth all along.
“Why? Did you truly think I was blind to everything? If so, let me give you some sincere advice: you’d do well to change your way of thinking.”
Harriet rose from her seat and slowly closed the distance between her and John. Her escorts, wary of any sudden moves, tightened their formation around her.
She looked John straight in the eye, her voice steady and her articulation perfect. Not a single syllable wavered.
“I know far more than you think, Uncle.”
“That arrogance will be your undoing! It will drag you straight to hell. Just you wait!”
“No, you wait, Uncle. Because I’ve heard quite a few interesting things about the ‘accident’ at Albrecht Park eleven years ago.”
Harriet saw him flinch. It was unmistakable. His eyes darted wildly, his lips parted in a silent gasp, and a faint tremor seized his fingertips. The signs were all there.
He killed them. He killed my father and mother.
As her suspicions solidified into certainty, a cold flame of rage ignited in Harriet’s chest.
“Uncle. Do you really think I came back just to get my hands on some land in Perilas? Land I didn’t even know existed until recently?”
“You… surely you don’t…!” John’s eyes bulged. “If you dare try to ruin Bella’s engagement, I won’t let you get away with it!”
“Bella’s engagement? Haha! You’ve got it all wrong. I’m actually quite happy about that engagement.”
Harriet leaned in, her voice dropping to a chilling whisper.
“The higher you fly, the harder you fall, don’t you agree?”
She offered him a faint, razor-sharp smile.
John was forced to realize that the Harriet Listerwell he once knew was gone. It was a realization that came far too late.
“You’ll regret this. You will absolutely regret making an enemy of me.”
“Go ahead and try. I’ll be doing my best as well.”
John lunged to his feet. Without a word of farewell, he turned and left. No—he fled.
Watching his retreating back, Trisha shook her head in disdain.
“It’s strange. So many of the guests who visit my home seem to have forgotten how to say goodbye.”
Only then did Harriet allow her expression to soften. She looked back at those who had stood by her side. She was no longer alone. That simple fact gave her a confidence that bordered on fearlessness.
Trisha suddenly gestured for the servants to leave. Once only Roxana and Harriet remained in the drawing room, she spoke.
“Now, I believe it’s time I heard it. The truth about the scandals you claim you didn’t cause.”
“Grandmother…”
“John even set the stage for you to bring it up, didn’t he?”
Harriet offered a small, awkward smile before asking, “Can you… truly believe me?”
“After seeing how John behaved just now, I’ve reached the conclusion that I must believe you. So, tell me everything.”
Harriet took a deep breath. It wasn’t the first time she had revealed the truth behind her reputation, but it was the first time she was telling someone who actually possessed the power to threaten John and Bella.
It felt as though she was finally fastening the first button of her long-awaited revenge.
She sat opposite Trisha and began to speak, carefully refining the words that threatened to spill out of her all at once.
“…The true protagonist of every scandal I was involved in was Bella.”
Harriet’s recollection continued for a long time. She tried to recount the things Bella had done to her as objectively as possible, keeping her tone dry even when her heart wanted to scream. She wanted comfort, but she knew that blurring the facts with too much emotion would make her no better than Bella.
“…As those incidents piled up, everyone started pointing fingers. They called me a harlot. A scandal maker.”
By the time she finished, Trisha was trembling, her knuckles white as she gripped the armrests of her chair.
“Those heartless, blood-sucking wretches…!”
Roxana quickly brought Trisha a glass of cold water. Even after downing it in one gulp, Trisha’s hands continued to shake with suppressed rage.
“I have never heard of such malicious relatives in my entire life! Arthur was always so good to them!”
Because Trisha still held such fond memories of Arthur, Harriet refrained from mentioning her suspicion that John had murdered her parents. She feared the shock might cause the older woman to collapse.
Still, seeing someone get so genuinely angry on her behalf brought Harriet a sense of profound relief.
“Thank you for believing me. For a long time, I was… so lonely.”
