Her Leading Man

by Duncan, Alice

  She yanked her next costume from a hanger and flung it on over her head before she realized Martin wasn’t moving She glanced up from wrenching the fabric over her hips and saw him standing there, staring at her and licking his lips. All at once she felt shy.

  “Um, I didn’t mean to cause problems,” he said after entirely too many empty seconds, during which Christina felt like covering herself with several blankets, a heavy coat, and a quilt or two. His gaze was hot enough to fry eggs.

  She swallowed. “I guess you didn’t do anything too terrible. At least we managed to get the stupid scene done in one take—after waiting an hour or so for you to get over your sulks.”

  “Sulks.”

  She didn’t like the way he continued to stare at her.

  No, that wasn’t true. She did like the way he looked at her. His hot gaze made her feel soft and feminine and desirable, three things her upbringing hadn’t taught her to value properly. Her family was eager to praise social rebellion and a person’s willingness to fight for a just cause. She wasn’t sure if her relatives simply didn’t understand human desire or if they felt it was somehow beneath their dignity as Mayhews, but Christina wondered now why her parents hadn’t told her more about the man-woman connection in other than clinical terms. She didn’t recall them ever mentioning love or emotional attachment or the physical longing for one person that was now causing her so much trouble. The man-woman connection was, after all, one of the most powerful connections in the universe. If that weren’t so, the species would have died out thousands of years ago.

  “Um, Martin? Shall we change?”

  He didn’t answer for the longest time. Christina reached for the length of gold-threaded silk she was supposed to wear over her slinky costume and wrapped it around her. During the filming, she would let it drape and flutter. Right now, she hugged it close to her body, trying in that way to fend off the waves of lust coursing through her.

  “Blast it, Martin, we don’t have time to do anything now.”

  He shuddered all over, briefly, and seemed to come to his senses. Christina didn’t know whether to be relieved or disappointed. When she considered alternatives, she guessed she was relieved, work-wise. On a personal level, she was bitterly disappointed.

  Although it didn’t seem likely, she harbored a faint hope in her deepest soul of souls that she and Martin might overcome their differences if they craved each other enough Physical craving was good, wasn’t it, if it was a part of a deep and meaningful relationship? As long as it didn’t interfere with one’s duty to one’s gender or one’s willingness to fight to right the world’s wrongs.

  Sexual impulses couldn’t possibly be considered bad. Could they? Although her brain was a trifle clouded at the moment, Christina didn’t think so. After all, God had created human beings and all of their desires. Therefore, sexual impulses were a natural part of life.

  Then again, if she followed that rationale, she guessed she’d have to say that God had created starvation and poverty, too, and she didn’t like to lay those hideosities on a kindly Creator.

  Fudge. She was getting all mixed up. Giving herself a hard mental shake, she snapped, “Get dressed. We have to get this over with one of these days, and the longer we delay, the more expensive the picture will be. Surely you don’t want that to happen.” Had that been more than necessarily cutting? Honestly, she didn’t know.

  Whether it had been or not, her comment seemed to galvanize Martin into action at last. Thank heaven. He said, “Right. I’ll be there in a couple of shakes. You go on out there and try to keep everyone calm.”

  He turned and stripped. Christina’s heart gave a huge spasm as she saw his bare backside come into view. He was certainly a beautiful man. Michelangelo would have adored him Christina adored him. Shoot, even Paul Gabriel adored him.

  She muttered curses to herself as she left the room and went back out onto the set.

  By the time Martin strolled onto the scene, dressed in his slave costume—only with a length of striped cotton swathing the lower part of his face, because he was supposed to be in disguise—Christina had draped herself on a couch. Piles of grapes and round loaves of bread—did Egyptians bake loaves of bread like that? Oh, who cared?—were spread on a table beside her.

  Paul Gabriel lounged on a couch at her side. This was to be the beginning of the orgy scene, in which Martin’s slave character was supposed to kidnap Christina for the last time and carry her off to live in eternal bliss with him.

