At this moment, Maude entered the living room again, as silent and discreet as when she arrived. Her way of moving, with her felted and delicate step, her confident, supple and elegant gait, sent a chill down the spine. Maude didn't seem like an ordinary employee. In some ways she looked like an assassin or mercenary, elusive and deadly.

Without her clearing of the throat, the two companions would not have noticed that she had entered.

 - Forgive me for my intrusion, the meal is ready and so are your rooms. Now, if you please...

Lucy jumped up from the sofa she had been sitting on, causing a dull creak and raising a cloud of dust. Before Maude's arrival, she had tried to peek into the tea cups, but when she saw that one of the cups had become the support for a spider's web, she had quickly given up this project.

Alistair had remained standing the whole time, in the room. In the ambient half-light, he almost passed for a column in a corner of the living room.

All three left the living room and emerged in the hall. They then climbed one of the two stairs leading upstairs. Along the way, Lucy couldn't help but take another look at Izumi Shinzo's painting. Despite the passage of time, she still found it so sublime and could not help but seek the heroine's gaze. In some ways, Izumi reminded her of someone, without really being able to explain why.

Upstairs, the walls were white, made of golden illuminations. The floor was covered with a forest green carpet, just like in the living room, which gave the impression of treading on the moss of the deepest part of a forest, soft and delicate underfoot. Lucy almost wanted to take off her shoes to feel this caress against the sole of her foot. At regular intervals, pedestal tables were posted against the walls, valiant soldiers who seemed almost to salute the guests of the manor and supporting a few unlit candlesticks of half-melted wax. From the ceiling, new chandeliers of the same luxury as those in the lobby and living room hung but produced no light. Lucy remarked to herself that, when they were on, they must produce a veritable cascade of light, a multitude of rays under which people could happily bathe. Each crystal had to shine with its own fire as if each of them were inhabited by a soul.

There were only a few windows in the hallway, making it quite dark. Further on, on the right as well as on the left, you could see closed doors.

The place smelled of dust. There too, the cleaning had not been done for a long time. No noise. The mansion was silent with a heavy atmosphere. This place was gloomy. It looked almost abandoned. The air felt heavier, harder to breathe, thick. It was as if spirits were haunting the place and staring at the living with their sightless eyes, traversing them with their immaterial masses. The silence seemed to greedily absorb every sound, feeding on all noises. The corridor continued deeper, a bottomless mouth, dark and wide open, ready to swallow them.

Lucy shivered. She didn't know if it was because of the cold or because of the atmosphere.

Already, Maude was advancing, without really waiting for her guests.

 - The countess will receive you for the meal in the small dining room. It is more comfortable and more intimate than the large one. It'll be nicer to discuss...some things.

 - Do you have any information on the count's death? Lucy asked.

Maude's face twitched imperceptibly.

 - Very little. He was found in his workshop three weeks ago, dead, strangled I think, but I'm not sure anymore.

 - Do you have any suspicions about the culprit?

Maude paused again slightly and her face contracted, again discreetly.

 - Not really. I think it's better if you discuss all this with my mistress. She will know how to answer you better than me.

She went on below: "She was, after all, the one who was closest to him."

She let out a long sigh. She seemed tired. She turned her gaze out the window to contemplate the landscape.

 - I hope this ends soon, I can't take it anymore, she whispered so softly that no one could hear her. Nobody, except perhaps a very observant person who listened to everything that was happening around her. A person who always had the senses on the lookout.

The maid ended up stopping in front of a white door, like all the others. She opened it then gave way to the two companions.

The room was very small and sparsely furnished. The floor was plain brown, with no rugs or carpets. There was no chandelier here, only two small dark windows illuminating barely two meters around. Simple walls too, without any ornamentation. The only furniture was a sturdy wooden table, without a tablecloth, surrounded by several chairs of the same material.

The Countess was seated there, in front of an empty plate and a pair of silver cutlery. In the center of the table was a candlestick with a flickering, uncertain flame.

Next to the Countess sat a little boy. He looked tiny and his shoulders barely reached the table. He had hair the same color as the Countess's, brushed so well that you could see the traces of the teeth of the comb in his hair. He had a small snub nose with cherry-colored lips. His complexion was quite pale and his cheeks sunken. He wore a brown wool jacket over a cream colored shirt with a dark red bow tie. The jacket was too big for him, his small hands exceeded barely. His fingers were too red, as if very cold. He was quite thin, not the slightest roundness typical of childhood. His face was also frighteningly lethargic. He was empty, devoid of any emotion. Constantly displaying a neutral air. His lips were sealed, not a single laugh, not a single word or one of those happy chirps that children have. His eyes seemed dull and stared motionlessly at the table. This boy did not look like a boy. It looked more like an imitation, a cheap copy. There just wasn't that hint of life that characterized young people who are usually so cheerful and good-humored.

