Pamela stood in front of the gate of the Rodrix Manor.
Her hesitation to ring the doorbell was evident, as each previous visit had seen the young butler greeting her with a smile before she even got out of her car.
This was highly unusual, Pamela thought, Professor Shearer seemed to be aware of the whereabouts of every visitor to his manor, their timings and arrivals were hardly a secret, hence every guest was greeted just in time.
But this time, no one was there to welcome Pamela.
Pamela knew she had no grounds to complain about any perceived rudeness, as her visit was indeed sudden and unannounced. However, she did believe the blame shouldn't solely fall on her as it was Bruce who had asked her to come.
The wealthy businessman had a reason for this—Bruce claimed that if Pamela didn't visit, they'd likely be having dinner with Miss Talia tomorrow, which Pamela dismissed as a ghost story-style joke.
Having come to learn about the full extent of Bruce's relationship with Talia, Pamela thought that Bruce was likely concerned that an angry Talia's visit to Shearer may pull him down further. Since Bruce had invested in Pamela's security plant research project, she knew she was obligated and reluctantly agreed to make the troublesome visit to an irate Shearer.
She really must have been out of her mind to give him her phone number, Pamela mumbled to herself, suspecting there would be more of such troublesome tasks ahead.
But she knew that she first needed to tackle the current task at hand. Actually, she didn't want Talia to be torn apart either, because she was quite attractive and Pamela had never tried it before.
Thinking about this, she licked her own lips, craned her neck to gaze into the mansion, but didn't hear a sound.
Breaking in through a side door would be too much, Pamela wasn't good at things like that, so she decided to play to her strengths and find her own way into the Rodrix Manor.
And what could the strength of the spokesperson for All Things Green be?
Pamela circled to the back of the Rodrix Manor and in the corner of the garden, there was a banyan tree planted by the previous owner. The tree was neither tall nor noticeable, but since it was so close to the wall, when Pamela was drawing up the design of the garden at the Rodrix Manor, she had considered moving this tree to avoid anyone climbing in through the branches.
Standing outside the fence, Pamela beckons, a bough extends along the top of the fence, then more vines wrap around and quickly weave a ladder.
Pamela expertly climbed the vine ladder into the yard and surveyed the ruins of the garden, moving up the estimated starting date of the project.
She sent the preliminary design plans to Shearer last night and soon received a reply. As always, Shearer had given her some quite practical suggestions, and Pamela had been thinking about improving the design all day.
As to why she did it, the answer was surprisingly straightforward—Pamela planned to continue her studies at school, but she also needed money.
She wanted to do work she enjoyed, like designing a garden for a mansion. She was gifted in this field and used her unique ability to make the work feel easier. Moreover, she earned good money dealing with the wealthy, which made it quite a satisfying part-time job.
The problem she faced was that the prerequisite for designing a garden for a mansion was that there had to be an estate owner who was willing to let her practice with their garden, and the only estate owner in Gotham who wouldn't mind their garden getting ruined several times was probably Shearer.
Pamela was grateful for this, cherishing the opportunity. So, when she walked through the garden at Rodrix Manor again, she carefully observed its structure, trying as much as possible to analyze the changes Shearer had suggested in actual terms.
Before she knew it, she had reached the back door of the main building of the manor. Pamela stepped onto the porch, reached out to knock on the door, but then hesitated as she noticed something out of the corner of her eye.
Pamela looked back, standing between two steps, looking toward her side and the ground under the floor-to-ceiling windows.
The place was covered in mud, battered either by the heavy rain or the sprinklers, and the few small plants still left there had toppled over and were already dead. However, what caught Pamela's attention was a gleaming white patch in the mud.
Pamela lifted her skirt, gingerly stepping along the edge of the building to the ground beneath the floor-to-ceiling windows. As she bent down for a close look, she saw it— several white petals clustered together.
Frowning slightly, Pamela turned again to look up at the diagonally rising window, the only one on the floor-to-ceiling glass and the supposed apex of the petal's trajectory.
It was a camellia flower thrown from the window.
Pamela then looked through the misty floor-to-ceiling window, no one was in the room so she had a full view of the entire room. Pamela had never been inside, but her eye immediately caught the camellia flower in a thin vase on the desk at the other end of the room.
Through the glass, Pamela's searching gaze became more purposeful and, as she expected, a coffee table between the single-seat couches held another vase but it was missing its flower.
The only two vases in the room were both ornamental vases, suitable for holding flowers or as decorations. The one on the coffee table was even shorter, perfect for a standalone coffee table decor.
Again, Pamela turned to face the wall. As she watched, tiny vine tendrils turned over the soil to reveal the stem beneath the petals. By its length, this Camilla flower must have been the one on the coffee table.
Shearer was not a person who liked flowers.
