Writing for Fun
September 2016
Doppleganger - Pete Norman
Doppelganger The man extended his hand, but there was no warmth in it and there was no handshake on offer.
‘You have the money?’
Roger pulled a brown manila envelope from his inside pocket.
The man riffled through the notes with practised ease and nodded his acceptance. He reached into a drawer and produced an iPad. He pressed the power button and the screen burst into life. Roger gasped as he recognised the front of his own house taken from a somewhat acute angle. He scrolled the screen. The next photograph was of an ice blue Jaguar parked in the roadway outside. The next few shots, which had apparently been taken in very quick succession, showed a man frame by frame climbing out of the car and moving towards the house.
He was tall, well built and well dressed. He was in his mid to late forties with a shock of blond hair which appeared to have been carefully groomed to appear dishevelled. He looked like a fitness instructor in executive clothes. The camera followed as the man walked up the driveway and then, just at the moment he pressed the doorbell, it captured a furtive look over his shoulder as if to see whether he was being observed.
Roger stared in disbelief at the next picture, Annette was standing in the open doorway, her smile was warm and familiar, much too warm and familiar. She was wearing one of her favourite party dresses that hugged her figure and left very little to the imagination. He had always loved her in that dress, but before she had always worn it for him, for her husband, nor for some fitness gigolo in a fancy suit. He could feel his pulse rising. He took a glance at the man sitting behind the desk but his face was impassive, he had obviously been here many times before.
The next shot was of Annette stepping back as he entered, he was so close that it almost looked as if he was going to kiss her on the doorstep, but the next was of the door closing and the moment had gone.
Roger closed his eyes and shook his head. ‘Are there any more?’
He scrolled the screen through several bland shots until finally he could see the door was open again and the man was emerging. Behind him Annette looked nowhere near as pristine as she had when he had first entered, her hair was dishevelled and it looked as if she had thrown the dress back on with very little thought. Roger clenched his fists as he saw the smug, satisfied expression on the bastard’s face as he walked back to his car.
The next screen showed a rather nice house in a rather nice neighbourhood which might otherwise have seemed quite innocuous but for the ice blue Jaguar parked on the driveway. Beside the door the number 57 in ornate brass letters was set into a carved wooden plaque. Photoshopped onto the bottom of the picture was the detail: Clive Marchant, 57 Meadow View, Maida Vale.
The man popped out the SD card and handed it to Roger.
‘These are the only copies.’
He nodded and stared at the small piece of blue plastic resting in the palm of his hand. It looked so tiny and insignificant, but the devastation it contained would signal the end of his life as he knew it. He had been prepared for the worst and this was as bad as it could get. In his mind he had gone through all of the possible scenarios over and over in the past few days and he now knew exactly what he had to do.
He parked in the next road and walked casually along the pavement that he had paced so many times in the virtual world of Google Maps Street View. The house looked even more grand in the flesh than it had on the computer screen and the resentment was seething inside him as he walked up the driveway and rang the bell. A few moments later the door opened and a man appeared. He looked even more good looking than he had on the photographs but the hint of an arrogant smile on his face destroyed the image, made Roger’s blood boil.
He struggled to remain calm, forcing a neighbourly smile. He held up an envelope with his left hand. ‘Sorry to trouble you, but it seems the postman has delivered this to the wrong address.
As the man’s attention was focussed on the address on the envelope, in that split second of inattention, he failed to see Roger’s other hand snaking out from inside his jacket. The knife was large and sharp and swept upwards, through the man’s stomach and up under his ribcage.
The expression on his face was a delight to behold, a mixture of surprise, incomprehension and absolute horror. As the man collapsed in his doorway Roger turned on his heel and walked quickly away. His emotions were in overdrive, he was trembling with adrenaline, excitement and pure unmitigated vengeance, but he knew only too well that he had to get the hell out of here as inconspicuously as he could – if he was seen and if someone took notice of him then he was in deep trouble. He wanted to run as fast as his legs would carry him away from this place but somehow he managed to keep his legs moving at a casual pace and his face impassive and unremarkable, but he knew that for the next few minutes he was more vulnerable than he had ever been in his life before.
He was running though it all in his mind, questioning everything he had done, convinced that some tiny mistake, some insignificant error he had made would come back to haunt him. He knew he was being paranoid and he knew that this was a perfectly natural reaction to a dreadfully unnatural situation, but he could not shake off the feeling that he had missed something important, that he had made some fatal error.
