Chapter 7
“Miss Monbel.”
Count Klever said with a face full of laughter.
“Your chef is insane.”
Elysia glanced at me once, then answered with perfect composure.
“I know.”
I muttered inwardly.
‘Should I just quit and go work somewhere else?’
Still, it wasn't the sort of atmosphere in which I could protest.
The parlor had just been hit with the insane price of 150 gold, and the creditor count who had heard it was smiling.
The problem was that I couldn't tell whether it was a pleased smile or the aristocratic smile a noble wore just before having someone's head cut off.
Count Klever leaned back in his chair and tapped the table with his fingers.
People like that didn't raise their voices right away even when they were angry.
Instead, they calculated profit and loss in their heads, then decided whether to tear the other person apart or let them live once the calculation was complete.
He was a particularly fucking awful type of customer.
“150 gold.”
The count said,
“Considering House Monbel's debts, that is a fairly audacious sum to name as a joke.”
“It isn't a joke.”
I answered as calmly as I could.
The truth was, I wasn't calm. The inside of my palm was slightly damp.
I hadn't been this nervous even when I was chopping food in front of television cameras in my previous life.
Back then, if I made a mistake, it could at least be edited out. Now, if I made a mistake, there was a chance my life would be edited out instead.
Count Klever looked at me, then turned his gaze toward Elysia.
“Miss Monbel. Do you feel the same way? Do you believe today's meal was worth 150 gold?”
Elysia didn't answer immediately.
She looked at the empty plates.
The small plate that had held the goat's-milk cheese, the bowl that had held the mushroom soup, the plate the fish had passed through, the main plate with a thin trace of venison sauce remaining on it, and finally, the dessert plate that had held the honey and cheese.
I didn't know what she was going to say.
To be honest, I was a little uneasy. Elysia had decent instincts, but she was also the sort of person who could smile brightly even while on her way to die.
If she said something like, “I think it's a little expensive, too,” I was prepared to choose between going back to the kitchen and slitting my own throat or stabbing her with a knife.
Elysia slowly opened her mouth.
“Count, tonight, you ate the fall of House Monbel.”
The parlor fell silent.
Count Klever's fingers stopped.
Elysia didn't smile.
Her face was pale, but her voice was strangely clear as she said,
“Our family is in debt, the manor is old, the vineyards are tied up as collateral, and our people don't even know whether they'll still be able to remain in this house tomorrow. In a house like that, what we could prepare today was not splendid silverware or expensive spices, but the forest, herbs, goat's milk, and venison we still had left.”
‘My lady is better at talking than I expected.’
“What you ate was not the abundance commonly found at an aristocratic banquet. It was the final table a house on the verge of ruin could set in its own name. Whether that is worth 150 gold is for you, Count, to decide—not me.”
When Elysia finished speaking, she quietly closed her mouth.
I got goosebumps.
In a good way.
Those words hadn't been part of a script I'd prepared for her.
I'd only tossed out the concept of the Last Banquet of House Monbel, and Elysia had taken it and delivered it in her own voice.
When a ruined noble young lady decides to sell even her family's downfall, something much more frightening than expected comes out.
……
Count Klever said nothing.
The silence grew longer.
I could feel Marie holding her breath outside the parlor.
Uncle Bernard's expression had gone rigid, and I calculated in my head which direction I should flee if the count became angry.
The window was too far away, and the attendants were blocking the door.
That left me no choice but to run for the kitchen, but unfortunately, I hadn't been particularly friendly with running even in my previous life.
Then Count Klever gave a very small laugh.
“Ha.”
It was a short laugh.
It might have sounded like mockery, but it wasn't.
He slowly nodded.
“I ate the fall of House Monbel.”
The count looked at the empty plates again.
Until moments ago, he had seen them as traces left behind by a meal.
But after Elysia finished speaking, that had changed.
The goat's-milk cheese had become the first greeting a poor house had managed to bring out, the mushroom soup had become proof of a forest that had not yet dried up, and the venison must have looked like the warmth remaining inside a collapsing manor.
The storytelling had worked.
Count Klever slowly folded his napkin and placed it on the table.
“Miss Monbel.”
“Yes, Count.”
“I came here today to collect a debt. No matter what you say, that fact will not change.”
“I know.”
“But at least for this evening, it seems I may have come to the wrong place.”
Elysia's eyes wavered.
The count looked at me.
“Kyle Pratt.”
“Yes, Count.”
“It was delicious.”
It was a short statement.
And yet, at those words, I nearly felt the strength leave my shoulders.
It was the simplest, most dangerous, and most powerful thing a chef could hear.
Delicious.
There were no elaborate descriptions, no philosophy, and no long-winded speech.
And yet, in the end, every bit of madness in the kitchen existed for those words.
The count took a small leather pouch from inside his coat and placed three gold coins on the table.
They landed with a heavy sound.
Each one was a 50-gold coin.
