“And you’re there for both turns?”
“Sometimes. I try not to always make it.”
“Given the family business, you must have had an overprotected childhood.”
“Once past puberty, yes. It didn’t help that my brother, my only sibling, is ten years older than I. Boys with too much ambition for me were delivered beatings.”
“Did that cut down on the number of your suitors?”
“No, it just made them stop coming to the house. I had to meet them somewhere my father and my brother couldn’t think of, or a girlfriend would pick me up and deliver me, on the way to her own evening out.”
As their dinner arrived, Stone’s cell phone began vibrating. He knew who it was, and he pressed the button that would send the call to voice mail.
“Do women often call you in the middle of a dinner with another woman?”
“It only seems that way,” he said. “Anyway, it was my call being returned. I’ll phone again tomorrow.”
“She must miss you terribly.”
“One hopes, but she is a very busy woman right now. She works for Katharine Lee’s campaign.”
“Ah, our papers have been full of the pregnant candidate!”
“What do the French think of it?”
“The women like it. The men think she should leave the race, but they are careful about telling their wives that. Do you know Kate Lee?”
“Quite well,” Stone said.
“Is she carrying your baby?”
Stone held up a hand. “Don’t say that, even in jest. You never know who’s listening.”
“You didn’t answer my question.”
“The answer is an emphatic no. I know her quite well, but not that well, and her husband is my friend, too.”
“That would not stop a Frenchman.”
“It wouldn’t stop a lot of Americans, either, but I am not one of them.”
“We have had some . . . unusual . . . first ladies,” she said, “especially lately, but we’ve never had a pregnant one, at least not since Jacqueline Kennedy.”
“Neither have we,” Stone said. “I was at the press conference when Kate announced it, and the reaction of the media was pretty much nuclear in nature.”
“Do you think it will help or hurt her chances of election?”
“The first poll taken after her announcement elicited mostly favorable responses from women and neutral ones from men. I think American men, like Frenchmen, don’t want to argue the point with their wives. Their reactions in a bar with male friends might be very different, though.”
“So, will it help or hurt?”
“I think it will help to the extent that it turns out the women’s vote. If they respond, that could mean the election. The immediate effect is for the press to ignore her opponent and concentrate on Kate, which must drive the Carson campaign crazy.”
“Well,” Mirabelle said, “if it drives the other campaign crazy, it must be good for her.”
They continued their dinner, but slowly, since they were talking so much. As Stone asked for the check, he saw the two men at the other table doing exactly the same.