the wall was playing nevertheless, and their old friend Lisette Benson was reading the morning news. Ralph remembered the day he and Lois and Bill had sat in Lois's living room, eating macaroni and cheese as they watched Lisette Benson report on the doll-throwing incident at WomanCare. Less than a month ago that had been. He suddenly remembered that Bill McGovern would never watch Lisette Benson again, or forget to lock the front door, and a sense of loss as fierce as a November gale swept through him. He could not completely believe it, at least not yet. How could Bill have died so quickly and so unceremoniously?
He would have hated it, Ralph thought, and not just because he would have considered dying of a heart-attack in a hospital corridor in bad taste. He would've considered it bad theater, as well.
But he had seen it happen, and Lois had actually felt it eating away at Bill's insides. That made Ralph think of the deathbag surrounding the
Civic Center, and what was going to happen there if they didn't stop the speech. He started toward the elevator again, but Lois pulled him back. She was looking at the TV, fascinated. -will feel a lot of relief when tonight's speech by feminist abortion-rights advocate Susan Day is history," Lisette Benson was saying, "but the police aren't the only ones who will feel that way.
Apparently both pro-life and pro-choice advocates are beginning to feel the strain of living on the edge of confrontation, John Kirkland is live at the Derry Civic Center this morning, and he has more.
John?"
The pallid, unsmiling man standing next to Kirkland was Dan Dalton. The button on his shirt showed a scalpel descending toward an infant with its knees drawn up in the fetal position. This was In a cross surrounded by a red circle with a diagonal red line slashed it.
Ralph could see half a dozen police cars and two news trucks, one with the NBC logo on its side, in the background of the shot.
A uniformed cop strolled across the lawn leading two dogs-a bloodhound and a German shepherd-on leashes.
"That's right, Lisette, I'm here at the Civic Center, where the mood could be termed one of worry and quiet determination. With me is Dan Dalton, President of The Friends of Life organization, which has been so vehemently opposed to His. Day's speech. Mr. Dalton, would you agree with that assessment of the situation?"
"That there's a lot of worry and determination in the air?"
Dalton asked. To Ralph his smile looked both nervous and disdainful.
"Yes, I suppose you could put it that way. We're worried that Susan Day, one of this country's greatest unindicted criminals, will succeed in her efforts to confuse the central issue here in Derry: the murder of twelve to fourteen helpless unborn children each and every day."
"But Mr. Dalton-"
"And"-Dalton overrode him-"we are determined to show a watching nation that we are not willing to be good Nazis, that we are not all cowed by the religion of political correctness-the dreaded pee-cee."
"Mr. Dalton-"
"We are also determined to show a watching nation that some of us are still capable of standing up for our beliefs, and to fulfill the sacred responsibility which a loving God has-"
"Mr. Dalton, are The Friends of Life planning any sort of violent protest here?"
That shut him up for a moment and at least temporarily drained all the canned vitality from his face. With it gone, Ralph saw a dismaying thing: underneath his bluster, Dalton was scared to death.
"Violence?" he said at last. He brought the word out carefully, like something that could give his mouth a bad cut if mishandled.
"Good Lord, no. The Friends of Life reject the idea that two wrongs can ever make a right. We intend to mount a massive demonstration-we are being joined in this fight by pro-life advocates from Augusta, Portland, Portsmouth, and even Boston-but there will be no violence."
"What about Ed Deepneau? Can you speak for him?"
Dalton's lips, already thinned down to little more than a seam, now seemed to disappear altogether. "Mr. Deepneau is no longer associated with The Friends of Life," he said. Ralph thought he detected both fear and anger in Dalton's tone. "Neither are Frank Felton, Sandra McKay, and Charles Pickering, in case you intended to ask."
John Kirkland's glance at the camera was brief but telling. It said that he thought Dan Dalton was as nutty as a bag of trail-mix.
"Are you saying that Ed Deepneau and these other individualsI'm sorry, I don't