Civic Center next month, and the announcement of her speech sparks a demonstration at WomanCare, the Derry women's resource center and abortion clinic which has so polarized-"
"There they go with that abortion clinic stuff again!" McGovern exclaimed. "Jesus!"
"Hush!" Lois said in a peremptory tone not much like her usual tentative murmur. McGovern gave her a surprised look and hushed.
"-John Kirkland at WomanCare, with the first of two reports," Lisette Benson was finishing, and the picture switched to a reporter doing a stand-up outside a low brick building. A super at the bottom of the screen informed viewers that this was a LIVE-EYE REPORT.
A strip of windows ran along one side of WomanCare. Two of them were broken, and several others were smeared with red stuff that looked like blood. Yellow police-line tape had been strung between the reporter and the building; three uniformed Derry cops and one plainclothesman stood in a little group on the far side of it.
Ralph was not very surprised to recognize the detective as John Leydecker.
"They call themselves The Friends of Life, Lisette, and they claim their demonstration this morning was a spontaneous outpouring of indignation prompted by the news that Susan Day-the woman radical pro-life groups nationwide call 'America's Number One BabyKiller is coming to Derry next month to speak at the Civic Center.
At least one Derry police officer believes that's not quite the way it was, however."
Kirkland's report went to tape, beginning with a close-up of Leydecker, who seemed resigned to the microphone in his face.
"There was no spontaneity about this," he said. "Clearly a lot of preparation went into it. They've probably been sitting on advance word of Susan Day's decision to come here and speak for most of the week, just getting ready and waiting for the news to break in the paper, which it did this morning."
The camera went to a two-shot. Kirkland was giving Leydecker his most penetrating Geraldo look. "What do you mean 'a lot of preparation'?" he asked.
"Most of the signs they were carrying had His. Day's name on them.
Also, there were over a dozen of these."
A surprisingly human emotion slipped through Leydecker's policeman-being-interviewed mask; Ralph thought it was distaste. He raised a large plastic evidence bag, and for one horrified instant Ralph was positive that there was a mangled and bloody baby inside.
Then he realized that, whatever the red stuff might be, the body in the evidence bag was a doll's body.
"They didn't buy these at K-mart," Leydecker told the TV reporter.
"I guarantee you that."
The next shot was a long-lens close-up of the smeared and broken windows. The camera panned them slowly. The stuff on the smeared ones looked more like blood than ever, and Ralph decided he didn't want the last two or three bites of his macaroni and cheese.
"The demonstrators came with baby-dolls whose soft bodies had been with what police believe to be a mixture of Karo syrup and red food-coloring," Kirkland said in voice-over. "They flung the dolls at the side of the building as they chanted anti-Susan Day slogans. Two windows were broken, but there was no major damage."
The camera stopped, centering on a gruesomely smeared pane of glass.
"Most of the dolls split open," Kirkland was saying, "splattering a substance that looked enough like blood to badly frighten the employees who witnessed the bombardment."
The shot of the red-smeared window was replaced by one of a lovely dark-haired woman in slacks and a pullover.
"Oooh, look, it's Barbie!" Lois cried. "Golly, I hope Simone's watching! Maybe I ought to-"
It was McGovern's turn to say hush.
"I was terrified," Barbara Richards told Kirkland. "At first I thought they were really throwing dead babies, or maybe fetuses they'd gotten hold of somehow. Even after Dr. Harper ran through, yelling they were only dolls, I still wasn't sure."
"You said they were chanting?" Kirkland asked.
"Yes. What I heard most clearly was 'Keep the Angel of Death out of
Derry."
"The report now reverted to Kirkland in his live stand-up mode.
"The demonstrators were ferried from WomanCare to Derry Police Headquarters on Main Street around nine o'clock this morning, Lisette.
I understand that twelve were questioned and released; six others were arrested on charges of malicious mischief, a misdemeanor. So it seems that another shot in Derry's continuing war over abortion has been fired. This is John Kirkland, Channel Four news."
"Another shot in-' "McGovern began, and threw up his hands.
Lisette Benson was back on the screen. "We now go to Anne Rivers, who talked less than an hour ago to two of the so-called