Normally - normally - he'd be grumpy at anyone assuming he'd need special accommodation for his age and his limp (unless, of course, he was exploiting it), but there's something about her that gives him pause from immediately snarking. She looks so much like Marie - granted, a younger Marie than he or David had ever known, and maybe it was just the hair, because she doesn't sound a thing like the French-Canadian economist - and maybe it's just age making him sentimental, but any reminder of home, no matter how slim, is welcome.

"No law that says we can't share," he says with a smile. His own accent's a carefully cultivated generic East Coast American, no trace of the Russian of Brighton Beach he'd grown up with.