DARREN BROUGHT the kayak safely back to the dock. Nimble as a monkey he climbed out of the shaky boat as we all applauded.
By 3:30 P.M. we’d returned to St. Croix. By then, the Chevy station wagon was ready for our mother to pick up.
On the left side of the driver’s windshield was the new inspection sticker for 1997.
“NO GOOD DEED GOES UNPUNISHED”: A PERSONAL TESTIMONY
AUGUST 2006*
Dr. Voorhees!—please help me.
They came to him in desperation. They came to him after dark and sometimes they came in disguise.
It didn’t matter where, really. You’d think so, but no.
As likely in Ann Arbor or Detroit as in some small town like St. Croix or Muskegee Falls, Ohio.
If the clinic was open until 6:00 P.M. they might come then. When the protesters had gone home.
Sometimes one was waiting in the parking lot. Just—standing there, waiting.
His car which was usually the last vehicle in the lot. She’d be standing close by. In winter, gripping her mittened hands and her faint breath steaming.
Hello? Yes? Did you want to talk to me?—but she’d back away hurriedly. Before he could see her face she was panicked and running and gone.
In a light snowfall, her footprints just visible. Such small prints!
In the wintry dark, snow in patches on the ground. Snow in heaps. Snow glittering coldly in lights from the street.
DR. VOORHEES? Is that who you are? Please—help me . . .
She was young—just a girl. Could’ve been sixteen, fourteen.
Or, she was in her twenties. Already a mother, and fatigue in her face.
Or, she was older. Heavy face, frightened eyes. Opened mouth panting in terror of her audacity in so addressing the abortion-doctor-murderer.
In all of these, who approached him in such ways, the desperation of those who believed themselves damned.
What am I doing, what will come of this, what sin, what punishment, what shame and sorrow scathing as the fires of Hell.
Gus Voorhees had been surprised, the first several times. Astonished seeing one of those whom he recognized as a protester who’d been kneeling on the sidewalk in front of the clinic for months chanting in singsong with her comrades—
Free choice is a lie,
Nobody’s baby chooses to die.
Free choice is a lie,
Nobody’s baby chooses to die.
Earnest and maddening in seemingly tireless repetition to infinity you could not hear (except you could imagine) through the shut windows of the Clinic.
Free choice is a lie,
Nobody’s baby chooses to die.
One of those who’d brandished picket signs out on the street—magnified photos of aborted fetuses, mangled and bleeding; signs decrying the clinic staff as MURDERERS, BABY KILLERS; signs pleading DO NOT KILL YOUR BABY, GOD LOVES YOUR BABY.
Visitors to the clinic had to run the gauntlet of these ardent Christian protesters who were supposed to keep at least seven feet away from them but who often surged forward when a girl or a woman arrived, screaming at her. Girls and women seeking birth control. Girls and women seeking appointments to have abortions. Girls and women scheduled for abortions and very frightened.
Don’t kill your baby! God loves your baby! God loves YOU!
The clinic provided volunteer escorts to help visitors make their way inside. Sometimes, the volunteer escorts were involved in shouting/shoving matches with the most ardent of the protesters.
Murderer! Baby killer! You will rot in Hell.
But by late afternoon the protesters began to melt away. By dusk all were gone. Their greatest vigilance was during the daylight hours.
And so, at dusk, this girl/woman waiting for Dr. Voorhees at the rear of the clinic was alone. In her apprehension and indecision and in her terror waiting to see the notorious Voorhees who was (as she knew) of the Devil. Because she was desperate now. Because it was happening to her now. Because now it wasn’t someone else’s desperation but her own. Summoning her strength and courage to speak with this man so reviled and hated she would find herself pleading like a child Please—please help me and the doctor’s reply was sympathetic but regretful You will have to come to the clinic during our hours, you will have to speak with our nurse-receptionist, I am so sorry please understand there is nothing that I can do for you tonight.
And the protesting voice But you could! You could, Dr. Voorhees! I know you could.
I’m sorry. I can’t.
You could! You could!—incredulous that the very Devil would not capitulate to her, in the committing of this enormous sin.
Only just the tired-sounding man who was Gus Voorhees for whom she and her Christian comrades had prayed for months even as (they supposed) he was beyond praying for saying Would you like to give me your name? A number where you could be reached?