Chris Bohjalian - Midwives

And then abruptly he spread both arms to his sides, and with a sudden flourish brought them down hard onto the rail before him, so near to one juror that the young man flinched when they hit.

"For God's sake, Sibyl Danforth didn't kill someone," Stephen said, "she saved someone. Sibyl Danforth didn't take the life of one young woman that morning in Lawson, she saved the life of one baby boy. That's what happened, that's the truth: She rescued a baby from his dead mother.

"The State, of course, is claiming otherwise, insisting that Charlotte Bedford was alive when Sibyl Danforth performed the rescue. Where did this allegation come from? The opinion of a terrified, exhausted, and naive twenty-two-year-old woman, that's where: a woman who hadn't yet seen a dozen births, but had just endured the drama of her young life. The State is going to ask you to take the word of this twenty-two-year-old apprentice over that of the defendant, an experienced midwife who has safely delivered over five hundred babies. A woman who probably knows more about cardiopulmonary resuscitation and emergency medical treatment than most paramedics.

"Make no mistake: Sibyl Danforth knows about birth, but she also knows about death. She is too well trained to confuse a live person with a dead one. Charlotte Fugett Bedford was dead when Sibyl Danforth saved the life of the child in her womb."

He turned toward my mother and pointed at her: "This woman isn't a felon, she's a hero! Her actions weren't criminally negligent, they were courageous! She's courageous!"

It hadn't rained since just before lunch, but the skies showed no signs of clearing. Stephen paced toward the window, looked briefly at the clouds, and then stared at the jury from across the courtroom.

"There are risks to birth, and there are risks to home birth," he said, his voice even, almost wistful. "You know that, and so did Charlotte Bedford. Both she and her husband knew the risks. The State insists that Mrs. Danforth did not share with them the risks. We will show you the State is wrong.

"The State says what Mrs. Danforth did was practice medicine without a license. We will show you that she did only what any decent and courageous person-perhaps any of you-would do, given the same horrifying choice: Two deaths. Or one.

"Finally, the State is going to tell you that Charlotte wouldn't have died had she labored in a hospital. We'll never know that. But it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter because Charlotte Bedford made the informed decision to have her baby at home. And you will see that when Charlotte Bedford's labor failed to progress the way my client would have liked, my client indeed did everything in her power to get the woman to a hospital. Everything. Unfortunately, ice and wind and rain conspired against her.

"Charlotte Bedford's death is a tragedy. We know that. The State knows that. But given Charlotte and Asa Bedford's desire to have their child at home, a right protected by the state of Vermont, it was unavoidable-as you will see.

"The only reason my client is even on trial is because we have doctors in this state who want to see home birth disappear as an option; they want the whole idea to go away. They want to see every baby in this state born in a hospital. The whole idea that a midwife can do what they do-and do it better-drives some of them crazy, and so they're persecuting my client. A woman who is an excellent midwife. And I use the word persecute advisedly: They're not just prosecuting Sibyl Danforth, they're persecuting her. Her and her… kind.

"Doctors are doing now to Sibyl Danforth exactly what men have done to midwives for centuries, since the days when Anne Hutchinson was exiled from Massachusetts. They're trying to drive Sibyl Danforth away. And they're trying to do it by charging her with crimes she didn't commit."

He nodded at the judge and then murmured a soft thank you to the jury. He then took his seat beside my mother and rested his chin in his hand.

At the time I thought it had been a powerful and impressive argument, and although almost two weeks of testimony still loomed, I certainly would have resolved to acquit my mother of all charges had I been sitting in the jury box. But there was something gnawing at me when Stephen sat down, and it wasn't until my family was driving home and I was alone with my thoughts in the backseat of the car that I figured out what it was: Although Stephen had said in a variety of eloquent ways that my mother did not kill Charlotte Bedford, he never did say exactly why the poor woman had died.

I could probably figure out roughly the number of times I've reread what I wrote on March 15. I'd just have to count on a calendar the number of days that have passed since then to get a good estimate, because few days have gone by when I haven't looked at that entry. I think I started writing about four-thirty in the morning because I couldn't sleep, and I don't think I stopped until Rand got up a couple hours later. It was the Saturday we met Stephen.

That entry's like a car accident to me. I'm drawn to it, I find myself staring at the words.

When Stephen and Bill Tanner were giving their opening arguments today, they each had their own versions of what happened, and I kept thinking of mine-what I wrote on the fifteenth. After all this time, it seems to me that mine's become just one more version, too. I have a version, and Asa has a version, and Anne has a version. And we expect these twelve people to make some decision about what really happened, when even we can't agree.

Did I really love catching babies once in my life? God, I know I did, because I did it for years. And my diary is filled with the ways I loved it; I can run my fingers over the words-my words. But I haven't caught a baby in months now, I haven't felt a mother's surge while she's in labor since the spring.

And I just can't remember anymore what it felt like.

All that pleasure I once experienced has gotten to be like pain, the sort of sensation you just don't remember very well when it's over and done with. Very few of us really remember pain when it's gone; we can't recall how awful it was. That's what all the pleasure I once got from birth has become: a vague word that doesn't mean very much.

Next week I'm going to sit on the witness stand and I'm going to tell everyone what I think happened, and I'll probably find it in me to be really cool and together about it. I'm sure I'll be every bit as confident about what happened as Stephen wants me to be, because that's what I have to do now for my family.

But the truth of the matter is, I just don't have any idea anymore what really happened.

– from the notebooks of Sibyl Danforth, midwife

IN THE WEEKS BEFORE my mother's trial and the weeks of the trial itself, it was all my parents could do to take care of themselves. Their teenage daughter was certainly not the lowest priority in their lives, but, understandably, their attention was not focused upon me.

During the nights the trial was under way, I was supposed to be home in my room doing the sort of reading that the adults around me had concluded did not demand either class discussion or an academic's explanation. The school's guidance counselor had met with my teachers and my mother the week before the trial began, and everyone had agreed I'd try and keep up with my English and history, and then catch up in math and science and French when all this had passed.

Looking back, I'm astonished that anyone would have demanded such a thing. The adults were exhausted after each day in court, and so was I: After watching my mother savagely attacked for six to eight hours, I was in no condition to work.

Likewise, my parents were too tired to discipline me, too spent to even remind me that I was supposed to be doing my homework.