The girl, with pink hair cascading down like ripe peaches on both sides, now looked as if she was about sixteen or seventeen years old.
Adorned with a vibrant white lace bonnet and wearing a matching dress, she peered down at the map with a thoughtful expression.
“This is the right way.”
The young man with dark black hair standing next to her leaned over and looked at the map together with her, and pointed his fingertips at the front.
“Isn’t it the next alley?”
“Oh! I guess we have to go one more block. No wonder, they said the shop was on the main road.”
Under the soft shade of the bonnet, her emerald eyes sparkled with anticipation.
“The entire building up to the third floor is the shop. Impressive, isn’t it? There must be several patissiers. It became very famous because the desserts were delicious from the day they opened.”
As she spoke, the girl retrieved a worn piece of paper from the pocket of her dress. The paper cutouts from a magazine were folded neatly along the creases.
“This is from when the shop first opened. It’s quite impressive. Apparently, all the pastries were sold out on the first day of business.”
“If you open a shop, you’ll be quite the hostess.”
“Ah, but isn’t it like that at my house too? I don’t like that…and there’s a magazine that almost closed because of me. I don’t think other magazines will run my articles.”
The girl, Asha, spoke with a mournful voice, and Karnov beside her swallowed his laughter.
“Why would that be your fault? They agreed to it when they sold sensationalized stories for money. And now they’ve decided to focus on other things.”
Upon hearing this, Asha clenched her fist.
“Yeah, right. But I talked to them well, and they understood. They apologized and compensated.”
Karnov covered his mouth with the back of his hand, feigning a cough. The <Weekly Vichegda> had stopped publication for almost a month – barely managing to substitute for the numerous piles of postcards received for stopping publication without reason – after issuing the last edition recently.
Along with a correction on the misinformation they had spread, and an apology letter, they collected a lot of postcards for firewood again – mainly saying, “Why are these children suddenly pretending to be nice!” – they had once again faced the end of the <Weekly Vichegda>.
“I’ve seen some drafts and there’s already something interesting.”
“Because I wrote the novel well.”
Thus, they accepted Asha’s recommendation and decided to publish a new novel serialization magazine, <Weekly Vichegda>.
Of course, after paying reparations and fines, they couldn’t afford to smooth this transition, so Baroness Saratov, who was keeping an eye on a series of events, took over the <Biweekly Vichegda>.
“Oh! It’s over there. Cafe Grin… del…”
Asha, with a smile on her face as she looked at the building, trailed off. People were lining up in front of the cafe. Staff members of the cafe were telling those waiting that it would take a few more minutes.
“Wow… the line is long.”
“Do they wait this long just to eat cake?”
“I told you it’s popular. It seems like we’ll have to wait for an hour…”
As Asha spoke, trying to gauge Karnov’s reaction, he took a step forward, turning back to her.
“Um, where are you going, Karnov?”
“I’m going into the store.”
As if it were obvious, Asha hesitated for a moment before whispering as she grabbed Karnov’s arm.
“Karnov, you’re doing this again. Everyone else is waiting in line.”
“What’s wrong with that?”
“We have to wait in line too…”
“No need to wait. I made a reservation.”
Asha’s eyes widened in surprise.
“You made a reservation? When?”
“When you suggested coming here. I asked Baroness Saratov.”
“…!”
Seeing Asha’s astonished face, Karnov suppressed a laugh, then lightly flicked the lace edge of her bonnet and nodded toward the shop.
━━━✦❘༻༺❘✦━━━
“Wow… Wow.”
The table that the two were guided to was a seat open toward the terrace on the third floor. The staff who guided the two to a space where they could sit side by side at a table by the window left the menu, trying not to glance at them.
“There’s quite some space between the tables, isn’t there? Looks like the walls are made of white marble.”
Asha brushed the wall lightly with her fingertips.
“They emphasized it with gold decorations, and the lighting… They hung small chandeliers of various shapes so it has an unbalanced charm to it…”
As Asha surveyed the inside of the shop, naming each detail, she suddenly met Karnov’s eyes sitting beside her and blushed, closing her mouth.
“Was my voice too loud?”
“No.”
“Then why are you looking at me like that?”
“How am I looking?”
Asha hesitated for a moment before shaking her head. Then, she opened the menu and, with a serious tone, said.
“Uh, um. We’re not here for leisure but for market research, so we’ll try five desserts.”
“Five desserts?”
“Yeah. That’s why I only had a glass of milk this morning.”
“Even if you empty your stomach, can you fit more in… Ugh.”
As Karnov joked, Asha leaned her waist against his and playfully pinched his waist.
“Did you break any of my ribs?”
