A Book of American Martyrs

by Joyce Carol Oates

  “Here is what the petition will say:

  “‘We, the undersigned, declare a State of War in the struggle to defend innocent human life.

  “‘We declare our allegiance to the Word of Jesus, and not the Law of Man.

  “‘We declare that we will not shrink from taking all earthly action required to defend innocent human life—including the use of force.

  “‘We declare that whatever force is necessary to defend the life of a born child is legitimate to defend the life of an unborn child.

  “‘We declare that the martyrs Michael Griffin, Lionel Greene, Terence Mitchell, though they may have broken the law of the state, have not broken the law of God; though they have shot abortion providers who were about to commit the terrible act of feticide, they are not guilty of murder but of intervening in premeditated murder. That is to say, these courageous men committed acts of defense against murderers not to save their own lives but the lives of unborn children. Therefore, their use of lethal force was justified. We will pray that the court will comprehend this in the case of Terence Mitchell, and acquit him of the charges brought against him by the State of Michigan.”

  Professor Wohlman gazed out into the audience as if he were gazing into our hearts. His eyes searched us out row upon row. His eyes moved upon me.

  To me, Luther Dunphy, the Professor seemed now to speak with special earnestness as he concluded his speech:

  “Know you this, my sisters and brothers in Christ: there are martyrs for every cause that speaks to the heart of mankind. It may be that Terence Mitchell will be acquitted—(and will live out his days knowing that he had been forced to shed blood)—or it may be that Terence Mitchell will not be acquitted, like his comrades, and will be incarcerated by the state. Like Michael Griffin and Lionel Greene, he may be sentenced to life in prison. These fates, no one can predict. Yet God observes, and God will reward. There have been martyrs for our cause, and there will be martyrs to come. Pray for our brave martyrs, and pray for ourselves, that we have the strength to act as we must, when we must.”

  In the crowded hall there were many cries and murmurs—“Amen.”

  And mine among them—“Amen.”

  AFTER THE TALK, I remained sitting in my seat. For I could not rouse myself to rise just yet, and depart. Some others also remained in the seats about us while others stood in the aisles speaking to one another in lowered voices.

  Edna Mae tugged at my arm, but I could not seem to move. How had it happened, the Professor had addressed me.

  “What is this, Luther? Where are we? Why are we here?”—Edna Mae spoke with a vague sort of anxiety, yet smiling, or trying to smile, hesitantly touching my arm.

  It was disturbing to me, to see how my dear wife, though (I was sure) she’d been listening intently to the Professor for the past hour, had now the air of one who has been wakened from a dream and has no clear idea where she is.

  Gently I explained to Edna Mae where we were, and why we had come to Huntington, West Virginia, that evening with friends from our church. A faint recollection came into her worried eyes.

  I had no doubt that Edna Mae would soon realize where we were, especially when she saw familiar faces. As often when she has taken her medication, as prescribed by our doctor, she requires a few minutes to orient herself if she is in an unfamiliar place, once I have explained to her where we are.

  “And where are the children, Luther?—outside in the car?”

  “No, dear. We didn’t bring them, remember? They are back home safely.”

  This was a strange way to speak—back home safely. As if the children had been away, and had returned home. As often it happened when I spoke, because I am not so easy with speaking as others, and if someone is looking at my mouth, I would say words that came to my lips without understanding what I said.

  “We’re in Huntington, West Virginia, dear. But now we’re headed home.”

  “Of course—‘West Virginia.’ I knew this.” Edna Mae smiled, a childish-sly smile, to hide her confusion. “—I was testing you, Luther.”

  Edna Mae had not noticed that her wadded tear-dampened tissue had fallen to the floor and so quickly I stooped to pick it up and hide it away in my pocket. Trying not to think that the Edna Mae of a few months ago would have been stricken with embarrassment, at such personal carelessness for which she’d often scolded the children. As she’d have been at the sight of herself in the rumpled raincoat with matted hair brushed behind her ears, a smear of lipstick on her mouth and what might have been spots of “rouge” on her sallow cheeks.