  Christina couldn’t help wondering if her character wouldn’t be better off with Pharaoh’s brother, who could at least provide her with plenty of food, nice clothes, decent baths, and body lotion so her skin wouldn’t get chapped.

  The prospect of living in filthy poverty on a barren desert with an escaped slave didn’t sound awfully comfortable. Especially if their love produced a herd of children she’d have to take care of and feed and clothe. Given what she knew about Middle-Eastern cultures, she’d get precious, little help with those chores from her slave husband, who’d probably be out seducing somebody else because she’d lost her figure three or four children ago.

  Good heavens.

  That was her cynical side speaking. Love was supposed to conquer all, at least in pictures. As she watched Martin stride onto the set, she wondered if love could help to conquer the divisions between the two of them.

  Perhaps all that was needed here was a little education. Some conversation without rancor or blame. If Christina explained carefully why equality between men and women was so important to her, Martin would surely understand. Wouldn’t he?

  With a shock, the notion that he might want to educate her about his own opinions conked her on the head.

  But that was silly. After all, she was right.

  Wasn’t she?

  Of course she was. There wasn’t any possible way that he could disagree with her about women being the equals of men. At least they were in all the essentials. There was no way to change basic physiology; not at this point in the annals of human history. Women would forever bear the children, and men would forever be physically stronger than women. That wasn’t the problem. The problem, as Christina saw it, was that men wanted to pretend that women were less intellectually capable than men, and that was a flat falsehood. Men liked to pretend that women were mentally unstable and could be overtaxed by thought, especially political thought. They wanted women to remain politically powerless so as not to upset the status quo.

  Men enjoyed having their little slavies at home, doing their laundry for them, so that they could go out and have fun with other men. Drink themselves silly at their stupid clubs, gamble away the family’s food money on cards and races. Have mistresses.

  The notion of Martin with a mistress other than herself sent a dart of fury through Christina. She snarled., “It’s about time you showed up. It’s hot out here, in case you didn’t know it.”

  She regretted her anger immediately, when both Paul Gabriel and Martin turned to gawk at her. “It’s not that hot, Christina,” said Paul. “Is it that time of the month, dear?”

  She wanted to slug him. Irate, she swiveled her head. “No! It’s not that time of the month, damn you!” When she saw he was grinning at her like a eat in the cream pot, she realized he’d deliberately baited her and huffed indignantly. “Paul, you’re a fiend.”

  “I do my best.” He buffed his fingernails on his Egyptian costume and fluttered his eyelashes.

  “You play women better than I do,” Christina grumbled.

  Martin had resumed his march to the set. Christina was sorry to see that he looked somewhat pouty. That, as she well knew, was her fault, because she’d barked at him. She felt guilty until she bucked herself up with the thought that turnabout was fair play. Martin had upset the apple cart this morning. She’d only tilted it a little bit this afternoon.

  When she saw her grandmother, who had been resting during the filming of the bathtub scene, walk onto the set, threaten Pablo Orozco with
her cane until he gave her his chair, sit, and glare around her as if she owned the world and didn’t understand why all these other people had invaded it, Christina’s heart crunched painfully. All she needed was for Gran to create a disruption. There had been far too many of them already today.

  Wishing she could rush over to Gran and give her a lecture, and knowing she couldn’t and that it wouldn’t do any good if she could, Christina had a hard time concentrating on the scene she was about to play. Phineas Lovejoy called everyone to take their marks. She watched Martin pick up a tray laden with goblets and a pitcher he was supposed to carry into the banquet.

  Although she tried not to, she heard the squabble going on between her grandmother and Pablo Orozco.

  “Quit bellyaching,” her grandmother demanded of the actor. “I’m an old lady and you’re a young man. Even if you did manage to fall off a camel and break your arm, you’re still obliged to be polite.”

  Trust Gran to use her age as a bat to beat the man with. Not that he didn’t deserve it.

  “I am polite,” Orozco said, beating his chest with a fist. “I am Orozco.”

  He rolled the R in his name as if it were a fine wine. Pretty fancy talk from an Italian butcher’s son from the Bronx. Christina told herself not to be petty.

