Baccano! - Volume 15 - Chapter 4

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CHAPTER 4

“THEY REALLY ARE INNOCENT.”

1709, late autumn Lotto Valentino, in front of the theater

“This is incredible, Jean. Your play is a huge success.”

Even in the blustering wind, people were braving the cold to line up outside the theater.

Lebreau gazed at the queue, complimenting his companion.

“No… It’s not as if this play were my creation alone.”

“That’s beside the point. Your passion brought the truth to life and stirred the hearts of the people.”

Jean was being modest, but Lebreau looked up at the sky as if he was sincerely touched.

“I don’t believe this is enough to atone for what I’ve done, but…I can hope I’ve managed to redeem that poor boy’s past in some way, and to soothe the hearts of everyone who suffered because of the witch hunts.”

“I’d say we’re liable to have caught the eye of the church, though.”

“Yes, and you brought this play into the world despite knowing the risks. You should take pride in it. I say with utmost sincerity…that words cannot express my gratitude.”

“Oh, stop. It’s really nothing like that. It’s the money—I only wrote it for the money.” But despite his protests, Jean was secretly brimming over with satisfaction at having accomplished his mission.

The play was extremely popular, and it had been decided the first performance of his next play would happen right here, at Lotto Valentino’s theater. He was nearly done with the script; at this point, he only had to come up with the very last part.

The ending alone had been left to his imagination.

Jean-Pierre Accardo.

His current play was based on fact, but so was the one he was scripting at the present moment. However, he was hesitant to write that final part, and it wasn’t for lack of ideas.

He couldn’t finish the play because uncertainty had been rising in his heart.

“Listen, Lebreau.”

“What is it?”

“About the new piece I’m writing… Are you sure it’s all right to perform it in this town?” Lebreau said nothing, and Jean stammered on. “I, erm, I mean… Perhaps I shouldn’t say— Uh, well… I don’t mind angering that lecherous lord, and I doubt he’d be careless enough to try anything, but… If I spread knowledge of these events, won’t it jeopardize your position?”

“It’s all right. I haven’t told anyone but you that I know about…what happened. Not even the patrons of our workshop. I had once believed I may need to take the knowledge to the grave with me, but…I can’t allow it to continue casting a shadow over this town.”

Once again, Lebreau had given him a true story, on which the new play was based—but Lebreau’s expression was dark, as if this incident had brought about a deeply troubling choice for him as well.

“Besides, if someone involved—if the very criminal is still here in town…I should hope this would lead to a confession. And absolution.”

“But…well, I actually think I’d like the criminal to get away with it in the end.”

“If that is what you wish, I won’t fault you. If the reputation of your new work spreads, and the guilty party still refuses to face judgment…an opportunity for escape may yet be provided.”

“Would it now?” Jean still looked reluctant, and Lebreau nodded at him, smiling softly.

“Yes. Your talent lies in delivering words that help. The sayings of a poet may serve as a weapon or a remedy. Your works hold a power that can change the world; I’m sure of it. I was convinced the moment I saw the hope in the eyes of the people lining up outside the theater.”

As he listened to Lebreau, Jean turned his gaze to the queue again.

“Help,” hmm…

I’m only writing for my own sake.

I’m an appalling hypocrite, aren’t I?

Even as he silently mocked himself—there was a smile on his face.

It was as if he believed calling himself a hypocrite was enough to a satisfy his guilty conscience.

The end of 1709 The hills near Lotto Valentino

The wind from the sea was cold, and the whispers of the dead grass on the hill sounded lonely somehow.

Standing on the hilltop, Elmer sensed someone behind him and turned. He was smiling.

“Hi there. You’re late, Niki.”

“You were just early, and you know it,” the woman muttered with a sigh.

Elmer smiled a little awkwardly. “Maybe so.”

The two were at a youthful, romantic age, but they didn’t seem at all like a pair of lovers wistfully watching the view.

Niki’s expression was cold as she spoke to Elmer.

“So neither Monica nor Huey has returned to the library yet?”

“Nope.”

“…But it’s been months.”

“Yup.” Elmer answered easily, but there was a hint of loneliness in his smile.

Elmer and Niki had met during a certain incident a few years previously.

Niki had temporarily left town but then returned on a whim, or so she said. At present, she was working at one of the libraries the alchemists used, as a servant. She said they had moved to this area about half a year previously from another town.

And then—one week after she and Elmer had reunited, a man and woman had disappeared from the town’s public eye.

Huey and Monica.

Before the two of them went to the theater together, Elmer and the denizens of the library had teased them mercilessly.

However, the pair had not come to the library the next day, nor any of the days after that.

What on earth had happened?

The reactions varied widely, from people who worried something awful might have happened, to others who whispered they must have eloped. Nonetheless, after more than a month had passed with no word, the couple gradually began to fade from their memories—and now, after several months had gone by, almost no one mentioned them anymore.

