David Kessler - Mercy

“Oh no, that I didn’t do. That was just luck. They wanted out and I saw my opportunity. If they hadn’t dropped out, I’d’ve probably gone to work for them. Although I must confess I liked it a whole lot more this way — for reasons that should have figured out by now.”

“Then perhaps you’d like to tell me.”

“Well firstly, I liked the irony of defending the man who was found guilty of killing her.”

“Except that he didn’t kill her, did he?”

“No,” replied Nat, swallowing nervously. “I did.”

Juanita was waiting for the second page of the fax to come through. But there seemed to be a problem. The machine was making frantic noises like it was making valiant efforts to print the page, but it wasn’t happening. After a few more seconds, the machine fell silent and it flashed a message on the LCD display: “Black toner empty.”

“Damn!” she cursed.

She raced to the office supply cupboard and found another, angrily ripping the box open and tearing the wrapping off the cartridge. There was a frantic haste in her movements as she opened the fax machine and removed the old cartridge, tossed it aside, pulled off the tape that covered the flow-hole of the cartridge and slotted it into the machine.

Then came the long wait for the machine to restart. The motor cranked to life and started huffing and puffing like an aging locomotive struggling up a high-grade track to the top of a hill. Even then it wasn’t over: the LCD display invited her to choose “Y” or “N” for whether she had changed each of the four cartridges. And even then, after more cranking and wheezing, the LCD announced: “Cleaning.”

Every time! She thought to herself. Every fucking time!

“I had a feeling that you were going to say that,” said Alex, meeting Nat’s eyes unflinchingly. “I assume you were one of her classmates. I don’t remember your picture in the year book. Which one were you?”

“It doesn’t matter,” said Nat.

“Is he dead?” asked one of the crowd of people, a reporter.

“The doctor’s still checking.”

“Why was it called off?” asked the reporter.

“They got a call from the governor,” said another reporter.

For a moment, Alex and Nat had got distracted by the exchange. But now they looked at each other again.

“Okay,” said Alex. “I don’t need to know the minutiae now. But I want to understand why. Why did you kill her? What had she done to you?”

“You really don’t get it, do you?” asked Nat with a sneer in his voice. “I was doing her a favor.”

“A favor?”

“Yeah, you know … like in that movie — They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? ”

Alex was beginning to understand. “You wanted to put her out of her misery?”

Nat nodded.

“Think about it. An abusive father. An indifferent mother who turned a blind eye to what her father was doing to her. Bullying in school, not just at the hands of Clayton Burrow but most of her class. Burrow was just the ring leader, but how do you think the rest of them reacted to a cross-dressing bull-dyke?”

“So what was it? A mercy killing?”

“You could call it that. I know that’s not a defense in law, but it’s the truth.”

“But when did you do it?”

“What do you mean, when?”

“Well it wasn’t round about the time she vanished. We know that she went to London and had an abortion. We know that she never came back. You had her passport at your place and it didn’t have any exit stamp from England. What happened, Nat? Did you go over to England and kill her there?”

“I had to. It was hard. To do something like that is never easy. But I had to. I finally killed her when she was over there.”

“What do you mean ‘finally’? Had you been trying before?”

“Oh, I’d been trying to kill her for a long time.”

Looking at the clock on the wall, Juanita was frantic. The fax machine was taking ages to go through its self-cleaning routine. She shifted uncomfortably, waiting for it to finish and start printing again.

But what was the point? Looking at the clock on the wall, she realized that it was too late. Unless they had taken a long time reading out the warrant or Clayton had made a particularly long final statement, he had to be dead by now.

While she waited, she remembered Jonathan’s call about his mother. She thought she should tell Alex. But when she called, it went straight to his voicemail. She decided to send him a quick, tersely-worded text.

Finally the machine finished its routine, the chugging sound gave way to a rapid high-pitched whirring and the printing started up again.

Juanita’s heart leaped into her mouth as she waited for the machine to spit out the next sheet of paper.

David had finally recovered the MP3 file. He wasn’t sure if the recovery process was bit perfect, but even if there were a few inaudible or distorted parts, they would still have the bulk of it.

He had copied it over to a PC in the lab; now he had to run it and listen to it. But the PC didn’t have any speakers, it was built as a high-spec functional machine, not a games machine — so, although it had a sound card, it had no speakers.

He wandered off in search of another computer that he could borrow. The trouble was, most of the offices were locked, making it impossible to check them out. The offices that were open told the same story: no speakers.

Finally, on a hunch, he decided to check the drawers in some of the offices and labs that were open. He eventually found what he was looking for: a set of headphones.

He raced back to the lab and plugged the speakers into the PC. Then he put them and played the MP3 file, listening to the voice of a girl who may or may not have been dead, addressing her daddy.

“How did you kill her?”

“Slowly?”

“I thought you said it was a mercy killing?”

“Some things can’t be rushed.

He was still facing Nat. In the background, several other people seemed to be taking an interest in them.

“He’s dead!” said a reporter in the background.

Alex and Nat half-turned.

“Are you sure?” asked another.

“Yeah, they’ve just confirmed it.”

“Why did they try to halt it?”

“The warrant was withdrawn.”

“Procedural or substantive?”

Some of the reporters were looking at Alex from a few yards away, as if hoping for a reaction from him.

“God knows.”

Alex, for his part, kept his eyes locked on Nat.

“So what did you do with the body?”

“I buried her.”

“Where?”

“Somewhere deep.”

Nat hadn’t noticed the uniformed men who came up behind him, until Alex motioned to them with his eyes. When Nat did eventually look to his side he noticed them — a slightly fat older one of just below average height and a lean younger one, maybe two inches taller. They were wearing the uniform of Marin County Deputies.

“Nathaniel Anderson?”

“Yes.”

“We have a warrant for your arrest for obstruction of justice.”

One them flashed the warrant in front of him, while the other clamped his hand behind his back and handcuffed him. Nat offered no resistance and made no attempt to run. As he was about to be led away, he smiled at Alex.

As Alex watched them leading Nat away, he switched his iPhone back on. As soon as it came on, a message came through. He looked at it. It was a message from Juanita.

Had call from Jonathan. Esther Olsen died.

As he walked out into the corridor toward the entrance area and the exit from the prison, Alex felt the pain in the pit of his stomach. He had been moved by the death of Clayton Burrow. But it was nothing compared to the gut-wrenching feeling that ripped at him now. This poor woman, who had wanted only to bring happiness to her daughter, had instead alienated the girl and lost her love forever. This woman who had tried to ease her husband’s pain and guilt as best she knew how, had lost him — and lost her daughter trying to keep him. This woman who had gone to unimaginable lengths to give her tormented husband a son, had lost the son’s affection and love. This woman who had sacrificed everything and let other people walk all over her for the sake of those she loved had died alone … unloved.