His face always seemed to express a hint of sadness or disappointment. That was the only thing that seemed alive about him.

In an even darker room, he could have been mistaken for a fairly realistic doll, because of its immobility.

Hearing them enter, the Countess raised her head slightly, not losing her tired expression. Her fingers caressed the cutlery that framed her plate slowly. She seemed full of weariness and boredom. She also seemed a little absent, lost elsewhere in her mind.

 - Come in, sit down, she told them.

Immediately after, she fell back into her thoughts, her eyes glued to her empty plate.

Alistair and Lucy took each place next to the countess. Silence returned to the room. Nobody said a word. Lucy and Alistair felt embarrassed, they felt like they were intruders in this setting.

Finally, Lucy decided to speak.

 - Can you... Can you tell us more about the murder of your husband? We need information in order to be able to help you.

The Countess raised her head, she looked surprised that Lucy had spoken. Her mouth opened as if to speak, but suddenly it closed. Her lips were quivering. She began to clasp her hands to her chest. Her eyelids twitched. She seemed to want to say something but appeared unable to utter a single word.

In her gaze, Lucy perceived something like despair. While trying to read her thoughts, behind the layer that prevented her from seeing anything, she heard a noise. Like a cry, a cry for help. It was so faint and so distant, but that sound was there.

The countess swallowed.

 - I... I can't tell you much. I know nothing.

Lucy turned her head towards Alistair, worried. She didn't really know what to do. He looked at her without being able to answer her either.

The young girl felt more helpless than ever.

From the back of the room, Maude stepped forward to speak. She took a step then suddenly halted, stopped in her tracks by an unknown thing.

Her eyebrows were furrowed, her lips tight. It looked like she was fighting against something.

 - What... what the countess is trying to tell you...

She paused for a moment, as if to catch her breath. She glanced at the Countess, who looked pleading, desperate.

The child had not moved since the beginning of the conversation. It almost seemed as if he couldn't hear what was being said around him, that he was unaware of who was around him.

 - What the Countess wants to tell you, she continued after her exchange of glances with her mistress, is that we need help!

Her gaze seemed worried, she glanced behind her, she seemed afraid that something heard them. Her breathing was becoming jerky. She bit her lip, anxious.

 - We... need help, she repeated. You need to find out what happened to us... Please.

Alistair raised an eyebrow at these strange words. The attitude of the residents of the manor puzzled him. Perhaps they knew the identity of the murderer and were threatened by him?

Too much information was missing to be able to make such an assumption.

 - Is someone threatening you? he asked.

At these words, Maude straightened up. Her features seemed to relax and her gaze lost that frightened look. She lowered her shoulders and cocked her head. She crossed her hands on her skirt and stretched her lips into an unsettling smile. Almost unhealthy. Just a moment before, she seemed almost on the verge of tears and yet... Now she was smiling. There was something wrong.

She let out a staccato, mechanical laugh, her shoulders heaving and sagging at the same time. She sounded like an actress with terrible acting.What was she trying to do ?

Her gaze had clouded over, it seemed opaque.

 - Threaten us? No, who could... who could do such a thing?

She laughed again, leaning forward, placing a shaking hand over her mouth. The longer her laughter continued, the more it looked like she was crying.

A sudden squeal, from an unknown source, interrupted her ride. She straightened up again and tilted her head back. She pulled it forward to stare at the two travelers, the neutral look she had at the start of the discussion showing on her face again.

 - We're doing perfectly fine. We have no worries.

The countess' gaze seemed to become even sadder. She returned her attention to her plate. For a moment, she had seemed, when Maude had spoken, to be hoping for something. Her hope appeared to have been disappointed.

Lucy felt disturbed. For a moment, she thought she heard thoughts, real thoughts, louder behind the wall blocking them, as Maude tried to speak. When she smiled, her mind went silent again.

The girl felt so frustrated. She felt like the answers she was looking for were close at hand, but she still couldn't reach them. No matter how far she stretched her arm as far as possible, they remained inaccessible.

She wanted to take Maude, the countess and the taciturn boy and shake them very hard, until they started talking. Maybe give them a big punch, as she would to an object refusing to function, however, something told her that they might not appreciate it.

Staying that way, not knowing what to say or what to do was so unpleasant for her. She could not stop her feet from moving on their own on the carpet, tapping the tips of her soles in a frantic rhythm.