“Worried?” Elmer asked. “I thought you would be.”

Niki gave a small nod.

“I didn’t get to talk to the two of them much, but… They did save me once, after all. And besides…”

“Besides?”

“I am also part of the Mask Makers.”

Once, Niki had been destined to die in this town.

Her life had handed her only two choices: Let someone else end her life or end it herself.

However, over the course of two encounters with the Mask Maker, her fate had entangled with the fates of others, providing a new choice.

Afterward, she had left this town for a while, saying she had to find her own place to die.

“It’s been a month since we last met, too. How goes the search? Did you find a place where you could die with a smile?”

“I don’t know.”

Elmer’s words made Niki remember her past.

After hitching a ride on a cart bound for a neighboring city, she’d considered just walking as far as her legs would carry her, then dying in a gutter.

However, she’d fallen asleep on that cart, and when she opened her eyes—the cart had reached the workshop of a group of alchemists.

It didn’t take long for her to learn this very workshop had created the original version of the drug that had changed the town of Lotto Valentino and her own life. As far as she was concerned, what was done was done, and they hadn’t directly committed any crimes. Her heart had only just been saved by her encounter with Elmer and the others, and she didn’t feel like bearing any grudges. She’d only held her tongue and started to leave the workshop.

But someone had held her back. An apprentice alchemist who lived there—a man named Fermet.

You’re looking for a place to die? That isn’t something you seek out. You arrive there naturally, after you’ve lived out your life. I imagine whether you are able to smile then or not depends on the nature of that life.

He was a strange man.

She hadn’t meant to tell him about herself; it had just come pouring out. Niki had felt a peculiar sort of reassurance from the man, and she’d opened up to him almost in spite of herself.

Fermet had smiled at her gently.

The other day, my teacher passed away in an accident, leaving Czes behind. I truly pity him. I believe we can pay you sufficient wages from the workshop’s reserves. Would you become a surrogate elder sister to him? Of course, I know that isn’t the sort of thing one can purchase with money. But…you have the eyes of one who has accepted death, and I would like you to serve as a guide to little Czes.

“Both Fermet and Begg are very good people. Good enough that I want to work for them of my own accord, at least.”

“How about that? And you’re also serving as a spy, too.”

“To be honest, I don’t care for that job very much, but…I don’t have a choice.”

Currently, while she helped out at the workshop, she was also acting as a courier between it and the people of the House of Dormentaire.

Apparently, the workshop run by Fermet’s associates was funded by multiple nobles. While their main supporter in this town was the Avaro Family, their largest patron as a whole was the House of Dormentaire.

“It sounds as though Fermet is checking into the unusual goings-on of Lotto Valentino and reporting on it. Sometimes, they have me deliver letters, too. I can’t read much, so I don’t know what’s written in them.” She hadn’t been allowed in her childhood. The girl narrowed her eyes slightly as she went on. “Well, I’m more than happy to help others learn more about everything wrong with this place, but…I didn’t really want to get involved with things here. That’s why I don’t care for the job.”

“Oh…”

“Oh, but don’t get me wrong. It’s fun talking with you, Elmer, and I know there are good people here as well, like Count Esperanza.”

Elmer had lowered his eyes apologetically, and she smiled reassuringly—but a hint of loneliness soon crept into that smile, and she murmured almost to herself.

“Really… I wonder where those two went. Monica and Huey.”

Then she turned back to face Elmer.

“I could be wrong, but…Elmer, you know where they are, don’t you?”

It was a frank question, and Elmer’s response was equally so.

“Yeah. Of course I know.”

Niki sighed in exasperation and shook her head.

“But you can’t tell anybody where they are. Is that it?”

“Yup, I promised.

“Still, I really think they’ve been staying in the same place too long. Both physically and emotionally. They shouldn’t hide forever.”

That night Somewhere in town

“And then I told Niki, ‘G’on and smile more,’ but she never smiled for me once. I guess I need more practice.”

“You think practice will improve your chances?”

Two young men conversed by candlelight in a room.

One of them, Elmer, was wearing his usual smile, but the other—Huey—was perfectly expressionless. Before, he probably would have made his jab with a wry smile. But at the moment, there was not even a spark of emotion on his face. It wasn’t much different from the mask he was toying with in his hands.

Elmer spoke to him just as he always did, as if he was making small talk.

“So how about it? You still don’t feel like seeing Moni-Moni?”

“…No.”

“Well, you’re still playing the shadowy puppet master with the townsfolk as the Mask Maker, so your heart isn’t completely broken. That’s good,” Elmer commented, but Huey’s reply was almost more for his own benefit than his friend’s.

“…I almost wish it were.”

Several months before, he had gone to see a play.

Monica had invited him to the performance, which had been staged by a certain troupe.

