Obituary 2

Chapter 2

***

If only she could smoke a cigarette, it would be so much easier to endure.

The smoking ban that began with a marriage she never wanted had now lasted a month.

The woman who had been Rose Davis and was now Rose Crawford sighed as she climbed the embassy stairs. The embassy party had been going on for a full three hours.

"How can we raise a toast without Orthuran, the star of the show! Hurry and fetch him. He's probably in the gallery room."

Pressured by the Prime Minister's wife to bring her husband back to the main hall, Rose reluctantly moved.

The embassy's gallery room boasted a peculiar layout: its door was only at one end of an L-shaped corridor, with just a curtain draped where the corner turned.

As was customary during parties, the door stood wide open.

Her husband sat alone on a velvet sofa in the corner. Lost in thought, he didn't seem to notice her crossing the threshold.

Rose approached him slowly, her expression reluctant, when suddenly she stopped at the sound of noise coming from somewhere.

"A Bolton? Crawford has finally lost his mind. I just don't understand why."

Someone's loud condemnation followed by a mocking laugh.

The sound came from beyond the curtain, from the side where the exhibition paintings hung.

"How much did Elliot Davis donate to the Conservative Party, anyway?"

"Oh, come on, surely not for that. The party isn't short on funds. I bet it's true he fell for her face. I was shocked when I first saw her too."

"With a face like that, why did she stay unmarried until that age?"

"Elliot Davis probably weighed too many suitors to sell his daughter for the highest price and missed his chance."

"Ugh, is being a Bolton the bigger problem, or being Elliot Davis's daughter?"

"Isn't it the worst choice because it's both? Even if all sorts of foreigners are crawling into Orthuran, a Bolton?!"

Judging by the voices, there seemed to be about three people. Were they unaware someone was in the adjacent space, or were they speaking like that knowing full well?

After a moment’s thought, Rose guessed it was most likely the former.

Orthuranians, at least in public, wouldn’t speak so blatantly.

Of course, it wasn’t the first time she’d heard such criticism.

Newspapers were making a huge fuss over the news that Orthuran's most beloved young politician was marrying a vulgar Bolton woman, as if it were some kind of tragedy.

Patriotic newspapers subtly expressed concern that this foreign nouveau riche, who was raking in Orthuran's money, might use the political connections gained through this marriage deal to inflict even greater harm on the country.

"I wonder if Crawford knows that vulgar merchant is poking his nose into all sorts of urban development projects now that he's got a minister for a son-in-law. What a disgrace."

"Our disgrace? It's Crawford's disgrace."

"But isn't that Orthuran's disgrace too? The papers will be up in arms again soon enough."

Her father, whom she hadn't seen once since the wedding, seemed to live to fan the flames of that worry.

Listening quietly to the barrage of insults, Rose briefly clasped her trembling hands.

Ever since arriving in this country, an unjust guilt had dogged her. Even though this marriage was clearly not her fault.

Rose glanced at her husband, who was now the subject of gossip because of their marriage, and gasped in shock.

He, Ray Crawford, was simply smiling.

"Frankly, Count Crawford has always been too arrogant, relying solely on his popularity. I believe God placed a stumbling block in his path to teach him humility."

"Don't mistake that attitude for mere popularity. He is Crawford, after all. Crawford."

"He is His Majesty's own son, isn't he? Such an attitude is only natural."

A faint smile was clearly playing across his elegant, handsome face as he listened to the relentless barrage of criticism. Even from the side, it was unmistakable.

Each time Ray Crawford slowly tapped his shoe, the red wine in the glass held in his hand rippled ever so slightly.

What on earth was he thinking? While listening to such talk.

Laughter erupted once more from behind the curtain, and simultaneously, Ray Crawford's head turned slowly. Toward Rose.

He didn't seem surprised to see Rose enter the room. Only the subtle smile vanished from his face.

Even seeing Ray standing there, still holding his glass, staring at her with a cool, expressionless face, Rose found it hard to speak.

