3 bar menu

The Headless Lady Comes at 3 A.M. – Part 04

---

Translator: Kell

---

The letter was written in slightly broken English. At home, his second brother was a laid-back guy who did nothing but invent random things, but outside, he was a level-headed man working for the government. Apparently, he wrote the letter in English to improve his skills. The letter contained an innocuous update on the present state of things, such as the well-being of his family, how one of the trees in the garden had died, and that this winter had been quite cold.

At the end of the letter was a shoddy ink drawing of what looked like a rose, with an image of a woman below it.

Next to the image were small letters: Don’t tell anyone.

Kazuya stared at Victorique’s small face. He thought that Victorique must have been overwhelmed by the incomprehensible picture and message. But then she chuckled.

Kazuya jumped in surprise. Victorique, sharp-tongued and never smiling, suddenly beamed. She looked incredibly cute that Kazuya’s heart started pounding in his chest.

“Wh-What’s wrong?” he asked.

“Hmm? Your brother just made me laugh a little.”

“Was there anything funny in the letter?”

Kazuya studied the letter. He read it over and over, then shook his head, completely clueless.

“What do you mean? The picture made you laugh? I have no idea what he’s telling me. What is he referring to with this ‘don’t tell anyone’ part?”

Victorique pursed her glossy, cherry lips and moved them close to Kazuya’s ear. Her cool breath brushed his face, and he blushed a little.

“Your brother has a secret girlfriend!” she whispered in her husky voice.

“What?! A girlfriend?!” Kazuya screamed.

“That’s right. And the only one he shared the news with is his youngest brother who’s studying abroad.”

“My brother has a girlfriend?! No way! All he does is tinker with stuff all day! He eats a lot, though.”

Kazuya grabbed the letter and read it over and over again, moving it closer to his face and then away again. But there was no mention of a girlfriend.

Kazuya gave up and lifted his gaze from the letter, waiting patiently for Victorique to explain.

A wind blew through the skylight, rustling the palm leaves.

Victorique had forgotten all about Kazuya and resumed playing in the dirt to her heart’s content. After a while, she washed her small hands in the bucket, and looked up.

“Handkerchief,” she said.

“Okay, but you better explain it to me.”

“Explain?” Victorique looked at Kazuya curiously. She wiped her tiny hands with the handkerchief. “Explain what?”

“My brother’s secret girlfriend!”

“Oh… You still don’t get it? You are so dumb. You must lead a tough life.”

“Oh, get off my case! Explain it, quick.”

Victorique sighed wearily. Reluctantly she began to explain what was written on the letter.

“Listen close.”

“I’m listening.”

“First, the letter is written in English. And there is an image of a woman under a rose. In English, ‘under a rose’ means a secret.”

“I see…”

“Your brother has a secret woman. And you must not tell anyone about it. He must be embarrassed. Do you get it now?”

Kazuya nodded in admiration. “I hundred-percent got it. I’m surprised you noticed, though.”

“Wha—?”

Kazuya meant it as a compliment, but Victorique frowned as though he had just insulted her.

“K-Kujou,” she growled. “Who do you think I am? There is nothing I don’t know. This does not even count as a mystery.”

“Hmm…?” Kazuya observed her as her rosy cheeks turned bright red. “That reminds me, my brother has always been into riddles. He’s so shy around women that he fainted when my sister hugged him. He’s incredibly smart, though. He was so brilliant in college, he surprised even his math professor. And his hobby is inventing things. Oh, yeah. His job aside, he said he was the best riddle solver in the world.” He laughed.

“What did you say?”

Kazuya jumped. His casual remark caused Victorique’s lovely eyebrow to rise even higher.

“V-Victorique? What’s wrong?”

“Your brother dares to claim he’s the best in the world?”

“Wh-Why are you emphasizing me?”

Victorique’s fists were shaking. Suddenly she let out a weird-sounding yelp. She rolled out of the conservatory, her frilly petticoat and puffy bloomers stirring past the gaping Kazuya.

“Uhm, where are you going?”

The red shape wrapped in a chiffon dress rolled back to Kazuya. She was holding a writing paper, a quill pen, and an inkwell.

“Oh, you’re back.”

Kazuya studied her, wondering what she was up to. Face red, Victorique unfolded the paper and suddenly started drawing a picture of a white horse.

“You’re drawing?”

