The Cavendish brothers shared similarities despite their apparent differences. Their ingrained courtesy was one such trait, along with certain small habits that occasionally surfaced.

Watching David fold his napkin into a sharp point after finishing his meal, Catherine naturally recalled how Saul would fold his napkin in a similar fashion at every meal.

She thought absently that even after years of separate lives, traces of a shared childhood couldn’t easily disappear, and she placed her own napkin on the table.

At David’s gesture, the waiting butler quickly began clearing the dishes, including Catherine’s barely touched plate that she had reluctantly taken a few bites from at the urging of both men. 

After swiftly clearing the table, the butler placed teacups before them and produced a glass jar containing delicately dried marigolds with a faint reddish tint, which he carefully placed into each cup.

These flowers had been gathered and dried by the Cavendish household staff in autumn. The blossoms, reminiscent of midday sunlight, slowly unfurled their petals beneath the stream of hot water.

“I’ll take my leave now,” the butler said after arranging some simple baked treats attractively on the table. Catherine continued watching the unseasonable flowers bloom until she heard the door close with a soft thud.

Even after that, the room remained wrapped in silence, permeated only by a gentle warmth.

Thinking about it, this was the first peaceful moment since Saul had begun breathing again. 

Catherine quite enjoyed this brief instant where the warm air gently brushed against her nose. David seemed to feel the same, as he too remained silent until the warmth had somewhat dissipated.

“I heard you stayed with my brother until his last moment. Though it’s late… thank you,” David suddenly said, causing Catherine to look up.

She blinked slowly as she met David’s calm blue eyes before lowering her gaze. The greeting felt oddly unnecessary now that Saul had revived, yet David’s manner was deeply sincere.

Looking at the beautifully bloomed marigold in her teacup, Catherine exhaled a breath so deep it nearly touched the tip of her nose. She glanced at David’s solemn face, wondering if perhaps he too had realized something about what he thought he had permanently lost, and then spoke. 

“You have nothing to thank me for,” she replied quietly, her fingertips caressing the rim of the now-lukewarm teacup.

“It was naturally my place to be there.”

“Now that I think of it, I should be the one apologizing for being late. You even went through the trouble of moving him to the bedroom…”

Catherine stopped mid-sentence when she noticed David’s fingers freeze around his teacup in her downcast field of vision. When she raised her head in confusion, she found him staring with a rigid expression, as though he’d heard something completely unexpected.

“David?”

Catherine called his name, confused by his reaction, only to see him blinking unnaturally and avoiding her gaze.

“That too is nothing to be thanked for,” he retorted, mimicking Catherine’s earlier response and smiling awkwardly.

Seeing his seemingly flustered reaction, Catherine observed him for a moment before pulling her lips into a smile. Though she didn’t understand why he was acting this way, she had no intention of pressing the matter.

“What was the important matter you wanted to discuss?” she asked instead, reminding David of his original purpose for bringing her to this room.

Catherine wanted to finish their conversation quickly and return to Saul’s side, where he would now be alone. Had David not mentioned having something important to discuss, she wouldn’t have left Saul’s bedside at all.

Bringing the teacup to her lips, Catherine speculated about what David might say. Given the circumstances, it seemed most likely to concern Saul, or perhaps the Cavendish family. Maybe he even had something to say about himself. She was just swallowing a sip of tea when he spoke.

“Leave this place,” David said abruptly, as though throwing out thoughts he’d been holding back. Catherine didn’t respond immediately, unable to comprehend this sudden, inexplicable statement.

As she quietly set down her teacup, she tried to guess why David would make such a suggestion, but soon gave up due to the lack of context or explanation. Then suddenly, she realized that through this suggestion, David was revealing his true thoughts to her for the first time.

“…Where to?” she asked, unable to hide her bewilderment.

“Anywhere. Anywhere that isn’t Cavendish,” David whispered in a tone that seemed somehow unsteady. Or rather, he appeared to be concentrating on clearly distinguishing something in his mind.