  On the walk outside the hall several members of the congregation were waiting for us, for we would drive home together in a kind of caravan, into the night.

  Reverend Dennis and the others were speaking excitedly of the meeting. I was sorry to seem abrupt with them for I could not trust myself to speak in a normal way, after Professor Wohlman’s words that had entered my heart. Also it was painful to me, to observe others speaking with my dear wife, and Edna Mae attempting to answer them, for I did not like the way their eyes moved over her, the women’s eyes especially, with the greed of birds pecking in the dirt.

  It was not like me to avoid speaking with Reverend Dennis whom I revered as a true Christian minister, nor was it like me to be rude to the minister’s wife. All I recall is that quickly we walked away to our car that was parked close by—that is, with my hand gripping Edna Mae’s arm I urged her to walk as quickly as she could. If Edna Mae was surprised to see these familiar faces, in this unfamiliar setting, there was no time for her to exclaim. Behind us was the murmur which I am not sure if I heard—Poor Edna Mae!

  In our car, Edna Mae lapsed almost at once into sleep, beside me. Where once my dear wife would have been alert and anxious about my driving at night on the interstate, where trailer-trucks come roaring up behind you flashing lights to blind you in the rearview mirror, and to pass dangerously close at eighty miles an hour, now Edna Mae took no mind at all of the situation like a creature that cares only to curl up to sleep.

  It seemed to me that Edna Mae had drawn up her bare legs beneath her as a child might, to sleep. Yet each time I glanced at her, I saw that this was not so and that she was slumped sitting-up in the seat, her head flung back and her mouth open.

  Soon her breathing was damp-sounding, a kind of hoarse pant. Since Daphne, Edna Mae either did not sleep at all, or slept too much—a heavy, sodden sleep from which she could hardly be wakened. (It was disagreeable to hear the children shouting at their mother to wake her where she might have fallen asleep on a sofa perhaps, even at times on the living room or kitchen floor. Especially Dawn’s exasperated voice—“Mawmaw! Wake up!”)

  In this heavy sleep Edna Mae was breathing strangely, as she’d begun to do in recent months. For several seconds she would seem to cease breathing as I listened, though trying not to listen, and counting seconds when she had ceased to breathe—one, two, three . . .six, eight, ten—before there came a catch in her throat like the clicking-open of a wet lock, and a sudden snorting noise of such loudness she was awakened, drawing in breaths like a drowning person . . . But soon then she lapsed back into sleep again, and after a few minutes cease to breathe. Ever more often this would happen, and I would nudge my dear wife, and say her name to urge her to breathe, for this strangeness did not happen when she was awake but only when she was sleeping very deeply, so that it was a matter of Edna Mae remembering to breathe, as others of us, for some reason, do not need to remember.

  What would happen to Edna Mae, if I did not wake her, to rouse her to breathe? Was there an understanding in this, sent by God, that I was to interpret?—badly it worried me, like picking off tiny thorn-seeds from my trouser cuffs, that you can never come to the end of picking-off, for I did not understand.

  Though knowing that Operation Rescue was to be a turn in my heart. This, I seemed to know even before we’d made our plans to drive to West Virginia.

  Thinking calmly how the Professor had looked into my h
eart, he had seen me.

  Pray for our brave martyrs. And pray for ourselves . . .

  For weeks I had been planning to attend Defending the Defenseless. But I had not thought that Edna Mae would accompany me on such a long drive, for she has been unwell. It was surprising to me, she’d suddenly said Take me with you, Luther—I am afraid to be alone in the house without you. You have to watch over me.

  At first I could not comprehend what this might mean. For often Edna Mae is alone in the house when the children are at school, and I am at work through the day. But then, as Edna Mae spoke further, in a wandering manner, with interruptions of breathless laughter, it seemed to develop that my dear wife was afraid of being alone in the house without her husband to watch over her in the night.

  This could only mean—(so I thought)—that Edna Mae was afraid that she might injure herself in my absence.

  By accident, she might take an overdose of her medication. Or, less by accident, she might “injure” herself with a sharp knife, or in some other terrible way.

