On Talia's thirty-fourth hesitation about whether to get up from bed, her resolve was harshly jolted by the fragrance wafting from downstairs.
This is absolutely ludicrous, thought Talia. Her room's place in the Rodrix Manor was akin to Texas in America. It was damned impossible for the aroma to drift through the corridors to her.
Unless it didn't come from the corridors.
Talia, her hair disheveled and her clothes disarrayed, walked to the window with her middle and ring fingers pressing against a throbbing headache. A swing of her arm pulled back the heavy curtains and a strong smell rushed into her nostrils.
As she looked down, Shiller was glancing up at her from the edge of the glass door of the pavilion.
Talia let out a faint whimper of agony. The most damned thing was that she knew the contents of the big pot on the picnic table might be no better than what was in the witch's cauldron, but she was still keen to eat heartily since she felt so famished.
Normally, hunger wasn't a problem for her. Talia could keep still even if the delicious food was placed in front of her and she was starving to the brink of human tolerance. But not now.
She didn't know why not now. She didn't know that the human body is more delicate than she imagined. The most delicate part being that if a string is overstretched, there are only two outcomes; it either snaps or loses its elasticity after relaxing, unable to be stretched so tightly again.
There's a limit to human spirit. If the mental torture Talia endured before was slowly tightening this string, then Shiller was just like playing a Paganini composition with a bow on it.
Then she lifted her hand. Talia thought in despair, letting the broken string dangle on the instrument, why couldn't she make some noise by herself?
Talia jumped straight down from the third floor.
Butler Merkel, standing on the other side of the pavilion, seemed even more anxious than when he had been kidnapped as he watched Talia stand upright in the bushes, pulling back her chaotic black hair, and brushing off the leaves that had stuck to her silk robe.
Only then, Talia saw clearly that there was a picnic table in the pavilion, but behind it was a small round shiny red grill. Fallen tortoise back bamboo leaves resembled natural fans. The white steam against the green backdrop seemed innocently harmless.
Pamela was picking meat behind the grill with tongs. The meat looked very fresh and was a deep purplish-red, strikingly enchanting against the vast green vegetation.
Shiller was placing plates on the picnic table. Merkel was carrying a big pile of decayed leaves collected from inside the pavilion, stepping unevenly towards the distance. Two children were playing chaser beyond the clear glass door. The wind fluttered up one corner of the picnic tablecloth, and a strong hand smoothed out the wrinkles.
Like smoothing out something else, Talia pondered blankly, but for some reason, what sprung into her mind wasn't the chequered dress similar to the vibrant tablecloth. What was it?
Talia gently shook her head, casting off the irrelevant associations. She lifted her robe's hemline, kicked off her slippers, and walked barefoot outside the pavilion.
"You have a larger build than Anna, but all I have here are leftover robes of hers. At least she didn't get so drunk she threw up on it after the party."
"She's your colleague?"
"Yes, a respectable mathematician." Shiller held the door open for Talia. Talia gathered her dress and stepped inside.
As Pamela was deboning the meat, she raised an eyebrow at Talia. But Talia was too hungry for banter. Now even if the pot contained a whole periodic table of elements, she would not stop eating.
"It seems you're starving. Regrettably, Gotham can't find any decent chefs at the moment. The meals were prepared by my butler which might not be too suitable for this season."
Shiller made way for Talia to peer into the pot. Good, Talia had always suspected something amiss with this so-called Butler Merkel. If he were indeed one of those weak Brits, he should've cried out the moment she throttled his neck.
A bowl of borscht might not fit the season, but to Talia, there was nothing more suitable for her stomach now than a high-calorie soup. Otherwise, she might devour a whole pig if she were to fill her stomach with cold Spanish ham.
Shiller brought a big wooden spoon and without any hesitation, served Talia a big bowl of soup. As she took the bowl, she looked up at Shiller: "I thought your banquet would be more..."
"More what?"
"I'm not sure. Like the ones I once attended. A heavy long table, a wrinkle-free table cloth, and dishes valued more for their appearance than taste."
"You have an astonishing sense of humor, Miss Talia." Shiller chuckled, he shifted his pot even further away, and said, "If I could, I'd like to hold such a banquet, too, but alas, the brutal heat almost wiped out all of Gotham's top chefs and the guests on the invite list. The safety of the food can hardly be guaranteed as high temperatures cause the meat to deteriorate quickly."
Talia couldn't help but look at the meat Pamela was handling. The color was a bit strange, deeper than any raw meat Pamela had ever seen, and with few fibrous parts. Almost never was there any blood smell.
"What kind of meat is that?"
"Reindeer meat. Have you ever tried it?" said Shiller as he began to put cold dishes on the plates, still the usual cheese, ham, vegetable salad, their smell completely overpowered by the hot soup from the pot.