“That’s quite sudden. Why would you say such a thing?” As she asked this, Catherine didn’t miss the troubled emotion that momentarily flashed across David’s face. She sensed that he had no intention of properly explaining this matter—or perhaps couldn’t explain it.

“Because Saul is deceiving you,” he said.

Catherine gestured with her eyes, demanding an explanation, but that was all. David fell silent for a moment, interlacing his fingers, visibly deep in contemplation.

His face showed signs of complicated, tangled thoughts. Catherine noticed his fingertips nervously tapping on his knuckles and realized that David was extremely anxious.

“Saul… doesn’t love you,” David finally said cautiously as the shallow silence began to touch their feet. Catherine understood what he had been worrying about and couldn’t help but smile a little.

They were brothers who seemed different yet were alike after all—in their seemingly polite manner that concealed their true feelings, and in how they showed concern in unexpected ways. Catherine knew that David was worried she might be hurt by his words.

But even without David’s concern, Catherine wouldn’t have been hurt. In truth, she already knew.

Their relationship had never been premised on love to begin with, and the three months she had spent with Saul had been sufficient time to vaguely guess his feelings. They had lived not as mere acquaintances but as husband and wife; it would have been strange not to notice.

“Whatever Saul told you, it wasn’t sincere,” David asserted, speaking with the confidence of someone who knew Saul well.

But to Catherine, David seemed to both know and not know his brother. Saul was certainly a man of dry temperament, but he wasn’t weak enough to exploit someone who knew nothing.

If he had been that kind of person, he would never have made a deal with Catherine, nor given her multiple opportunities to let go of his hand.

“Why do you think that?” Catherine couldn’t help but ask, seeing the intense sincerity in David’s expression.

She was curious about why David thought Saul was deceiving her, and why he believed Saul would naturally have whispered words of love to her.

But to this question, David once again closed his mouth, unable to hide his discomfort. For a moment, Catherine gazed at his handsome face shadowed with concern as she tilted her completely cooled teacup. The flower slid along the tilted surface, tapped against her lips, and drifted away.

“Saul…” David began, then bit his lip as though chewing on it.

His distinctly shaped eyebrows contorted. With an inexplicably pained expression, he squeezed his eyes shut then opened them again. Catherine saw the tension in his interlaced fingers and realized once more that he was showing unnecessary consideration.

“What he wants from you is…”

“For the sake of Cavendish, I presume,” Catherine completed the sentence David was hesitating to utter.

Though it was nothing special to Catherine, David suddenly looked up, seemingly surprised by her matter-of-fact tone. His hair scattered with the movement, catching the reddish light leaking from the lamp and making it resemble the flower in the teacup.

Catherine lowered her gaze to the flower that had brushed past her lips, then quietly set down her cup.

“I know,” she said.

“You… knew?” David seemed unable to comprehend Catherine’s lack of reaction.

His expression resembled someone who had discovered that the answer to a complex problem was ridiculously simple. He looked half-empty, half-disbelieving of what he’d heard.

Catherine nodded lightly in affirmation, and David’s blue eyes wavered like those of a lost wanderer.

“If you knew, then why…” he murmured.

Instead of answering, Catherine simply smiled. It wasn’t a question seeking an answer—it was more like a muttering directed at himself, unconsciously questioning something he truly couldn’t understand.

But sometimes, even without spoken words, the silent language captured in one’s vision can become an answer. Just as Catherine noticed from David’s eyes that he had found that answer.

“You… loved him,” he said softly.

Not that she had loved him—she still loved him.

Yet Catherine deliberately chose not to correct his words. For some reason, David’s expression as he pressed his lips together seemed somehow tinged with a sadness that even he himself found difficult to bear.

“But Saul… can never love you,” he whispered, his voice so small it was barely audible. David raised his elbows painfully, lifting his interlaced hands to bury his face in them.