Mr Doubler Begins Again

by Seni Glaister

  ‘That’s complete and utter bollocks, Julian, and you know it. You failed to mention, when you offered to swap my car for a Clarins, that my car is worth a fortune.’

  ‘It is? I had no idea. And Clarins is a make-up brand, Dad. Swapping a car for a lipstick would be deceitful of me.’ Julian rocked back on his heels and laughed at his own wit. He remained standing, his hands clasped behind his back.

  ‘Once again that’s complete bollocks, Julian,’ Doubler said, mustering as much imperiousness as he could dredge up from within the folds of his comfy chair. Doubler enjoyed the sound of the word ‘bollocks’ even more the second time he used it. ‘You knew exactly what you were doing when you offered to take my car off my hands, and worse, you made me believe you were capable of kindness.’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about, Dad. Seems to me you’re suffering some kind of breakdown. A breakdown with paranoid tendencies.’ Julian smiled, delighted by his diagnosis. ‘I suppose it’s to be expected, being stuck up here with no friends for all these years.’

  ‘This is not about me or my friends. This is about you and your money problems. I am your father. You can trust me. I am trying to help you, Julian.’

  ‘I do not have money problems.’ Julian, who stooped habitually as if there were a low and exceedingly sharp object dangling just above him and threatening to stab him at all times, straightened himself up and clenched and unclenched his fists. The gesture wasn’t threatening – he didn’t look like he might punch his father – but his knuckles were white and his cheeks were pink, and these two colour alterations combined to suggest he might soon implode.

  ‘But why would you go to such surreptitious lengths to defraud me of my car? A car I like very much and one that is perfectly adequate for my needs?’

  Julian sighed dramatically, impatient now with his father and no longer interested in denying his deception. ‘Because, as you patently know, Dad, the car is worth a small fortune and it is wasted sitting rotting in your garage.’

  Doubler looked seriously up at his son, nodding at the truth spoken. ‘That’s fine, and I agree it shouldn’t rot in the garage. That it’s worth so much money is rather a shock to me. But why, if you don’t have money problems, would you not just tell me it’s worth a bob or two? Why wouldn’t you let me decide for myself whether to sell it or not? You’re pretty intent on me selling the farm – why didn’t you just urge me to sell the car, too?’

  Julian tipped his head back and stared at the ceiling as if looking for a less obtuse audience among the old oak rafters.

  ‘Because, Dad,’ he said, lowering his head and gaze with exaggerated torpor, ‘it’s wasted on you.’

  ‘What is? Money? This house? The car?’ Doubler was enjoying himself enormously. He had rehearsed this exchange in his head many times, and as he felt no great affection for his son, he felt no real responsibility for the way in which he delivered it or the way in which it was received. His son was nothing like him, so his behaviour couldn’t very well reflect badly on Doubler. There was no betrayal here; it was just what he would have expected.

  ‘Yes, all of it. It just seems wasteful. I could make so much more money out of it.’

  ‘But why? For what? Are you in debt? Do you have a gambling problem?’

  ‘No, Dad. Jesus. I just like making money. I’m good at it. I don’t like seeing the opportunity go to waste.’

  ‘But it’s my car. It’s a good car. It’s the only one I’ve ever owned. Has the car really wasted its opportunity? It’s fulfilling its purpose right here and you seem intent on turning it into a commodity.’

  ‘It’s not a commodity, anything but. It’s a 1949 Series 1 Land Rover with all of its original features in perfect nick. And I’ve got a very keen buyer lined up.’

  ‘But it’s not yours to sell! I’m trying to find some sort of reason, some sort of justification for your subterfuge. Tell me you’re in debt or have got another money issue of some kind. Then I can help you. I can give you money. You don’t have to go to such tortuous measures. If there’s no reason, then perhaps . . .’ Doubler looked around the room for inspiration and found it in the cold, empty fire grate. ‘Perhaps you’re just a bit of a shit.’

  Julian physically recoiled, taking a step back in shock. ‘Dad! This is quite outrageous! And that is absolutely no way to talk to your son.’ Julian paced the room, his angular form jutting and posturing but, in its awkwardness, completely unable to naturally assume any dignified pose of superiority.

