Free Betina Krahn by The Last Bachelor Page A

… and ‘vile,’ ‘loathsome,’ and ‘ridiculous’ follow quickly on. He doesn’t believe in marriage, you see. He proclaims it a relic of our primitive past—an ‘onerous and inequitable arrangement’ that unfairly burdens the members of his sex.” Her voice and manner began to heat. “And he’s not too keen on women, either. If he had his way, he’d ship the lot of us to Bora Bora and be done with us … indolent creatures that we are.”
    “Hold on, now … that is a bit extreme,” he said,smiling. The way his eyes danced in the candlelight made it clear he was more pleased than perturbed by her vehement characterization of him. “I have never
seriously
advocated Bora Bora. France is plenty far enough. And what’s this nonsense about my not being keen on women?” He gave her a raking glance that said he was quite appreciative of certain aspects of femininity. “Why, I’ll have you know, my mother was a woman.”
    A wave of laughter around them alerted Antonia to their growing audience, and she looked around to find at least a dozen wine-warmed faces staring at her, some with disapproval, some with expectation. She hissed privately. She should have known he would make some sort of spectacle of their encounter.
    “And what would your mother have thought of your proposal to tear women away from their children and force them to work in coal pits, sweatshops, and woolen mills?” she demanded. “For that is your proposal, is it not? To degrade women … to belittle their rightful place in the home … to drive them into the streets and make them earn their keep?” She was gratified by the way the satisfaction in his smile faded.
    “It has never been my intent to degrade women,” he answered in an annoyingly reasonable and sincere tone. “It is my goal to set women on an equal footing with men in every aspect of life—including the vote and the necessity of working for a living.”
    “And just what makes you think women don’t already
work
for their living, Lord Carr?” she demanded.
    “Experience, dear lady. Experience,” he declared, edging closer. “The women of my acquaintance—indeed, more than half the women of this land—are supported in such a fashion and to such an extent that they need do precious little toward their own maintenance. They have housekeepers for managing their homes, maids for housework, andnurses for child rearing. Seamstresses do their sewing, laundresses clean their clothes, and the public schools educate their children. The men they have sunk matrimonial hooks into both earn their living and do their thinking for them.” He paused and cast a wicked look around him, preparing his audience for something outrageous.
    “The most strenuous things they have to do are stir their morning chocolate”—he whirled a finger daintily around in an imaginary cup—“and decide whether to wear the yellow bonnet today or the blue.”
    The laughter, both male and female, that welcomed his summary of women’s work outraged Antonia, but she knew that to show her anger here would only play into his hands. He flaunted his contempt for women under the guise of humor, making light of his views in order to make hers seem heavy-handed and puritanical.
    What a perfectly devious man he was, she realized. And how delicious it would feel to bring him to his clever male knees!
    “Then your
experience
, like the size of your female acquaintance, must be rather limited. Understandably so, considering your hostile attitude toward women and the home.” She took a step toward him, outdoing his smile with a fierce one of her own.
    “The women of
my
acquaintance work every bit as hard as their husbands,” she continued, her eyes flashing. “Or harder. Few have more servants than a maid-of-all-work or an elderly house couple. And even fewer can afford a nurse for more than a few weeks past a lying-in. They manage their homes and their children by themselves, and seldom have to worry about