Talia took a sip from the bowl, unable to suppress a sigh of satisfaction. She could taste the amount of butter in it and she even started to appreciate the Russian culture and weather for once.
"Regarding our previous conversation…" Shiller lowered his voice slightly. Talia was unsure if she detected a hint of tenderness in his deep voice. She noticed Shiller subtly glancing towards Pamela with his eyes.
Talia asked, "What's wrong?"
"Bruce sent her here, she did not want to come."
Talia raised an eyebrow, thinking she understood Shiller's implications. She quickly scooped up the dried food in her soup with her spoon, took cautious sips of it, then stood up from her chair beside the picnic table and sat down on a small stool next to the grill.
"Are you Bruce's girlfriend?"
"Clearly, I'm not." Pamela glared at Talia and said, "That's just a rumour they have."
"Then why are you here on his behalf?"
Pamela lowered her eyes and said, "Because I don't want the rumors to continue."
"Because being Bruce Wayne's girlfriend brings you unimaginable trouble, hm?" Talia raised an eyebrow, her expression full of unspeakable allure.
"He's purposefully letting these rumors continue." Pamela rubbed her furrowed brows with two fingers, her voice was laced with a touch of pain as she said, "I didn't actually get anything from him, but he let people think I was dating a rich man. When those people started causing me trouble out of jealousy, he seemed very happy, the damn sadist."
Talia averted her gaze, the laughter in her eyes slowly faded away. She started fiddling with the charcoal fire in the grill, seemingly just to keep her hands busy. Soon, half-heartedly, half-seriously she said, "So it seems we both have had some trouble with him."
"It's not just the two of us." Pamela snorted coldly, then continued, "Do you know that he's engaged?"
Of course, Talia knew, but she still feigned surprise and replied, "Not a girlfriend?"
"No, she used to live at Wayne Manor permanently, she even helped Bruce with his child, not his adopted son, but his biological daughter."
This was information already available, but there were things that Talia had not discovered in her own investigations. Even though she didn't expect Pamela to have any intel, she still asked, "Bruce Wayne seems to not have been married before."
"Clearly, another victim." Pamela pierced her thigh with a boning knife, lowered her gloomy head, continued her action and said, "Of course, the whole world believes he's entitled to his affairs, aren't you also eagerly climbing into his bed?"
Talia neatly sidestepped the subject, but she felt that this might be a good opportunity, unrelated to her initial plan of obtaining Batman's genetic material.
By now she realized, if Batman really was a morally bankrupt scumbag, then the likely method, other than knocking him out and forcibly obtaining his genetic material, seemed non-existent.
However, Batman would certainly be on high alert, so Talia knew she needed to devise a plan to distract him, in other words, give him some trouble.
"People laugh off a millionaire's romantic history, because it's not like those entangled with him are completely innocent." Talia pinned her black hair behind her ears and continued, "Most people are attracted to his wealth, or they are only attracted by the vanity that comes with the world's richest man as their boyfriend. However, if he's been abusing these girls, it's a whole different matter, right?"
"What kind of abuse?" Pamela shrugged and said, "He neither hit me nor scolded me, people would say that I am the one who started these rumors, in order to pressure Bruce into making it true."
"Actually, it's him doing so." Talia stared deep into Pamela's eyes and said, "He enjoys manipulating these girls, watching them suffer, and if they become too much trouble, he would even resort to illegal methods…has he ever drugged you?"
Pamela opened her eyes wide and said, "Of course not."
"Really? Not even a suspicious moment? Such as sudden dizziness, lack of concentration, things like that."
Pamela pursed her lips and presented a hesitant expression, she shrugged and said, "How to distinguish that from the effects of staying up late and fatigue? Please, this isn't a legal cross-examination."
"Have you discussed these issues with your professor, Pamela?" Shiller asked.
Pamela shook her head and said, "That's my personal business."
"Perhaps he's just capitalizing on that." As he straightened the folds in the tablecloth, Shiller said, "He knows that society would put tremendous pressure on any woman who steps forward to challenge him. People would claim that you took his money and accepted his expensive gifts voluntarily, thereby consenting to his emotional abuse. Worst-case scenario, they would just say that you fell into the trap of being a gold-digger, that you brought it upon yourselves."
"Anyway, Pamela." Shiller turned his head to look at Pamela and said, "The professors at Gotham University will always stand on the side of justice and fairness, we will not bow to money or public opinion."
At that point, Talia stood up. A smile appeared on her face, her eyes sparkling as she said, "Professor Shiller, could you perhaps recommend me a good doctor?"
"What are you trying to do?"
"Testing for drug residues."