While Meia was still admiring the tree, she heard the sound of wheels and hooves. It sounded as if a large carriage was arriving.

Meia walked away from the tree, through two tables again, up a small flight of stairs to one of the windows.

As expected, a carriage was just stopping in front of the house. It was pompously painted in red and silver.

The doors opened. Several people got out one after the other.

Because the balcony of the lower floor was in the way, Meia could hardly see anything and only saw their hair. To get higher, she therefore propped her arms on the window sill. Only with the tips of her toes did she remain on the ground. In this way she recognised four people. It was probably a couple with their son. Mrs Monet was also there. With that hair, she was unmistakable. She greeted the couple with kisses on the cheeks. Even now she was still wearing her bathrobe. But it seemed that she had at least tied it. The mood of the people was good. They were chatting in a boisterous manner. Mrs Monet even laughed once and teasingly pushed the man away from her with her hand. At the same moment, his wife also pushed him, but for different reasons. It seemed he had made a joke about whether he could not exchange his wife for Mrs Monet or something like that. Meia had not quite grasped everything. In any case, Mrs Monet was seemingly in high spirits. So the maid had certainly lied.

While the adults talked, the son stood waiting. His shoulders sagged and his gaze went somewhere towards the house. Meia knew this posture out of personal experience. During a first pause in the conversation, Mrs Monet probably noticed that the boy was not necessarily happy about his presence in the group. But instead of finally going into the house, as he surely wanted, she bent down to him and pinched his cheek to wind him up. As low as she bent down, perhaps it did not matter that the bathrobe was closed. After the brief humiliation, they continued their conversation standing. Meanwhile, the boy contorted his face in annoyance and rubbed his cheek. Unfortunately, Meia also knew this procedure from her own experience. It was only when the carriage drove off that the group took it as an opportunity to go inside. They disappeared under the balcony.

The view of the fountain became clear. There was also krystafei in its basin. Some of the tiles were made of it. The streams of water were already glowing faintly. Now that Meia saw the statue again, she noticed that the female figure looked very much like Mrs Monet in some ways. The hair was almost as long and as wavy. It was seemingly a depiction of herself. It seems that modesty was not one of her virtues.

Meia also noticed the meadows again. From this higher position, it was even more impressive. It was completely over the top, but in a good way.

Just as Meia was lowering herself back down, she heard someone come into the room.

"Miss Arvis, I brought you a drink," said a voice from the doorway.

It was the maid. No, actually it was not. It was just the butler again. Only now he had a frilly apron on and his gloves were gone.

"Yes, I'm coming."

What else could Meia say? A thank you was not allowed, after all.

Meia went to meet the butler and they both arrived at one of the tables.

"I'm sorry, it was forgotten to ask them what kind of drink you would like. What I have with me is orange juice from Blenas." He held out a silver tray with a full carafe and a glass. "Would that be within the scope of your request?"

"Yes, absolutely. You can just leave the decanter here."

Unlike the maid, Meia found it surprisingly easy to be rude to the butler. He had more of an air about him like the housemaid.

"As you wish."

The butler placed the things on the table. With a dull clink, the spout of the decanter settled at the top of the rim from the glass and orange displaced the emptiness. Meanwhile, the butler did not look at Meia. He was paying close attention to what he was doing and kept his head close to the action. ~Maybe he needs glasses? The maid had done it the other way around. When she served outside, she had never once looked at her hands. Unfortunately, her gaze had been almost constantly on Meia. Which manner of behavior was the right one now? Judging from the rest of her demeanor, certainly that of the maid. So the butler was doing it incorrectly.

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As a butler, why did he not know how to pour a glass? It was suspicious. A butler was always suspicious anyway. It could be that Meia was biased, based on the books she was reading, but if so, it was certainly only minimal. 'In the end it was always the butler,' was a saying from one of her books, but only in half of all cases was the butler the real culprit. In most other cases it was the gardener, or the victim's wife, or that one time all of them together.

While Meia was thinking, the butler had filled the glass and put the decanter on the table.

