The Abandoned Duchess Seems to Want a Peaceful Life - Chapter 7

Chapter 7: The Village Chief of the Frontier

The old man sat in his chair with his shoulders drawn in, making himself small.

Lutz was the village chief of Enkar Village, sixty-eight years old this year. He had joined the pioneer party in his late teens and was the last of the original members who had cleared the land around the village.

It was only a few days ago that he had heard a new master was coming to the manor that had long been left unused. Usually, nobles toured their lands once the rainy season at the end of spring had passed and clear weather continued. Now it was the very beginning of spring, with the signs of winter only just fading. It was not unnatural to take it as meaning that the manor was to be made ready by then.

It was called the lord's manor, but Enkar Village, though relatively large for this region, was an ordinary village with no notable specialty, and not only a lord but even the bailiff who oversaw the surrounding area rarely came to inspect. At most, a tax collector came in spring and autumn to check the ledgers and the fields, and he hardly ever stayed in the village for it. The manor, built merely for appearances, was nominally the largest building in the village, but it had been kept to the barest semblance, had hardly ever been used, and was normally shut up.

He had thought he could ask the village women to clean it once the seed potatoes had been planted in spring. Then, yesterday, around sunset, he had heard that the new master had arrived at the manor.

They said she had arrived in the morning, her retinue had finished the cleaning right away, and the so-called new lord had stayed the night in the manor.

The blood had drained from his face at the news, but calling at a lord's residence without notice after dark would have been such rudeness that no one could have complained if he were cut down for it. Lutz, who had long been involved in the pioneering, knew well how terrifying and unreasonable nobles were.

Nobles generally finished their work in the morning and spent the afternoon at leisure. To call before the sun was high and interrupt their work was frightening. The best course would be to send a young man after noon, to begin with, and request an audience.

If he could offer his own wrinkled neck over the manor's not being in order and thereby beg pardon for the other residents, that would be a stroke of luck. With that resolve, he had told his eldest son, already a man in his prime who served as a leading figure in the village, to take over the village's future, and last evening he had embraced his wife of many years in tearful farewell.

And now, across the table in Lutz's own home, sat the new lord.

"I'm sorry to have called so suddenly. We are simply short of people on my side, so please forgive me that the formalities are not in order."

"Ah, no, um, not at all, Madam, not at all."

She wore a simple dress, but one could see at a glance that its glossy fabric was silk. Fingertips without a rough patch, snow-white skin untouched by the sun, glossy golden hair and clear green eyes. In a village full of people who worked covered in mud, her unreal beauty stood out; from every angle, she was a carefully raised noble princess.

"Um, young miss is..."

"She is the Duke's wife," said a tall man in a knight's uniform who stood behind her, in a low voice, and Lutz trembled all over.

When Lutz's back had still been straight, in his prime, a man from a baron's house who had been put in charge of watching over the pioneer parties in this area had cut down several of his friends on a charge of disrespect.

The reasons had been things like land clearing not progressing as hoped, and objecting to levying taxes when they could not yet even count on a wheat harvest.

Lutz and the others had been clearing land in order to live. There was nowhere else for them to go, and when crops didn't grow as hoped, it was none other than the members of the pioneer party who starved. A fat young pup in silk clothes who had never labored in his life told them the fields they had cultivated so desperately were insufficient, and told the thin, gaunt villagers, whose crops had not grown as hoped, to hand over four tenths of what little there was as tax. There was no way they could simply nod and agree.

It had been forty years ago. Only a few people, himself included, were left who had known that day firsthand. Because of that, he had told the villagers over and over, like a litany, how frightening nobles were.

You must never go against them. Like waiting for a storm to pass, bow your heads and endure whatever you are told.

"So, the land on the western side hasn't been cleared yet, has it? I would like to turn that into fields, and for that I want to use the nearby serf settlement as a whole. But serfs are also the village's property, so I wanted to consult you so that you won't be inconvenienced by it."

"Yes, no, whatever Madam wishes is fine."

"I've heard that serfs are sometimes called out to help in the fields. Will that be all right?"

"The fields around the village need only the villagers' hands, and we have tenant farmers as well."

Serfs were used not only for new clearing but also for maintaining the village's fields, so being worked to death by a noble princess would indeed be a problem. But if it were only a matter of tending the fields now bearing wheat so richly, the villagers could manage by helping one another, and if no new fields were added, no additional taxes would be levied.

In any case, going against a noble with an armed knight standing behind her had never crossed Lutz's mind from the start.

"Then I will borrow the serfs of the pioneer settlement. And, what do you do with the straw from the wheat you harvested last year?"

"Straw, Madam?"

"Yes, the part that is left after the ears of wheat have been harvested."

"The soft parts we feed to the livestock, or cut and use as bedding straw in the animal sheds, or use to mend houses, and some is woven into baskets as handiwork by the women."

"The bedding straw gets replaced, doesn't it? What do you do with it?"

"Sometimes we plow it into the fields, but when we can't spare the hands, we throw it away at the foot of the mountain with the leftover straw."

"May I have that? Does it belong to someone?"

"No, we threw it out as garbage, so..."

Old bedding straw was mixed with the livestock's dung and stank. During rainy spells, it rotted and gave off a terrible stench. Throwing it outside the village because of the smell was nothing unusual.

"Then I will have it collected, so please tell me the place later. And what about the other garbage that comes from this village, bones and kitchen scraps and so on?"

"Scraps of food we feed to the livestock, so there is hardly any. Animal bones are thrown at a dump next to where the straw is discarded."

"May I have those too?"

"Of course, Madam. Everything in this village belongs to Madam..."

Lutz did not feel it was wretched to flatter a girl young enough to be his granddaughter. If it kept the villagers living in peace, that was enough.

"Thank you. I'll consult you again if anything comes up."

It seemed her business was done, for the girl rose lightly to her feet. A handmaiden placed a wide-brimmed hat on her head and quickly adjusted its shape and angle. She did not reproach him over the manor's not being kept clean; it did not even come up as a topic.

"Oh yes, Village Chief, what is your name?"

"I am... Lutz, Madam."

"Then, Mr. Lutz. Please call me Melfina. I don't much like being called Madam."

Having said so, the new lord went out through the door that the bitter-faced bodyguard knight held open.

Along with a rush of exhaustion, a clammy sweat broke out on him. After the sound of a carriage driving off, the door burst open again.

"Dad!"

"Dear! Oh, thank goodness. You're alive!"

His son and his wife of many years pressed in, both looking as though they were about to burst into tears. In fact, his wife was crying a little.

With faces like that, the two of them looked just alike.

"What's this? I thought I was finally going to be village chief, but looks like you're not planning to retire anytime soon, Dad."

Even his son, who joked that way, had something shining at the corners of his eyes.

It seemed the storm had passed without taking anything away, but she had most certainly said "again." She had told him to call her not Madam or Lord but by her name.

"...I couldn't possibly call her that."

At his age, dealing with nobles was no joke; it shortened his life. As long as he was village chief, he could not refuse an audience when one was demanded.

Thinking of that, it might not be a bad choice to hand things over to his son at this point and retire, Lutz reflected with deep feeling.