The Ferryman

by John E. Siers

“OK—I’ve got a few things to take care of here before we close up. Why don’t you look at that and maybe we can bend the rules and talk about it over dinner. I’m cooking tonight—remember?”

  “I’m looking forward to it. See you at closing time.”

  Chapter Four

  Lacrisha

  After signing off with Lisa, Mark turned to the file Eunice had sent him. The subject’s name was Lacrisha Jones, age 14—the minimum age to contract with the Ferry on her own.

  At one time, legal contract murder was only permitted for adult victims—age 18 or older—and the same would have been true for the Ferry’s “assisted suicide” business. But in a lawsuit brought by a suicide advocacy group, the Supreme Court ruled that anyone over the age of fourteen (which the court judged to be the “age of reasonable independent thought”) could contract for suicide as an adult and without parental consent.

  The court had not chosen to comment on contract murder other than suicide, but LifeEnders had announced that it would not take a contract unless the both the target and contracting party were 18 or older. The Ferry simply announced that it would adhere to the ruling of the court.

  Mark was surprised that Mercer had sent him one this young. Girl must be really far gone, he reflected. Probably broke Eunice’s heart to make the call.

  Lacrisha was a small, skinny black girl whose face had once had a look of childlike innocence, bright brown eyes above a wide, shiny nose, under an unruly mop of jet-black natural curls. The first picture was a school portrait, and her sweet smile showed that she’d once been a happy child.

  Other pictures—notably the booking photos taken after her latest suicide attempt—showed no trace of that happiness. She’d gone directly to jail from the hospital after being treated for her self-inflicted injury, and her neck showed an ugly bruise from the garden hose with which she’d tried to hang herself. A prominent scar on her cheek ran from just below her eye to just above the corner of her mouth. Her face was thin to the point of emaciation.

  Mark wondered how she had possibly gotten from the sweet, happy girl in photo number one to the desperate, death-seeking scarecrow in the last picture. He turned to the case history notes in Mercer’s file.

  Normally that file was all the documentation the Ferry needed, but after reading the first two pages, Mark filed a request with NorthStar Investigations, LLC for more information. The security company’s fees would probably eat up all the grant money they’d get for the termination—the Ferry didn’t usually investigate CSPC clients—but Mark was beginning to get a feel for why this case bothered Mercer so much, and he wanted to know more.

  Lacrisha was the only child of a single mother who’d only been thirteen when Lacrisha was born. Nonetheless, Tamara Jones had managed—with a minimum amount of public assistance—to provide for her daughter and herself. Lacrisha had been a good student, earning above average grades through elementary school, even skipping two grades, and moving on to advanced placement courses in her first year of high school.

  Then something had changed. There were notations about online bullying and then physical harassment by persons unknown. Mercer’s file showed that she’d transferred to a new school a year ago, but her tormentors wouldn’t let go, and they knew where she lived.

  One day, on her way home from school, they’d kidnapped her. Her mother had been frantic and had called the police when she came home from work and discovered Lacrisha’s absence.

  The police hadn’t been helpful. They got a lot of calls like that—usually when some teenager went off to party and do drugs with friends—and mothers always insisted their child would never do that. They told Tamara to call them back if Lacrisha didn’t return in a week.

  In fact, she returned the next morning—battered, her clothing torn, bleeding from a cut on her cheek—the one that had produced the scar Mark had seen in the photo. She’d refused to talk about where she’d been, but bloody underwear gave evidence that her virginity had been taken. Again, a trip to the hospital drew little response—ER doctors provided basic treatment for visible injuries. A rape kit showed she’d been sexually molested, but she refused to name her attackers, and the police closed that case as well.

  From that point, abduction and release—usually within a few hours, but once she’d been gone for three days—became a regular part of her life. She stopped going to school, but the tormentors seemed to know whenever she left the little run-down house her mother rented. And her mother still needed to go to work, so they started coming to the house to take her even when she didn’t go out. The first time they’d broken the back door, and her mother hadn’t had the money to get it repaired. After that, Lacrisha just left it open so they wouldn’t break anything else.

