A Book of American Martyrs(190)

She stared out, leaning her face close to the glass, at the river a quarter-mile away, over a scattering of rooftops and water towers.

“There’s a nice sunset, on the river. You can see it from this floor.”

Adding then, when Naomi seemed not to have heard:

“There’s new TVs in all the fourth-floor rooms. Flat screen.”

But Naomi paid no heed to the flat-screen TV. Nor the minibar. She was far more interested in the view from the window though she wasn’t sure what she was seeing.

“Excuse me, is that the courthouse? Over there?”

“Yes. I think so.”

“Where is Howard Avenue? Can you see it from here?”

“I’m not sure . . .”

The address she had for the Broome County Women’s Center was 1183 Howard Avenue.

“Can you see Shawnee Street from here?”

“‘Shawnee’? I don’t think so . . .”

“Front Street?”

But the woman had not heard of Front Street.

Naomi heard herself say, as if she were thinking aloud, “My mother once attended a trial here in Muskegee Falls, in the courthouse.”

“Did she!”—the woman smiled uncertainly.

“It was in 2000. The trial of Luther Dunphy. Do you remember?”

“‘Luther Dunphy.’ Oh yes. Everyone remembers that trial.”

“What do you remember about it?”

“It—was a sad case.”

“Why was it sad?”

“Because Luther Dunphy killed two people—just shot them down on the street. Two doctors.”

Two doctors. Naomi considered this.

“Did you know either of the men who were killed?”

“I didn’t. But my husband’s sister lived next-door to one of them. He was a nice guy, a Vietnam vet.”

“Do you remember his name?”

“‘Barron’—I think. Tom, or Tim.”

“And the other man’s name?”

“N-No . . . He wasn’t from Muskegee Falls, I think.”

“Did you know Luther Dunphy?”

“Oh no. Of course not. Nobody in my family knew him.”

Naomi turned her attention away from the big-haired woman who’d begun to frown, so interrogated. Since working as a documentary filmmaker Naomi had become far more aggressive with strangers than was natural for her; it was not a personality trait she admired in others, or in herself.

She noted: a scent of air freshener in the room. A cushioned chair with curved legs, covered in dark purple velvet. A small writing desk with a top that quaintly opened and shut, not very practical for one with a laptop. Queen-sized bed with brass headboard and eggshell-white coverlet upon which a half-dozen pillows had been artfully arranged.

Above a bureau a large mirror framed in eggshell-white in which Naomi Voorhees and the big-haired woman appeared. The younger with a baseball cap shielding half her face, the other a woman in her early or mid-forties, with bright-dyed russet hair.

Naomi asked: “Do you remember much about the trial?”

“Well—no. Not really. I never got to it, I had to work. Some of my friends went, and relatives. But you had a hard time getting in—getting a seat. The courtroom isn’t large. The trial drew a lot of attention. It was in the papers and on TV. And all these people picketing outside the courthouse . . .”

“Picketing? Why?”

“I think they were anti-abortion people. Some of them were Catholics. I mean, Catholic priests and nuns. But there were others too—all kinds. They came in buses. There was an abortion clinic here, where the doctors were shot.”

The woman was speaking carefully now, aware of Naomi’s interest.

Naomi asked if she remembered how the trial had turned out.

“He was found guilty—I think. He was sentenced to death.”

Adding, “There was a lot of upset over that. It was thought to be a harsh sentence. People who knew Luther Dunphy and his family, worked with him or belonged to the same church. In the paper there were interviews with people who knew him and all of them saying what a good man he was, a good husband and father, how he’d done carpentry work for his church. One neighbor said how after a windstorm, when some shingles on her roof were blown off, Luther Dunphy replaced them for nothing—no charge . . .” Pausing as if unsure what this might mean.

Good man. Husband, father. Carpentry. No charge.

There was a ringing in her ears. She was not hearing this.

“Does the Dunphy family still live here?”

“I don’t know.”

The woman spoke sharply. A faint flush came into her face.

“Miss, are you a—reporter?”

“No.”

“Not a reporter? You ask questions like they did. There were lots of them here during the trial. TV people, with cameras, in the street . . .”

“I am not a reporter.”

Naomi noted: on three walls of the room were framed daguerreotypes depicting scenes on the Muskegee River, of another century. On the floor was a deep plush rug, that had been recently vacuumed. The small bathroom appeared to have been remodeled with shining fixtures and a bathtub that looked as if it were made out of white plastic.

A fleeting face in the bathroom mirror. Naomi felt a touch of panic—her mother had stayed here, in this room. She was certain of this.