As Harriet smiled bitterly, Trisha’s brow furrowed, her eyes shimmering as if she were holding back tears.
“You’ve suffered so much. You’ve endured well, child. From now on, I will protect you.”
Hearing those words—that someone would protect her—sent an overwhelming wave of emotion through Harriet. The knowledge that she now had family who believed in her and would watch over her ignited her fighting spirit.
I’ll take back everything that was stolen from me. Every single thing.
The veins stood out on the back of Harriet’s clenched white fist.
*
John rushed home in a frenzy and immediately summoned his entire family.
His relatives, whose peaceful evening had been interrupted, gathered in his study with disgruntled expressions. However, the moment they saw John’s ashen face, they realized something was terribly wrong.
“Father, what’s happened?” Bella asked.
John, who had been nervously biting his fingertips, raised his head. “That wench Harriet… she seems to know something about her parents’ deaths.”
“What? That’s impossible.” Bella scoffed.
It couldn't be. Even looking back now, the plan had been flawless.
Eleven years ago, Bella had realized that to truly take everything from Harriet, she first had to strip her of her status as the daughter of the house. Even as a child, her cunning had been second to none. She had been able to weave a perfect plan from mere fragments of information.
“Daddy. You want to be the Viscount, right?”
“Hahaha! Of course I do. I just wish I’d been born a little earlier. I’m sorry, my princess.”
“Even if you weren’t born before Grand-uncle, there’s a way for you to become the Viscount.”
“Hm? And what would that be?”
Bella had smiled innocently. “Grand-uncle just needs to die.”
At the time, John had dismissed it as the simple, dark logic of a child who didn't understand the weight of her words. He had hesitated, unsure how to respond, but his young daughter had continued calmly.
“I read in a book that some types of cheap, poor-quality glue slowly dissolve in cold water. They turn soft, like jelly.”
“What… would you use that for?”
“Well, for example, if there was a hole in the bottom of a boat, you could plug it with that glue, couldn’t you?”
“But then it would dissolve in the water and the plug would fall out, wouldn’t it?”
“Exactly.”
Bella had kept smiling, looking as though she didn't harbor a single shred of malice.
John had been stunned by a plan he couldn't believe originated from a twelve-year-old. Then, his mind had gone cold as the realization hit him: If the boat sinks, the evidence sinks with it.
It had been five years since Arthur inherited the title, and John was tired of living in his brother’s shadow.
“Alright. Let’s try it.”
He had purchased a large quantity of the glue Bella described and found a craftsman to ‘repair’ the boat. Then, at the annual boating event they attended every year, he had gifted that boat to Arthur and his wife.
“Brother! It’s a gift. While I was commissioning our boat, I had another one made for you.”
“Oh, John! You didn’t have to go to all this trouble!”
“This is nothing compared to everything you’ve done for me, truly.”
Arthur, delighted by the gesture, had boarded the boat with his wife.
John had been on tenterhooks, terrified the glue might soften too early. But just as his tests had shown, roughly twenty minutes after they left the dock, the disaster began.
“John! The boat is leaking! Help us!”
When Arthur’s cry rang out across the water, John and Miriam had exchanged a single look. Then, they pretended to hear nothing, staring fixedly at the shoreline.
“John! John! Don’t leave! At least save Lillian!”
John’s hands had trembled as he rowed away, but he had gritted his teeth. It had taken immense mental fortitude to turn a blind eye while his own flesh and blood drowned behind him.
But as a reward for his endurance, he had obtained the title of Viscount Listerwell. He remembered how happy Bella had been that day.
“Who could possibly know? The man who worked on the boat is dead, isn't he?” Bella asked.
“Yes, I took care of him myself. No one should know…” John swallowed hard. “Still, something feels wrong.”
Harriet’s eyes, staring straight through him, flashed vividly in his mind. Those eyes had looked like they were simply waiting for the perfect moment to strike—fully prepared to drag him down into the depths.