A Book of American Martyrs

by Joyce Carol Oates

  Naomi was alarmed now. It was not like her mother to speak to her at such length at all—not for a long time. She tasted panic, her badly stitched-together mouth had gone dry. She wanted to nudge against her mother, wanted to cry But, Mommy! You are my Mommy. You would expect Jenna to (instinctively) embrace the frightened fourteen-year-old and console her for such harsh words—(Naomi expected this)—but that did not happen. In the same slow wondering voice Jenna said, “I think I’ve known this for a while. I have not been feeling so well for a while. I’ve said that I am a weak person—I mean, I am a fearful person. Fear is weak, debilitating. Fear is a kind of cancer that enters our bones. I can’t be ‘there’ for you any longer, Naomi. You and the others. All of the others—Gus’s others. I am just too tired. You will have to make your own way.”

  Naomi was stunned. Her stitched-together mouth would not allow her to protest.

  “I can’t be your ‘Mommy’ any longer. No more.”

  In the horseshoe driveway the sleek black car waited with its motor running. The driver came to take Jenna’s suitcase, to place it in the trunk. “Mrs. Voorhees? Detroit airport?”—“Yes. Thank you.”

  Jenna turned from Naomi leaving the girl stunned and staring after her. Poor Naomi whose sarcastic mean-girl tongue was useless.

  Jenna turned from Naomi walking carefully as if the steps, the front walk, were coated with ice; gripping a railing with the caution of one who is near-blind but can see gradations of light.

  If only she’d fallen! Missed a step, slipped and fell, revealed how ill she was, how not-herself, not to be blamed, injured herself, broken and weeping.

  It was a scene that, in a film, even in one of Darren’s lurid comic books, would not end so incompletely: the mother would relent, would hurry back, would (weepingly) embrace the (weeping) girl; or, if not relent, if not hurry back, at least glance back, and smile, and wave.

  Be brave, darling. Without Mommy you will have to be brave but you can do it.

  But this did not occur. In the doorway in pajamas, barefoot, tasting something bitter-black in her mouth, the girl stood staring after the departing mother, scarcely seeing how the mother climbed into the waiting car, how the driver shut the door after her and went around to the driver’s seat, and very calmly drove away.

  THE ANT

  Her life would be a small life now. Not even a widow’s life now. An ant making its cautious way around the rim of a plate, she smiled to think. I can do that. What remains of my strength will allow me to do that.

  “THE HAMMER”

  DECEMBER 18, 2000—MARCH 4, 2006

  BROOME COUNTY COURTHOUSE,

  DECEMBER 18, 2000

  Mistrial.

  Was it over? Was he released? Was he—free?

  For why was there rejoicing in the courtroom, if he had not been released? Rejoicing among those who were supporters of Luther Dunphy?—even as others who hated him and were his enemies stared in dismay and disbelief.

  Jurors, you are dismissed. You may leave.

  Defendant is remanded to custody. Bailiffs will clear the courtroom.

  The judge’s voice was flat, contemptuous. Frowning white-haired man who could not depart from the courtroom quickly enough through a (private) door at the rear.

  He’d believed that Luther Dunphy was guilty! Now it was clear and in that instant, Luther felt a stab of joy, defiance.

  Shut his eyes tight to thank the Lord. He understood that the trial had failed, the jurors had not voted to convict him. In the courtroom there were uplifted voices and amid these ecstatic cries of Luther! Luther Dunphy! God has spared you.

  Turning then, to seek out the faces of his wife and children who were seated behind him. For the days of the trial he had seemed to forget them—he had scarcely glanced at them. But there was Edna Mae on her feet, but dazedly, and her smile uncertain and confused, and her eyes so wet with tears it seemed she could not possibly see him; and Luke and Dawn his children whom scarcely he recognized, for they had grown in his absence from their household, also on their feet, and looking about smiling in confusion.

  His lawyer was very excited.

