Joanna took the hint. Whatever it was that had happened to Leann Jessup’s relationship, the hurt was still too raw and new to tolerate discussion.
They paid their bill and left the restaurant right afterr that. Riding in Joanna’s county-owned Blazer, they arrived at the capitol mall well after dark and bare minutes before the vigil was scheduled to begin. Folding chairs had been set out on the lawn. A subdued crowd of two or three hundred people, augmented by news reporters, had gathered and were gradually taking their seats. After some searching, Joanna and Leann located a pair of vacant chairs near the far end of the second row.
The organizers from MAVEN had set the makeshift stage with an eye to drama. In the center of the capitol’s portico sat a table draped in black on which burned a single candle. Because of the enveloping darkness, that lone candle seemed to float suspended in space. Next to the table stood a spot-lit lectern with a portable microphone attached.
A woman who introduced herself as Matilda Hirales-Steinowitz, the executive director of MAVEN, spoke first. After introducing herself, she gave a brief overview of the Maricopa Anti-Violence Empowerment Network, a group Joanna had never heard of before reading the newspaper article earlier that morning.
“The people of MAVEN, women and men alike, deplore all violence,” Ms. Hirales-Steinowitz declared, “but we are most concerned with the war against women that is being conducted behind the closed doors of family homes here in the Valley. So far this year sixteen women have died in the Phoenix metropolitan area of murders police consider to be cases of domestic partner violence.
“We are gathered tonight to remember those women. We have asked representatives of each of the families to come here to speak to you about the loved ones they have lost and to light a memorial candle in their honor. We’re hoping that the light from those candles will help focus both public and legislative attention on this terrible and growing problem.”
Matilda Hirales-Steinowitz paused for a moment; then she said, “The first to die, at three o’clock on the afternoon of January third, was Anna Maria Dominguez, age twenty-six.”
With that, the spokeswoman sat down. Under the glare of both stage and television lights, a dowdy, middle-aged Hispanic woman walked slowly across the stage. Once she reached the podium, she gripped the sides of it as if to keep from falling.
“My name is Renata Sanchez,” she said in a nervously quavering voice. “Anna Maria was my daughter.”
As her listeners strained forward to hear her, Renata told about being summoned to St. Luke’s Hospital. Her daughter had come home from her first day at a new job at a convenience store. She had been met at the door by her unemployed husband. He had shot her in the face at point-blank range and then had turned the gun on himself.
“‘They’re both dead,” Renata concluded, dabbing at her eyes with a hanky. “I have had some time to get used to it, but it’s still very painful. I hope you will forgive me if I cry.”
Joanna bit her own lip. The woman’s pain was almost palpable, and far too much like Joanna’s own.
From that moment on, the evening only got worse. One by one the deadly roll was called, and one by one the survivors came haltingly forward to make their impassioned pleas for an end to the senseless killing that had cost them the life of a mother, sister, daughter, or friend.
Renata. Sanchez was right. Because the names were announced chronologically in the order in which the victims perished, the survivors who had lost loved ones earlier in the year were somewhat more self-possessed than those of the women who had died later. That was hardly surprising. The first survivors had had more time—a few months anyway—to adjust to the pain of loss. After speaking in each person took a candle from a stack on the table and lit it from the burning candle. After placing their newly lit candles on the table with the others, the speakers crossed the stage and sat in the chairs that had been provided for them.
Some of the grieving relatives addressed the listeners extemporaneously, while others read their statements hesitantly, the words barely audible through the loudspeakers. Several of the latter were so desperately nervous that their notes crackled in the microphone, rustling like dead leaves in the wind. Their lit candles trembled