  ‘But, Julian, you have just tried to con me out of my car. That is absolutely no way to treat your father. It’s only just dawning on me, and I don’t know why it’s taken so long for me to figure it out: you are a bit of a shit.’

  Julian stopped in front of his father’s chair and leant down over him, exhaling heavily through flared nostrils. Doubler could feel the heat of his hatred. ‘One, I had no idea you knew anything about cars. The fact you knew it was worth a fortune and you were still prepared to let it rot in a farm building just confirms how little head you have for money.’

  Julian straightened himself up again, glaring angrily, searching for a second reason for his indignation. He found it and delivered it triumphantly.

  ‘Two, making money is in my bones. It’s what I do and you should give me a little credit for it.’

  Doubler was interested in this twist. Should he be able to credit his son with some level of ingenuity? Had he failed to recognize a skill within him? ‘What exactly do you do, Julian?’

  Julian snarled his answer. ‘I work for a bank. I make them a pile of cash.’

  ‘Mm, yes.’ Doubler wondered whether this was something he already knew. Had he ever asked? Perhaps not. ‘Do you love what you do?’ he enquired gently.

  The word ‘love’ looked for a second as if it might stop Julian in his tracks, but he carried on blithely. ‘It has its bonuses. I’m good at it, but it’s an extremely stressful way to make a living, so there needs to be good compensation, and it certainly delivers that. I earn a fortune.’

  ‘Why is it stressful? What do you worry about?’ Doubler was genuinely curious, wondering whether his son shared the same feeling of unfathomable dread he experienced each spring just before the first shoots of green appeared.

  Julian’s eyes looked off into the middle distance, capturing the feeling in an attempt to do its impact justice. ‘When a deal goes well, there’s no greater high. But if a deal goes bad, if I call it wrong’ – he paused for dramatic effect – ‘it can cost the bank a fortune. It’s terrifying.’

  Doubler imagined the terror, trying hard to understand it and relate it to any of his own experiences. ‘But nobody’s going to die, are they? I mean, if you just don’t turn up for work, nobody will suffer. You might make less money for you or for the bank. But then again, if you don’t turn up for work and you escape a wrong call, you won’t lose as much money as if you’d turned up. Either way, if you don’t turn up, there’s no actual pain or hardship. Is that right?’

  Julian was demonstrably flustered. ‘Are you mocking me? I’m proud of my achievements. I’ve created something out of nothing, which is more than you can say for this old place and your blasted potatoes.’

  ‘Well, as you say, I’ve sat twiddling my thumbs for the last forty years and the two things I own, my car and my house, are now apparently worth a fortune without me lifting a finger. Perhaps it might be the same for you? If you did less, you might make more. You’d suffer less stress certainly.’ If Doubler had smoked a pipe, he would have tapped it. He appeared contemplative, but inside his heart was racing.

  ‘You really are the most frustrating old man. This farm is worth a ton of cash and you’re going to watch the opportunity sail by. The value of that car is about to go through the roof and you’re once again going to blow it. And where then is the result of your hard work?’ Here, Julian painted quotation marks in the air, making him in Doubler’s eyes look even more childish than usual.

  Doubler drew
himself up in his chair. ‘My business is in good shape. In fact, I too seem to have done rather well for myself over the years. I certainly won’t go hungry, and I’ve got the finest roof over my head that I could wish for. And I’m busy working on my legacy. We should all try to leave one of those. But like you, Julian, what I do doesn’t particularly matter. If I die tomorrow, nobody will suffer.’

  Julian sneered. ‘Is that the only way you can value a success, Dad? I don’t think you’ll find it’s a particularly useful currency.’

  ‘Perhaps you’re right. But I can’t help wondering about our worth as individuals as a measure of a life well lived. There was this man—’

  ‘Oh God,’ Julian groaned. ‘Your damned potato hero. I know, I know – without him we wouldn’t have chips. What a tragedy.’

  ‘Actually, I wasn’t going to mention Mr Clarke, though I think you’ll find that the contribution he made to the planet was significantly greater than chips. No, no, I was thinking of a chap a dear friend once told me about.’

