Heads You Win

“In about ten minutes,” said Sasha, glancing at his watch. “Do you want to join us for the meeting, Mama?”

“No, thank you,” said Elena. “You’re so much better at these things than I am. Just be sure to check both diaries.”

“I already have,” said Sasha. “Elena One is fully booked for March the thirteenth.”

“And Elena Two?”

“If it’s for twenty or less, we could just about manage it.”

“It seems as if you have everything covered, so I’ll get back to work. I need to discuss today’s specials with the sous-chef.”

Sasha smiled, well aware that his mother would do almost anything to avoid having to deal directly with customers, but was transformed the moment she entered the kitchen. How different she was from him. He avoided the kitchen at all costs, so the division of labor suited them both ideally.

Sasha was considering which menu options he should offer when the front door bell rang.

He sat down at the popular alcove table at the back of the room as Gino opened the door to let the three of them in. As he accompanied them over to the table, Sasha tried, as he always did, to assess his potential customers.

From their ages, they could have been father, mother, and son, but not from their pedigrees. He rose to greet them, taking a closer look at the younger man, whom he could have sworn he’d seen somewhere before.

“Good morning, I’m Sasha Karpenko.”

“Alf Rycroft,” the older man replied, shaking him firmly by the hand.

“And I’m Mrs. Campion,” said the woman. “You’ll remember I called you,” she added, sounding as if she was used to getting her own way.

“Indeed I do.”

“Hi,” said the younger man, “I’m—”

And then Sasha remembered. “Nice to see you again, Michael. How are you?”

“I’m well, thank you. And touched that you remember me. But then, I told Alf and Audrey on the journey up to London how you demolished the entire Oxford chess team single-handed, so perhaps I shouldn’t be surprised that you could recall my name.”

“So what are you up to now?” asked Sasha. “Didn’t you read Jurisprudence?”

A waiter appeared, and once they’d ordered coffee, Michael answered Sasha’s question.

“I’m a solicitor in Merrifield. But that isn’t the reason we wanted to see you.”

“Of course not. So let me start by asking what sort of party you had in mind.”

“The Labour Party,” said Alf.

Sasha looked puzzled.

“Allow me to explain,” said Audrey Campion, in the same no-nonsense voice. “As I’m sure you know, until recently the Member of Parliament for Merrifield was Sir Max Hunter.”

“Fiona’s father,” said Sasha. “How could I possibly forget? I saw that he died of a heart attack while out fox hunting.”

“That’s correct. But what you won’t know is that last night the local Conservative Association selected his daughter to fight the by-election.”

Sasha remained silent for some time before muttering, “So Fiona will be the first of my contemporaries to sit on the green benches.”

“You can hardly be surprised by that,” said Michael, “because we all assumed it would be either you or her who would be the first to climb the greasy pole.”

“But I still don’t understand why you’ve come all this way to tell me something I can read about in tomorrow’s papers.”

“I’m the association chairman of the Merrifield Labour Party,” said Alf Rycroft. “And Audrey is the party agent.”