After I Died, My Husband Went Mad - Chapter 46
Glenn couldn’t hide her emotions.
Staring at her severe face, Dehart dryly said, “Can you still claim innocence regarding her death?”
Silence descended on the room.
Dehart audibly read the murder instruction letter penned in Glenn’s handwriting. About half of it was charred, making the content incomplete, but it was sufficient to solidify the suspicions.
“I…!”
“Take her away.”
“No, really, it’s not true. I’ll admit that I felt that way at one point, but this is unjust. I truly…!”
“How pitiful.”
Glenn protested, but it was already too late. Dehart sighed, shaking his head. He regarded her objections as a futile last resort.
“Dehart!”
“Escort Lady Glenn to the tower. Treat her with the utmost respect, lest anything untoward happens.”
Ryan dragged her away. Glenn struggled, but it was no use. Watching the scene blankly, Roger too was escorted out of the room after her.
Half an hour later, word spread throughout Hillend Hall that the couple had been moved to the tower.
* * *
“You know it’s not enough, don’t you?” said Ryan.
“…”
“Soon enough, both of them will be released. A noble house like the Rems will ensure that. And when that time comes, it won’t simply be dismissed as run-of-the-mill family discord.”
Ryan cautioned in a subdued tone. Dehart nodded heavily.
“Yes, it’s not enough to be conclusive evidence of murder.” Dehart thought Ryan was half right and half wrong. “But it’s enough to lend credence to the assumption that her death wasn’t a suicide, and that’s all I want.”
Dehart walked through the creaking main hallway, amidst the crackling of the burning wood.
“The suspicion that there’s a sinister conspiracy behind her death, the doubt that unsettles people’s minds. I need that.”
Ryan silently followed behind him, occasionally shielding him when debris fell from the crumbling structure.
“Wheddon claimed she fell into the abyss, and this magnificent Hillend Hall killed her.”
His hollow voice echoed through the corridor. Dehart walked aimlessly, stopping in front of Roger’s room.
“Then shouldn’t we know how she was killed, what suffering she endured as she died?” Dehart entered the room with only the door frame remaining, his voice cutting sharp. “After all, I was supposedly her husband.”
“Leave it to me,” Ryan said to Dehart as he began to rummage through the broken and charred room.
“It’s fine. Even if my eyes can’t discern between truth and lies, I can still distinguish what’s right in front of me.”
Dehart paid no heed to the soot staining his face and hands as he searched frantically. Eventually, he found what he had been looking for.
“Fire can be helpful sometimes.”
The safe, its intricate locks melted away, held the evidence of Roger’s machinations to discredit Sebelia.
“If only I knew all this when she was alive…”
His golden eyes trembled, and his rough voice strained as the words poured out.
“Then I could have put those devils in jail and comforted her. She must have been hurting all alone.”
But Sebelia was already dead, and all that remained in his hands was this disgusting stack of documents.
“Your Grace…”
“Never mind.”
Dehart handed Ryan several documents and a few valuables that had been inside the safe before rising from his seat.
“Sigh.”
The once opulent chamber had been engulfed in flames, creating an almost hellish scene. This was the real Hillend Hall, the pride of the Inverness family.
“…Truly despicable,” Dehart murmured, looking down at his soot-covered hands. “If she hadn’t married me, she wouldn’t have had to endure such things.”
“That’s been decided for generations.”
A strategic marriage to strengthen ties with the Capital—it was the will of Dehart’s father, the late Duke of Inverness.
“Yes. He always loved that kind of peace,” Dehart sneered.
Ryan approached him and added urgently, “It’s no one’s fault that Sebelia came to Hillend Hall. It’s just the way things are, so…”
“Don’t strain your tongue trying to console me, Ryan.” Dehart stared at Ryan with dry eyes, a wry smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. “Because the outcome would have been the same regardless of who came to me.”
“That’s…”
“She was just unlucky.”
Dehart sighed and ran a hand through his hair. Beneath his black locks, his lidded golden eyes were tired.
“Her biggest misfortune in life was having someone like me as her husband.” Dehart muttered with cloudy eyes as he sifted through piles of books near the bookshelf.
Yes, if she hadn’t married him, there would have been no reason for the Capital’s espionage.
“It was a flawed union from the start.”
Dehart could barely close his stiff eyes as he recalled the day he first met her. He remembered how he rebelled against such a marriage, refusing to accept an arranged match, insisting on bringing another person, claiming he couldn’t trust a bastard like her.
“Why did I then…?”
Dehart slumped back into a shapeless chair and buried his face in his hands.
“Haah, this is exhausting.”
