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Lady F had always adored Christmas. More importantly she had always adored a party, and Christmas was the perfect opportunity for a great one. It wouldn’t have been a Montague event if half of England hadn’t been invited to it, but the afterparty was a different story. Those were private, peaceful. Close friends and… dubiously invited plus ones.
The father was there, of course. Peculiarly it wouldn’t have been the same without him, even when he was quietly sipping some sort of brandy Hornby had so graciously acquired when Mrs M wasn’t looking. Bridgette herself was a woman who looked simultaneously displeased and ecstatic to be there, and Felicia gravitated towards her, the alcohol leaving her even more raring to fight than usual with Bunty following after her like a begrudging little duckling. The poor woman couldn’t drink for the life of her, and she tottered a little, but Sid had been expecting it enough to have kept one hand free to correct her just in case. The five of them gathered in the corner of a sitting room, drinking and laughing and gossiping about the weeks peculiar events which often ranged from humdrum to outright insanity as they secluded themselves from all the other guests in the room who hadn’t quite left yet. Somewhere in the distance she could hear Mallory’s angry little grumblings, but that had rather been the background noise of the entire evening, so much so that she’d almost gotten used to it. She had gotten into the habit of inviting the Kembleford constabulary when Mallory’s predecessors were still around, and It would be rude to rescind the invitation now. Still, it really rather grated on her when combined with blind ‘Arry’s wild laughter and occasional equally wild repartee. Invited by Mrs M, she assumed. The two got along more famously than they tended to admit.
Mallory and Harold argued just as famously, if not more. The two could simply pass each other in the street and then almost as if by magic they would be pulled together, bickering endlessly over the smallest of details. ‘Arry seemed to find a perverse joy in winding up the inspector, pushing the edge between annoying and being arrested.
It took her a second or two to notice it when it did, but the pair’s argument actually –and surprisingly- stopped. Slowly, Felicia turned around, curious as to what could possibly shut the two men up.
“You have got to be kidding me.” Silently they stood, stock still and trembling, hands clenched around their glasses as they stared up at the ceiling. More specifically at the piece of mistletoe that was attached to it. It was ridiculous, really. She’d put some up for the party but they had mostly been let down by now. This was probably the only one left in the house, and she hadn’t exactly made it invisible. Were they blind? Somebody in the meagre crowd -most suspected Bunty- cheered, and the rest joined in. There was a moment where Mallory stared at Father Brown as if to be the voice of reason, but the man just smiled, sipping his brandy with false innocent glee.
“It is tradition.” If there was any sort of vindictive pleasure in the priest’s voice, nobody took note of it.
If the inspector had a response to that, nobody got to hear it. Even if they could have in the sudden din it had been neatly, well messily interrupted by Harold Slow making the best of an amusing situation, leaning over the inspector to pull him into a kiss. There was whooping, and claps, and the entire gang had known each other too long not to smile happily when the kiss went on just a few seconds too long. Mallory put up the barest inch of a fight and In the corner, Bunty laughed.
“They’ve been dancing around that mistletoe all night.” Indeed, now that she thought about it the two men had never strayed far from their spot in the room. She’d been so annoyed by their arguing she hadn’t seen it. “I was wondering if they were ever going to work up the nerve to do it.”
Unsurprisingly, they disappeared after that. Harold dragged the almost certainly blushing (and not even remotely managing to pull it off as angry) inspector upstairs. She was about to send Hornby off to help them find a room -the house could be quite difficult to navigate it you weren’t used to it- when she noticed he had already gone after them. Brilliant man, really. He deserved a raise. It was a thought she only really had when she was too drunk to remember it, so she turned to Bunty to remind her, who proceeded to look at her peculiarly.
“Fel’s… has anybody ever told you can be rather oblivious sometimes?”
“Constantly my dear. Constantly. Why?”
“Well… I’ll remind you of that raise.”