The playwright had been Jean-Pierre Accardo, the town’s own poet—and Huey and Monica had known the story. However, they only knew that they knew after the curtain had risen.

To Huey, they were personal memories of his past. To Monica, they were a secret Huey had once shared with her.

Not twenty minutes after the play started, Huey had realized it was based on his own life—while Monica had apparently come to the same realization at very nearly the same time. Partway through, she’d begun trembling and occasionally glancing at Huey.

For his part, he’d stayed perfectly silent.

His face hadn’t betrayed a hint of emotion, nor had he looked at Monica once.

He did nothing but watch intently as his own past was reenacted on the stage.

Even after the play was over, Huey hadn’t said a word. He hadn’t even tried to look at Monica.

Behind him, he’d heard a voice near tears. “No… This isn’t what it looks like; it isn’t, Huey… Huey…” Maybe she was already crying; maybe she wasn’t. He didn’t turn to check.

Huey had left without giving her a single answer—

—and the very next day, he’d stopped coming to the library.

In the same way—Monica had vanished as well.

“If you say breaking will help you smile from the bottom of your heart, I could help you out with that. Either way… If Moni-Moni had wanted to see you, she’d probably have come here already. Does that mean neither of you has the courage to face the other?”

“…”

“It’s not like you never want to see her again, right?” Elmer murmured breezily, but Huey kept his mouth shut.

He’d gone into hiding at one of the Mask Makers’ workshops, but the workshop wasn’t exclusively his secret. Elmer and Monica shared his secrets, and they knew about this place.

As a matter of fact, Elmer had shown up here shortly after Huey had gone into hiding, but…

“You want her to come, don’t you, Huey?” Elmer picked up one of the gold coins on the table and flipped it into the air. “Listen, I went to see that play, too. The final performance was three days ago, but I asked Speran and managed to get tickets at the last minute. They started a new one yesterday.”

“…I see.”

“Maestro Dalton didn’t tell me everything, but I knew right away. That story was based on your past, wasn’t it?”

“…That’s right. I never told you about it. They were acting out things not even Dalton knew… Things I’d only told Monica. Down to the last detail.” Huey spoke as mechanically as an automaton.

Elmer finally stopped repeatedly flipping the coin and catching it, slapping it down on the table.

“So you suspect Monica?” he asked. “You’re wondering if she took a secret only you two shared and blabbed it to the scriptwriter. Then she took you to see the play and rub it in your face.”

“…”

His expression twitched slightly, as if he was desperately repressing some emotion bubbling up deep inside him.

Smiling at Huey, Elmer kept going.

“You already know this line of reasoning doesn’t make sense, right? If Monica knew what that play was about beforehand, she never would have taken you to see it… Well, it’s possible she wanted to help you break free from your past and decided to meddle in a big way, but I really don’t think Moni-Moni’s that type of person. I mean, that’s what you’d expect me to do.”

As Elmer laid out the facts, Huey stayed silent. Elmer didn’t seem to mind; his smile didn’t falter.

“Besides, I bet she likes even the part of you that hates the world. But all these arguments don’t matter. What matters is whether you trust Monica Campanella or not.”

“…Trust?”

“Do you believe she’d betray you? That’s what I’m asking you.”

Huey didn’t nod in response, but he didn’t shake his head, either. He just looked at Elmer quietly and began to speak.

“I’ve been betrayed enough for a lifetime. If you saw that play, then you know. The villagers who were kind to me, and that young woman—they all accused my mother of witchcraft. The play may not have shown everything I felt, but until that day, I knew how to trust. That young woman—I may even have been in love with her, or something like it.”

“So are you saying you never want it to happen again? Liking somebody and getting stabbed in the back?”

“…Well, it isn’t pleasant, you know. If people are going to turn on you, you might as well never believe in them at all and live your life in peace.”

“Now there’s a contradiction. A man who wants to destroy the world shouldn’t be talking about peace. What, you don’t trust me, either?”

The question sounded like a challenge, and Huey nodded easily.

“I never trusted you. I trust you less than anyone else in the world.”

“Wait, what?!”

“No matter what promises we make, or what secrets we share, or what sort of mutually beneficial relationship we form… If you had a chance to make someone smile, you’d stab me in the back in the most despicable ways without even blinking, wouldn’t you?”

Huey responded to the challenge with a test of his own.

After thinking hard for just a few seconds, Elmer nodded frankly, just as Huey had predicted.

“You’re right! I certainly would! You’re right, that won’t do! You really shouldn’t trust someone like me, Huey! You’d better be careful!” Elmer cried with genuine worry.

Huey gave a deep, deep sigh. “Maybe that’s why I’m able to open up to you. Because I never trusted you to begin with.”

“Can’t you open up to Monica that way, too?”

“You’re an exception. She’s nowhere near as strange as you.”

