Chapter 7: Revelry

A/N: Well I can't be funny every chapter.


Camille found she really rather liked the way Richard's eyes seemed to find her wherever she was in the bar. Most of this evening she'd actually spent extracting him from conversations with local politicians and businessmen as opposed to saving him from unwanted female attention. The Commissioner had been rather firm with her earlier that she too attempt to do a little networking, so on several occasions was forced to leave him to go say hello to some lawyer, local politician or officer from Guadeloupe. She always felt him watching her though, even when he was supposed to be talking to the Mayor of Honore and the Commissioner about next year's budget.

The music was pretty loud, and several guests were using the patio as an impromptu dance floor. Camille could see the Duke and Duchess discussing something in one corner of the bar, she appeared to be asking something whilst the Duke looked grumpy and refused. She could see Richard in his father at that moment, realised just how many of his traits were inherited. Eventually the Duke seemed to give up and nod in agreement to something the Duchess was saying, and then he got up to join Richard, the Commissioner and the Mayor. This left the Duchess alone, which Camille didn't like to see, so she went to join her.

"How are you this evening, Madam?" She stood politely before Richard's mother, despite how often the Duchess had invited Camille to be more casual around her she still felt like she should wait for permission to sit.

"Camille, my dear, would you care to join me? I've managed to convince my husband he will be dancing with me if they put on a slow song, which I will of course ensure by making the request myself shortly," She said as Camille sat down with her. She followed the Duchess' gaze to find her watching her husband fondly.

"You love him very much," Camille said without really thinking about it. Richard's mother was such a bright, charming woman she did find the pairing a little odd, but her love for her husband was obvious every time Camille had seen them together.

"Well of course I do, dear, we've always been very happy together," Camille must not have hidden her thoughts well enough, because the Duchess actually tsked before telling her firmly. "Now, dear, just because he's not all hearts and flowers like French young men might be when trying to woo you doesn't mean he doesn't love me. Poole men just don't work that way, they are a bit more, well, subtle. It took him two years to pluck up the courage to ask me out."

Camille was unable to resist asking how exactly Poole men did go about showing their feelings.

"Well, let me see, there used to be this advertising campaign in the UK for these sweets and it was 'do you love anybody enough to give them your last rolo?'. My husband will always save me the last one, he'd even sometimes buy a packet when away on some diplomatic trip and then bring the last one home with him – normally it was a bit too manky to actually eat but it was the sentiment that was important," She paused, smiling, probably remembering the many chocolate offerings of her marriage. "If you knew how big a sweet tooth my husband has you'd understand the significance of that gesture better, I think."

"Richard told me something similar," Camille commented.

"Well it's not just that, it's how he does things that make him so terribly uncomfortable because it makes me happy – like dancing, or spending the afternoon in the Tate Modern," she continued. "I used to think he cared more about his job than anything else in the world. I told him about how this young woman who lived near me was going to be deported back to Viet Nam – this was during the war of course. He stayed up all night, putting in phone calls, begging various ministers, secured the young woman residency in the UK – even though such a thing could have seriously set back his career. Civil servants are not supposed to question to actions of their superiors."

"That was very noble of him," Camille agreed, though her mind was already considering the actions of his son, a man who covered up the true motives of a murderer to save the rainforest, who gave back stolen medication to a nurse practitioner so he could keep helping those who could not afford medical help otherwise.

"He still surprises me now you know. The library at Euston Hall has this set of first edition M.R. James novels – he was friends with one of the previous Dukes. King's College have been making offers for that set of novels for I don't know how long, but he would not give them up. His father used to read them to Peter and he, and in fact when we went to Euston Hall for visits Peter always loved scaring Richard with a tale or too. Anyway, yesterday the man comes to me and says he rang the head librarian at King's and came up with a new offer – he's given them the books in exchange for them maintaining a new, well stocked library at the hospital with at least a third of the books being for children. He must have made the decision when we popped in to visit young Solomon again, he disappeared and I thought he'd just gotten bored but I found him scowling in the library. I had no idea…" The Duchess looked a little teary, and to her surprise Camille found herself feeling quite moved as well.


At the same time Camille was receiving a lecture from the Duchess of Grafton, Richard managed to find himself alone with his father when the Mayor and Commissioner excused themselves to go greet some other minor dignitary who had just arrived. Richard glanced around for Camille, whilst mentally berating himself for having spent the entire evening doing so. On a few occasions he'd entirely missed what was being said because he was too distracted by the sight of her.

"She's with your mother," his father supplied helpfully, and Richard immediately tried not to blush that it had been so obvious his attention was elsewhere.

"Uh-oh," he said under his breath, he began to debate interrupting them in case his mother decided to give Camille a similar talk to the one he had received earlier.

"What's the matter, son?" His father asked, following his son's gaze.