She hated this feeling of helplessness that took her at once, seizing her every other time. She hated herself for not being able to solve all the problems. If she had become a detective, was it not to help others, to solve mysteries, to reveal the truth? And yet, she could not find the right words to make the residents of the mansion speak, she could not understand their strange behavior, she could not make her power work in order to read their thoughts. Everything was so repetitive, again and again she faced the same problems without the solution ever appearing. With every thought that passed through her mind, she clenched her fists a little harder, as if she received a little blow. No matter how time and things around her changed, she always stayed the same inside. She had hoped to be able to start a new life, a life where she would have been useful to others, where she could be counted on, where she would have been trusted, where she would have had her place... But everything, everything was exactly as before. For a moment, she thought she was going to get out of it only to see her hopes dashed and a wretched roar in the wind. How could she have believed that things would be different? She was the same person, miserable, pathetic, monstrous, abominable... as he had always told her. What seems beautiful, what seems brilliant, what seems wonderful, look at it, admire it, remember that you can never have it, because there is no place for you there, you can only sit in the shadows, little doll.

Her hands clasped on her dress as if she wanted to tear the fabric. She bitten her lips violently, not seeing anything around her. What did she care if the ceiling of that damn dining room collapsed on the heads of its guests? What did she care if they all looked at her with curious eyes, wondering what she had to remain motionless and petrified? She didn't want their looks, she didn't want their questions. She hated the embarrassment she was getting herself into without knowing how to deal with it. 

Sometimes she would have liked to be like Alistair. Alistair was amazing. He was useful. He was smart, so smart. Nothing ever escaped him. He managed to understand everything. He knew what to do, how to react. He was a master of himself. When she saw him, it seemed to her that he had never made any mistakes or blunders. Alistair often seemed so perfect to her. She wanted to be up to it. It was often for this reason that she teased him so much, without that, what would have been left to her? Just a vague resentment, a buried feeling of jealousy and loneliness.

Of all the feelings she could feel, loneliness was much the worst. She never wanted to experience it again. Never again to be alone in the world, overwhelmed by all the other emotions, without anyone to hold on to, drowning, desperate to come back up. When she was faced with loneliness, it was as if she were in front of an endless tunnel, a tunnel which descended little by little, then, faster and faster, always lower, at such a speed that one could not no longer stop tumbling. One became a spectator, to watch one's fall from afar. When there was no one left, Lucy felt the veil of memories close on her, of all the regrets she carried. She could no longer get rid of it and she became a prisoner of it. The whole world was dark, she no longer saw any light. She felt isolated from everything, lost in the depths, far from the others, in the middle of the shadows that came to torture her. There was no escape then, just let yourself sink.

Down.

Down.

Down.

Down.

Down.

Always lower.

No. She finally had a second chance, after all she had to sacrifice to get it, she wouldn't let it down. She didn't want to give up. Not now. This was the very beginning, her first investigation, was she really going to be discouraged like this? At the slightest difficulty, would she give up?

Lucy clenched her fists and got up from her chair. She walked over to the Countess, leaned over her and took her hand.

 - Don't worry, no matter what happens, no matter what you are really afraid of, we will help you! I promise you.

She sat up and turned to Alistair, her usual big smile on her lips. No, she wasn't going to get depressed, she wasn't going to let herself sink. She was Lucy Moon. And she was going to solve her first case.

No matter what fears she had, what memories and remorse she held, she was going to keep moving forward. The most important thing was not to look back, not to listen to the whispers of her conscience. If she avoided thinking about it, if she did her best to forget everything, then maybe she would be less affected. Maybe she would really end up not remembering what made her suffer.

Her smile widened a little more.

 - Come Alistair, we have no time to lose. We have to solve an investigation, remember? Could you lead us to the scene of the crime ? she said, addressing Maude.

At these words, the maid raised her head and left her listless state. A faint smile, one that seemed real, graced his lips. It was barely noticeable, but it was there.

 - No matter where the killer is hiding, we'll find him!

While speaking, the young girl dropped the chair behind her in her burst of energy, which broke for good the tense atmosphere that had set in.

Alistair couldn't help but be amused by his young partner's pranks. She always had the gift of simplifying situations, with her big smile, her frankness and her honesty.

Already, Lucy grabbed the servant and Alistair by the hand and dragged them outside, in her impatience to start working.

As the Countess found herself alone again with the little boy, her son, a gleam appeared in her eyes. She rose from the table. Even though she hadn't eaten anything at dinner, it was by far one of the best meals she had had in a long time. It had finally given her hope to get out of this hell, to finally be able to be at peace. A tear appeared in the corner of her eye and almost ran down her cheek.