  Julian groaned again and, finally, collapsed his tall frame into the chair opposite his father. He slumped low in the seat, stretching his legs out wide in front of him. The move wasn’t so much one of defeat, more a vivid illustration of the enormous boredom he was about to suffer. He ran both hands through his hair and then rubbed his face and eyes dramatically as if to ward off a deep stupor.

  Doubler continued, untroubled by Julian’s pantomime, ‘A neurosurgeon, he was. A brain doctor. My dear friend saw a documentary about him and we talked at length about that level of personal accomplishment. What struck my friend was how the surgeon, throughout his career, cycled to work in the mornings. On a bicycle! Even in the snow! He was such a good brain doctor that he used to travel to one of the old Soviet Bloc countries to perform terrifically complicated surgeries and there would be queues and queues of people who had travelled for days to see this chap. And he’d do all of this work voluntarily instead of going on holiday. And then he’d come back home and carry on operating on people who would die a horrible death if it weren’t for him.’

  Doubler continued, still unbothered by the curled lip of his unimpressed audience, ‘What struck my friend, quite profoundly, I recall, was that bicycle. “If I let a man into my brain, picking through my memories and my abilities, I’d want him picked up from his home in a bloomin’ chauffeured car.”’ Doubler laughed at the memory of Mrs Millwood’s words, repeating them as he’d heard them. ‘“Meanwhile, it’s the bankers and the lawyers in their flash cars barging him out of the way. How could they possibly know that this man on a bicycle had the power to save their lives?”’

  Julian, exasperated, started to pat his pockets for his car keys, making it clear he had no wish to continue this conversation. Doubler chuckled a bit, his eyes misting up a little at the memory of Mrs Millwood’s outrage.

  ‘What on earth are you rabbiting on about, Dad? I literally have no idea what you’re talking about. You’re losing the plot, old man. Hearing voices, are we?

  ‘I don’t know what it can be like being stuck up here on your own day in and day out. Something makes me think your dear friend doesn’t even exist. Do you have any friends, Dad? Any at all?’

  Doubler stopped chuckling and looked sombre. ‘Yes, son, I am beginning to believe that I do.’

  Julian looked around at the room, for signs of these friends. Finding none, he smiled a little sadly at his father and stood slowly to his feet.

  ‘You talk about a thriving business. I see no evidence of that. You talk about your friends. I see no evidence of those either. You have a massive opportunity to release equity from this old place, just at the time you ought to be considering downsizing and preparing for the final years of your life, and you’re refusing to entertain the idea in a manner that is frighteningly reckless. I do fear for you, Dad. I fear you’ve lost the ability to make these important decisions on your own, and I think it’s time I stepped in and managed your affairs before you do something disastrous. In fact, Dad, I’m not going to sit and watch you fail. I’m going to take steps.’

  ‘Steps, son? You’re going to take steps?’ Doubler arched his eyebrows, inviting his son to elaborate.

  ‘I can’t sit here passively and watch you ruin your life and my inheritance. Where did it all go so wrong for you, Dad? When did it all start to unravel?’

  Doubler considered the word ‘unravel’. Things had indeed unravelled. But now, a tightening in his stomach, a sickening, gripping, throttling of his lower intestine suggested a ravelling.

  ‘And you’re so weak, so passive, so detached, Dad. I don’t want to become like you. I want to be a man of action: decisive and certain. Which is why I must intervene. I will be doing it for you.’

  Doubler looked at his son and didn’t know whether to pity him or pity himself for raising him. ‘You ask me where it went wrong, Julian? But what exactly do you mean? How are you judging my success? What do you even know of my affairs that allows you to be the arbitrator?’

  Julian threw his hands in the air in an exaggerated movement. If he could have stamped his feet like the small child he was about to recall, he would have. ‘I remember clear as a bell you telling me you planned to be the biggest potato farmer in the land. “In all of the land” you said! I remember it like it was yesterday, though it was well before Mum left. You had so much drive, such great ambition. You wanted to be the biggest and nothing was going to stop you! I believed in you then, Dad. But look at you. You let Peele beat you at your own game. You sat back and you watched him buy everything around you, and you’re marooned here now, with no prospect of expansion. You’ve been outmanoeuvred time and time again. I find it sad, Dad, to watch you slowly fail. You’re like a scorpion surrounded by a circle of fire, about to sting yourself to death.’