"Oh it's just," he sighed, debating is he should actually confide in his father. Decided to simply because then he might exert some control over the situation. "Mum isn't always the most realistic person, she's such a romantic and I think she has some vague idea that this is all, I don't know, like a fairy tale. The plain heir to the Dukedom moves far away and disguises himself as a common police officer in the vain hope he finds somebody who loves him for who he is and not his title. For reasons I can't fathom she has decided that woman is Camille, which is utterly insane. This is not a fairy tale, and a woman like Camille Bordey has about a thousand better suitors than me."

"You know son, sometimes fairy tales do come true."

Richard couldn't believe that his devastatingly practical father had actually just uttered those words. Since he was 90% sure his Dad was just finishing his second glass of wine, alcohol could not be to blame. Richard mentally started running through the symptoms of a stroke in his head, and having also eliminated that as a possibility, ended up asking stupidly, "I'm sorry, what?"

"Look, um, I've no desire to get overly sentimental here, but I never would have imagined your mother would agree to marry me. She was independent, feisty and gorgeous – I was not the obvious choice for her, you know? But she did pick me and, well, it felt like a little personal miracle," his father confessed. Richard, having never heard his father speak like this before, was pretty much just left silent and shuffling awkwardly. "If you're worried let's go over there and make sure your mother is behaving, eh?"

They approached the women, to find them both looking a little tearful. Father and son exchanged mildly panicked looks, Camille missed this but Richard's mother must have caught it because she ending up letting out a laugh.

"Is everything ok, my dear?" His father asked cautiously.

To Richard's surprise Camille leapt to her feet and addressed his father, "Your Grace, well I just wanted to say thank you for arranging the new library at the hospital. I know those books had great value, not just monetary, and I think what you did was very sweet."

Richard realised what Camille was going to do only about half a second before she did it, so he was unable to prevent it when she threw her arms around his father and kissed him on the cheek. He almost laughed at his father's reaction, the way he just stood very still and looked like he was willing the experience to be over as soon as possible.

"Camille," he said, putting a hand on her arm and guiding her away before she succeeded in actually giving his father a heart attack. He didn't remove his hand immediately, because surely he should continue to try to restrain her, right?

"Oh God that was really inappropriate, wasn't it?" Camille seemed genuinely mortified by her actions.

"It's fine Sergeant Bordey, I'm just…not used to people expressing their gratitude in such a manner," behind her husband's back, Angela Poole, Duchess of Grafton, was physically biting her tongue to stop herself from bursting into laughter. Her husband seemed to sense her amusement though, shooting her a sideways glance of disapproval that only tickled her more.

"You gave the M.R. James novels to King's?" Richard asked, this was the first he'd heard of it.

"Yes, in exchange for them maintaining a decent library at the hospital," his father replied, subconsciously taking a step back in case reiterating the fact should cause Camille to throw her arms around him again.

"You love those books," Richard couldn't help but continue.

"Yes," his father confirmed. Richard supposed if he had a normal relationship with his father he'd be able to say 'well I think that was really nice of you Dad'. In fact he might have done if his father wasn't still recovering from Camille's slightly emotional response. So instead he just sort of nodded his acknowledgement and his father gave him a curt nod in return.

"Come on, darling," his mother said standing. "I want to see if they have our song."

With a very audible sigh Richard's father followed her.

Next to him, Camille said miserably, "He thinks I'm crazy now doesn't he?"

"Oh no," Richard dismissed, looking down at her. "He's just very English and he probably thinks you're very French. He'll get over it, I did."

This succeeded in drawing a smile from her, which was his aim. That smile got a little bit wider when the pace of the music changed, and damn it he knew exactly what she was thinking.

"Oh come on, Camille. Can't I get a pass? It is my birthday."

"It's your party and you'll refuse to dance if you want to?" She teased.

He actually got that popular culture reference, "Exactly!"

"Well I'm not forcing you to dance," she told him coyly. "I'm just letting you know that I wouldn't say no if you ask."

"Well there are about thirty other men eyeing you up in the bar, I'm sure they'd make better partners than me," he told her exasperated.

"Well I'm not going to say yes to them," To his surprise, she sounded as exasperated as he was, and he was thoroughly confused by her response to his suggestion.

"Why not?"

Now she looked confused by his confusion, and told him firmly, "Because I came here with you."

With that response, Richard changed the probability of his mother being right about Camille from "infinitesimal" to "minute".

"Okay," he said. Camille must have thought he was just acknowledging her statement, because she looked surprised when he stood and offered her a hand.

"You want to dance?" she asked for clarity.

"No, I do not want to dance. But you do, and you know, you got dressed up and you look, um, well fantastic. And since you've had to put up with me all evening I think it's just polite and…" his frustration at being unable to be articulate got the better of him, and he ended up finishing with, "Look do you want to dance or not?"

She took his hand, rising as she told him sincerely, "Of course I do. And don't be so self-deprecating, I haven't been putting up with you. I've had a really nice time."

As she moved in closer than he expected, he upgraded "minute" to just "unlikely".