The Ugly Wife of the Shady Duke

“The reporter probably found out the whereabouts of the lady and figured out a way to access the orphanage. Since there’s no way to manipulate people inside the orphanage, he must have thought of the director who is outside.”

“That person might have had the original key to the orphanage… It’s surprising that he hasn’t discarded it yet. But the money wasn’t stolen.”

“According to Cleta Dunn, she said she kept the money in the dresser drawer in her bedroom. That means she didn’t use to use that place before.”

The reason the money wasn’t stolen was that Cleta didn’t use the original safe or the office that the previous orphanage director used.

“In the case of the reporter, it’s highly likely that they approached the director, claiming that the orphanage caught the attention of a ‘high-profile individual’ and asked for help in making a large sum of money. This is something we can confirm once we catch the culprit.”

Since they had requested patrol from the security guards, the reporter wouldn’t appear near the orphanage for a while. If they had planned to revisit the interior within the next few days, they wouldn’t have left the workshop in such a messy state.

It was a blatant act of pretending to be a thief, indicating that they no longer intended to investigate the inside of the orphanage.

“Since we’ve called the security guards and reinforced security, they’ll lie low for a while, right?”

“Yes. reporters are quick to catch on to that kind of thing, so if we release the news now, they’ll just escape. Besides, we don’t even know what the reporter looks like.”

“Well, the child referred to the person as ‘Uncle’…”

Grace muttered quietly, lost in thought. Rubbing her temple and rolling her eyes downward, as she spoke.

“Should I go out alone at night?”

“No, you shouldn’t.”

Benjamin responded with a horrified and incredulous expression as if he had just heard something terrible and absurd.

“Absolutely not.”

He emphasized once again.

“But…”

“It hasn’t even been a month since My Lady collapsed, and you’re already thinking about doing something like this again. No, even if My Lady hadn’t collapsed, you shouldn’t be doing something like that.”

Benjamin spoke with a very firm tone, leaving no room for Grace to speak.

As Benjamin had never interrupted Grace’s words so firmly before, Grace found herself sweating and had to make an effort to explain her plan.

“If, if you listen to what I have to say, you’ll understand!”

“No matter what reason you give, I can’t accept putting My Lady in danger.”

“But it’s not me who will be in danger.”

Benjamin raised an eyebrow skeptically at Grace’s statement that it wouldn’t be her in danger.

“My Lady won’t be in danger?”

And in an instant, his expression softened, and he neatly folded his hands, ready to listen to Grace’s words.

Seeing Benjamin soften and become as gentle as a well-behaved puppy, Grace’s expression became bewildered.

“D-Do you trust me?”

“I’ll listen for now. You said it’s a plan that won’t put My Lady in danger, so I can’t outright reject it without even hearing it, can I?”

“Thank you…?”

“Of course, I’ll make a judgment after listening. I don’t want you to be in danger due to a misjudgment.”

Benjamin took a sip of the cold herbal tea placed in front of him.

⋆★⋆

At late night.

In that moment, the man holding the recording device in his arms felt a headache coming on as he muttered to himself.

“…Is this another one of her whims?”

Grace Felton.

Well, Duchess Felton was a peculiar being.

She seemed to lack presence, yet many people were secretly curious about her. With little public activity, she rarely appeared in the newspapers, but rumors whispered about her from ear to ear were never good.

‘Even if she were mentioned, it would only be in third-rate magazines that the nobility rarely encounters.’

And those magazines were bought by the maids of the noble families.

There was a way for the nobles to secretly read them while pretending not to be nobility.

Despite that, the various newspaper companies in the empire had no intention of openly covering Duchess Felton.

But one reporter, Tom Birkin, had a different mindset.

To be precise, his circumstances were different.

‘…I feel bad for her, but I need the money.’

Despite the swirling rumors, there was very little concrete information known about her. Not even her face. Tom had even investigated the territory operated by Viscount Linden, but there also he didn’t find too much information about her.

It seemed that her childhood had been slightly unfortunate, and that was about it.

So, as a freelance reporter, Tom had used the money he scraped together to purchase an expensive high-powered telescope and an even more expensive compact recording device.

After many days of watching the Duke’s entrance and exit from a distance, Tom Birkin realized something was amiss when he witnessed the arrival of an imperial carriage. [1]

Having analyzed the outward characteristics of those who came and went around the Duke’s residence, Tom had identified a sense of unease in ‘one’ of them.

[1] The time when Crown Prince came to meet Benjamin… It’s rare for a Royal to visit a Duke so, he might have thought there was a scoop waiting for him.