The Fourth Child by Jessica Winter (best classic novels TXT) 📕

and carry so many protesters that the police department purchased wide leather lifting belts,like the ones Pat and Colin and Brad Bender used to wear for weight training during football season.

“To every thing, there is a season, and a time to every purpose under heaven,” Father Steve said to murmuring assent.

“Will we—will people who participate in the Spring of Life risk getting arrested?” Mr. Glover asked.

“We may be arrested,” Father Steve replied. “It’s nothing to fear. I can’t imagine a jail in the suburbs looking like Attica.Arrests are one thing, but in terms of convictions, if we are speaking of an actual prison sentence, it’s very unlikely.”

“How can you be sure?” Mr. Glover asked.

“The necessity defense,” Summer and Charity said in unison.

“The activists in Wichita shouldn’t have been arrested in the first place,” Summer explained, “because of the necessity defense.The courts recognize that sometimes breaking the law can be justified for a greater good.”

“It’s straight out of Thomas Aquinas,” Mr. Glover said.

“Any fair-minded judge will understand that we have to do this,” Charity said.

The ultrasound images that Mr. Glover procured from his doctor friend at Children’s Hospital made Jane think of seafood. A shrimp submerged in brine. A jaunty seahorse. Sean was the only one of her babies who Jane saw on ultrasound. They rubbed a gel on her belly that conducted sound waves through a plastic wand as big as a mixing spoon, and a computer assembled the pictures that bounced back, much like a bat assembles a mental floor plan of his environment through echolocation. Or a dolphin. Sean, her little dolphin! Bouncing his clicks and squeaks around the pool until they etched his self-portrait. The wand was smooth and beige as the reverend. The technician pushed and dug in and worked it over Jane’s belly, like she was moving cold butter through batter with her dumb wooden spoon, like Jane was in the way, or like Jane wasn’t there at all. Trying to reach the baby, to see the baby’s clicks and squeaks. The messages Sean wanted everyone to hear.

Sean. That was Sean. Never anything but Sean. She could have ended Sean, by law.

The gleaming instruments could have ended Sean. She closed her eyes against the glare. She shuddered as the nurse brushedpast.

“We obey God’s law before we obey man’s law,” Charity said. “It’s the first commandment.”

“You might argue it’s also in Romans, which is incidentally the most law-abiding of the Gospels,” Father Steve said. “Romanssays, ‘Love doeth no harm to a neighbor, therefore Love doth fulfill the Law.’”

“I understand that the doctor in Wichita was doing abortions very late, when the baby is, well, really a baby,” Betty Andrower said.

“It’s always a baby!” Summer and Charity said.

“Okay, but there’s a continuum—” Betty said. She was fussing with the gold cross around her neck, drumming her plum-colorednails against the brief line of décolletage that disappeared into the V-neck of her sweater.

“You sound like Tiller the killer,” Phil said, not a condemnation so much as a correction, like of course Betty didn’t meanwhat she had said. Tiller was the worst one, his name a curse.

“Well, yes, I know, it’s always a—you know what I mean,” Betty said. “My question is—do we know if any of the clinics in Buffalo—justto play devil’s advocate—”

“And why would we advocate the devil?” Phil asked.

“—are there any, shall we say, special cir-cum-stances,” Betty enunciated, an actorly warble entering her voice to protest all the interruptions, “under which they perform—”

“What type of special circumstance could possibly justify murder?” Phil asked. “This is science. This is a genetically unique,growing, living being. That living being has never existed before and will never exist again. What justification can therebe? Why would we look for one?”

“Well, I don’t like even to say the word, but”—Betty’s voice dropped to a scandalized whisper—“rape.” She tugged at her cross.

“There’s no death penalty for rape,” Summer and Charity said in unison.

“Okay, but—it’s hard,” Betty said. “To put someone through all that.” Phil opened his mouth to reply—and Jane knew what hewould say: If it’s so hard on the mother, then how hard is it for the baby?—but he stopped himself.

Jane didn’t think Betty’s conundrum was hard.

“Don’t get me wrong,” Betty said, her head stooped prayerfully. “It’s a terrible thing. No words. I mean, that’s why I’m here. Because I think it’s all just terrible.”

Jane had one that was hard. “What about a case where the mother’s life is in danger?” she asked. “Women used to die in childbirthall the time.”

“Used to,” Mr. Glover said.

“It’s rare that a baby would put his own mother’s life in danger,” Father Steve said.

“It’s a myth created by the pro-abortion forces,” Mr. Glover said.

“But even if it’s rare,” Jane said, “even if it only happens to one woman—”

“That woman is a child of God and a whole world unto herself, and that is a tragedy. You are right, Jane,” Father Steve said,nodding.

“Pardon?” Mr. Glover asked.

“Jane,” Father Steve said, “you have heard of the term fetomaternal chimerism.”

It was neither a question nor a statement, and the ambiguity was intended to flatter the listener. “Chimera in the Greek myths is a fire-breathing monster,” she said. “Part lion, part goat, part dragon. Always a woman.”

Surprise or pique crossed Father Steve’s face, but then he was beaming indulgence at her again. “I used to read a lot of fablesand myths to the kids,” Jane said. “Sorry,” she added.

“Chimera is also an illusion,” he said, nodding. “A mirage born out of magical thinking. Like in your myths, Jane. The irony, in thiscase, is that it’s in fact entirely appropriate to think in terms of magic and miracles when it comes to the bond betweena mother and her unborn child. Science”—he popped a tiny exclamation point on the word, like in the goofy English pop songthe boys used to like so much—“has discovered that a baby’s cells can remain inside his or her mother’s body for years, evendecades after he or she is born. They might stay there forever. And those young, new