It seemed like an eternity but finally he regained the sanctity of his own car where for a few brief moments he allowed himself to collect his breath and surrender to the enormity of what he had just done before he drove off, away from the scene and out of danger.
It had all taken just a few short minutes and at no time had he seen another living soul in the road. He was positive that there would be nothing that could connect him to the crime but still the niggling doubt would not leave him.
He parked the car in the office car park and returned to his desk where he spent the rest of the afternoon in perfectly tedious normality, although at times he found his hand moving of its own volition to the top pocket of his jacket where a small piece of blue plastic, concealed from the world, appeared to be pulsating with malignant energy.
On the drive home he stopped beside a roadside newspaper vendor and picked up a copy of the Evening Standard. The headlines screamed out from the page in huge black letters: MAN STABBED TO DEATH IN OWN HOME. He read the article all the way to the bottom and then read it again. It gave an emotionally charged account of the discovery of the body and the fact that the police were appealing for witnesses but there was nothing whatsoever to suggest that anything incriminating had been forthcoming.
He wondered whether it would be on the local news, whether Annette would see it, but she never took any interest in current affairs and never read a paper. However, he would watch her like a hawk over the next few days because he was curious to see just what her reaction would be when she finally did find out.
He had thought he would feel more excited now that it was done, that he would feel more positive, more secure, but he could not shake off that underlying feeling that there was something he had missed, something that was going to come back and bite him hard.
When the local evening news came on Annette was in the kitchen putting together the finishing touches of their Spaghetti bolognaise. The newscaster appeared to be quite indignant that such a heinous crime could be committed in the leafy suburbs, as if the privileged few should somehow be exempted from the misery of the degenerate masses. Roger permitted himself an ironic chuckle, but that uneasy feeling would not leave him and an otherwise excellent meal was consumed in silence.
The next day he had left home as usual, had kissed Annette on the doorstep as usual, had driven to work as usual, but nothing in his life was usual at the moment. He had hardly slept last night, that little something was still niggling and he was unable to resolve it. He slipped into his desk as usual, the office was all talking about the dreadful crime that some vicious criminal had perpetrated in their safe, middle class world. They discussed the television news broadcast, they produced and dissected the newspaper reports, but he struggled to keep his distance from the irritating hype. It was only when he heard someone quote the name of the deceased that his heart nearly stopped. Cyril Marchant . . . Cyril Marchant?!
He did not need to drag the small SD card from his top pocket to check the detail, he knew that the name of the adulterer was Clive Marchant, not Cyril. His mind was in a turmoil as he struggled to come to terms with the possibilities and then, only at that moment, did he rationalise the niggle that had been troubling him for the past 24 hours – the Jaguar – the Jaguar had not been on the driveway – the driveway had been empty.
He buried his head in his hands and tried to make some sense of the situation, but the only rational answer he could come up with is that Clive and Cyril were the perfect names for doting parents to choose for identical twins.
Roger slipped unnoticed from the office and raced down to his car. Half an hour later he was driving into his own road and there in front of his own house was an ice blue Jaguar. His fists clenched on the wheel but he managed to drive past his house without stopping to the end of the road where he parked his car out of sight. It took quite some time before he could control the fury that racked his body.
He walked back towards his house with a determination that strengthened his step and over-ruled his subconscious that was screaming out for him to be careful, that he must be vigilant, that his life might depend on the next few minutes.
He unlocked the garage door and slipped quietly into the house, into the kitchen and up to the knife rack. He selected a razor sharp Russell Hobbs 9 inch stainless steel carving knife. It was Annette’s favourite knife, it was the perfect knife for all of her culinary projects . . . it was the perfect knife to wipe that smug, satisfied expression off that bastard’s face.
It would only take a second – just like it had with his brother and then . . . and then he would have to deal with Annette. It was regrettable, but then she could hardly blame him for her transgressions, could she?
He eased down the handle and threw open the lounge door. The bastard was there, on the other side of the room and there sitting beside him, so very close beside him on the settee, was his ever loving wife. They were both staring at him with an expression of pure horror. He raised the knife and stepped forward.
A sudden movement to his right stopped him dead. He spun around to see a third person in the room. In that instance he knew that he should have been more careful when he arrived, for if he had he might have guessed that the grey Ford Focus that was parked outside his house, directly behind the ice blue Jaguar, was an unmarked Police car.