Pamela figured this out very early on. She had noticed during her previous visits to Rodrix Manor that there were no decorative flowers in the huge manor, which was almost unthinkable.
Pamela knew Shearer was someone who treasured style and nuance; without flowers, the interior decor would lack the color and vitality they normally brought. Yet there were no living flowers to be seen anywhere within Rodrix Manor.
Pamela learned the reason for this anomaly from Shearer's reply to her email last night. Shearer doesn't despise flowers; he just dislikes the smell of flowers.
Shearer had emphasized in his response to Pamela's garden decoration suggestion not to use fragrant flowers, believing that some uncontrolled scents might affect his thinking. Pamela changed her flower selection criteria based on his suggestion.
Just thinking about Shearer's suggestions in the email, Pamela quickly made the connection. She lowered her eyes to the camellia in the soil, realizing something was off.
Camellias vary in kind, and so do their scents. Some have hardly any scent, while others have an intense fragrance. The one discarded into the soil was clearly one of the strongly scented ones.
Did Shearer throw the camellia out of the window just because of its scent? Pamela pondered briefly, then quickly dismissed the idea. Merkel clearly understood Shearer better. If Shearer detested fragrant flowers, this type of flower would not have ended up in a vase in the manor.
Moreover, Shearer had not traditionally used decorative flowers, and the vases were always left as ornaments. Why would he suddenly insert flowers into two vases today? And fragrant ones at that?
Pamela couldn't figure out the answer. But as she continued to inspect the camellia debris in the soil, she noticed several inconspicuous footprints around, not left by Shearer, but by a stranger.
The footprints appeared abruptly in front of the floor-to-ceiling window with no apparent path of approach. There was only one possibility: the stranger had fallen from the sky. Pamela could only look up.
She saw a pair of slightly scattered grey eyes.
Shearer was standing on the balcony of a second floor room, leaning against the railing, looking down from a high vantage point.
Pamela felt a bone-chilling cold in an instance.
But Shearer just glanced at her, sighed softly, then turned and retreated back into his room.
When Pamela came to her senses, she felt that she saw a touch of helplessness in Shearer's stare. She didn't understand the meaning of this, but she saw a certain indulgence in Shearer's eyes.
Then, a thin vine climbed up the vertical decorative line on the manor's surface. Pamela began listening to the upstairs movement through the plants. Besides Shearer's voice, she heard another slightly familiar female voice.
"...I'm much better now, thank you."
That was Talia's voice.
Pamela's brow furrowed tighter. She hadn't forgotten what she had been tasked to do. The vine boldly climbed onto the balcony railing and found a slim gap left by the slightly ajar balcony door.
The tip of the thin vine decisively burrowed into the crevice, and the scene in the room came into full view. It was a study room, specifically the master's private study room.
The place was identifiable as a private space because it didn't have the matching furniture usually found in a reception area. There was only one single-seater sofa, and the table in front was too small, just enough to hold a set of teaware. Several books were scattered on the table, not organized neatly like a classroom.
"Is this your study?" Talia looked up at Shearer, who had just served her a hot cup of tea, and asked.
"Yes, Miss. I believe you've had some symptoms of panic attack, and a relatively enclosed private space might help improve your mood," Shearer replied.
"I do feel somewhat better," Talia averted her gaze, then turned to look at Shearer again, as if reevaluating him.
Talia began to doubt her senses. There were no vibrant feathers, no ice-cold vertical pupils, and no venom-dripping fangs. The Shearer before her was slightly different but not terrifying.
Suddenly, Talia gripped the cup handle tighter. She gritted her teeth and spat out a name: "Bruce Wayne!"
Shearer paused midway through arranging the teaware. He looked curiously at Talia and asked, "Pardon me, Miss. What did you say?"
Talia muttered under her breath as she recalled, "When did he drug me? And what drug did he use?"
"I apologize, Miss Talia."
"No, it's nothing. I'm just thinking about something else." Talia tilted her head and took a sip of the hot tea. Her anger was unabated. It had to be Bruce Wayne who drugged her, as the haze of illusion often appeared during her antidrug training sessions.
But what kind of drug could knock her out in an instant and then, once she regained consciousness, cause her to hallucinate visions of Shearer? Well, they were hallucinations, right?
Talia felt a bit spacey. She raised her head and scrutinized Shearer's facial features in an almost rude manner before shifting her gaze to his attire.
Nothing there could trigger a terrifying fantasy, so it was probably just the residual effect of drugs causing hallucinations.
At that moment, Shearer put down the teaware, backed away slightly and, with a hint of concern, said to Talia, "I don't think I've ever mentioned, but I'm a licensed psychologist. If you're troubled about family relationships, perhaps I could provide some advice."
"No... my troubles are not family-related, Doctor. I need to know right away whether I've been affected by drugs."