It felt like speaking would be heard by those beyond the curtain, and she wasn't sure what to say to someone who was listening to such accusations.

One thing was certain: the man who smiled even when hearing accusations against himself became completely expressionless when looking at her.

Why had Ray Crawford married her?

When he found her so unbearable.

That was precisely what Rose found herself increasingly curious about. She didn't know what her father had received in exchange for the marriage, but it might not have been enough to make him welcome her presence.

After a moment passed, Ray set his glass down on the side table and rose quietly from the sofa.

The sequence of actions—adjusting his clothes, walking toward her—was simply neat.

He seemed to make no particular effort to stifle sound, yet he passed her without making any noise.

Rose followed her husband like a stranger, saying nothing.

Ray, who had been walking at a pace just fast enough for Rose to keep up, stopped at the stairs and extended his arm.

This man, who clearly detested her intensely, was impeccable in his manners.

When Rose quietly placed her hand on his arm, he whispered.

"Smile."

Then he began slowly descending the stairs.

Rose barely managed to lift the corners of her mouth, which now felt like they might spasm.

Having to smile at an unspecified crowd of people she barely knew was more grueling than she'd imagined.

In Bolton, where she lived, no one smiled unless there was a reason to.

The people of Bolton used to say:

A person smiling for no reason is either a clergyman or a madman, one or the other.

By the time Ray reached the bottom of the stairs, a natural smile had returned to his face.

"Don't say anything useless."

He whispered again, pulling her forward.

The Orthuran people gathered in the hall greeted them with bright smiles.

* * *

Weary from conversations with strangers, Rose absentmindedly tapped her fingers on the table, following the faint piano melody of a nocturne that drifted through the noise.

The party had now stretched past four hours, and the headache from the over a dozen hairpins her maid Joan had pinned in her hair was intense.

A cold hand briefly rested on her unconsciously moving fingers, as if to say stop, then withdrew.

She looked up to find Ray, her husband, watching her. The formal smile on his lips was as measured as if drawn with a ruler, looking like a warning.

That was usually the meaning behind the smile he occasionally gave her. A warning or disdain, something like that.

Rose stopped fidgeting her fingers pointlessly and instead took the wine glass Ray handed her, sipping once.

Her throat was parched.

As difficult as quitting smoking was the task of correcting all her habits—even the petty ones she hadn't even known she had.

They were so trivial that sometimes it felt less like correcting habits and more like chipping away at her very being, piece by piece.

In any case, it was clear that everything that made up Rose was subject to 'correction'.

"But honestly, judging by Mrs. Crawford's appearance, she doesn't really seem like a Bolton person."

A woman who was supposedly the mayor's wife remarked, as if intrigued.

How many times had she heard this remark already?

Since arriving in Orthuran, she'd heard it over a hundred times. These people seemed to believe Boltons must have three eyes or two noses.

"Ah, right. I believe Mother mentioned she wasn't from Bolton but from the Antaka nobility, correct? I recall Lady Crawford mentioning it."

Her mother-in-law, Agatha Crawford, had spent the entire month packaging Rose this way—erasing her father as much as possible and mentioning her dead mother.

Though Orthuran and neighboring Antaka had fought over land and power for over a thousand years, the Orthurans might dislike them, but they didn't ignore them.

That dislike wasn't a serious emotion like hatred; it was closer to the playful rivalry one feels when facing an opponent of equal stature, one whose level was acknowledged.

Even this gathering was a private party hosted by Antaka's ambassador to Orthuran, yet many Orthuran nobles attended willingly.

The only ones the Orthurans looked down upon were the lowly Boltons, caught between them.

Even when at war with Antaka, they resented Bolton more than their actual enemy, Antaka, for not siding with them.

Agatha Crawford never approved of her daughter-in-law being a product of Antaka and Bolton bloodlines, yet she seemed to judge that having Antaka blood mixed in was preferable. She always emphasized that point first.