Guilt

Or the volunteer work with the Sierra Club. See? Even though he made money – and he wasn't ashamed of that, nosiree – he was sensitive to the environment.

Christina did volunteer work herself, so she could back him up here. It was important to have a broad spectrum of interests and involvements. You didn't want to lose sight of the big picture, which was a quality life.

Another of his big phrases – quality life.

Also, he had the habit of saying, 'Look at the facts,' followed by, 'That's very interesting.' Both of which set Christina's teeth on edge.

When she'd first started seeing Joe, she'd been attracted by the sense of sweetness he projected. It had been nearly three years since her professor. And Joe had just happened.

He'd been the TA in her Contracts course. After a few classes, some of the students started hanging around together afterward, going out for pizza, talking the ever-fascinating law talk. And then one night everyone else went home early.

She and Joe had closed the place, in the course of the night leaving Contracts behind them, discovering a mutual interest in backpacking, skiing, the Great Outdoors. Christina also liked Joe's looks, his full head of black hair over a chiseled face. A cleft chin like her father's.

Joe and some friends were going out in the Tahoe Wilderness for five days over Thanksgiving. Would Christina like to come?

No push, no come on. She'd liked that.

After a while, she came to recognize that she liked his manner and his personality in a lukewarm way that occasionally got up to a fair impersonation of heat. That was all right. Maybe it would change – she would wait. She didn't trust too much passion. She also desperately wanted to believe that the 'like' could over time transmogrify into 'love.' It was why she had after all this time picked a nice person, someone whose company was, if not thrilling, then pleasant, livable with.

Joe was now at his desk at four in the afternoon, twirling a pen between his fingers, glaring at Christina, struggling to control his anger.

'I don't know why you're so mad,' she was saying.

'I'm not mad. I just thought we'd already talked about this. I mean, you didn't even mention it last night, and now here you are, dressed to impress.'

She spread her hands in front of her. 'Joe, this is a simple business suit.'

'Yes, but every other applicant for summer clerk or anything else sends in a letter and a resume. Then we review it and decide whether-'

'I know all that. Mark Dooher asked me to come down, so I thought it would be appropriate to dress nicely.'

'Which on you doesn't-' He stopped himself, not wanting to say it, to admit that whether she liked it or not, her beauty was an issue, over and over again. 'I'm… maybe I'm a little disappointed, is all.' The pencil snapped between his hands, and he looked down at it in surprise.

'I don't know why you'd be disappointed, I really don't. Mark said…'

'Mark? You mean Mr Dooher?'

Her lips tightened in frustration. 'He said to call him Mark. He's a nice guy, Joe.'

'He's a nice guy.' Avery reeled himself in. 'I lied,' he said calmly. 'I am really mad.' He looked over Christina's shoulder, making triple sure his door was closed all the way. 'Mr Dooher is not a nice guy. Let's get that straight. Look at the facts. He is a hatchet man. He cut both McCabe and Roth out of here like so much driftwood after thirty years and-'

She was shaking her head. 'Okay. He's tough in business. He's the boss, right? That comes with the territory. But he asked me to come down. What was I supposed to do?'

'I asked you not to come down. How about that? How about how comfortable I am with you going around feeling out the job situation here behind my back?'

'I didn't do that.' The volume went up. 'I told you, I ran into him at church. Jesus, give me a break, Joe. Don't be so – so…'

'So what?' Jumping on her, notching it up.

'So goddamn controlling, is what.'

Avery sat back, lowering his voice almost to a whisper. Trn controlling? If I am, I'm not very good at it, am I?'

'You shouldn't be. That's my point. This is my life and my career and if the managing partner invites me down for an interview, what do you expect me to do? Say, "Oh, I'm sorry, I'm a modern woman and all, but my boyfriend would be so upset."'

'I'm not upset.'

'And you're not mad either, I suppose.' Though she knew he was furious. 'Damn it, Joe, you don't have any right to be mad at me.' She grabbed up her briefcase.

'Where are you going?'

'I'm going to talk to Mr Dooher.' She hesitated. 'To Mark.'

This got him up, hand outstretched, nearly knocking his chair over behind him. 'Whoa, whoa, wait a minute, Christina. Wait a minute!'

She paused, her hand on the doorknob. 'All right, one minute. What for?'

He crossed around his desk, stopping an arm's length from her. 'Look…' A long breath, getting his own control back. 'Look, I'm sorry. Don't go to Mr Dooher, not like this.'

'Like what? Like all mad at you? Like I'll get you in trouble? I promise, I won't mention you at all.'

'Christina…'

'I don't understand why you don't want me to work here, Joe. I thought you'd be happy. We could be together, see each other during the day, go out to lunch… I thought it would be fun.'

He moved toward her, held her arms gently. 'I know,' he said. 'I know. It would.'

'So what's the problem?'

'It just surprised me, that's all. I thought we'd decided something else, and then just having this sprung on me…'

'This wasn't sprung, Joe. I didn't feel like I needed to ask your permission. I came down and here I am now, telling you. I'm not hiding anything.'

'All right,' he said. 'All right, I'm sorry. I don't want to fight about this.'

'I don't either.'

'Okay, then.' He stepped back. 'Did you bring your resume with you? A cover letter?'

She nodded, crossed to his desk, put her briefcase on it and snapped it open. Handing him the envelope, she asked him where it went now.

There was a look in his eyes that she didn't like very much. Then a half-smile to back it up. He motioned with his head – follow me. On the floor next to one of the bookcases across the room was a cardboard box that had originally held a case of wine.

As the associate in charge of the summer clerk program, Avery received all the hopefuls' resumes, which a four-person committee reviewed once every two weeks. In the meanwhile, Avery 'filed' the resumes in the cardboard box, which currently was two or three inches deep in them.

He dropped Christina's in on top.

'Okay,' he said, 'you're in the hopper. Next it goes to the committee.' He reached out a hand and touched her sleeve. 'After this it gets pretty objective, Chris. We'll just have to see what happens.'

All that to drop her envelope in a box! She had been finessed.

Christina was so angry that she didn't even feel her reaction until she'd kissed Joe goodbye by the elevator banks and ridden the twenty-one floors back down to the lobby that opened on to Market Street. There, she stopped still, her heart suddenly pounding.

Though it was short notice, Victor Trang had been only too happy to come down for an afternoon meeting with Mr Dooher, who was representing the Archdiocese.

As usual, Trang wasn't exactly loaded down with litigation and he was heartened by the almost immediate response represented by Dooher's call. Also, late in the day, he welcomed the excuse to leave his one-room office in the darkened back corner of a turn-of-the-century building near the Geneva Avenue off-ramp of the Junipero Serra Freeway – as bleak a setting as San Francisco offered.