S2 E7 – The Bet
Part 1 of 2
'Drinks all afternoon says he hasn't a clue!'
Through the haze and pleasant buzz of alcohol, D. I. Poole distinctly remembers SAYING that.
He even remembers meaning it.
But not in a losing frame of mind. Oh, no. He'd been SO sure he was right that it never even occurred to him that he might be wrong and that he might spend the rest of the afternoon trying to keep up with a French woman who obviously had a hollow leg or maybe is pouring her drinks out the window when he isn't looking!
Not that he isn't looking!
Oh, no, to that, too.
He's looking at her all right. Can't seem to help it. He also can't help but notice how she seems to glow with some inner hilarity that he doesn't understand. He slips one eye closed and peers at her anew. Yep. Nope. She's awful happy about something. But what? Maybe she's got a hot date lined up for later after she's drunk me under the table? His heart twists suddenly but he puts it down to the burning peristalsis in his throat and shrugs it off.
As the afternoon wears on and the liquor builds up in his system, he just has to marvel at her capacity for liquor. God! Did the woman never pause for breath? Whose idea was it to keep pace with each other? I'm heavier. I have the greater body mass. I should be the one to set the pace. But… no… once again she's out-maneuvered me somehow. Christ! Where is she putting it? There's nothing to her!
He spends a pleasant minute running his gaze over her, wondering where she can possibly be putting all this booze when she catches him at it. He stumbles out an apology but she just grins and looks more gleeful than ever. He is supremely grateful to escape another dressing down for ogling. It wasn't an ogle. It wasn't! He is merely appreciating her… her… her fitness. Yes! Her fitness.
He downs his current drink to cover up his lapse. Whomever she's seeing tonight, he's in for one hell of an adventure, if I'm any judge of women who indulge. His heart gives another odd twist. He thumps himself on the chest, trying to loosen whatever obstacle is lodged in his throat but there doesn't seem to be anything there. Odd.
They have now finished everything he has in his little shack. Even the cooking sherry! God help me!
She stands up, grabs her purse, and a wave of relief washes over him. She's done! She's going! I'll be left in peace and quiet to pass out here in this chair. I'll wake up with a thumper of a headache and a groaning back but… I'll take whatever small mercies I can get! He salutes her with his empty glass, "Ave, victor. I concede defeat. Go thy way in triumph." Except he says it in Latin without realizing it.
She stands over him, seeming to be weighing him somehow.
Probably comparing me to her hot date, he thinks morosely. God, why do I have to be such a zero? Why don't women look at me like that? What can't SHE…? He shakes his head abruptly. Don't go there, Poole. She's not for you. If she even suspects what I'm thinking… Oh, the laughter! I couldn't stand her scorn, or even worse, her pity. Man up. Send her on her way. She deserves a life and this isn't it!
He lifts his glass to her once more and says, "Calling it a day?" At least, that's what he thinks he says.
"Oh, no," she finally murmurs, "Not when things are just starting to get interesting! I'm off to Maman's to raid her bar. I'll be right back! Don't you go anywhere!" She leans down to stare into his hazy gaze with firm resolve, "And, even if you DO go somewhere, I'll find you. I'm a detective, after all." With that totally incomprehensible comment, she is gone, seeming to simply shimmer out of existence somehow.
He goggles about. Yep, she's definitely not here. Unless… He manages to stagger to his feet after three tries. Funny, I've never noticed how hard it is to get up out of these chairs before. He carefully circumnavigates his veranda. No Camille. He peers in through the veranda door. No Camille. His eye is captured by his bed for some reason but he can see she's not there either. Giving up, he turns back to face his beach.
MY beach, he muses. When did it become my beach? Well, about the same time I realized I no longer wished to go back to England. Benjamin Sammy showed me the truth. Saint-Marie is my home now. Mine to guard and mine to keep. But not alone. I don't want to be alone any longer. I have to do something. I have to make my life here. And for that, I need a real partner.
Once more, Camille's image roars into his head unbidden. He sucks in a deep breath, feeling his oxygen-starved cells soak it up like, well, oxygen. OK, he tells himself sternly, enough of that! I need to sober up and I need to send her away when she gets back. This whole situation is getting too dangerous!
He more or less falls down the two steps to his beach and desperately begins pacing. Much more of this and I will be legless in no time and then… ! Who knows what will happen? Certainly not me! I've never been this drunk and alone with a woman before! Certainly not with a woman as irresistible as Camille Bordey! Certainly not with a French woman! Well, OK, half-French, but that isn't any safer! I'd better hurry up and get my wits back before the unthinkable happens! My thoughts are almost out of control. I can't risk making a slip and giving her the slightest hint as to my urges. She'll defenestrate me!
Just as he is congratulating himself in managing such a big word, she is suddenly in his midst with such a collection of booze that he is sure her mother is complicit with the plan to get him so totally drunk that he loses his mind and his inhibitions and… No! I have to try! I can't give in so easily as this! I have to fight it. Have to. Have to…
She takes his hand and leads him back up the steps. She deposits him back into his chair and leaves momentarily. Just as his eyes are slipping closed once more, here she comes with yet another tray of assorted poison that is sure to kill him.
She locks eyes with him as she sets the tray down on the veranda table and gives him a challenging look that almost seems to say 'Are you man enough, sir?'.
END – part 1