Her Leading Man (43 page)

She shook her head. “I don’t disapprove, Martin.
It was foolish of me
not to appreciate a helping hand
when it was offered.”

“
Don’t be silly, Christina I know you to be a
woman
of firm moral principles. I honor you for your
values,
although I fear I sometimes have to bow to
expediency
when dealing with my job.” He sighed. “At all odds,
you won’t be
troubled by the law any time soon.”

She expected him to add a caveat.
Unless you join
another suffrage
march
. Or
perhaps,
Unless you do
something else stupid and
ill-advised
.
But Martin was
too much of a
practiced gentleman to toss something
so volatile
deliberately into a conversation. He didn’t
add a thing, and Christina discovered
herself poking
the wound herself. “It’s liable to happen again, you
know. I can’t
abandon the cause until it’s been won.”

He took a deep breath and held it for a few seconds
before letting it
out slowly. “You’re determined
to pursue women’s suffrage, aren’t
you?”

After thinking about everything she had to lose—and
everything she had to gain—Christina nodded
slowly. “I am, Martin. It’s important
to me that half
of the citizens of the United States have a voice in
their own
government. Women have been treated like
men’s possessions for far too
long.”

Martin sat back in the chair Orozco had left moments
earlier. He didn’t
continue to gaze at Christina,
but stared vaguely into the crowd of Peerless
folks
milling
about in the drawing room. Christina pressed
her lips together
and
knotted her hands in her lap,
and
watched him, waiting for the ax to fall. She was
sure
he
wouldn’t countenance a lover who advocated
equality between the sexes.
What man would?
Equality to most men meant the
same thing as subservience. It wasn’t, but most
men
operated
on emotion, just as they accused women of
doing. They couldn’t be made
to
understand
that
equality
didn’t mean women would rule the universe,
only that they would at last have a
say in laws governing
their own welfare.

She realized she was holding her breath and let it
out. “You hate that,
don’t you,
Martin?” She spoke
softly, then wondered why she’d asked the
question
.
If he said
yes, she’d have to break off their affair.
If he answered no,
she wouldn’t believe him
.
In other words, she
was putting Martin in exactly
the same paradoxical position in
which men
dumped
women
all the blasted time. What a fool she was, to
be sure.

Her question seemed to draw Martin back from
his deep
contemplation, and he turned to gaze at her
again. She was surprised when he
smiled.
“I’m
not sure.”

She could only look at him for a moment, then
she reached out,
lifted her glass, and took a large
gulp of her drink. She needed something to
calm her
jagged nerves. When she put the glass back on the
table, it clunked
loudly.

He lifted his hand in a gesture conveying
uncertainty.
“I mean, my first reaction is that you’re wrong. But
when I take time to
think about it, I’m not so sure.”
He
shrugged. “
After
all, what’s the big
deal? Taken unemotionally—which is difficult to
do, as I’m sure you
realize
, I
suppose everyone should have a say in
making
decisions that affect their lives. And I don’t, in
case
you
wondered, think women are less capable of making
sound and thoughtful
decisions than men.”

“
You
don’t?” Good heavens.

His smile broadened. “Of course, I don’t. .I thought
you knew me better
than that by this time, Christina.”

She lowered her head, ashamed of herself. “I
should. You’ve
always been so good to me, Martin.
And to everyone else with whom you
work.”

“
I try
to be fair,” he said simply.

They sat not speaking for several minutes. The
party churned and
chatted around them. Christina
didn’t catch any words distinctly, although she
go
t
the impression most of the folks present were
talking
about
Egyptian Idyll
and how well it was going, now
that some of the kinks had been
worked out.

“
I’ve been thinking about my parents,” he
went
on after a while
.

“
Oh?” This was unexpected. Christina
watched
him inquisitively.

With a nod he said, “Yes. They worked together
as a team always. My
dad never appeared to dominate
my mother, and she never kowtowed to him
The
work they
did was hard, and they respected each
other. Still do, for that
matter.”

“
Yes, I guess Egyptologists need to work
closely
together. It must have been kind of difficult to
raise
a child
in Egypt if you aren’t Egyptian. Still, you
must have had a fascinating
boyhood.”

“
I did. And my parents’ relationship was
fascinating,
too. They’re absolutely devoted to each other.” His
smile tipped a bit.
“I guess I figured all couples were
like that. It was a shock when I learned
the truth.”

Christina sighed deeply. “My parents are like that,
too.” Wondering if
she should say so, she murmured,
“My father’s a physician. He’s the one who
encouraged
me
to go to medical school.”

“
Yes, I remember you telling me. It’s
interesting
that you’ve chosen to enter his profession.”