  Of course—Edna Mae did not mean this. It is a way of saying how sad she is, how unhappy. How badly she needs her husband to protect her.

  Thought of this responsibility filled my heart with a husband’s love. And for my dear children, the love of a Christian father.

  That night, after we returned past midnight to Muskegee Falls, and to the (darkened) house, Edna Mae was scarcely able to keep her eyes open as I helped her from the car, and into the house; she had difficulty keeping her balance as I half-carried her upstairs to our bedroom. As we ascended the stairs two things seemed to occur simultaneously: the sound of a door shutting in the upstairs hall, and the appearance, at the top of the stairs, of our thirteen-year-old Luke in pajamas, and barefoot, staring down at us with worried eyes. Though I was not quick-witted enough to comprehend this at the time, it is likely that one of our daughters, probably Dawn, was responsible for shutting the door, quickly entering the room she shared with her sister Anita before we could see her; while Luke, the child most like me, a boy with young-old eyes, remained to greet us, and to ask what was wrong with his mother?—and I said, trying for a jovial tone, “Not a thing is wrong, son, except that your mother is up past her bedtime.”

  Still the boy stared at us, unconvinced. It is rare that one sees a child’s forehead so visibly furrowed, as Luke’s; and it is upsetting to observe how the boy gnaws at his lower lip, as if to draw blood. Often it seems to me that I see a small mottled-red birthmark on the boy’s left cheek—in fact there is none. (Yet I can’t stop myself from looking—many times in a single day.) I felt as though a vise had seized my heart, for our firstborn will surely grow to be as tall and as big-framed as his father, and there is a helplessness in such, for it will be your responsibility to protect others who are smaller and weaker than you; and it is very easy to lose balance in such a frame, and you are always exposed—the sky is always “open” above you. In a lowered voice I said, “Go back to bed, son. You have school tomorrow.”

  Yet worriedly the boy persisted—“Is Mawmaw OK?”

  “Mawmaw is tired. And I am tired, son. Don’t tempt me!”—still in a jovial voice though the boy understood the look in my eyes, of warning, of love laced with warning, or warning laced with love; and quickly he drew away, and returned to the room he shared with his younger brother, barefoot and silent as if indeed my hand had been raised against him which it had not.

  It is a terrible responsibility to be the progenitor of new life. In a dream it came to me years ago after the first of them was born—Increase and multiply is the curse of humankind.

  But this was not the (recognizable) voice of the Lord, or of Jesus. It was a (possible) voice of mockery, to test Luther Dunphy who had aspired to be a minister in the St. Paul Missionary Church of Jesus and was on trial at that time.

  In our bedroom removing Edna Mae’s clothing with clumsy fingers. Beneath the raincoat my dear wife had not been naked (as I had feared) but wore a soiled flannel shirt that might’ve belonged to one of the older children, and a soiled corduroy skirt that looked as if it had been retrieved from the dirty-clothes basket, no stockings or socks and her undergarments (which I would not remove) were grayish from many launderings and loosely fitted her shrunken frame.

  Since Daphne, my poor dear wife has lost fifteen pounds at least. While I have gained weight in my torso, a fatty tumor like a fist encasing my heart.

  Clumsily too I pulled Edna Mae’s cotton nightgown down over her head and for a moment the nightgown was caught, and Edna Mae struggled weakly against me, her face hidden. Too late seeing that the nightgown was inside-out. But already Edna Mae had slumped back on the bed and into a light doze, openmouthed. A string of saliva on her chin. I would help her into the bed and draw the bedclothes up upon her and pray that we would get through this night for these were nights that seemed dangerous to me, in the nights, weeks, months after Daphne when there was yet indecision as when a jury is deliberating a verdict regarding you but which you do not fully comprehend.

  The bedroom was dim-lit. On my knees I prayed beside the bed. It is my habit at such times—the oldest prayer of my childhood which I had been taught to repeat in echo of my father’s voice Our Father Who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name. Thy kingdom come . . .—for such words are a consolation as whiskey had once been a consolation.