  “You may be Orozco, but you’re still an ass.”

  “I’m injured,” Pablo pointed out.

  “That was your own damned fault,” Gran retorted.

  “Your grandmother is a woman after my own heart,” Paul. Gabriel murmured at Christina’s side.

  “She’s about to drive me crazy,” Christina admitted. “I’m afraid she’s going to get Pablo so mad, he’ll interrupt the scene, and then we’ll never get today’s filming over with.”

  “Places!” Lovejoy called, shooting an admonishing glance toward the old lady and the young man, who looked, from Christina’s perspective, to be squaring off for battle.

  She knew who’d win. Nobody—but nobody—bested Gran, provided they fought fair, and Christine didn’t think even Pablo would dare hit an old woman. And that, as Christina well knew, was because Gran depended upon the American male’s superior attitude toward women as protection. Somehow that didn’t sound right to her, but she wasn’t in a mood to think about it now.

  Martin stomped over to the two reclining figures. “I swear to God, Christina, someday your grandmother’s going to go too far. She just hit Pablo with her cane!”

  “Good heavens, did she?” Christina craned her neck to see around Martin, who’d blocked her line of vision.

  Sure enough, Pablo, red-faced and irate, was jumping up and down on one foot, and uttering incoherent words—Christina assumed they were oaths—as her grandmother looked on smugly.

  “Yes, she did. I swear, the woman ought to be locked up.”

  Christina felt her lips tighten. “She was. You’re the one who bailed her out, remember?”

  He frowned at her. “I had to, in order to get you out. I couldn’t very well leave her there, could I?”

  “Not if you wanted me to finish this picture.”

  “Exactly.” Martin set the tray down with a rattle and started to retie his striped cotton belt, which had slid down his lean hips “This is stupid.”

  Christina chose to ignore his last comment. “But that’s only because women are oppressed, and Gran and I were arrested while fighting for the honorable cause of women’s suffrage.”

  “Mercy me, I do believe a spat is in progress.”

  Paul showed no embarrassment whatsoever when Christina and Martin both cast angry glances his way. He only smiled, rested his chin on his hand and his elbow on his couch, and gave them both a fey finger wave with his other hand.

  Turning away from him, Martin said, “I thought the two of you wanted to be treated as equals to men.”

  “Of course, we do! That’s the whole point!”

  “Then I think you ought to teach your grandmother some form of proper behavior. If a man went around whacking people with a cane, he’d be locked up as a menace to society and never let loose to injure people again.”

  Sitting up in anger, Christina cried, “That’s not fair, Martin! Gran uses the only power available to her as a woman. A man wouldn’t have to hit people in order to get recognition.”

  Even though the argument rang false in her own ears, Christina resented Martin’s sarcastic glance. “Right. Tell me another one.”

  “Blast you, Martin Tafft, it’s the truth!”

  “Nonsense. If women want to be given the vote, they’d be wise to behave in a rational manner. I never heard of Saint Susan B. Anthony battering and bullying her way to the ballot box. She’d probably be horrified to hear about your grandmother’s shenanigans. As I understand it, Susan B., while a fighter and indefatigable nuisance, behaved with propriety even when she was out rabble-rousing.”

  He was right. Damn him. As she watched her grandmother and trepidation boiled like acid in her breast, Christina suffered another enlightenment experience. It wasn’t a pleasant one. By golly, Gran didn’t fight fair. Never had. Never would. And Christina didn’t approve, either.

  “And,” Martin continued relentlessly, “her behavior puts the lie to a good many of the philosophies she espouses with such vehemence. If she truly aspired to be treated as men are treated, she ought to play by the same rules.”

  “But—but—” Christina sucked in a deep breath. “Darn it all, Martin, she’s only doing what she has to do in order to get what she wants. She—she . . .” Blast it, she was a mean-tempered shrew, was what she was, and Christina couldn’t pretend otherwise.