  Pumping Luther’s hand in congratulation, and his fingers clammy-cold so Luther understood how anxious the man had been and how incredulous now. Almost, his lawyer embraced him but Luther stood stiffly apart.

  “I’m—free? I can go home?”

  “No, Luther. You’re still in custody. You’ll be returned to detention. But you were not convicted—that’s the good news.”

  He’d known that. Of course, he could not be freed.

  He had surrendered his soul to the Lord, he could not now take it back. Never could he be an ordinary man again, husband, father, son and in all these found wanting.

  “Very, very good news, Luther. It will take a while—for me—for the news to sink in . . .”

  Luther understood now that his own lawyer believed that he was guilty. In the courtroom there had been a game of some kind, in which the opposing lawyers contended, the prosecution with conspicuously more assistants than the defense, and so, though badly outmatched, Luther’s lawyer had not lost. That to him was triumph—he had not lost.

  The lawyer was a young man in his early thirties with prominent gums, a way of smiling that suggested the nervous smile of a dog, and something of a dog’s craven eagerness.

  “I’ll file to dismiss the charges, Luther. That’s the next step.”

  “But I can’t go home? Isn’t there—bail?”

  “I’ll apply for bail. But I wouldn’t count on it, since the charge is two counts of homicide.”

  Two counts. Homicide. Hearing this Luther would hear nothing else clearly.

  He wanted to protest as he’d protested many times: he had not shot the second man. From the first he had denied that he had shot Timothy Barron but they persisted in accusing him. It was a cover-up for the Broome County deputies who’d shot Barron by mistake—he knew. That could be the only explanation. All of the witnesses had lied including even—(he could not comprehend this and so had given up thinking about it for the wisdom of Jesus is, it is to no purpose to provoke great anguish in your heart if you are powerless to overcome it)—the ex-priest Stockard who was his friend. And even Reverend Dennis who had intervened with him, with Jesus, had not seemed to believe him, he had not killed Barron. This great injustice no one seemed to care about not even his lawyer who spoke now heedlessly and excitedly rejoicing in the good news of the mistrial.

  The jurors had not thought he’d killed the men. Or rather, they had not thought that Luther Dunphy was a killer. That was the meaning of the “mistrial”—they had rejected the prosecution’s case against him; yet, the judge had not freed him. It was confusing to him, though he did not truly wish to be free, that he was not now free.

  Later it would be explained to him: two jurors had held out against the other ten jurors who had voted guilty. This would seem to him the unmistakable will of the Lord, intervening in the way of grace.

  “Luther! Luther!”—Edna Mae’s hoarse voice was startling to him, in this place amid strangers.

  He felt an instant’s fear for her—that his dear wife who had been unwell, whose graying hair was disheveled and whose clothing was loose and shapeless on her as the clothing of a much larger woman, would be exposed to the eyes of mocking strangers at a time when Luther could not protect her as a husband should protect his wife.

  “Luther! Thank God.”

  It was not allowed, or should not have been allowed—for the defendant was to be led from the courtroom by Broome County deputies, as usual; but there came Edna Mae weeping with happiness, and the uniformed men stepped aside, that Luther Dunphy might embrace the sobbing woman, who clung to him murmuring words of such joy and heartbreak, he could not absorb them; for it seemed too that Edna Mae must have thought he would be freed, and return home to them—if not at this hour, then soon.

  Poor Edna Mae!—her hair felt brittle, and smelled of something like ashes. Her clothing sme
lled of her anxious unwashed female body.

  And there came his beloved son Luke, taller than Luther recalled, whose sharp-boned boy’s face too shone with tears; and his daughter Dawn, who was not crying, but rather laughing with a kind of animal joy, harsh, jubilant. Her small deep-set eyes gleamed like a lynx’s eyes, in sudden light.

  Luther’s other children, the younger children, he did not see. For a moment he could barely recall them. A girl, a boy . . . A baby girl. Increase and multiply had been the commandment, he had obeyed.

