Happy Days of the All-around Maid and the Duke - Chapter 6

?Ahh, What a beautiful day!?

Ririka, who had used all her experience as a lumberjack, succeeded in creating a sunny spot on the south side of the building. Thanks to this, the laundry is getting a nice sun ray and the northerly wind was blowing softly.

?Now, the next thing I’m going to do is garden work.?

Ririka was wearing gardening gloves, holding a sickle in her right hand and a bucket in her left. Inside the bucket were various items, including pruning shears and fertilizer for the plants.

The garden of this mansion was unnecessarily large.

Well, it is probably a small place compared to a normal aristocratic mansion, but considering the size of the mansion, it is spacious. This is probably due to the fact that it is located in the middle of a forest and there was plenty of land available. Surrounded by a tall iron fence, the mansion is covered on all sides with a desolate lawn. In front of the mansion were two fountains covered with stale water and dead leaves, a flowerbed with weeds that had grown to the point of ruin. The pavilion was in disrepair that there is no place to sit, and the backyard was overgrown with ivy and no place to step on it. The backyard was so overgrown with ivy that there was no place to step. The overall atmosphere was that of a haunted house. Even if there were ten gardeners, it would take a month just to maintain the garden. 

However, Ririka was not discouraged at all, but rather full of motivation. Rolling up the sleeves of her servant’s uniform, she fired up.

?I’ll be good at this!!?

Ririka had been told repeatedly by her grandmother.

?The servants are the best at keeping the house clean and tidy. If the mansion is in disrepair, the character of the people who live there will be questioned. The way we work is directly connected to the master’s evaluation of us?

If this is the case, then it is Ririka’s duty to make the mansion beautiful and restore the master’s reputation.

Ririka was determined to succeed in her first live-in job, no matter what it takes.

Let’s start by trimming the hedges.

The mansion is surrounded on all sides by an iron fence, but the hedge had been planted to hide the fence,  perhaps to prevent a sense of enclosure, and it was in a terrible state. 

As a result of unattended and unrestrained growth, the hedge has grown to a height that exceeds the iron fence by a comfortable margin, and its width is thickening. If this is not taken care of, there is nothing else that can be done.

Ririka climbed up on a stepladder and began pruning the hedge.

***

Wilgia was surprised at how warm the bright winter sunlight was.

Thanks to Ririka’s logging, the sun began to shine on the south side of the house, bringinglight into the house that had been dark for years. Wilgia’s study has also benefited.

Direct sunlight is not allowed in the studyroom because it burns the paper, but I thought it would be quite nice to face my books in the natural light. This was the first time I had ever thought such a thing.

The large reading room in the Royal Library, where Wilgia works, is filled with sunlight pouring in through the stained glass ceiling. However, Wilgia is not fond of spacious and crowded reading rooms so he always take the book he wants and quickly retreats to the basement.

It may be very cold outside, but if he stays in the house, he can enjoy the coolness of the air.

I looked out the window to see if Ririka was cold, and found her working in the garden today.

She climbed up on a stepladder twice her height and was pruning the hedges.

Her work was not something that could be described with a simple onomatopoeic word such as ?chokey-chokey?.

She was using both hands to cut the hedges with a pair of large shears. As I watched, the hedge became lower and thinner. It was like a diet.

?That’s amazing…?

Wilgia sat up and leaned his face against the window and thought to himself.

Since returning to the mansion and meeting with Ririka, I have been somewhat disturbed.

Wilgia is basically a hater. Born as the fourth son of a royal family, he has a clumsy personality that is unbecoming of royalty. He is too lazy to talk to people and his social skills are depressing. He doesn’t want to hold a weapon, so there is no way for him to become a knight. He has no grand ideas to interfere in politics.

The only thing that keeps him alive is reading books and learning about history, and he has lived with books all his life.

As a result, although he comes from a royal family, he is a historian, a humble profession that people do not pay much attention to. Combined with his gloomy appearance, no one comes close to Wilgia anymore. The only exception is Gerard, another historian and friend, who is close to Wilgia.

Well, that’s good enough, Wilgia thought.

He could avoid the marriage problems that follow aristocrats, and he doesn’t have to worry about anything else.

It would not be a bad idea to spend the rest of his life buried in books in a mansion where no one would approach him. At 20 years old, Wilgia is already thinking about the end of his life, like an old man in his 80s.

But Ririka’s appearance came as a bit of a shock to Wilgia. 

She is committed to everything she does and continues to struggle on her own to get the mansion in order.

?Because that’s what servants are for!?

She said cheerfully, trying to fulfill her duties as a servant.

I thought she was a nice girl. I like a girl who does her job well. I’m not saying that the servants I’ve had are bad, but her ability is far superior to the others. After all, it would be hard to find a servant who would cut down a tree to secure the sunlight.  There were servants who offered to cut down the trees, but they were dismissed because they suggested to hire a woodcutter . I did not want to bring unnecessary people into the mansion.

Wilgia was a little excited to see how the garden would be transformed by Ririka’s hands. It was strange that he had never cared how rough the garden was.

?No, I have to do my job, too …?

As I sat down in my chair to get back to work, a stack of papers fell off my desk 

?Oh, no, that’s not good!?

When I dove under the desk to pick up a bundle of fallen paper in a hurry, I hit my head against the desk and the ink bottle I was using shakes and falls off.

Oh no, If the ink spilled, it would ruin the translation that I had been working for twenty days. Wilgia quickly grabbed the papers and leaned onto her back. He felt a cold sensation and ink dripped from his head. A black liquid stained his vision, but he was relieved to know that he was able to protect his translation. 

?Phew…?

After a short pause to catch my breath, he found the room in such a state of disarray that I could not look straight at it. Piles of scattered papers, smeared ink, broken ink pots. The other rooms in the mansion were clean, but this room stood out. He told the servants not to go into the study room, so no servants had ever come to clean it. The dust in the room made Wilgia sob.

?Sob, sob?

As I sobbed, there was a knock at the door of my room, and a subdued voice called out through the door.

?Wilgia-sama, I heard a terrible noise, is everything okay? …?

?Sob… ah, I’m fine, I’m fine!?

When she opened the door, Ririka opened her big eyes to see Wilgia-sama’s figure and looked up at her.

?What happened to you, Wilgia-sama!??

?I spilled a little ink?

?I’ll prepare your bath right away?

Without saying a word, Ririka pulled Wilgia into the bathroom, prepared for the bath very quickly and pushed Wilgia into the bathtub.

After washing her head and cleaning the ink, he soaked in the bathtub at the right temperature, which was not too hot nor too cold.

Wilgia thought idly as he looked up at the ceiling.

?Is it okay… I guess not?

The study room was in a terrible state of disrepair, no matter how one looked at it. It would be understandable if they said it was burglarized.

For Wilgia, the study room is the most important and sacred place anywhere. He has never given anyone his permission to enter his study room, because he hates it when servants enter without permission. Therefore, it has never been cleaned.

In the past, he would have wiped off the ink himself and resumed his work.

However, I thought I could give Ririka her permission to enter.

Ririka’s arm would make his study room so beautiful that he would not be able to recognize it.

?I’ll spell out the translations I’ve … written and put them on the bookshelf in chronological order … Yeah, that’ll be better?

Wilgia’s mind was made up.

I’ll get Ririka to help me organize the library.

I am sure that Ririka will use her abilities to the fullest and make that little room shine.