  She’d managed to endure whatever they were doing to her for more than a year. She would never admit it, but her mother knew she was being sexually molested, probably raped. Just thirteen at the time, she hadn’t even had her first period, but when that arrived, her mother spent most of her savings to get the girl a long-term contraceptive shot—even knowing, at her age, that it might damage her ability to ever have children.

  On her 14th birthday, she’d attempted suicide the first time, swallowing the contents of every bottle she’d found in her mother’s medicine cabinet. Finding her unconscious, her mother had called EMS to take her to the hospital, where the medics had saved her life.

  The police called it “drug abuse” rather than a suicide attempt. Their conclusion was based on the needle marks on her arms and legs, as well as blood tests that showed heroin, methamphetamines, and several other things that hadn’t been in the medicine cabinet.

  Her second suicide attempt—slashed wrists—had brought her to Mercer’s attention. At first she’d been compliant, cooperated with counseling, and went back to school. Then she’d started missing school and counseling sessions. Two months ago, she tried to hang herself.

  Medical reports told the tale of a battered body, forced drug use, and sexually transmitted diseases. Thanks to a rehab program Mercer had gotten her into, her system was clean of both drugs and STDs, but nothing could heal the psychological damage she’d suffered. Only death would do that now.

  By the time he’d finished the file, Mark had revised his commission to NorthStar several times, giving them additional information to work with, and requesting specific information in return. In the course of it, he’d more than tripled the cost of the investigation, putting Lacrisha’s termination in the loss column of the Ferry’s books.

  Mark didn’t care. This time it was personal, and if NorthStar delivered the information he’d requested, he’d probably be spending even more money after Lacrisha was gone.

  What has this world come to? Eunice wondered. Human life means nothing anymore. She had grown up in the waning years of the 20th century and was at a loss to understand how society had gotten to its present state.

  She cared nothing for Mark Marshall’s rich clientele. If someone with a million dollars in the bank was so screwed up they wanted to kill themselves, she would happily give them the Ferry’s number. She might even admit that in some cases they probably did society a service. Every now and then, some truly evil sociopath would disappear, and the news media would hint that he or she had taken what they liked to call “a Ferry Ride,” to avoid prosecution, or to escape a messy execution by LifeEnders.

  But the young girl she was bringing today—delivering into the lair of the enemy—was not rich, not evil, was just a sweet kid Eunice had tried to save.

  Tried and failed, she admitted bitterly, as she watched Lacrisha and her mother walk up the steps toward the entrance of Charon’s Ferry.

  Mark had seen Mercer’s car drop the girl and her mother and drive away. She wouldn’t have gone far—Mark would call her to pick up the mother after the meeting.

  Sitting in his office, Lacrisha looked like the booking photos—thin, battered, disheveled, and mostly dead already. She looked at Mark with the “thousand-yard stare,” as th
ey called it in the Marines. Lights are on, but nobody’s home, he thought.

  Tamara Jones was an inch or two taller than her daughter, and easily a hundred pounds heavier. Mark could see the resemblance, and imagined that in a happier life, Lacrisha would look like her mother’s younger sister rather than her daughter. He turned his attention to the girl.

  “Lacrisha…do you know why you’re here?” he began.

  “Yes,” she said promptly, her face showing some life for the first time. “You’re gonna put me down. Put me outta my misery, is that how they say it? End my suffering?”

  “I can’t pretend to know anything about your suffering,” he said, “but yes, we’re going to end it for you.”

  “Good. That’s what I want. I tried to do it myself, but they won’t let me. Now you’re gonna do it for me.”

  “Ms. Jones…” Mark turned to the mother, “you know she’s old enough to do this herself. You don’t need to be here. We’ll take good care of her…”

  “I know. I just want to say goodbye before you…send her off.”

  There were tears in her eyes, and Mark felt a stinging in his own. Suck it up, Marine. Be professional. Let’s get this done.

