“I didn’t know they couldn’t eat scones.”
“Not with bacon in they can’t.”
“Aye, well,” said Ted, reaching across. “There we are, now.”
Minnie bustled over with the coffee pot.
“Refill?”
Israel took a hasty sip of coffee.
“It tastes off,” he said grumpily.
“What does?” said Minnie.
“The coffee,” said Israel.
“It doesn’t.”
“Coffee can’t go off,” said Ted.
“The milk can.”
“Our milk is not off,” said Minnie.
Israel sniffed the milk in the jug.
“It’s fine,” said Ted.
“It must be the coffee then,” said Israel. “It has a sort of fishy smell. Is this an americano? Are you using that chicory stuff again?”
“Ach,” said Minnie, “the machine’s not working.”
“That machine has never been working,” said Israel.
“It has, so it has,” said Minnie.
“When?”
“It’s usually working.”
“Not since I’ve been living here.”
“How long have you been living here?” said Ted, in an accusatory fashion.
“Long enough,” said Israel.
“Aye,” said Ted.
“Life sentence,” said Israel.
“Ooh, did you see Prison Break, Ted?” said Minnie.
“That the one with the tattooed fella?”
“Aye.”
“Was it on last night?”
“Aye.”
“I think I Sky-plussed it. I was watching this program last night about the American security services on the History Channel.”
“Ooh. Really? Was it any good?”
“In America,” said Ted, raising his fingers as though about to conduct. “In America, they have sixteen security agencies.”
“Sixteen?” said Minnie, impressed.
“I bet you didn’t know that, now, did you?” Ted said to Israel.
“No, I must admit, I didn’t-”
“There’s the CIA,” said Ted.
“Oh god,” said Israel. “Are you going to-”
“The FBI. The NSA.”
“Never heard of it,” said Israel.
“National Security Agency,” said Minnie.
“How do you know that?” said Israel.
“The Defense Intelligence Agency,” said Ted, counting on his fingers. And…some others.”
“Drugs Enforcement Administration?” said Minnie.
“Aye, that’s one,” said Ted.
“How the hell did you know that?” said Israel.
“Sure, wasn’t Denzel Washington in one of those films?”
“Was he?” said Ted.
“Aye?” Minnie turned to Israel. “Now what’s up with ye? You’ve a face’d turn milk sour.”
“The coffee,” said Israel, grimacing. “It really is-”
“I was telling ye, we can’t get the parts,” said Minnie.
“How long have you had the machine?”
“The Gaggia?” said Minnie. “I don’t know. Forty years?”
“Right. Well, there you are,” said Israel. “It’s obsolete.”
“It’s a very good make,” said Minnie.
“It’s an antique,” said Israel. “Like everything else in this godfor-”
Ted reached forward and clipped Israel round the ear.
“He smells lovely,” the women at the next table were agreeing among themselves at that very moment, as Maurice Morris wafted over to them, and he did, they were right, Israel could smell it as he ducked down with the force of Ted’s blow; he smelled absolutely lovely, Maurice; it was the sharp, sweet lemony smell of a Turkish cologne, which Maurice had discovered while on holiday with friends at a luxury golf resort hotel in southern Turkey some years previously, a cologne to which he had become famously-according to his campaign literature-addicted, and which he had sent over specially from London, and whose smell of exotic sweetness had until recently cut famously and decisively through the manly whiff of his cigar smoke, though, alas, since the beginning of his campaign Maurice had-also famously-given up smoking. You had to make certain sacrifices in politics, Maurice believed, and politicians were expected to set an example. Also, smoking was no longer a vote winner, so the cigars had had to go. A politician caught smoking cigars in public these days might as well have been caught patting a secretary on her pert little behind, or having an affair-for the sake of argument-with one of their constituency workers; those days, the good old cigar-chomping, camel-coat-wearing, secretary’s-pert-little-behind-patting, and constituency-worker-bedding days were long gone, and they sure as hell weren’t ever coming back. You had to keep moving with the times and keep on moving forward in politics, according to Maurice, which could be easier said than done, frankly: since giving up smoking he’d put on a few pounds around the waist, and if he was absolutely honest the last place he wanted to be was in a café surrounded by gray-haired men and women in car coats discussing coffee and cakes, but if these good people-his people, his constituents-wanted to talk traybakes, Maurice talked traybakes. He was like Jesus, Maurice Morris: his life was a living sacrifice.
“Tasty, ladies?”
“Yes,” said one of them.
“That was a statement rather than a question,” said Maurice, winking.
“Here you are,” offered one woman, “would you like a wee nibble of mine?”
“Well, thank you,” said Maurice, leaning down teasingly. “It’s not often I get an offer like that.”
“Go on, then,” said the woman, blushing and reaching forward with her fork, the dark brown confection poised perilously on the end. Maurice closed his mouth around the cake, winked at the assembled crowd, smacked his lips around the cake, and exaggeratedly chewed and swallowed.
“Mmmm!” he exclaimed suborgasmically. “That is delicious. So rich!”
“I think it’s made with buttermilk,” said the woman.
“Really?” said Maurice, entirely as if the use of buttermilk in cakes were a point of great interest to him.
“You have to use buttermilk,” piped up someone from the crowd.
“I can’t get buttermilk these days,” said someone else.
“Buttermilk,” repeated Maurice, confirmingly.
“Me neither,” said another woman.
“You ladies can’t get buttermilk?” said Maurice.
“No,” they all chorused.
“That sounds to me like a problem,” said Maurice. “Is that a problem?”
“Yes,” chorused the ladies.
“Well, let’s make a note of that,” said Maurice. This was where he really came into his own, M ’n’ M; this was where his years of independent financial advising and his reading of Neuro-linguisic Programming For Dummies really came into play: he profoundly understood that people liked to think that they were being consulted, even when they weren’t, that you had to give people at least the illusion that they were in charge of their lives and their destinies. Hence one of his favorite phrases, “Let’s make a note of that.” Maurice didn’t make actual notes of anything himself, of course-that would have been ridiculous; he always had a secretary with him-whose pert behind went noticeably unpatted-whose job it was to make notes of things.
“Buttermilk,” he said as he got up from the table. “Let’s see what we can do about that. Ladies, I hope I can rely on your vote.”
Of course he could rely on their votes: Maurice was the tallest and the best dressed and the most pointlessly and aggressively articulate Unionist politician in Northern Ireland, where there was plenty of competition in the pointlessly aggressive articulation stakes and no competition whatsoever between parties outside of their secure geographical and sectarian areas, which made Maurice’s reelection a real possibility. All he needed to do was to win back the popular vote and to get people on his side again-including his wife, Pamela, who’d stood by him through thick and thin, even though she had every reason not to, given the…unique…stresses and strains that Maurice’s career had placed upon their marriage.
“Here he comes!” said Minnie. “Quick! Sit up!”