Everyone in the parlor heard it.
I heard it, Elysia heard it, and Uncle Bernard heard it.
Marie, waiting outside the door, must have heard it, too.
It was the sound of House Monbel surviving for one more day.
“150 gold. The price of today's meal.”
Elysia silently looked at the gold coins.
Until moments ago, she had been about to take her family's last money to the gambling house.
But now, three gold coins from someone else's hand lay in front of her.
The count stood up.
“Let us discuss the debt again in three days.”
“In three days?”
“If I seized the manor immediately after eating today's meal, I would seem like a rather uncultured man.”
He said that and smiled.
‘This man is obnoxious even when he's moved.’
But right now, I needed to say thank you before I called him obnoxious.
Elysia seemed to know that, too, and rose to offer him a proper bow.
“Thank you for your consideration, Count.”
“It isn't consideration. It is curiosity that borders on investment.”
Count Klever's gaze turned toward me again.
“Will you be able to serve a meal this good in three days?”
I answered immediately.
“If you give me money, I can serve an even better one.”
Uncle Bernard drew a very small breath behind me. He probably thought I was being rude again.
But the count laughed instead.
“Excellent. Monbel's chef is insane, but at least he knows his own worth.”
“Thank you.”
Count Klever left the parlor with his attendants.
Uncle Bernard escorted him to the front gate, while Elysia stood quietly in front of the table with the three gold coins on it.
I couldn't return to the kitchen, so I stood beside her.
After a while, the sound of the carriage wheels faded away.
Only then did Elysia speak.
“Kyle.”
“Yes.”
“You really got paid.”
“I know.”
“150 gold for one meal.”
“Yes.”
“That was crazy.”
“If it succeeds, it's a business.”
Elysia picked up one of the gold coins.
Her fingertips were trembling ever so slightly.
She held the coin up to the light, then suddenly burst out laughing.
It was the laugh of someone who had held it in for too long before finally letting it out.
The laugh of someone belatedly realizing that she had survived.
It was the sort of laugh that somehow made my chest ache a little when I heard it.
“Ha, haha… This is really crazy. I really got paid. Kyle, you're a complete lunatic.”
“You did pretty well earlier, too, my lady.”
“Me?”
“When you said he had eaten the fall of Monbel. That was good.”
“It was?”
“Yes. I could smell money.”
“Is that a compliment?”
“It's almost the highest praise I can give.”
Elysia looked dazed for a moment, then laughed again.
Then, as if all her strength had suddenly left her, she sank into a chair.
I reflexively took a step toward her, but she raised a hand to show that she was all right.
“I'm not dying.”
“That's the most worrying thing you could say.”
“I'm really not dying today. It would be a waste to die now.”
Her words sounded light, but I could feel the change mixed into them.
Yesterday, Elysia had thought of death as an escape.
But now, at least, she looked like someone who had gained a reason to live for another day.
It was a little strange that the reason wasn't the revival of her house or some noble hope, but the fact that she'd wrung 150 gold out of a single meal.
People don't live only for noble reasons.
Sometimes, three gold coins are enough.
Just then, a chorus of footsteps came from the kitchen, and Marie and the servants poked their heads around the doorway.
“Kyle.”
Marie whispered,
“You really got paid?”
I pointed at the gold coins on the table.
“See?”
Marie stared at the coins for a moment, then suddenly covered her mouth with both hands.
“Are we getting our wages?”
“Not that much.”
“What?”
“There are too many debts.”
“Then why did you make us feel so moved?”
“We can at least eat a proper dinner tonight.”
At those words, all the faces in the kitchen relaxed at once.
Perhaps the most realistic hope in this house wasn't the revival of the family, repayment of its debts, or a return to high society.
It was being able to eat a proper meal that evening.
For the people in a failing house, that alone was a fairly major change.
I looked at the three gold coins and thought about the future.
Count Klever probably wouldn't be able to keep quiet about this strange meal.
Nobles wanted to hide the things they had experienced before everyone else, while simultaneously wanting to brag about them.
Which urge won varied from person to person, but Count Klever seemed closer to the latter.
Elysia asked,
“What do we do now?”
I answered while looking at the gold coins.
“First, let's eat dinner.”
“And after that?”
“We have to prepare to take reservations.”
“Who's going to make a reservation?”
“If the count spreads the word.”
Elysia thought for a moment, then nodded.
“What if he doesn't?”
“Then I'll make him do it.”
“How?”
I gave the same answer as before.
“By making it delicious.”
Elysia laughed as if she found it absurd.
For the moment, Monbel hadn't gone under.
And I had to return to the kitchen.
Because a kitchen after its first service is filthier than a battlefield.
I rolled up my sleeves and muttered,
“Marie.”
“Yeah?”
“Let's do the dishes.”
Marie's face immediately fell.
“Wasn't this supposed to be a touching moment?”
“That's that, but the dishes still need doing. Let's go!”