  Martin tied another knot in his belt and yanked it tight. Stooping to pick up the tray again, he snapped, “That’s what children do all the time. Doing whatever they damned well feel like doing in order to get what they want. That’s why people invented discipline. Because the world would be total chaos if everyone did what they decided they were entitled to do without regard to the feelings of others.”

  “Oh, now, really . . .” But Christina couldn’t think of a sound argument to fling back at him—mainly because she knew he was right, at least about Gran.

  Instead of letting the subject drop as a gentleman should, however, Martin went on. “Anyhow, I saw what she did. Are you going to try to tell me that it’s fair for a woman to deliberately bait a person whom she knows can’t strike back without being considered a degenerate cad? Can you imagine what the feminists would say if Orozco had belted her back?”

  “Orozco is a reptile.” Christina wished she were still a child so she could hit Martin Tafft. Of course, she’d be proving him right about this argument by doing so, and that would never do. The thought appealed to her mightily, however.

  “Yeah? So what does that make your grandmother?”

  Martin had never scowled at her in so angry a manner. His expression made Christina want to scream, cry, and kick him, all at the same time.

  “Children, children,” Paul intervened, “I think Mr. Lovejoy is becoming slightly exasperated because you’re causing a delay in the filming.”

  Martin whirled around, and Christina looked up too. Sure enough, Phineas Lovejoy, a terrible frown on his face, was headed straight at them. “Blast.”

  She wanted to fight some more; to come to some kind of conclusion to this conversation which, she sensed, was very important to the future of any relationship she’d ever hope to have with Martin. But she couldn’t do it. She had her benighted job to do instead.

  “Very well, Martin Tafft. We have to film this stupid picture now, but this conversation isn’t over yet.”

  “You bet it isn’t.”

  She couldn’t seem to give it up. “I mean it, Martin.”

  “So do I.”

  He sounded as though he did mean it, and Christina had to bite her tongue to stop herself from flinging more remarks at him Actually, in a war between her grandmother and Pablo Orozco, Christina didn’t know which party was worse. Orozco was a pile of dog poop,
but her grandmother was one of the most difficult human beings, male or female, in the entire universe.

  Which had nothing to do with Egyptian Idyll. She managed to school her countenance into a semblance of slave-girl simplicity, and to lie back down on her couch. She hoped to heaven Mr. Lovejoy wouldn’t scold her. She wasn’t sure she could accept more criticism without blowing up.

  Christina feared the truth of that indicated a side to her personality that could use some work. Damn Martin Tafft for being right! It wasn’t fair of Gran to use the very tricks and ploys she despised as male-fostered symbols of female oppression in order to get her own way. Christina knew it. Gran probably knew it, too, although she’d never admit it.

  And she still hated that Martin had pointed out the discrepancies in Gran’s behavior versus her espoused convictions. She also took his criticisms of her grandmother as directed at her.

  “Are we ready here?” Lovejoy sounded tense.

  Knowing she’d have to shelve her cogitations until later, Christina sighed deeply. “Yes. I think so. Sorry for taking so long to get ready, Mr. Lovejoy.”

  “That’s all right.” Lovejoy wasn’t even looking at her, but was frowning at Martin. “Well, Martin?”

  Since she knew they were best friends, Christina didn’t know whether to be sorry about the note of hostility in Lovejoy’s voice, or triumphant that Martin had annoyed him, too. Actually, she did know. She ought to be sorry to see any friendship strained on account of anything she or her bullheaded, impolite grandmother did. This, too, pointed out a distinct flaw in her character that Christina was unhappy to have discovered.

  Blast it all. Until she met Martin Tafft, she’d considered herself a fairly decent, upright, and honorable person.

  Maybe it would be better if she ended their affair before it got too difficult to extract herself from it. She flung her gold-edged, gauzy scarf over her body and proceeded to drape it as the wardrobe mistress had instructed her. Who was she trying to kid? She was already so deeply in love with Martin Tafft, she didn’t think she’d ever recover. It wouldn’t matter if she ended their affair now or waited until hell froze over. She’d never get over him.