Two to Tango (Nick Madrid)

by Peter Guttridge

  On the second repetition of the lines I was aware of movement to my right. I looked and stood stock still as a man walked on stage.

  It was Otis Barnes.

  I'd half expected this but even so I was rooted to the spot. This was my "or" from my earlier "either ... or" formulation. Open-mouthed I watched as he walked past me towards the Otis Barnes who had been singing all evening. I took in the clothes-the same black jeans and T-shirt, Otis's uniform. He was taller than the other Otis, not as bulky.

  Otis-the real one, I was presuming-glanced to his side. He saw the thing he'd always feared. Himself.

  He stopped, the line frozen on his lips, his fingers frozen on the strings of his guitar. His doppelganger walked right up to him.

  I was rooted to the spot. I looked imploringly over at Ralph. He was looking back on stage but from his angle could only see one Otis. He looked perplexed that the singing had stopped.

  Everything happened at once. As the doppelganger reached Otis, I finally stirred, grabbing my microphone stand and starting towards them. But before I could reach them, the doppelganger raised the pistol in his right hand and shot Otis twice in the chest.

  Otis fell back. His double took two steps to the end of the stage and dropped off it into the darkness below just as I swung at him with the mike stand.

  Missing him, I overbalanced, the microphone whacked the stage and bounced back and the lead whipped round my legs. I sprawled full length, tensed for some kind of electric shock. Nothing happened.

  I looked up. Ralph was kneeling beside Otis.As I heard Sukie and Venus start to scream and a delayed gasp from the audience, I couldn't help but notice that the microphone lead that snaked round my legs was not plugged into the amplifiers.

  The bastards. I'd given the performance of a lifetime and nobody had heard a bloody thing. I'd spent all night singing into a dead mike. Snarling, I jumped off the stage and set off in pursuit of Otis's double.

  I saw him lumbering towards Huayc Picchu.The high peak was bathed in light, the weird symbols drifting across it. I hurried through the deserted ruins-this part of Machu Picchu wasn't being used for the concert. My quarry was about fifty yards ahead. He wasn't hurrying but he was moving steadily. For a moment he was silhouetted in a sharp beam of light and I saw him toss the gun away.

  I wondered if it was the gun he'd taken from the man he'd beaten half to death outside the nightclub in Bogota. I had no doubt he had done that, not Otis. He had probably killed Horace, too-I recalled the puzzled look on the manager's face as he was led into the alley. Puzzled because he suspected the Otis he was with wasn't the Otis he knew.

  As I followed, I rejigged the events of the past few days. This was the man who'd told me about murdering his parents. Who better to deliver death threats to Otis's bedroom and dressing room than someone everyone mistook for Otis? Even following us to Baza to spray-paint the Mercedes wouldn't have been difficult.

  Ralph had said something in Lima about Otis losing his backstage pass and needing another one. I guessed that was the double getting access.And once he had a pass he could come and go as he pleased. That explained why Otis had not been where he was supposed to be on Machu Picchu earlier in the day. It was the double Raoul had let through first.And once on the site, he'd gone to ground until he deemed the time was right.

  I wondered how long he'd been stalking Otis. Maybe his existence explained other things in Otis's life that Otis had no memory of. But two questions remained-who was this guy and what did he have in mind? When the doppelganger replaces its original, what happens then?

  Okay, three questions.

  As chases go it wasn't the most exciting you'd ever see. Once we reached the base of Huayc Picchu we only went 300 yards-though it did take forty-five minutes. The steepness of the trail and the bloody altitude again.

  He saw me as the track dipped before striking up the almost sheer side of the peak. He set off at a run up the slope.

  Within ten yards he needed to stop to catch his breath. I got to within an arm's length of him when I had to make my stop. At which point, glancing back over his shoulder so I could see his red face and open, gasping mouth, he started off again.

  He slowed to a walk after five yards and ground to a halt again after a further ten. Bent over clutching his knees, I could hear him sucking in air but I wasn't in any position to do anything about it. I was standing head back, hands on hips, dragging in great lungfuls of non-existent air. My heart was beating like a triphammer.

  And so it went on-stop start, stop start. It reminded me of some elegant mathematical theory I'd read once proving that logically you can never get from A to B.You get halfway then you go half the subsequent distance, then half of then half again ...

  That was pretty much how I was feeling after fifteen minutes, by which time we were both reduced to shuffling a few yards then stopping to look at the view

  Except for the heavy panting we made no sounds. He would look down at me, his face red but expressionless. I thought of shouting something to him but I didn't have the breath to spare.

  My legs were dead weights but I forced myself to keep moving. The heaviness in my limbs was getting worse, my throat and chest were aching from the exertion just from the effort to breathe.

  The path began to zigzag. By now we were moving in and out of darkness as the light-shapes floated across the side of the mountain. I thought I would zig instead of zag and gained a couple of yards by scrambling up the slope between the two lengths of path.

  I was now no more than six yards behind him and could smell his sweat as he forced himself on.

  I caught him up when he was partway up a short flight of steps the Incas had cut out of the rock face 500 years before. He lost his footing on the third step and slid back. I grabbed him by his belt and wrenched him down.

