The Sabbathday River (47 page)

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Authors: Jean Hanff Korelitz

BOOK: The Sabbathday River
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“I did see some skin!” Ann objected. “Like I said. This girl couldn't keep her clothes on. I told you—she got undressed on my own porch, for God's sake!”
“Ah yes.” Judith switched gears. “The public nudity. This was”—she bent forward over the table to consult her notes—“October of 1984. A few months before you and your
group
followed Heather and Ashley into the woods, with your flashlights. Is that correct?”
She set her jaw. “The
date's
correct,” Ann said stiffly, on her toes again.
“Now, when you described the incident a few minutes ago, for Mr. Charter, you said the porch of your store was full of customers—mostly tourists, by your account—and you suddenly saw Heather begin to strip. You said … you know,” Judith considered, “I can't quite recall the exact words. Could we have them read back, your honor?”
The court reporter, a thin man with scurrying, arachnid fingers, found the place and read: “Answer: ‘Next thing I saw, she had her shirt unbuttoned
and her breasts hanging out. I asked her to button up her shirt, but she wouldn't.'
“Question: ‘Did you remind Miss Pratt that she was on your property, and that you were requesting she button up her shirt?'
“Answer: ‘Sure, I did. But she wouldn't do it. I suppose she didn't see anything wrong with it.'”
“Thanks,” Judith told the court reporter. She turned back to Ann. “You used the word ‘breasts.' Is that right?”
Ann looked at her as if she were a moron. “Sure, it's right.”
“Breasts, plural. Two breasts.”
“Well”—she was livid—“I saw one.”
“
One
breast? Not
two
breasts?”
“What difference does it make!” Ann spat.
“Ann,” Judith said, “you know perfectly well what difference it makes. You know, though you chose not to tell this jury, that Heather was not, in fact, stripping off her clothes in order to exhibit herself to the general populace, but was preparing to nurse her infant daughter, Polly.”
“How do I know what she was doing?” Ann retorted.
“Well, might you have inferred that a woman with an infant in her arms, who is unbuttoning her blouse, is just possibly preparing to nurse her child?”
“Listen, I don't give a damn what she thought she was doing. She was taking off her clothes!”
“Really?” Judith asked. “Her pants? Her shoes? Or was she just unbuttoning her blouse?”
“Just the blouse, that I
saw
. Who knows where she might have stopped.”
“Do you have children, Ann?” Judith said, her voice suddenly softer and more intimate.
Ann looked at her with intense dislike. “Four. They're grown now.”
“Did you breast-feed your own children?”
“I don't see that's any of your business!” Ann objected. She looked to Charter for help.
“Well, it seems to me that if you had nursed your own children you might have recognized the gesture Heather was making. So I ask you again: Did you breast-feed your own children?”
“Certainly not. All mine got the bottle. They got formula.”
Judith walked over to her for the first time. Ann watched her approach
with something like wary repulsion. When she neared the witness box, she placed a friendly elbow on the railing.
“How do you feel about breast-feeding, Ann?”
She squared her shoulders. “It's fine. If you can't afford the formula, it's fine.”
“So formula is better than breast-feeding?”
“It's cleaner. It's scientifically better.”
“You know,” Judith said kindly, “I think most mothers—and most doctors—felt that way during the time your children were young. Yet many women today who have the option to do either actually
prefer
to breast-feed their babies.”
Another jerked shrug. “Why would someone do it if you could do what was cleaner? Only to make a display of yourself!”
“Someone might do it for the same reason you fed your own children with formula: because they believed it was the best thing for the baby. Are you aware, Ann, that most doctors today feel that breast-feeding is, in fact, healthier for the baby than bottle-feeding? Perhaps Heather was following the best advice available to her, just as you followed the best advice available to you when you were a young mother.”
“I hope you're not comparing me to her! I don't give a good goddamn what she does. I care where she does it.”
“I'm well aware of that. After all, didn't you try to have Heather arrested for nursing her baby on your porch that day?”
“She was taking her clothes off!”
“She was nursing her baby, Ann. And it offended you so much that you called the police.”
“Hey,” Ann shouted. “I have a right to say what goes on on my own porch!”
“Without question,” Judith said soothingly. “You could have gone over to Heather and suggested she move inside. You could have offered her a private room inside the shop where she could have fed her hungry child in warmth and quiet. Or you could have just told her the truth: that nursing in public made you uncomfortable and you'd be very grateful if she could find somewhere else to do it.” Judith paused. “But for whatever reason, you felt unable to do those things. Instead, you called the police.”
