He paced the aisle of the ghost train, waiting. Each time he welcomed a ghost, each time he comforted a murdered woman, he longed to join her on that final journey. But that would never be so he kept his eternal vigil. Diogenes with his lamp, riding the Chicago subway.

The train slowed and stopped; the doors opened to admit a single passenger. She was a young woman, barely grown into an adulthood she would never enjoy. Her clothes, torn and bloodstained, gave evidence of the brutality. Her eyes were cold; shocked at the violence she had just endured. He would offer her water, but he had none.

The door slid closed the train departed. He sat next to her, taking her hand. “It’s over,” he whispered. “He will never beat you again.”

 “Will he face justice? Her voice was frail.

He sighed. “Perhaps. Perhaps in time he will see the error of his ways. Some men do, you know.” The train entered a tunnel. “Be still now, it will be over soon.”

“Thank you for your kindness.” She said, and she looked directly at him. “Are you God?”

He would have laughed if the circumstances would have let him. 

The lights flickered and the woman disappeared; leaving nothing but a small spot of ectoplasm in his hand.

“No,” he said standing up to await the next passenger. “My name is Jack.”