Chapter 38

The Fourth Plan. To increase the intimacy between the father and the son. (8)

Gellerhard was currently in his office. He was talking with his aides when he jumped up as soon as Carl and I appeared together. Not only that, even everyone in the room stood up as well. It was one of the courtesies that I found a little bit cumbersome, but here, when a high-ranking lady or a noble lady entered a room, all the noble men had to stand up and show some courtesy. In particular, since I was the lady of the same rank as high as Gellerhard himself in this castle, I would then have to listen to those noises that were affirming the aristocratic status of a person wherever I went.

“Mandy.”

He called me by my nickname with his characteristically blunt face. As we got closer, he reached out his hand. I eventually placed my hand over his and Gellerhard grabbed it before he planted a kiss upon the back of my hand. Carl, who was still clutching onto the hem of my dress, looked at it with a twinkle in his eyes.

“You didn’t forget that you’ve decided to spend some time with Carl starting today, right?”

“Of course.”

“Carl, shouldn’t you say hello to your father?”

As he gave a response to the remark, Carl raised his head and started to face Gellerhard.

“Hi!”

Seeing that Carl was loudly shouting ‘hello’, I could hear a small laugh. His pronunciation was closer to a ‘hi’ than a ‘hello’ actually, but it was so cute that I just wanted to take a bite out of him. Nevertheless, I still corrected Carl’s greeting.

“Hello, Father; is what you should be saying.”

“Hello—”

I nodded and lowered my head. Then, Carl offered his greeting as if he was stumbling over my dress while grabbing a hold of my leg. Before I could even bend down and embrace Carl, Gellerhard had already made a move first. He shifted his large body swiftly and removed that little hand from my leg before he held Carl in his arms. Carl, who was seated with his hips right on top of Gellerhard’s arm, stretched out his arm and instantly clutched those clothes at the sight that had been increased at an instant.

“Let’s go.”

It was evident that Gellerhard had been discussing something with his aides just a moment ago. Nevertheless, as soon as he said something in passing while hugging Carl, the aides around him immediately arranged their seats before Gellerhard started to stride forward as well. Then, a silent greeting trailed after me as I followed him closely.

“Mandy—”

Carl, on the other hand, straight away looked for me and my arms. Not long after that, I picked Carl up from Gellerhard and held him tight.

“Isn’t he heavy?”

“He’s a bit heavy, but… I can still hug him though.”

“I know.”

“I don’t think Carl likes it very much… Well, that will get better soon. Because today, we will go sledding.”

“Sled!”

Carl immediately recognized the sled. How could you be so smart when our Carl had only caught words that he knew only from what people were often saying. I said so while patting Carl’s cute bottom.

“Yes, sled. Does Carl like sledding? Let’s teach Dad how to ride a sled today.”

“Hum!”

Carl exclaimed excitedly. After seeing Carl like that, I looked at Gellerhard and he, too, had a faint smile on his lips.

“If it’s sledding, will you be riding it through the back mountain then?”

“Uh? That’s right. Ah—Gellerhard, did you go for a ride when you were young?”

“No. But I saw the young attendants had ridden before.”

Oh, yeah… you didn’t have any friends. As I looked at him with a little sense of pity, I then patted him on the back.

“You are going to make use of your son as an excuse for this time. It will be a lot of fun.”

“Yeah, thanks to Mandy.”

Whatever I did, it became a rather pleasant phrase. After putting on our coats and clothes, we rode the sled happily. At first, it was Carl who rode with me in my arms, but after seeing that Gellerhard rode much faster than us, we quickly switched to Gellerhard’s sled. Gellerhard, who said that he was riding the sled for the first time ever, never fell down and went on very quickly. As if it wasn’t scary at all, Carl also squealed a lot with his red cheeks as he enjoyed the speed within Gellerhard’s arms.

After a pleasant sleigh ride for about an hour, Gellerhard soon went back to work. On the other hand, I thawed my frozen body from all the sledding while taking a bath with Carl. When Gellerhard got closer to Carl, it would then be Gellerhard’s job to take a bath with Carl after playing hard. Right after soaking his body in a hot water bath, he drank some hot milk that was mixed with red and white honey before he soon went to dreamland after feeling absolutely full. As I saw Carl sleeping on the rug in front of the fireplace, he instantly reminded me of Gellerhard, who was especially fond of being in front of the fireplace himself.

The rich seemed to be rich, indeed. Since it looked like he already had a good night’s sleep once again, he would soon wake up, eat a lot and start to play all over again. I ordered a maid to watch over Carl and take the child to the nursery once he woke up. Rather than going out, I brought in an escort and headed for the Duchess’s office where the Duchess Dowager was, but the head maid discreetly approached me instead.

“My Lady. I have something to tell you.”

It was actually quite hard to hear her small voice that was akin to a whisper, but I could guess what it had meant. I gestured at the maid who was following me and went into another room with the head maid. There had been so many rooms for many different purposes that the Duchess could use, so finding a quiet room wasn’t too difficult.

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