“I had a right to do it.” Ann held her ground.
“And you encouraged Nelson Erroll, the sheriff who responded, to
arrest Heather on a public-indecency charge, even though you were well aware that Heather was only attempting to feed her child.”
“Like I said, I—”
“Had a right,” Judith said fiercely. “Yes, I think we know about your right, Ann. I'd like to move on now.”
She was so commanding, Naomi thought. She played it as if Ann were a fish on her line: a strong and pigheaded fish, but stupid. “You gave your place of employment as Tom and Whit's, the general store. Is that correct?”
“It's where I work,” she confirmed. “With my husband. Have done for years.”
“But you had a second line of work, didn't you? Until recently, that is.”
“Only part-time,” she said grudgingly.
“And what was that?” Judith asked. “This part-time work?”
“At Naomi's place,” Ann told her. “The
collective
.”
“Oh, you worked for Flourish. That's where Heather Pratt worked, isn't it?”
Ann gave her a dark look. “Last couple of years, she did.”
“And did you do the same kind of work there as Heather Pratt?”
“No.” She bristled at even this comparison. “I made rugs.”
“Hooked rugs?”
“Yes.” A quick, brutal glance at Naomi. “I was very good at it.”
“I'm sure you were,” Judith said disingenuously. “And how long did you work for Flourish, Ann?”
“From the beginning. Since before it was even a business.”
“That would be about nine years?”
“I guess,” she said.
“But you no longer work for Flourish.”
“I said so,” Ann said tightly. “I quit.”
“Did you, now?” Judith said, delighted at this unexpected boon. “And why would you quit suddenly, after nine years?”
“Needed a change.” She shrugged, evasive.
“Is that the truth, Ann?” Judith stood with her hands easy on her hips. She looked maternal, almost, a kind of 1950s-sitcom maternal, with her features gentle and her voice full of loving authority. “Is that what really happened?” And Ann filled the role of the chastened child. Arms folded, she pouted in her seat. “Isn't it true that you were actually
fired
from the job you had held for nearly a decade? Isn't it true that you were asked to leave by Naomi Roth, because your tirades against your co-worker Heather Pratt had become intolerable?”
“You'll have to ask
her.”
Ann jerked her head at Naomi. “She's the
boss,
after all, for all her fancy talk about
communes.”
“Well,” Judith seemed to consider, “we can do that. We can recall Naomi to the witness stand and ask her what drove her to fire one of her most accomplished rug hookers and most faithful employees. I'm sure Naomi has her own take on the question. You know, employer and employee rarely see these things the same way …”
She went on. She dug and needled and punished and pretended to cajole. Naomi, who could not believe she was actually enjoying herself, sat stiffly on her hands, waiting for it to end but hoping it might last just a little longer as the successive Ann Chases were laid bare: a peeping Tom with flashlight in hand, a pathological prude unable to countenance the sight of a woman's breast in a baby's mouth, a gossip, a snoop, a fellow worker who refused to be civil … It was a bloodbath.
Just before lunch, Ann Chase was asked again about Christopher Flynn.
“I said I didn't know him,” she retorted, but feebly.
“No. You said you had not
met
him but that you had heard of him.”
“Sure. Fine.”
“So my question is, from whom did you hear of Christopher Flynn?”
“I don't know,” said Anne wearily. “Everybody was talking about him. And Mr. Charter asked me if I knew the man.”
“I see.” Judith nodded. “And of all these people who were talking about Christopher Flynn, did
anyone
say that they had actually met him?”
She thought. She shrugged. “Nobody I can remember.”
Judith walked back to her table, and her place. She might have looked finished, but in fact she had one more question.
“Ann,” she said, “there's no such person as Christopher Flynn, is there?”
Charter frowned but stayed quiet. Ann Chase shook her head. One ragged breath escaped her throat. “I wouldn't know,” she said.
Witness for the Prosecution
HEATHER'S MIDWIFE WAS A SQUAT WOMAN WITH a single rope of black hair that she wore like an ornament across her breasts. She had not been subpoenaed, but Naomi felt sure that she had not precisely come willingly, either. Her first act, on being seated in the witness chair, was to smile consolingly at Heather. Her name was Randa Burns. Her affiliation was to Mary Hitchcock Hospital, in Hanover.