“Oh, come on. I’m as gentle as a lamb…”
“What’s your definition of gentle? I understand the lamb part.”
Karnov stopped Asha’s left hand and then her right hand, quickly blocking her final attack with the menu. Asha lightly tapped the menu with the end of her bonnet, then looked up in surprise.
“Ugh, Karnov!”
“Let’s pick the desserts first, Your Highness.”
Karnov handed the opened menu to Asha and, as she glanced at the menu, he untied the ribbon of her bonnet.
“Can I take off my bonnet?”
Asha asked, looking at her bonnet in Karnov’s hand. Karnov shrugged.
“Who’s going to see?”
“Oh. Just because my face was in a few magazines…”
“Isn’t Mura more of a problem than a magazine?”
At Karnov’s words, Asha only pursed her lips. Ever since she collected Mura’s paintings when she was young and held an exhibition, she had held Mura exhibitions every few years whenever there had been several more paintings.
However, as the same girl continued to appear as a model in all the paintings at the exhibition, it naturally permeated people’s memories.
“But I didn’t want to stop her from drawing me. If she said she wouldn’t draw anymore…”
“I know. Since Mura Aylau draws nothing but your pictures.”
Asha stared at the menu with a troubled expression. The first article in the <Weekly Vichegda> also said that Mura Aylau, a great artist ahead of her time, only painted Princess Anastasia. Emperor Mikhail even burst into laughter when he saw the article.
– If that’s the case, wouldn’t it be me who would be most upset, not you? The artist ran away because she didn’t want to draw my portrait as an emperor, and now she only draws yours.
Of course, although the emperor laughed, he wasn’t really amused. Asha remembered the emperor’s gaze as he looked down at the magazine and quickly shook her head.
“For the desserts… Vanilla cream mille-feuille with strawberry fraisier, lemon meringue tart, pistachio éclair, and Mont Blanc. I’m curious about the chocolate cake, but I’ll try that next time.”
“What kind of tea do you want?”
“I like this one. ‘Garden of Spring.’ It’s made with orange peel and a little bit of cornflower.”
Not long after Karnov finished ordering, a teapot, teacups, and five small desserts came out. The first thing Asha touched was the strawberry fraisier.
“The sheet on the bottom is dacquoise. It brings back memories of when I used to make it. Karnov, do you remember?”
It was a cake stuffed with dacquoise on the bottom, filled with crème mousseline, mixed custard and butter, and strawberries.
“Oh, I remember. How could I forget the snack you made me work so hard to whip?”
“It sounds a bit harsh when you say ‘work so hard.’”
“Then how about forced me to do it?”
“Let’s call it volunteer service.”
“I understand the meaning of service, but what about voluntary?”
“Karnov, please stop.”
They looked at each other and chuckled softly, then cut a piece of cake with their forks and took a bite. Soon after, Asha rolled her eyes.
“Wow… They used a lot of butter in the cream. Let’s try the other cakes for now.”
After tasting all five cakes, Karnov put down his fork a little distance away and picked up the teacup. Meanwhile, Asha took a deep breath, adjusted her fork, and began to attack the remaining cake pieces.
One bite of cake, one sip of tea, two bites, three bites… After emptying his teacup, Karnov refilled his own cup and grabbed Asha’s hand. Asha’s fork, headed toward the cake, stopped.
“Is this the first time we’ve eaten cake outside? Together.”
Asha slowly nodded as she looked at the hand held by Karnov.
“Oh, really? I’ve never thought about it until now… Uh, yeah.”
“Yeah. Then this will be the first and last cake we eat outside.”
“Why, why do you say that?”
“If you force yourself to finish something you don’t even like, it’ll really be the last.”
“…Who said I don’t like it? I’m enjoying it. Why would you say that?”
“I’m sad if you think I wouldn’t know you’re lying.”
“But… still… making cakes is such a difficult task. If we leave such a meticulously made cake like this, it would be disappointing for the patissier too…”
It was the moment when Asha whispered like that and tried to pull away the hand caught by Karnov. There was a small cough from behind. Asha turned around to see a man dressed in a white rectangular apron, standing with his hands together. It seemed like he was the patissier of this shop, judging by the wrinkled cuffs, which may have been rolled up during the process of making pastries.
“Are you Lady Asha Byshovets, who made a reservation today? How do you find the cakes? Are they to your liking?”
Asha, surprised by the sudden appearance of the patissier, tried to calm her mind, then glanced at Karnov and gestured with her eyes.
‘Asha Byshovets? Byshovets is Olga’s family name.’
‘I asked Baroness Saratov to make a reservation, so she must have made a reservation under that name.’
