Dark could not tell from them whether the footprints belonged to one person or two.
Much less could he infer a person's posture from those traces.
Even the faint water marks vanished completely a little farther on.
In the real world, where were there so many traces that could be followed?
Only then did Dark suddenly think to ask, "By the way, why did Diana come to deliver the chocolate so early? There shouldn't be any particular timing for Valentine's Day gifts, right?"
Rose's face immediately flushed red again.
She averted her gaze and murmured, "They say that giving it early brings good luck."
Dark asked, "How early is early?"
Rose said, "As early as possible, I suppose."
Dark opened his mouth. Connecting the clues before and after, a thread of logic suddenly formed in his mind.
He could not help but cover his head. "I think I've figured it out."
He had avoided the tropes of detective novels.
Only to fail to avoid the tropes of romance novels.
The tropes of life really did come one after another.
Giving it early brought good luck.
Since such a saying existed...
If it were Eudora...
She might have been waiting outside the door since last night!
Thinking of that terrifying stunt she had pulled at Christmas, when she had presented herself as a gift, Dark felt that there was probably nothing too far beyond common sense for her to do.
And if he imagined further...
A delicate, frail person spending the night outside amid heavy snowfall—if she only caught a cold, that would already be incredibly fortunate.
"Let's go to the infirmary."
Dark sighed.
Why were the children of this year's class so incapable of putting people's minds at ease?
Inside the infirmary.
Sister Callian had casually thrown a coat over