Heather, Randa Burns said, had been an extremely conscientious patient during her first pregnancy. She had attended her appointments faithfully, and eaten well, and generally demonstrated in every possible way that she was preparing for and looking ahead to motherhood. At Charter's prodding, she told the story of Heather's labor and delivery, and her account did not shy from detail: four centimeters by eight o'clock, five centimeters by ten, then the long hours spent at eight as the night dragged into darkness. Heather was strong, that was the point Charter seemed to be making. She did not ask for relief. She barely asked for diversion. And indeed, the birth was achieved with very little in the way of intervention, which—Randa Burns
informed Mr. Charter—was certainly appropriate to her philosophy that labor was a most natural passage.
“In other words,” Charter said, “you might just as easily have not been there at all.”
“Well …” She considered. “I only helped her accomplish what she was quite capable of accomplishing herself.”
“Alone.”
“Well, it's always helpful to have others there. It's a fine thing to gather other women around the birthing woman. It can be very spiritual. And also, there is always the possibility that the mother or the baby could require some special assistance.”
“You mean, there might be a need for medical intervention.”
“For further support. And sometimes for the kind of support generally available in a hospital environment, yes.”
“The baby could die, for example.”
“An extreme example. Also, the mother could experience difficulties.”
Charter was not interested in the mother.
“When was the last time you heard from Heather, Miss Burns?”
Randa, a woman after Naomi's own heart, bristled at the “Miss.”
“I made my last postnatal visit when Polly was two weeks old. She was doing beautifully. Nursing was well established, and the baby was growing. There was a good support system in place—Heather got wonderful assistance from her grandmother—and the household seemed to be in good shape.”
“So your work was finished.”
“Sure.” Randa nodded. “She had things under control, and she was clearly elated by her daughter.”
“Did she ask you any questions? You know, general advice? Things she might be worried about?”
Randa glanced at Heather. “She had no major concerns, no.”
“What about minor concerns? Do you recall whether she asked you any questions at all?”
She shifted. “She only asked me one question, and it was entirely unremarkable under the circumstances. In fact,” she said, openly irked, “most of the moms I've worked with asked me this question at one time or another.”
“And what question is that?” Charter said, preemptively smug.
“When she could have sex again. After the birth.”
“Really,” Charter said.
“That's
what she wanted to know? Not what she ought to feed the baby? Or worries about the baby's health?”
Randa glared at him. “I think she was able to answer those questions on her own, Mr. Charter. Most mothers can.”
“And all she wanted to know from you was when she could have sex again?”
A crisp nod. “As I said.”
“All right.” He emphatically flipped a page of his legal pad. “Now, at what point in her second pregnancy did Heather again place herself under your care?”
Momentarily thrown, Randa shook her head. “She didn't. She didn't call to say she was pregnant again.”
Charter mimed surprise. “Never? Despite the fact that her experience with you was so positive the first time around?”
“I didn't know she was pregnant again until”—another uncomfortable glance at Heather—“I was told. By you.”
“In your opinion, Miss Burns, is it wise to go through a pregnancy without medical supervision?”
She appeared to consider her words. “It's far wiser to be supervised. Even women who have experienced a complication-free pregnancy could be at risk for complications in subsequent pregnancies. Of course, she might have felt that her first pregnancy had been sufficiently recent that she could recognize any symptom that might be abnormal and could contact me then. But no. It isn't wise. I certainly wouldn't encourage it.”
“How would you characterize Heather's general health, Miss Burns?”
“Excellent, I'd say.”
“And her general ability to bear children?”
“Well, in terms of fertility, she was obviously fertile. In terms of carrying a baby to term, she was clearly capable of that, too.”
Charter nodded sagely. “So no outstanding difficulties, then?”
Randa said there weren't.
“In your opinion, could Heather have delivered an infant without assistance?”
The midwife looked uncomfortable. “It's really impossible to say. There are many, many cases in which women deliver unassisted. Most women, thankfully, don't have to. But certainly, it does happen.”
“And would a strong woman like Heather, a woman who had already had one uncomplicated labor and delivery, stand a better chance of surviving such an ordeal than a first-time mom who might be panicky and not know what was happening?”
Randa Burns considered. “It would be an advantage in that situation, I suppose.”
“So it's certainly possible.”
She nodded grudgingly. “Yes.”
“Could she have carried twins to term, Miss Burns?”
The midwife looked across to Heather. “I didn't see her during her pregnancy,” she told Charter.
“I'm aware of that. That is not what I asked, however. Was there anything, any physical condition, that would have prevented her from either conceiving twins or carrying them to term?”