  In the dark for some time I lay awake beside my dear wife. I was very exhausted and yet could not seem to sleep for my body felt large and clumsy to me, and I needed to shower, for my body smelled of sweat, yet there was no time now, the hour was nearing 2:00 A.M. My (right) foot on the gas pedal ached from the pressure and became a foot-cramp—(for I suffer from foot- and leg-cramps often in the night). The interstate highway was rushing at me but dimly illuminated in the headlights of my vehicle and it was not clear—(in my anxiety, I did not wish to experiment by turning the wheel)—if my hands gripping the steering wheel possessed any power to “steer” the vehicle or whether the wheel was a false wheel provided for me to (falsely) placate me. As when it was said of the lifeless child She is with the angels now.

  And yet, it was the father who said these words, was it?—for it was my task to bring the news to the other children.

  “Your sister is with the angels now. There is no need for tears.”

  Like fingernails scraped on a blackboard, the sound of tears. Such a sound is not bearable.

  There had come Edna Mae’s muffled voice to the children somewhere upstairs that they must not cry, they must not cry for crying would displease their father, if they had to cry they must hide away to cry or wait until their father was not within earshot did they understand?

  The muffled aggrieved yet practical-minded female voice, of which I was not (altogether) certain, that I had heard it or imagined it, nor the children’s voices in reply, I did not seem to hear.

  So tired! It is that state when tiny stars and the faces of strangers seem to rush at us behind our closed eyes.

  Yet it was not comfortable in our bed where the bedclothes had come to smell of our bodies and the ooze of grief. And the ooze of anger. And disgust. For it had fallen to me lately, to change the bedclothes, when my poor dear wife could not remember if she had changed the bedclothes or not, when obviously she had not, nor had my poor dear wife remembered to bathe herself as once she had been so fastidious, she had laughed at herself. And now, days passed and (it seemed to me) Edna Mae did not change her undergarments, and she did not wash or even, at times, brush her hair.

  Explaining to the children that their mother was very tired. Their mother was prescribed medication which made her tired and so they must take care of Mawmaw, at this sad time in our lives.

  Our bed was “queen size.” Yet my feet pushed against the end of the bed, and were always tugging out the sheets there. I would lie on my side facing away from Edna Mae, and my eyes shut tight. In this position I felt like something that has toppled over in the cemetery, that had fallen from one of the larger gr
avestones, heavily into the grasses and could not be righted again. And Edna Mae beside me, not on her side facing out but on her back, which was not a good position, for on her back Edna Mae would breathe irregularly, and wetly, beneath the white-wool quilt Edna Mae’s mother had knitted for us for a wedding present, that she had explained was a diamond stitch, and that had once been so beautiful, it seemed amazing to me that my mother-in-law had knitted it and I had known myself blessed, that Edna Mae’s family would accept me as their son though (it was clear to me if not to them) Luther Dunphy was not worthy.

  And now it seemed to me again, as the Professor’s gaze had lighted upon mine, that I was not a true protector of the weak and helpless, but a coward who had no right to call himself a Christian.

  A Christian is one who will sacrifice his life, in martyrdom. I have long known this, but did not want to acknowledge it for it is far easier to hide within the family, to claim that the love and protection of your own family is your sole responsibility.

  How long it was, how many minutes, lying awake and trying to sleep despite these condemning thoughts and trying not to listen to the labored breathing of the woman beside me. Until at last—as I knew it would—her breath seemed to stop—and then, after some desperate seconds, during which it sounded as if she was being strangled, I would nudge her awake begging—“Edna Mae. Breathe.”

  And then, my poor dear wife would emit a startled snort, and for a confused moment she would seem to be awake; then lapsed back into sleep, close beside me.

  She is with Daphne now. The child has her.

  Almost I could see our daughter’s small arms tight around Edna Mae’s neck, pulling her down into blackness like black muck.

  Yet there was no sound from the child. It is rare that you will encounter a child who makes no sound.

  She is happiest with Daphne. They are with the angels. It will be the kindest thing, to send the mother there, to be with the child to comfort her.