“…”

“Man, I really don’t get you. Are you drawing a horse? Haha. You suck. Ow! Why did you pinch me?! It’s bruising!”

“This is not a drawing. It’s a challenge to your stupid brother.”

“He’s not stupid. He’s… Wait, a challenge?” Kazuya blinked.

Then he took a closer look at the picture Victorique had drawn.

It was a picture of a white horse on a mountain summit. Kazuya recognized it. A huge white horse drawn in ancient times on a mountain in Berkshire, England, quite famous as a tourist attraction.

“And what’s this one?”

Victorique was drawing a different picture. Kazuya studied it.

It was a funny-looking picture of a donkey. It looked awful.

“What’s up with this drawing? Hmm? What are you drawing this time?”

“Shut up. Don’t interrupt me.”

“H-How am I interrupting?!”

Ignoring Kazuya’s whining, Victorique focused on writing a message in English under the drawing.

Kazuya read it aloud. “Let’s see here… ‘Rearrange this awful drawing of a donkey and transform it into this beautiful colt. Do it in five minutes. That’s an order. From Victorique.’ Is this a riddle? Fine by me, I doubt he knows who Victorique is. Why are you glaring at me? Tsk. Fine.”

Kazuya gave in. He took the letter from Victorique and added his own message for his brother in the corner.

He was fine, that there was nothing new. That his brother’s secret was safe with him. And that he made friends with a little girl who was very smart. She wanted his brother to solve a riddle, so he included that in the reply.

Victorique nodded in satisfaction. Kazuya sighed inwardly. She’s so childish. And competitive too.

Victorique looked completely composed, sitting in a small but graceful pose, like a noblewoman. Slowly, she lifted a white ceramic pipe, lit it, brought it close to her tiny lips, and took a puff.

“So about the portrait of Countess Ashenden,” she said all of a sudden.

“You remembered!” Inspector Blois cried, poking his drill-shaped hair toward them.

A much-brighter sunlight was streaming through the skylight, shining on the verdant foliage in the conservatory. A spring breeze rustled the trees and flowers.

A wisp of white smoke rose from the ceramic pipe in Victorique’s mouth.

Kazuya was standing next to Inspector Blois, waiting with bated breath for Victorique’s next words.

“Kujou, do you understand Latin?”

“Nope.”

Inspector Blois scowled and waved his drill from side to side.

“There’s this Latin word ‘pentimento’. The literal translation is ‘to repent’. Of course, Latin is no longer used in everyday conversation. Only a few places still use the word in its original meaning. But words are sometimes given other meanings, allowing them to survive longer. Even if the rose disappears from the earth for some reason, the expression ‘under the rose’ will live on. As a descendant of the rose. It’s the same thing.”

“Y-You kinda lost me there.”

“The Latin word ‘pentimento’ lives on today as an art term, derived from when a painter regrets something. Sometimes a painter will paint over a work they consider a failure. Or when they want to hide the original painting.”

Victorique removed the pipe from her mouth and turned around, slowly and languidly.

Kazuya marveled at her pale green eyes, tinged with a deep ennui that he had never seen before. Her face was devoid of expression. It was as if she was a different person from the one earlier, childish and red with anger. Her green eyes, reminiscent of glass beads, were motionless, like those of a taxidermied rare creature that had gone extinct. They had the power to make people shudder. For some reason, Kazuya could not take his eyes off her; he felt like he was being stared down by a gigantic ferocious beast.

“Sometimes the painting painted over a previous work fades and vanishes over the years, and the original painting suddenly reappears. This phenomenon is called ‘pentimento’.”

Astonished, Kazuya and Inspector Blois exchanged glances.

“Wait, so what does that mean?”

“No one replaced the painting on the wall of the Forbidden Reading Room. Someone painted an awful portrait on top of the famous painting ‘South Atlantic’ to hide it. The paint has simply vanished and the original masterpiece reemerged.”

“Someone? Who?”

Victorique gave Kazuya a peeved look. She sniffed audibly, then continued in her usual, unbearable arrogance.

“Ciaran, who else? It was Ciaran who stole both the ‘South Atlantic’ and Countess Ashenden’s necklace, the Poison Flower. When he hid the masterpiece in the academy, he came up with the idea of painting over it, using the owner of the necklace, which he also hid here, as inspiration. That is the secret of the painting in the reading room, which no one knew when it got there.”

---

---