As Elmer tried to steer the conversation back to Monica, Huey quickly suppressed the emotions that had nearly risen inside him.

“Let me change the question, then. Just a tiny bit.”

“…”

“Right. Next, I was going to ask you, Do you want to trust Monica? but that still doesn’t get to the core of it.”

Elmer paused briefly. Huey was attempting to close off his heart, but Elmer persisted in speaking to him the same way he always did.

“It doesn’t matter whether you believe Monica or not, or whether you want to believe her or not…”

Elmer gave a smile that was just a little mean, like a kid who’d thought of a prank.

He gave a small nod, then asked his friend a question that couldn’t have been more to the point—

—and could not possibly have been more tactless.

“Do you love her?”

A few hours later An office in the Boroñal mansion

“Hiya, Speran. I came over to while away some time.”

“Go home. I am too busy for the likes of you.”

Scowling, Esperanza glanced at Elmer as he straightened the documents on his desk.

“Or so I would say, if I were the one you had come to see…but I imagine that’s not the case.”

“Well done, Speran! It’s so helpful how quick you are!”

Elmer matter-of-factly told the aristocrat, his old acquaintance, what he was there for.

“I want to see Monica. Is now a good time?”

“…Yes. She’s calmed down now,” the count answered, signaling with his eyes to the butler standing nearby.

The man bowed respectfully to Elmer, then stepped out into the hall, preparing to guide him to a certain room.

As Elmer followed, Esperanza called after him.

“I loathe asking men for favors, but I cannot invoke my noble authority for this. Though it vexes me, I will ask.

“Please take care of my little sister…of Monica.”

His voice held an emotion he would ordinarily never reveal.

Elmer was curious about the expression Esperanza might be wearing as he said those words, but he didn’t turn around. He just called back over his shoulder.

“You’re asking the wrong person, Speran.

“If you want someone to take care of her, you should ask the one who was blushing when he told me he ‘wants to want to love Monica.’ What a cliché.”

A few minutes later Somewhere in the Boroñal mansion

The mansion’s storage area was in the exact opposite direction from the office. The bedroom sequestered in its depths, behind a hidden door, was quiet. It was plain, yet tidy.

“Oh… Elmer… You came…,” said a woman’s voice.

Monica peeked her slightly gaunt face out from a blanket cocoon.

As she toyed with her Mask Maker mask in her hands, she gave Elmer the shadow of a smile.

The smile was pitiful, and she seemed to be emotionally unstable, or on the verge of becoming so. Her expression was so frail and ill that even an amateur would have been able to see something was wrong.

However, Elmer didn’t hesitate.

Giving her a smile that was as bright as could be, he waved at her casually.

“Hi there. I came over spend some time with you, Moni-Moni.”

Monica Campanella was Esperanza Boroñal’s younger sister. However, only a few of the people in town—such as the top members of the city police and the nobles—were aware of that fact. Officially, she was just an apprentice alchemist.

It was said she was his half sister, the child of a common mistress, and Esperanza himself didn’t want her existence made public. The nobles understood and refrained from mentioning her to others.

It wasn’t that they sympathized with her position or cared enough about Esperanza to be considerate. It was just that, to most people, Monica didn’t matter much at all.

Elmer was one of the few who knew about her circumstances, but Monica’s family tree didn’t matter to him one bit, for a different reason. He admired her both as a fellow member of the Mask Makers and as an ordinary friend from school.

And because that was the case, Elmer had been fairly sure that when Monica simply vanished, without returning to her lodgings, she had hidden herself away in this mansion.

Monica was frequently on the verge of breaking down, and between the day she’d stopped coming to the library and now, he’d only been allowed to see her five times.

“I saw Huey right before I came over.”

Elmer never was very good at being sensitive, and he casually dropped the name that would unsettle Monica’s heart.

“…!”

Monica’s face blanched, and she covered it with the mask in her hand. Completely hiding her own expression and forcibly erasing other signs of her emotions, she replied to Elmer.

“…And what about it?”

Her voice had shifted into the one she used as the Mask Maker. Elmer nodded vigorously.

“Do you want to go see him, right now?”

“……? …?!”

“I mean, you’ve got a pretty good idea of where he is, too, don’t you?”

“Wh-what are you talking about?! Have you lost your mind?!” she snapped angrily, still speaking as the Mask Maker. “It’s too late! How am I supposed to face my darling…Huey…?!”

“Whoops, I think you’re getting your personas mixed up.”

“Shut up! Did you come here to mock me?!”

Monica glared at the cackling young man from behind her mask, but Elmer shook his head easily.

“No. I didn’t come to laugh at you, I came to make you laugh.”

“…You’re still going on about that?” Her slightly muffled voice wasn’t frustrated or mocking—just a little sad. “Elmer C. Albatross… Are you seriously attempting to get a smile out of someone covering their face with a mask? What could this woman’s smile mean to you? Are you in love with her? Do you want to embrace her? I know you know that Monica Campanella’s heart belongs to only one! One who has rejected her. She has no dreams now; she does nothing but breathe. What could her smile possibly be worth?!”