  “Lacrisha, there are things the law says I have to tell you. First, we don’t notify anyone that you’ve been here except the California Department of Human Services—we send them a death notice when it’s over. Your mother knows what’s going to happen, but we can’t let her stay and see it. She’ll have to leave after this meeting.”

  “That’s OK…it’s better if she don’t see it anyway. Don’t want to hurt her any more than she is already.”

  “Also, we dispose of your body by our own methods,” he continued. “Your mother won’t be able to take you home and bury you. She can still have a funeral and put a marker in a cemetery, but you won’t be there.”

  “No, Mama, it’s OK…” Lacrisha insisted, seeing her mother’s distress. “You can’t afford no funeral, and I don’t need no marker. Those people would just come and mess it up. Better if they never know what happened. You’ll just keep me in your heart.”

  Tamara Jones could no longer hold back. She sagged in her chair, sobbing, tears flowing freely. Lacrisha got up and hugged her.

  “It’s OK, Mama. I’m gonna be in heaven. You can talk to me anytime you want, especially on Sunday, when you go to church.”

  Wonder how Lisa’s taking this.

  Like all the working spaces in the building, Mark’s office was covered by hidden security cameras. He knew Lisa was watching—they’d already agreed that she should, due to Tamara’s presence. He wondered if she was crying as well. In many ways, Lisa was hardcore, but she didn’t like to see anyone suffer.

  “What else do I need to know?” Lacrisha asked.

  “Only that when you imprint the contract, you’re giving us permission to end your life by whatever means we choose, at the time and place we choose to do it. In this case, that means here in this building, a few minutes after you sign. We won’t keep you waiting.”

  “How you gonna do it? Is it OK to ask?”

  Mark glanced at Tamara, but she was lost in her grief and didn’t react.

  “If this were an ordinary case, I would probably shoot you through the heart right there in that chair as soon as you imprinted the contract. It would hurt, but only for a moment.”

  That got a reaction from her, but only a surprised look with no trace of fear.

  “But…” he continued, “this is not an ordinary case. Your mother will have to leave before we do anything—we never allow anyone to see it happen.

  “Besides, I promised Ms. Mercer I would make it as painless as possible. We don’t do poisons or drugs—no lethal injections, no pills, no flavored bye-bye drinks—but that doesn’t mean it has to be painful. Since you’re not afraid to face it, I think hanging is the best way for you. It’s quick and painless.”

  “Huh! No it’s not,” she insisted. “I already tried that, and I was hangin’ there, chokin’ and kickin’, and it hurt like hell. Then I blacked out and woke up in the hospital.”

  “That’s because you didn’t do it right. A proper hanging doesn’t choke you—it breaks your neck. There isn’t any pain because your brain gets disconnected. Lights out.”

  She looked at him suspiciously.

  “So…OK. Tell me. What’d I do wrong, and how you gonna ‘do it right’—like you said.”

  “I saw the police report,” he told her. “Seriously? A rubber hose? It stretches and cushions your fall. Besides, you jumped off a chair—didn’t fall much, just kicked the chair out from under yourself. You’re a lightweight—your neck was strong enough to support your weight without breaking. You didn’t fall far enough or stop quickly enough to break it.”

  “Here, you’ll drop at least eight feet before our rope—which won’t stretch very much—stops you. Because you’re so light, we’ll attach weights to you to make sure. Your neck will break, and that will be it.”

  “Lacrisha,” he said, his voice softened, “I’ve done this many times, and never had it fail to work. You won’t feel a thing, and it’ll be over before you even know what happened.”

  “OK…It’s all good. I’m ready to sign.”

  “I need your Universal ID,” he told her. She handed it over, and he passed her the contract.

  “Just lick your finger and press it on the square that’s marked in red…that’s all we need.”

  “Never done no ‘legal document’ like this.” She actually smiled. “Just lick and stick, huh? That’s all?” She imprinted the contract as instructed. The square immediately turned green, indicating that both the fingerprint and DNA sample were good.