  Now Luther Dunphy too was weeping, awkwardly stooping to embrace wife, son, daughter until the deputies tugged at him—“Mr. Dunphy, time to go”—and led him away.

  And outside in a light-falling snow at the rear of the courthouse they were awaiting him—members of the St. Paul Missionary congregation, his brothers and sisters of the Army of God bearing picket signs, supporters of Luther Dunphy barred from the courtroom cheering him now as one might cheer a soldier returning victorious from war—“Luther! Luther! God bless you, Luther!” In the street were TV camera crews, and cries of reporters—“Luther? Luther look here”—flashes from cameras borne by individuals who darted close, risking the ire of police officers shouting angrily at them to get back. “Luther! Are you surprised by the ‘jury deadlock’? Is this a ‘sign from Jesus’—you will be found not guilty? Luther can you smile?” So astonished by this attention which was like a great blinding beam of light pulsing in his face, Luther halted blinking in confusion even as the now-impatient deputies urged him forcibly into the gray van bearing on its sides in black letters the humbling words Broome County Men’s Detention.

  IN TRUTH he was relieved. Grateful for the door shutting, and the van pulling away through the crowd, that he was no longer required to acknowledge.

  And inside the courthouse, his family—his dear wife, his children, his Dunphy relatives he hadn’t had time to speak with—it was a relief to have escaped them, for now.

  His wrists were shackled. His ankles were not shackled which was a kindness to him. There was a rough sort of comfort in this familiar place, in the windowless rear of the vehicle where he was seated on a kind of bench, hard beneath his buttocks as they made their way over a cracked and jarring roadway.

  It had been a long time since Luther had sunk into any seat, as into a cushion or a soft mattress in anything that resembled a house. If he’d thought of it he would have felt a shiver of contempt for the softness of his old life.

  At such interludes, in transition between the courthouse and the detention facility, he felt most at peace. His brain was awake but blank as a sky of pale drifting clouds. He was not happy, but he was not unhappy. Clutching his right wrist with his left hand and his left wrist with his right hand he’d found that (without shifting in his seat) he could exert a considerable strain in his arm and shoulder muscles and in that way strengthen these muscles. There were similar exercises he could do with his calf and thigh muscles, without moving or calling attention to himself.

  Even in the courtroom, during the interminable trial, he could exercise certain muscles, in secret.

  One of the guards was telling him a mistrial is a “rare occurrence”—like a “draw” in a fight—“real unpopular.”

  He should know, the guard confided, there would be another trial. He wasn’t finished yet. The Broome County D.A. had his reputation on the line and would not give up so easily.

  “But next time I predict, Luther—you’ll walk out of the courthouse a free man.”

  Free man. Luther wondered was this in mockery.

  The deputy had turned to speak to Luther through the grated Plexiglas partition as the other deputy drove. His manner was frank and confiding. How surprising it was, to learn belatedly that the deputy who was the elder of the two did not think he was guilty though the deputy wore the gray-blue uniform of the Broome County sheriff’s department and had not displayed any particular warmth or solicitude for Luther Dunphy before, that Luther could recall.

  Thank you, Jesus. Among even our enemies there are friends.

  This was a wonderment to him. For he had several times thought, in the courtroom, a captive animal amid those others who could roam free as they wished, and when they wished, that, if he reached for the police service revolver of one of the guards, and if he could manage to extricate it from its holster, the other guard, and perhaps other armed men in the courtroom, would shoot him down dead—and make an end of it.

  “Because—hey Luther?—you did what the rest of us don’t have the guts to do, that’s why. Killing a baby killer.” The deputy paused, considering. “Yah. That took guts.”

  Beside him the other deputy drove in silence for several minutes. Luther saw the tension in the man’s shoulders and neck and sensed opposition until at last he spoke, bitterly:

  “Except he killed Tim Barron. What about that?”

  “Well—Jesus! That was some kind of bad luck for Barron. That wasn’t what they call premeditated.”

