The next morning isn't much better: Richard is woken at an unfeasibly early hour by a couple of jet-skiers zipping up and down the lagoon, and when he opens the shutters to see what the unholy, high pitched noise is, he is almost blinded by the rising sun, already throwing off a fierce heat. He feels disoriented and desperately homesick, and he is dreading his first day of work with Sergeant Bordey. Glumly, he goes through his morning routine; shower, shave, suit, tea, and toast; baguette, he decides, toasts up quite well, but he still longs for a nice, familiar, perfectly shaped slice of Hovis. He considers trying out the chocolate spread from the welcome hamper (Richard loves chocolate, when it comes in the form of Cadbury's Dairy Milk, or a Terry's Chocolate Orange, at Christmas), but baulks at the last moment, and thinks wistfully of Marmite instead. Perhaps if he asks his mother nicely, she might post a couple of jars…Richard scoffs under his breath at the idea of his mother even remembering such a request, and moodily nibbles at his baguette, brushing off crumbs from his suit in annoyance, wondering why everything French is so messy… English toast would never leave crisp, flaky crumbs everywhere, nor crumble off in chunks that threatened to leave buttery smears on his second-best suit. English toast would be like eating warmed cardboard, granted, but Richard misses it with a longing that surprises him with its nostalgic intensity. What's wrong with me, he wonders, next I'll be sobbing for spotted dick and custard, or toad in the hole…come on Poole, get a grip!
The tea isn't much better – the leaves themselves seem all right, as far as he can tell, but the island's water supply is soft rainwater, not the chalky, mineral-tasting London water which he is used to, and the milk, while indeed fresh, is from France, and is too…milky, too creamy, and nothing like his usual pint of semi-skimmed from the Sainsbury Local near the Croydon Tube station. After a couple of tentative sips, Richard pulls a face and pours the brew down the sink, followed by the rest of the milk…which is when Sergeant Bordey arrives to collect him for work, rapping sharply on the wall of the shack nearest the open front door, peering inside impatiently.
Richard turns around, startled, as she gasps in horror; he sees her eyebrows shoot up as he tips the milk away, then her hands are on her hips, and her chin takes on a certain jutting quality which tells him she is annoyed…no, make that furious, he thinks, as she turns on her heel and strides back to the waiting vehicle. He dusts the last crumbs of baguette from his shirt front, picks up his slightly battered briefcase (a graduation present from his parents), and grits his teeth at the idea of spending ten minutes in a vehicle under the control of a hostile and angry female Sergeant. Well, and what's it to her, if I think my tea tastes vile, he reasons as he marches down the steps, across the sand of his non-existent front garden (sand, everywhere – what sort of a place is this?), and hoists himself into the passenger seat of the old Land Rover, staring fixedly out of the smeared and bug-encrusted windshield. I'll have to get Fidel onto that, he reminds himself, it's disgusting, as well as dangerous. Lily obviously hadn't made the care and maintenance of official police vehicles a priority…he winces at the thought of her, and from the corner of his eye he sees Sergeant Bordey glance in his direction, then look away again.
They sit in silence for a minute, before Richard realises that the Sergeant has no intention of starting the engine. He wonders what the problem is, but is reluctant to engage with her, as she looks out the driver's side window at the lagoon. He clicks his seatbelt into place; she doesn't move. Finally, he follows this up with "Richard didn't want to die, " referencing a rather effective (or so he thought) UK seatbelt safety advert, aiming to lighten the mood, or at least get her to acknowledge him, then start the vehicle and convey them both to work. She looks at him sideways, and then snaps, "In that case, perhaps Richard should have shown some more consideration, instead of throwing the most expensive milk on the island away." He blinks in surprise, before taking umbrage at her familiar use of his Christian name. "It's Inspector Poole to you, Sergeant, and I'll thank you to remember it. And what business is it of yours if I do pour the milk away? It's my milk, and if I want to make cheese from it, bathe in it like Cleopatra, or tip it straight down the sink, I will do so with impunity. Now, can we please proceed to the police station, so I can discover what delights await me today?" He sits back, folds his arms tightly across his chest, and waits.
