A Book of American Martyrs(11)

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 heart, 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.”