  “Look, I knew Tim Barron. He was a Vietnam vet. He was a great guy and shouldn’t have been shot down like that, like he was by this asshole son of a bitch thinking he’s Christ-almighty.”

  The first deputy was abashed and did not reply.

  In the rear of the van Luther Dunphy shut his eyes, and shut his ears.

  “THIS DAY YOU SHALL BE WITH ME IN PARADISE”

  This went back a long time. For she was a big girl now.

  Shocked and astonished saying she did not understand how anyone could kill a baby.

  In her loud girl’s voice she spoke like someone inside a great tin tub, calling upward aggrieved with no expectation or hope of being heard.

  It was the bawling voice of her childhood that had been sabotaged when her Daddy had been taken from her. So she would come to believe.

  Killing a baby! Her breath came short, she shivered at the thought.

  She could not ever do such a thing.

  THIS WAS BEFORE DAPHNE. Though confused in her memory with Daphne the little baby sister not-quite-right.

  Her mother had been very upset. Her mother had not wished to speak of this subject which had aroused the children’s curiosity since their father had joined what was called a prayer vigil in town in front of a building called the women’s center. Though their father was reticent about the purpose of the prayer vigil and discouraged questions about it in his way that warned you not to persist yet Dawn demanded to know more when Daddy was not present, plucking at Mawmaw’s arm, and would not cease until Mawmaw answered her.

  You are in my face get the hell out of my face her brother Luke would say meanly to her for even as a young child Dawn had a way of leaning aggressively close, lifting her baffled perplexed disbelieving and indignant face into another’s face which (she came to know) was a wrong thing to do, a mistake that offended others, and provoked them to shove her roughly away yet in her astonishment often Dawn could not resist for it was imperative that she know, she must know; and so she was most demanding of Mawmaw (who was weaker than other adults) and would always give in to her if she persisted.

  For at this time, Mawmaw was a loving mother. She was a young mother, not thirty years old. With her pregnancies she had gained as much as twenty pounds filling out her hips, her breasts, her cheeks. Her face was a plain-pretty face round as a dinner plate and the faint creases at the corners of her mouth were the result of eager smiles, for as a young mother, and a young wife, and a young daughter-in-law hopeful of making a good impression on her husband’s parents, Edna Mae was one aiming to please. Her skin was naturally rosy.

  But she was a shy young girl. Even as a woman, she remained a girl. There were some things you did not speak of, not even between husband and wife, and certainly you did not speak of such things to your children, as you would not (comfortably) speak of such things to your own parents. And so now deeply embarrassed, not meeting her daughter’s eye, Edna Mae told Dawn in a lowered voice that the women did not actually kill their babies that had been born
but rather their babies that had not yet been born.

  “How’d they do that,” Dawn demanded with incredulous laughter. “Where’s the baby at if it isn’t born?”

  With great awkwardness Edna Mae tried to explain to her that a baby was inside its mother’s belly before it was born. (For hadn’t Dawn seen Aunt Noreen’s fat old momma cat Smoky who was “bulging” with kittens half the time? It was like that.) A baby was inside its mother’s belly for nine months before it was born and at any time before that, it could be injured if its mother was injured or (Edna Mae could scarcely bring herself to utter such words) did something to herself, to her belly, to the baby in her belly, that caused it to die.

  Dawn stood very still. Dawn heard these astonishing words without quite registering all of them, just yet.

  Slowly as if she were groping her way in a darkened room Edna Mae said that—she believed— these mothers did not really understand that a baby was being killed. The women—(oh, some of them were mere girls!)—believed that they would be causing to die something that was not a baby but—(Edna Mae was unclear about this)—some little stunted thing like a kitten that does not have a soul.

  This too was perplexing to Dawn. For why’d anybody want to kill a kitten?

  Edna Mae hesitated not knowing if she should reveal that many people (including Dawn’s Dunphy grandfather up in Mad River) got rid of unwanted kittens—and puppies—all the time because, well—they did not want them; but she decided not to tell her already agitated daughter this fact, Dawn would learn all too soon for herself.