Although it embarrassed her to say so, she admitted,
“My father says I
have a healing touch. Whatever
that is.”

“Ah.”

The syllable sounded more important than it should
have. Christina
cocked her head at him
.
Martin elaborated. “When we
touch, I—well, I
think we’ve spoken of it before, and it’s true—I
feel
something.”

Christina’s heart fluttered. “Yes. So do I.” She
wanted to ask him if
he believed the phenomenon
meant something—for instance, that they were
meant
for
each other. But the question sounded stupid to
her own critical ears, so she
didn’t ask it

“
Maybe
that’s what he means by a healing touch.”

“
Maybe so.” She wanted it to mean more than
that
but didn’t press the issue.

Martin went on, “My dad wanted me to be a doctor,
too.” He laughed.
“But he supported my interest
in motion pictures. He’s a very
curious
fellow, my
father, and motion pictures fascinate him almost
as
much as
Egyptian tombs.”

She managed to laugh a little, too. “He must be
a curious sort, if
he’s been digging around in two
-
thousand-year-old tombs for so many years.”

“
Indeed.” Martin gave a reminiscent shake of
his
head. “Boy, you ought to smell some of those places
that have been shut
up for thousands of years. They
really stink. It takes a brave woman to go
down a
rope
into pitch darkness with nothing but stale air
and bad smells to accompany
her.”

“
A brave man, too,” Christina said, although
she
did it by rote. She didn’t really have an ax to
grind
at the
moment.

He laughed again. “Yes. A brave
man
,
too.” He thought
for a minute. “But it didn’t take any courage on my
part
when I
went down into the tombs with them. I suspect
any little boy—and probably any
little gir
l
—is too full of
curiosity to be scared of new things
like that.”

“
Oh, my.” Christina was struck by his
words.
“You’re right, Martin. I can imagine how thrilling
it
must have
been to have the opportunity to explore
ancient worlds.
Why, to know you’re the first
person
in
over a thousand years to view some of those places
must have been
marvelous.”

“
It
was.”

Again they stopped speaking. Christina didn’t
know what this
conversation meant, but she sensed
it was important. She didn’t want to say
something
that might break the connection they’d formed in the
past few minutes.
Surreptitiously, she scanned the
room, looking for her grandmother and
Pablo Orozco
and anyone else who might interrupt them and shatter
the peace between
herself and Martin. She
was almost
surprised when she saw the coast was
cleat
.
Gran was haranguing Mr. Lovejoy, and Pablo
was
plying
his charms on some poor wardrobe minion
.
She
hadn’t anticipated the two of them being so cooperative.
Perhaps her luck was
changing.

“
Anyhow,” Martin said
,
drawing her attention back
to him, “thinking about my parents made
your interest
in women’s rights a little less difficult to
understand.”

“
Did
it?”

“
Yes. I know my mother and father are a
team
even though they live now in the United States. But
I also know that my
father supports women’s suffrage
almost as strongly as my mother
does.”

Christina sat up straighter. “He does?”

Martin’s smile twisted slightly. “Did you really
think I advocate
keeping women subservient and oppressed,
Christina?”

“
I—I—” She didn’t know what to say. Actually,
yes,
she had thought that. She’d assumed it. Because most
men did. “I guess I
hadn’t thought about it,” she admitted.

He nodded. “I thought not. I expect you
automatically
anticipate opposition. Anyone who isn’t actively
working for your
cause is opposed to it in your mind.
Right?”

She wanted to cry out a denial. She wanted to tell
him that she was too
enlightened and intelligent to
make blanket assumptions about people.
Unfortunately, she
couldn’t unless she wanted to
lie to him
.
It hurt, but she
told the truth. “I guess
so. I’m sorry.”

He patted her knee. “No need to apologize, darling.
I
understand.”

She heaved another sigh. “It’s very difficult to
stand in direct
opposition to the majority opinion.
People actually jeer and throw things at
us, you know.
Some people have been spat at, even.
”

He
grimaced. “That’s not right.”

“
It’s not right, but it’s true.
People
are afraid of
change.”

“
I suppose. And then there are others, like
me,
who might not mind change, but whose interests lead
them to do other
things rather than work for it.”

His clear brown eyes appeared thoughtful. As well
they
might.
Christina had a
hard
time holding his gaze “I
suppose
so. I
must tell you, though, that going to medical
school is something I will fight
for to my last breath, Martin.
I’ve wanted to be a doctor
my whole life.”

“
I
understand.”

“
Do
you?”

“
I understand a passion that
won’t allow
you
to
fail in a pursuit, believe me. I’ve been working
like
a slave
in the motion picture industry for ten years
now, trying to bring my vision
to fruition.”