The Sergeant mutters something in French, jams the key into the ignition, lets out the clutch of the Defender with a jerk, and swings the vehicle around in as tight a circle as possible, before heading up to the main road into town, steering straight for every corrugation and pothole on the way. Richard clutches the grip strap grimly and rides it out. He is not going to be intimidated by an irritated junior officer with a strange obsession about milk; he does not want to have any more to do with her than is strictly necessary; he will not allow himself to be lulled again into a false sense of security. Not that Sergeant Bordey is interested in lulling me into anything, unless perhaps it's an early grave, he thinks, as she whips through a series of hairpin bends like a rally driver, so that the high vehicle sways sickeningly and he lurches against the door. He shoots her a warning glare – I'm onto you – but she doesn't even notice as they round the last corner and the road straightens out for the final run into Honoré. Sergeant Bordey parks hard and fast in front of the station, swings out of the cab, and stalks inside without so much as acknowledging the sarcastic "Thank-you" that he mutters from between clenched teeth.
Richard gets unsteadily out of the Land Rover and leans up against the fender, clutching his briefcase in front of him like a little boy holding his schoolbag, eyes closed against the sunshine, as he musters the courage to follow her inside. For a moment, he actually finds himself wishing for Lily. At least she had pretended to tolerate him; Sergeant Bordey is making it painfully obvious that she isn't even going to try to pretend. He sighs, feeling tension and annoyance settling in his shoulders, and wonders whether the Commissioner would notice if he just didn't show up today…but where would he go, and what would he do? Nowhere, and nothing, unless he made a break for the airport. For a moment, Richard entertains the idea of just running away, as he had so often dreamt of doing as an unhappy boy, and then he scornfully tells himself get over it, Poole, just get in there and get the job done, as he has so often said to himself as he approached the staff entrance of the station he had been assigned to in London, and he pushes off from the fender and stumps up the uneven steps to the front door.
Only twelve hours to go, he reminds himself, as he enters the main office area to see Dwayne sitting with his feet on the desk, uniform shirt half unbuttoned to allow the breeze from the desk fan to blow soothingly on him, Fidel, on the phone and speaking in the island's Creole patois, who nods an acknowledgement as he sees his new boss arrive, and his Sergeant, sitting ramrod straight at Lily's old desk, industriously, if noisily, sorting through her predecessor's IN and OUT trays, uttering exclamations and imprecations (all in French, of course) as she takes stock. Richard sets his shoulders and walks straight past her to his own desk at the back of the office, and sits down to read through the SOCO reports for the Hulme/Lavender murders. Even though the case has been solved, the paperwork is only just beginning – Lily had not bothered, for obvious reasons, to keep up with the reams of forms and reports that a homicide case generates, even in a backwater like Saint-Marie, and now he and Sergeant Bordey have their work cut out for them. He flicks a glance in the direction of her desk; she is busily punching holes in papers with just a little too much enthusiasm, then threading them neatly into lever arch files, closing the binder mechanisms with a sharp metallic click. He can't help but feel that each crunch! of the hole-punch, each snick! of the metal rings as they snap shut, each slam! of the desk drawers as she methodically goes through them and removes everything of Lily's – photos, keys, a USB drive, even a swimming costume, stuffed into the bottom drawer – and drops them into evidence bags with gloved hands – is somehow directed at him, and he finds it unnerving.
Richard has worked all his life with people who disliked him at best, and outright loathed him at worst, and his usual coping mechanism has been to simply not care; he doesn't know why his tried and true method seems to be failing him now, but he feels very disconcerted. A nice cup of tea is what I need…but where to find one on this miserable speck of rock in the middle of the Caribbean? Richard's eye falls on an out-dated copy of the local Yellow Pages, and an idea sparks at the back of his mind. He surreptitiously opens the book at H, for Hotels, and High Tea, and begins to peruse the advertisements…