The words were meant to harm her; she was berating herself through the mask.

To Monica, the Mask Maker wasn’t a different personality. It was no more than one of her multiple true natures. These words were Monica’s own, and this was an act of self-harm.

Even in the face of that frenzied scream, the smile junkie ignored the mood and stayed true to his own ambitions.

“A smile is worth plenty just for existing.”

“…”

“Frankly speaking, all smiles are equal as far as I’m concerned. They could belong to an unprecedented serial killer, or the ruler of an empire, or a slave, or somebody who’s going to die in three seconds, or a saint or a god or a devil—as long as they’re not faked.”

“…You really are a self-centered man.” The masked phantom shook its head in weary amazement.

If you imagined the blanket was a cloak, it almost seemed as if the infamous Mask Maker had returned for another death. However, the mysterious figure had none of the murderer’s eeriness, and the voice behind the mask sounded lonely.

“That said…you may not be aware that Monica Campanella…has no right to be happy. She has no right to smile.”

“I’m not so sure about that.” Elmer walked up to Monica and snatched the mask away from her.

“Huh?! Ah, aaah… St-stop it; give it…back…,” Monica stammered, tearing up.

Elmer put the mask on and murmured, “Young or old, man or woman, villain or saint—everyone has an equal right to smile. Even a condemned criminal about to be beheaded. If he thinks he’s happy and smiles, nobody has the right to stop him.”

“…You’re just splitting hairs. If someone had stolen someone I loved, I’d never forgive them for smiling as they died.”

“Right, but you don’t need to forgive them. You can’t stop them from smiling whether you forgive them or not. Unless you use your hands to hold their face in place by force. I guess you’d just have to wipe that smile off their face with despair—not that I’d do it, personally.”

“I knew it… You really are funny, Elmer. You’re not normal.” Monica spoke accusingly, but there was a faint, wry smile on her face.

“If I’m funny, then laugh. C’mon, smile, smile.”

Elmer hooked his index fingers into the corners of his lips and stretched them, exaggerating his own smile. But the trace of loneliness in Monica’s expression didn’t disappear.

Several seconds ticked by with that awkward tension in the air. Then Elmer sighed, as if he’d given up.

“…Well, if you don’t want to see Huey, I won’t force you. Don’t you want to know the truth, though?”

“Huh?”

“A guy named Jean-Pierre Accardo wrote that script, remember?

“I played a little trick on him. What would you do if I said I’d managed to get him outside tonight?”

One hour later An abandoned house, somewhere near town

Elmer said he’d bring him, but…will that poet really come here?

The old, abandoned house on the outskirts of town was surrounded by forest, and there were no signs of human activity anywhere.

Originally, it had been the country house of an aristocrat, but the aristocrat had come to ruin several decades previously. No one took care of it anymore; it was the sort of place children dared one another to explore from time to time.

The idea of using it as a base of operations for the Mask Makers had come up several times, but the suggestion had always been tabled due to various reasons—such as the fact that the place wasn’t much of a secret.

At present, Monica was dressed in her Mask Maker costume, and in her hand was her familiar stiletto.

She didn’t know what the poet’s intentions in writing that play had been, but before anything else, she had to find out whether or not he was hostile to Huey.

And if he is Huey’s enemy, then…

Monica tightened her grip on the hilt of the stiletto, steeling herself behind her mask.

Through the eye holes, she saw movement.

A figure wrapped in a hooded cloak had entered the house. The moonlight filtering through the window provided only dim illumination, but she could make out their movements clearly.

The new arrival seemed wary of something as well as they peered around cautiously.

Monica was watching from high above, lurking quietly on top of a chandelier with rusty chains. The enormous mass of metal didn’t so much as creak.

If she even twitched, the brass would scrape together and alert the figure to her presence. But despite the extreme tension, Monica’s mind was calm.

Where is Elmer? He said he was going to bring him here.

Don’t tell me something happened to him…?

Fearing the worst, Monica decided to attack.

Launching herself from the chandelier, she dropped down onto the banister of the stairs in the entrance.

Naturally, the chains creaked and rattled up by the entryway ceiling, and the cloaked visitor, sensitized to noise by the darkness, reflexively looked up.

Taking advantage of that momentary vulnerability, she leaped from the stairs, sliding around behind her target and moving the tip of her stiletto toward their throat.

“Don’t move.”

Her voice was low and stifled as she brought the blade closer, but—

—with a light click, its tip struck something.

A mask?

As that question crossed her mind, the figure spoke. “Monica…? Is that you?”

The moment she heard that voice, her mind plunged into confusion.

—?!

After all, it belonged to the person she knew best.