  “That’s all,” he told her as Lisa came into the office with perfect timing. They’d agreed that she would do the drop while Mark arranged for Mercer to pick up Lacrisha’s mother. If there was any delay, Lisa would just go ahead and hang the girl.

  “Don’t worry, Mama…” Lacrisha turned to her mother, who had started sobbing again. “I know I’m going to heaven, ‘cause I’ve already been to hell. I’m gonna tell God what a good mother you’ve been, and He should take care of you.” She squeezed her mother’s hand, then turned to Lisa.

  “You gonna take me there?” she asked. “You look like an angel—least what I always thought an angel should look like.”

  “Yes, honey,” Lisa assured her. “I’ll take you now…and send you off to heaven.”

  Lacrisha hugged her mother once more, then pulled away and let Lisa take her out the door.

  “Ms. Jones…believe me, we’ll take good care of her,” Mark said. “I’m going to call Ms. Mercer now. I’ll take you out to her when she arrives.”

  “Wait!…” Tamara Jones looked at him with pleading eyes. “Can I just…talk to you for a minute?”

  “All right.” He paused, looking at her with suspicion. Why am I thinking I’m not going to like this? “What do you want to talk about?”

  “I didn’t just come here to say goodbye,” she told him through her tears. “I came to ask you to take me with her. Please…I got no way to pay you, but it won’t be no trouble. You could just hang me with the same rope. Please…”

  Oh, hell…Mark had figured there might be a few problems with letting her sit in on the meeting, but he hadn’t seen this one coming.

  “Ms. Jones…I can’t just…”

  “Please!” she begged. “I got nothin’ left. She’s my baby, the only thing I have in the world. When she was born and didn’t have no daddy, I didn’t know what to do, but those DHS people told me I’d be OK—they’d take care of me and her. But I had to agree to let them fix me so I couldn’t have no more kids. Now she’s gone, and I got nothing left to live for.

  “That’s why I came here. Didn’t want her to know that, didn’t want to hurt her more. She might have tried to keep going, and I just want to end her suffering. But that’s it…I just want to go with her, right now, today. Just want to be with my little girl.�
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  Lisa’s pad pinged as she arrived on the execution room balcony with the girl.

  Something’s come up. I’m going to be delayed, but we’re still go for Lacrisha. Can you do the drop by yourself?

  Lisa looked around—they’d already prepped for the hanging, and the girl was the most compliant subject she’d seen in a long time. It would be over in five minutes.

  No problem, she replied. I’ll let you know when it’s done.

  It must be over…Eunice Mercer touched the icon on her car’s screen to take the call. Poor Tamara…what am I going to say when I pick her up?

  “Eunice, Mark…we need to talk.” Marshall’s voice held a note of concern that got her attention immediately.

  “What’s happened? Is Lacrisha…”

  “Lacrisha is being taken care of. It’s her mother I’m calling about. She’s here with me and has just asked me if she can…follow Lacrisha, go the same way her daughter’s going. Did you know she wanted to do this?”

  “No! I didn’t!” Mercer was stunned. “I…never expected…”

  He didn’t reply, and she sat there for a moment, trying to sort out the situation.

  “I guess maybe I should have,” she said at last. “She’s been so steady, so focused on helping her daughter. It never occurred to me to wonder what would happen to her when Lacrisha was gone.”

  “Well, now we have to decide what to do. She’s right here…I think you should talk to her.”

  Tamara’s face appeared on the screen, and Eunice sat in silence, listening as she made her plea. She’s even further gone than the girl was. She’s blamed herself for everything that happened to her daughter. I’ll have to…do what? What can I do for her that I haven’t already tried to do for Lacrisha?

  Tamara finished her plea, and Mark’s face appeared on the screen again.

  “So…what do you want me to do? If you want to try to help her, I’ll bring her our front. I can’t give her what she wants unless you OK it anyway…you know how it works.”