  ‘Scorpions,’ said Doubler, in a voice that oozed patience while belying his subterranean tremor, ‘don’t do that, incidentally. They are immune to their own venom, and it seems unlikely that any creature could have survived hundreds of millions of years of evolution with a suicide-inducing fear of fire. It’s a myth, I’m afraid, but an evocative one, and you used it colourfully, so let’s allow that inaccuracy to pass, shall we? Your memory fails you, Julian. I never, ever set out to be the biggest. My stated intention was to be the best.’

  ‘Dad, you’re a potato farmer. I don’t think you can be the best without being the biggest, so you really are clutching at straws. There are no prizes for runner-up in the game of life, Dad.’

  ‘Do you know, Julian, as hard as it might be to get your tiny little brain engaged in the facts, it is just possible that I am already certifiably the best. It is entirely possible that I have won in the game of life. Certainly in the potato leagues.’

  Doubler got up and went to the dresser; he opened a drawer and retrieved the large white envelope. He came back to his chair, the prize clasped on his lap. He glanced at it, stroked the writing absent-mindedly and turned back to face his son.

  ‘You know of Schrödinger’s cat, I presume?’

  Julian sighed impatiently and looked at his watch, neither admitting to his ignorance nor denying it.

  ‘I am, as we sit here, both a failure and a success in equal measure. At least, as long as this envelope remains unopened. It is fair to assume that I exist in both states.’ Doubler sighed to himself. ‘But I wonder, going back to what you said earlier, about measuring your own success in monetary terms. I don’t think money can be a measure. It is, after all, worthless in its own right. There must be something else to hold you accountable when the day of reckoning comes. Money can’t be the determining factor. It just doesn’t matter that much.’

  ‘This is exactly what I’m talking about, Dad. Your blatant disregard for financial affairs is bizarre. You may well be a farmer, but to be a successful one these days, you must have commercial instinct, and you seem to singularly fail in that department. What’s wrong with you?’

  ‘I set out, Julian, to live a consequenti
al life. And I think, in regard to this pursuit, irrespective of any external authentication that might or might not be recorded here, in this envelope, I consider myself a success. Or at least not a failure.’

  ‘How do you deduce that, Dad? On what measure have you succeeded, if money is so uninteresting to you?’

  ‘I set out to be the best potato farmer in the land. That was my purpose. My goals were a little different; those I have revised and revised over the years. I am confident I have achieved many of my goals, but it is quite possible that I have also achieved my purpose within my lifetime. But if I’m not quite there, then I am satisfied that I have made positive strides in the right direction. I will have travelled a little further down the path in pursuit of my purpose. And if nothing else, I might have made it a bit easier for someone else to finish off what I started. It is entirely feasible that somebody might find a small reference to my work in, I don’t know, a farming journal or perhaps my obituary – depending, of course, on who writes that – and something they read will pique their interest and they will pick up where I left off. Who knows, it might well take another lifetime to complete what I have begun.’

  ‘What are you talking about? You plant potatoes. Nobody is going to carry on with your work, Dad. You’re not inventing a cure for cancer.’

  ‘No, no, I’m not. That I wish I could do and I would give everything I have to deliver that. But I am talking about my scientific endeavours, what we like to call my Great Potato Experiment. I’m talking about research I’ve been undertaking for several decades.’

  ‘Ah, the pursuit of the academic! Otherwise known as living life with your head in the clouds. That explains a great deal. I met types like you at university. Poor as church mice, all of them, and as far as I can tell, not an original thought among them! Completely unemployable, of course.’

  ‘I don’t think I could disagree more.’ Doubler felt the ravel tightening.

  ‘So, Dad, let me check I’ve got this clear in my head. You’ve researched potatoes, and whatever it is you may or may not have learnt about potatoes, you believe it’s important enough that somebody, somewhere will find your work and continue it? I hope you’re not counting on me! What are the chances of somebody stumbling across this work, Dad? Sounds pie in the sky to me.’