She launched herself away from him, then took another look.

The moonlight filtering in through the window in the entryway softly illuminated the individual.

Monica knew this figure and his wooden mask well: He was a Mask Maker who wasn’t her.

“H-Hu…Huey…?!”

“…What are you doing here, Monica?”

They were speaking through their masks, but their masked personas were nowhere to be found.

Monica sank to her knees, while Huey asked her a question.

“…Did that idiot Elmer tell you he was going to bring the playwright here?”

“Huh…?” Monica nodded; she had no idea what was going on. If she had been her usual, levelheaded Mask Maker self, she would probably have understood the situation immediately— But right now, she was seeing Huey’s face for the first time in several months, and the two sides of her mask had gotten completely scrambled.

Meanwhile, Huey heaved a sigh, then murmured with some resignation.

“He got us… No, I think I almost expected this.”

“What do you…mean?” Monica asked, her voice so tight, it was on the verge of shattering into pieces.

“I mean Elmer set us up. Both of us,” Huey answered calmly.

“After all, he wouldn’t care if we called him a liar.”

Meanwhile In Lotto Valentino

“I never thought they’d actually fall for that. They really are innocent.”

In the darkness, the glow of a lantern was jauntily bobbing down the road.

As Elmer strolled nimbly through the alleyways, he was smiling cheerfully up at the sky.

“I hope nobody bad tricks them someday.”

He was headed for a single destination alone, as if planning to take responsibility for his own lie.

Elmer was making straight for—

—the town’s one and only poet, Jean-Pierre Accardo.

The abandoned house

“…”

The silence between Huey and Monica seemed as if it might last for eternity.

The rhythmic creaking of the chandelier still sounded at intervals, the only proof to them that time hadn’t stopped.

Monica wasn’t staying silent by choice. There were scores of things she wanted to say, countless explanations she wanted to give.

It wasn’t me. I haven’t told your secret to anyone, Huey!

Please…believe me! Believe me! Believe me!

But she couldn’t speak. She didn’t even know if she had the right to.

For the past few months, she’d spoken only to Elmer, her brother, and the maids who brought her meals, having only brief, infrequent conversations, but it wasn’t as if she’d forgotten how to speak. It was just that the pressure welling up inside her chest kept her heart and her tongue pinned, pushing her down into silence.

No, it’s all right if you don’t believe me. It’s all right if you hate me!

I just— I just…

Even in her own mind, she was at a loss for words.

What was she hoping for from him? Did she want to love him? Did she want him to love her? Did she simply want him to stay by her side? Or did she want him to forgive her for living on despite her crimes?

When she saw Huey, she no longer understood what she wanted.

She’d even forgotten that until just a few minutes ago, the only thing she’d wished and hoped and longed for was to see him.

What is it…that I want from him?

Unlike Monica, Huey’s silence was extremely calm.

I thought as much.

He’d had an inkling that Elmer was plotting something. He’d also thought Elmer was sticking in his nose where it didn’t belong, and that it had something to do with Monica.

However, despite his doubts, he’d gone to the abandoned house as instructed.

Was I half hoping for this? Hoping to see Monica here…?

Huey’s heart wavered, and it made him grind his teeth behind the mask.

In that moment, he had a thought. He’d avoided it for these past few months, but now that he was in this situation, it reached his mind.

What about me?

Did I…want to see Monica?

What the two of them had in common was that over the past few months, each had pushed away their thoughts of the other almost completely.

During Elmer’s occasional visits, he would make them aware of each other again.

In the meantime, Monica had merely relived her memories with Huey, while Huey had done his best not to think of Monica. They had let their feelings turn stale.

But in this moment, the shackles had come off.

Everything that had built up in the depths of their hearts, beneath their awareness, came flooding out.

They said nothing; they hardly even moved.

However, their eyes were locked through their masks—and in their hearts, a storm of emotions lashed and churned.

It was as if they were attempting to retake those lost months in the space of a few seconds.

Somewhere in Lotto Valentino

“Let’s see. From what Maiza said, this should be…that poet’s house.”

As he muttered to himself, Elmer stood in front of the building, looking up.

The place seemed to be built quite sturdily, but it wasn’t especially different from the houses around it; it didn’t really look like an artist’s residence.

The hour was so late that it was almost early again, a ridiculous time for a sudden visit. Not even Elmer could just barge right in; the man might actually call the city police.

Shall I introduce you? Maiza had offered. I don’t know why you’ve taken an interest in Jean, but I think he’s been busy lately, so it may not be easy for you to meet him. Unfortunately, Elmer would have had to tell Maiza about Huey’s past to take him up on the offer.

Elmer had managed to sidetrack Maiza and had come to the poet’s house alone, but he hadn’t considered what to do when he got there.

