65 - Small Anomaly
Two weeks had passed since the female tutor named Kaya began coming to the residence.
She was supposed to come once every two days.
Simple math said she should have visited this residence seven times as a tutor, but for some reason, she took days off without any notice once every two visits.
She was truly a tutor I had no idea what I was supposed to learn from.
Watching her daughter Kaya's attitude made even the claim that her mother was a famous tutor summoned to the capital feel dubious.
...On days she wasn't scheduled, that woman would suddenly show up out of nowhere.
I'd known from the introduction stage that she was after Leonardo, but even so, her actual work record was atrocious.
I'd been reporting this to Leonardo indirectly, but Kaya put on an act in front of him, so her awfulness wasn't getting through.
...Actually, that woman barely showed her face at her student's place properly, but she seemed to frequently visit Leonardo at the fortress. While looking like she was on her way back from tutoring.
In terms of frequency, she showed up at the fortress once every two days.
Since it was the fortress gatekeeper who said so, it had to be true.
That Kaya conducted lessons in my personal room on the third floor.
The instruction was to acquire ladylike manners, so even though it was a lesson, the classroom was my daily living space.
It was a room I'd hardly used, but was my heart too narrow to not want Kaya to enter even such a place?
To be honest, I didn't want her to set foot anywhere on the third floor, let alone my personal room.
Leonardo's master bedroom was on the second floor due to the residence's layout, but the third floor was completely the family's living space.
Even Alf, Leonardo's friend, wouldn't casually enter this area, so Kaya coming in here somehow didn't sit well with me.
...Huh?
Just as I stepped into my room to soothe my weary heart with my jinbei, I felt something off and stopped in my tracks.
Something's strange? I looked around, but there was nothing particularly odd.
It was my room, the same as always.
No matter how I looked at it, the room was unchanged, but the sense of wrongness I felt the moment I entered just wouldn't fade.
...If I had to say, the area around the vanity felt off?
I'd never once used the vanity in this room.
Since I didn't use it, there was no need to organize or tidy it, but I knew Tabitha cleaned it every day.
I couldn't deny the possibility that the arrangement of small boxes and such had shifted slightly, but even so, today felt wrong.
...What is it? How strange.
I was thinking about that in the early afternoon, and I found Tabitha searching for something in the laundry room in the evening.
It was about time to start preparing dinner, so I thought it was odd that she wasn't in the kitchen, but she was in the laundry room, flipping through sheets and laundry one by one, searching for something.
"What's wrong? Are you looking for shomething?"
"My apologies. I can't seem to find one of Tina-sama's hair ornaments..."
Even as she spoke, Tabitha's hands didn't stop searching through the sea of laundry.
Tabitha described the design of the hair ornament she was looking for, but I couldn't quite picture it.
As for my hair ornaments, including the ones Leonardo had bought for me, I had quite a number that the Black Knights had gifted me.
The lace ribbon Aurelia had given me was carefully stored in the attic, but the rest were mostly left to Tabitha's care.
To be honest, I didn't even know what shapes were stored away.
"May I ask you just in case... have you perhaps put on a hair ornament by yourself, Tina-sama..."
"I can't put it on neatwy by mythelf, sho no."
Pathetically enough, with my current short hands and fingers, I couldn't tie my own hair neatly.
If I didn't care about appearance, I could manage a half-up or a simple ponytail, but if I walked the hallway with such a hairstyle, Bart or Tabitha would come from somewhere and fix my hair.
And once that happened, I couldn't escape the condition that I needed someone's help to arrange my hair.
In the end, unless I cut my hair short, I would have to rely on others for my hair until I grew a bit more.
"How strange. I'm certain I stored it in the vanity drawer..."
Tabitha paused mid-sentence, perhaps thinking the same thing I was.
Recently, one more person had started coming and going from the residence.
And around the same time, something that should be there suddenly disappeared.
...I have a bad feeling about this.
That's what I thought, but this was too delicate an issue to make a big fuss over.
It was possible the missing hair ornament was just a misunderstanding, and Tabitha had simply placed it somewhere else.
I should search a bit more carefully and see how things go.
...I can't really count on Leonardo when it comes to Kaya, so maybe I should talk to Alf about it?
I had many thoughts, but if the missing hair ornament turned out to be a misunderstanding, I'd feel bad.
Conveniently enough, Alf brought a message that Leonardo likely wouldn't be able to come home tonight, so I stopped him, offered him the dinner Leonardo was supposed to eat, and asked him about various things concerning Kaya.
I couldn't reach a good stopping point, so I tried to post at a natural break... and it ended up this short... orz
Will fix typos and errors another day.
Found some typos and errors, fixed them.