"Miss Arvis, if you need anything else, please ring the bell. I'm right in the room below this one."

Meia nodded and while she watched how the butler took the tray and was about to leave, she wondered where the maid had gone? Was she not going to come back herself? Did she have something else to do? ... Normally one would suspect something like that, but not Meia. With the help of her deductive skills, she could immediately conclude that the butler had gotten rid of the maids by now. He had overpowered the figety one in the kitchen with the breakblade knife. Afterwards he had taken her apron, got rid of the bloody gloves and put on a wig, which he had previously decorated with grass. This way he could surprise the taller one in the hallway. He knew she would not notice the difference because she had two glass eyes. He had already done something similar with the real butler. He probably was not even really a coachman. His plan almost worked, but he had made a mistake. He had not had time to dispose of the knife yet. Consequently, he still had it with him. ... Meia remembered that there was something she really wanted to know.

"Erm, hold on," she stopped the butler.

"What can I do for you?"

"Can you tell me about Luca Monet?"

"Luca Monet?" The butler seemed surprised and slowly came back to the table. "What exactly do you want to know?"

~What exactly do I want to know?~ She wanted to know why the maid had been acting so strangely.

Suddenly she had a brilliant idea. It was probably the smartest idea of her life. In the future, it would be hard to top.

"So Mr. Monet asked me earlier if I'd like to go in the pool with him."

"Yes?" the butler asked, irritated.

"I just thought it was strange that he kept the pool, after the accident..."

"What accident do you mean? Mr. Luca Monet's? That was a hunting accident."

Meia tilted her head to one side. "A hunting accident?" she asked, strongly emphasized.

Essentially, she was terrible at acting, but playing dumb was the easiest thing to do.

"Yeah, that's right."

"I thought it was a swimming accident because the pool doesn't have a ladder. What could possibly go wrong during a hunt?"

The butler looked even more confused than he had before.

"The pool has a slope. You can just walk out."

"A-Ah, Yeah..." ~A slope? A slope in the ground?~ "I-I knew that. B-But it still doesn't have a ladder."

Meia knew herself how that last sentence seemed, but it had slipped out.

"Y-yeah, that's true, but I can assure you that it would be almost impossible for a person without health problems to drown in the pool."

Meia pondered. Her lack of pool knowledge had tripped her up again. And it had been such a good plan to ask unobtrusively about the accident.

"Then can you tell me about the hunting accident?"

"I don't know if I should tell you about it."

"Can you please explain it to me. I don't want to ask Mr. Monet about it. Erm... I don't want to accidentally say something wrong."

"Hmm... There's not much to explain. A bullet got lost and hit Mr. Luca Monet. When he collapsed all of a sudden, I immediately ran to him. I tried to save him, but had to realize that he had already died with the hit." The last words were almost swallowed.

The only thing that had really stuck with Meia was the word 'I'.

~In the end, it was always the butler.~ Or at least the butler had been there during the hunt.

"I'm sorry to hear that. I'm sorry for your loss."

Again, Meia bowed her head for a moment of silence.

"There's no need for that."

"I thought it was appropriate. Can you tell me who else was at the hunt?"

"I can't tell you that. There were dozens of other people on the scene besides the Monet family."

"Was the maid there?"

"Which one?"

"Erm, the taller one."

"Do they mean Rujell? No, why would she?"

"Earlier, she called Mr. Luca Monet, Master Luca. Were the two of them close?"

"Hmm, You could say Mr. Luca Monet was close to all of us. He was very caring."

"I see. I think I know enough now. That's all I wanted."

"I will go now then, Miss Arvis."

"Yes, you can go. Will I be picked up by the maid later?"

"Yes, that's right."

"Tell her she must come for me a little earlier. I still have to change my dress. I forgot about that."

"I will inform her."

The butler bowed and then left the room.

After hearing him close the door, Meia sighed. It was not easy to be consistently rude.

At least she would be alone for the next half hour. It was time to look at what she was actually here for - the books.

.../ End Part