Hmm. What do I do? Should I sneak in? I’m not sure I can do it as well as Monica, though. Maybe I’ll go grab a Mask Maker costume.

That method would, in a way, be more of a nuisance than walking through the front door. Elmer hesitated in front of the house, just as the sound of distant footsteps reached his ears.

“? Is somebody out for a stroll at this time of night?”

Ignoring his own goals, Elmer took an interest in the nocturnal footsteps. He made no move to hide as they approached. To a casual observer, he would only look like a young man who’d stopped on the street to think, and even if someone thought he was suspicious, he probably wouldn’t get reported or suddenly hauled away.

That was the conclusion he’d come to, but the wheels of fate didn’t always turn the way you might expect.

The owner of the footsteps turned out to be someone he knew.

“You’re…”

“Oh, Carla! Hiya, hello!”

The envoy had appeared in her full-dress uniform, holding a lantern, and Elmer hailed her as if she were a friend he’d known for years.

Even though several months had passed, her group was still in town.

Their ship did leave port from time to time, but most of the members of the envoy, Carla included, stayed in the city. As a matter of fact, every time the ship returned, the number of people wearing the hourglass crest increased.

However, over those few months, the townspeople had gradually grown less concerned; they seemed to have acclimated and decided it wasn’t a problem. At present, there were easily over a hundred envoy members staying in town, but it was no exaggeration to say she and the others had already been accepted as town residents. Maybe it was because of Carla’s trustworthiness as their leader.

Meanwhile, this disruptive bunch’s “search” didn’t seem to be yielding results.

Their leader sighed as she spoke. “…It’s the middle of the night. I’d appreciate it if you’d keep your voice down.”

She was holding the lantern in her left hand, but her right hand was free to draw her weapon at any time.

As one would expect, the fairly masculine way she dressed had sparked many rumors about her, and people said she’d been attacked multiple times while out patrolling at night by herself.

Of course, that was all during the first month.

The men were all unsuccessful, and some of them had lost a hand at the wrist or a particularly important masculine appendage.

After several incidents, the men in town had given a collective shudder at her. At this point, the only ones who tried anything with her were sailors who were new in town and didn’t know any better.

Even now, Carla stayed on her guard as she walked through town, ready to take on these insolent newcomers.

“Wow, am I glad to see someone I know! Walking alone at night really does make you nervous, doesn’t it? It’ll be fine now, though! I’m a lousy fighter, but I can keep you company, at least. So relax and smile, please.”

“What are you talking about? Are you drunk?”

Elmer was puffing up proudly for some inexplicable reason, and Carla was perplexed.

They’d encountered each other several times in town, and she’d run him off the few instances he’d tried to board the ship, but she couldn’t seem to make sense of the young man’s personality. Since he had ties to both the House of Avaro and the Third Library, she was keeping an eye on him, but she didn’t know whether he was harmless or dangerous. Her impression of him was that he was a man like a jellyfish.

“What are you doing here? Do you have business with someone in this house?”

“Well, yes, I do—but it’s late, so I was trying to decide between coming back another time and sneaking in now.”

“…Sneaking in?”

He’d said it so boldly that Carla thought she must have misheard him.

She was about to ask about his objectives again, but—

—just before she did so, the door of the poet’s house opened.

“Did you need something?”

The individual who had poked his head outside, attracted by the voices talking in front of his house…

…was the young poet, Jean-Pierre Accardo himself.

The Memoirs of Jean-Pierre Accardo

That was my first encounter with Elmer C. Albatross.

We had apparently crossed paths on a few occasions previously, but that was the first time I remember speaking with him face-to-face. At that moment, I was not yet aware that he was an acquaintance of Maiza’s, or a good friend of Monica Campanella.

I had surmised the reasons behind the visit from the member of the House of Dormentaire, so I was not especially surprised to see her.

As I had anticipated, Carla had noticed that a portion of my newest play seemed to have been modeled on the House of Dormentaire, and she had come to lodge a complaint.

However, I had already accounted for this. It was true that aristocrats modeled on the House of Dormentaire appeared in the new play, yes, but they only served as inspiration. There were no lines that would link them directly to the House of Dormentaire, and most importantly, the story was entirely fictitious.

She had been convinced, if not completely satisfied, and she took her leave.

This was all according to plan. I had planned it thus in order to buy a little time.

Although, to be accurate, Lebreau had advised me to do so.

In any event, the play being performed at that point in time was no more than an initial draft.

With that as my base, little by little, inconspicuously, I modified the script.

Since the title was the same, Carla and the members of the House of Dormentaire weren’t likely to suspect it again. In that sense, one could say it was a stroke of luck that the leader of the envoy had been the first to see that initial script and came to me. Even if another member of the group grew doubtful of the play later on, they were unlikely to pursue the issue in depth if their leader was saying nothing about it.

Slowly, slowly, like a bud unfurling, I rewrote the play, bit by bit—until at last, it blossomed into the flower of truth.