Randa sighed and shook her head. “I can't think of any,” she said finally.
“Could she have delivered twins, alone and unassisted?”
“It would certainly add to the likelihood of an unfavorable outcome,” the midwife said. She intended this, Naomi thought, as a jibe to Charter, but he did not seem to take it as such. Indeed, he shook his head with a kind of sage sobriety, looked meaningfully at the jury, and took his seat.
Judith, Naomi knew, did not consider the midwife the type of threat that Ann Chase represented, but Randa's very sympathy to the defense made it more difficult to score the kind of satisfying points Judith had won with Ann. She rose from her seat and smiled warmly at the witness. “Hi, Ms. Burns.”
“Hello.”
“Do you believe that, in ideal circumstances, women ought to be empowered to make their own decisions regarding their own health?”
“Absolutely,” said Randa. “Women know their own needs and their own bodies far better than anyone else can be expected to.”
“Do you consider pregnancy to be a kind of disease which must be medically supervised?”
“No!” she said forcefully. “Pregnancy is a normal physical and psychological passage in a woman's life. It is not a medical ‘condition.' Western medicine insists on treating pregnancy and childbirth as a disease. I treat it as a different aspect of a woman's health.”
“So you wouldn't
necessarily
feel that a pregnant woman who did not pursue medical supervision is showing depraved indifference to her health and her baby's health.”
Randa considered. “I would not, no.”
“Is it depraved indifference for a pregnant woman to engage in certain behaviors—such as smoking, or drinking alcohol, or taking drugs—which might harm herself or her baby?”
“No. Not depraved indifference. It's not wise, but I don't think of it as criminal. If it were, the jails would be full of pregnant women.”
“Is it depraved indifference for a pregnant woman to drive her car without a seat belt?”
“No.” She smiled. She saw where this was going.
“What about skydiving?”
“Nope!”
“Race-car driving?”
“Not criminal.”
“Is it depraved indifference for a pregnant woman not to seek medical supervision during pregnancy?”
“I wouldn't think so. No. As far as I'm concerned, it's kind of a dangerous question, too. Because, I mean, how many appointments would a woman have to miss before it was depraved indifference?”
Judith nodded. She walked around her desk and sat. Her way, Naomi knew by now, of signaling a change in direction.
“You testified that Heather established breast-feeding shortly after Polly's birth. To the best of your knowledge, did she continue to breast-feed her daughter?”
“I don't know exactly when she stopped. I remember discussing breast-feeding with her at some length. We discussed my own belief that breast-feeding can and should continue until either the child or the mother wishes to stop. In other words, there is no set age by which the child should stop nursing.”
“A one-year-old child should still nurse?”
“Absolutely. If the child is still interested.”
“Two years old? Three years old?”
“Why not? The notion of breast-feeding as only for very young infants owes everything to Western images of women and nothing to the physical abilities and needs of mother and child. In some cultures, children nurse until puberty.”
The men on the jury reacted, Naomi saw, but the women were mostly nonplussed.
“Are you aware of the common belief that breast-feeding has a contraceptive effect? In other words, that so long as a woman is nursing she is protected from becoming pregnant?”
Randa nodded. “Certainly I'm aware of it. But it's not, unfortunately, true. There are plenty of unplanned children conceived while the mother is nursing. Breast-feeding may delay the recurrence of menstruation, and many people erroneously assume that pregnancy is not possible until menstruation recurs.”
“When Heather asked you about resuming sexual activities after giving birth to Polly, did you warn her that she would require some type of birth control if she did not wish to get pregnant again?”
The midwife frowned. “I don't remember that coming up, to tell you the truth.”
“So it's possible that Heather was having sex with the misconception that she was protected from pregnancy, when in fact she had no such protection.”
Randa considered. With one hand, she fingered the end of her black braid. “Yes, maybe.”
“Isn't the duration of a pregnancy usually measured from the first date of the woman's last period?”
“Yes, we use Nagle's Rule to determine due date and, by extension, the period of gestation. We take one year from the date of the first day of the woman's last menstrual period, then subtract three months, then add seven days. In other words, human gestation is, on average, 275 days from the first day of the woman's last period.”
“But if Heather did not, in fact, recommence menstruating after the birth of her daughter Polly, wouldn't she find it rather difficult to gauge the onset of her second pregnancy?”
“Yes, she would,” Randa said helpfully.
“Is it possible that Heather did not know she was pregnant in January of last year?”

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