…I shall relate the contents of that play later on.

In any event, the young man named Elmer had visited to discuss my previous work and ask me directly whether that story had been based in truth.

Of course, my objective for the piece had been to spread that truth around the world…but I thought the church would make a nuisance of itself if I acknowledged this in so many words, so I replied with a bluff. I said I had used several stories as inspiration and then elaborated on them.

In truth, I may have been reluctant to admit my lauded work had been borrowed from someone else, and that was why I prevaricated.

I gave my answer with a smile—and I still remember what Elmer said.

Your smile just turned fake.

At that brief remark, I thought my heart might stop.

He was right. I had been smiling in order to put him off the scent; my own feelings left me incapable of smiling genuinely.

However, the fact that he had seen through it made me wonder if he had seen all the way down to my hidden depths.

To be honest, I wondered whether I would be forced to silence the young man on the spot. Granted, I was not in possession of such courage, but…he didn’t pursue the issue further. As he left, he made one more remark:

Don’t look so upset, all right? Smile, smile, he murmured, as if he were pacifying his own child.

And with that, he left.

I could not smile.

Inexplicably, I again began to wonder if I was doing the right thing, modifying the script as I mentioned previously. I had begun to suspect any smiles I could gain by doing so might be false ones.

In the end, I chose to forge ahead.

Over days and days and dozens of performances, slowly so as not to burden the players…bit by bit, little by little, I changed the lines, the show, the story itself.

I shifted it closer to the truth.

Now that I reflect on it, perhaps I should have stopped.

Had I let myself be dissuaded when Elmer pointed out the lie in my smile…perhaps I might be smiling with my family now, with no need to leave these memoirs for posterity. I might have worn a genuine one from deep in my breast, from the bottom of my heart.

But now it is too late.

The consequences of my actions temporarily stole not just my own smile, but the smiles of many others.

The abandoned house

How much time had gone by? It might have been only a few minutes, or even a handful of seconds.

For the two Mask Makers, it felt like an eternity.

The first one to break the silence was Huey.

Quietly, he removed his wooden mask, and the moonlight coming through the window illuminated his nearly expressionless face.

“…”

The sight left Monica petrified. The person standing before her was Huey Laforet.

Confronted with that immutable fact, she started trembling from head to toe. It was all she could do just to stay on her feet.

As Huey slowly approached her, she was so tense, she thought her skin might turn inside out.

She had to say something.

The more that thought grew, the more her body refused to listen to her, until finally, even breathing grew difficult.

In desperation, Monica momentarily considered suicide, but even that path was closed to her. The stiletto had slipped from her hand ages ago, and even if she tried to bite her tongue, her jaw was trembling and uncooperative.

She had no way out. Huey reached toward her face, and—

Slowly, the mask she wore was lifted away.

“Oh…”

Both their faces were bare in the faint light.

I have to…

I have to say something…

Summoning up her strength, Monica tried to at least say his name. Her lips worked.

“Hu…”

But she was cut off as Huey slowly pulled her into his arms.

“…!”

Just the way he had when he’d embraced her on the hilltop, a week before they’d gone to see the play.

But more firmly this time.

Huey held Monica tighter and tighter.

“I’ve been thinking…all this time,” Huey murmured into Monica’s ear. He might have been speaking to himself, but the words were for both of them. In his arms, Monica had become a part of him. “I don’t trust you.”

“…—!”

“I suspected you might have told someone about my past, and I can’t say I don’t still.”

Monica’s trembling had subsided the moment Huey’s arms wrapped around her. His confession made her sad—but she had no trouble finding a reply.

“…I know. It’s all right.”

“I’ll use you. That won’t change, either.”

“I know.”

I don’t mind. She was able to manage a nod. Still… No, that’s why…

She couldn’t bring herself to say the rest.

Please don’t leave me again.

It was so short, so simple, but it was too much for her. Monica’s tears spilled over as the sadness threatened to crush her heart.

And she had no mask to shield it from him.

She didn’t want Huey to see her like this, but she was powerless to stop it. The despair washing over her was so keen that she might have killed herself on the spot given the chance.

But Huey wasn’t finished.

“But…is it all right if I fall in love with you?”

“…What?”

At first, Monica didn’t understand what he’d said.

Huey’s embrace tightened, and he murmured as if seeking confirmation.

“I won’t trust you. But even if you did betray me, even if you are my enemy…is it all right if I still love you?”

“Huey…”

“Could my love be good enough, Monica?”

A flood of tears fell from Monica’s eyes, but these did not have the same meaning as before.

“That’s not fair… You’re not being fair, Huey…”

Tears ran down her cheeks, and her voice was shaking again. But the words she said were filled with incredible strength.

“I told you so a long time ago, didn’t I? You know there’s no way I could refuse you when you ask…”