  With hindsight it was the wrong thing to do. He fell on top of me, knocking what little air I had left out of my lungs. It took only a moment to realize I had no strength for a fight.The knowledge that he wouldn't have either was little comfort since he was sprawled across me like a beached whale. If I couldn't get him off his body-weight would flatten me like a cartoon cat.

  He was remarkably inert. I tried heaving. Nothing. I tried wriggling. Not a thing. Finally, with an immense effort, I rolled him off me and got up on all fours, gasping for air. Strange shapes floated before my eyes. I felt horribly dizzy.

  He was crouched, one hand on the floor in front of him, glaring at me balefully. He was summoning the energy to jump me. I staggered to my feet. As he lunged I swung a punch that was farcical in its lack of power.

  My fist glanced off his jaw, not slowing him in the least. He wrapped his arms around me and tried a head-butt. The effort was too much for both of us and we fell over again. There was no strength in his embrace. I struggled free and got to my feet again.

  This was humiliating. I looked around and saw a stone about twice the size of my hand. I picked it up and as he was getting to his feet hit him on the back of his head. He went down.

  I searched him. He had his passport in his back pocket. The name in it was Otis Barnes. Puzzled, I checked the date of birth. It was the same as Otis's. I was contemplating a Man In the Iron Mask scenario until I twigged. This was Otis's passport-he'd stolen it from Otis's room. I was willing to bet Otis was carrying this man's without realizing it.

  "I know imitation is the sincerest form of flattery," I said. "But what's going on here? Why this fixation with Otis?"

  He was propped against a rock, blood dribbling down the side of his face. I was standing off to one side, the stone still in my hand.

  "Because he's me and I'm him," he mumbled. "He knowsthat's why he wrote `Sinner Man.' He's been following me around, you know."

  "Sure, sure. Look, you've got to help me with this because I don't understand. Is it chance that you look so much like him? Or are you actually related?"

  "He stole my fucking life!" he said."I used to see him on the folk circuit.We both gigged. It
could have been either one of us. Either one. But he got the breaks." He lapsed into silence.

  Looking at him I could see that the resemblance was nowhere near perfect.The doppelganger was taller but less muscular than Otis. The facial resemblance was achieved more by extras-beard, hair, glasses.

  It had clearly helped the imposter to know that Otis wore the same clothes combination as a kind of uniform wherever he was. Black 501s, black T-shirt, and shades. Of course that meant he could have been the doppelganger for 80 percent of the people in music, the media, and advertising ...

  I remembered some of the horrific things he'd told me about his childhood. Maybe that explained it.Then again, maybe it didn't.

  "But why did you shoot him? Surely that's like killing yourself?"

  He looked up at me with hard eyes, the blood still dribbling down the side of his head.

  "I didn't kill Otis. I killed an imposter. I'm him-surely you understand that?"

  "You're a bit too post-modern for me," I said, just as the first security guard reached us.

  Ralph and the others had all gone down to the hotel when I got back to the stage. I couldn't find out from anyone if Otis was alive or dead. Crowds were still milling around outside the gate but the double was hurried through to a jeep with a blanket over his head and driven down the mountain.

  I was dropped off at the gate to the hotel in another jeep. I went over to Bridget's bungalow. Her door was ajar but there was no sign of her. I walked outside and looked down the path towards the river.The path was lit by soft lights concealed in the undergrowth. Bridget was walking alongside Ferdinand Porras.

  I called after them. Although the noise the river made was tremendous they both heard my hoarse cry.They turned.

  Porras had a gun pressed to Bridget's side. She was clutching her handbag, one hand inside it.

  Porras looked at me and shouted something. In the roar of the river behind him I couldn't make it out. He gestured with the gun. Bridget didn't move. He grabbed her arm angrily. She swung round, bringing her hand out of the handbag, and whacked him in the face. He swayed and the gun dropped from his hand.

  Bridget fell back with a horrified expression on her face. I could see something sticking out of Porras's left eye, blood pouting out around it. I heard an animal bellow of pain above the unremitting roar of the river as he stumbled like a wounded beast and put his hand to the thing that was stuck in his eye socket.

  I ran close as he tottered on the very edge of the path, flailing wildly with one arm, one eye wide and fixed on Bridget. I could hear his bellow of pain and rage more clearly as I closed the gap between us. Blood was pouring down his face, soaking his shirt and trousers.

  He reached up and plucked the thing from his eye. He looked at it with his one good eye, then at Bridget. Something between exasperation and resignation passed over his features as he let the object drop to the floor. His knees buckled and he fell backwards. I reached Bridget in time to see Porras hit the water. He was immediately tugged into the flow. His body bounced from rock to rock and was carried away on the surge of the water. Heading yet again for the Amazon.

  Bridget was shaking. I put my arms round her so we could shake together. We both looked down at the teak dolphin I'd bought an age ago on the Amazon, it's thin, curved tail dripping with blood.

  I don't know how long we stood there hugging each other but when we turned to go back to our bungalows, Otis's doppelganger was blocking our way.

  "Shit, not again," I said, then looked more closely.

  "Otis?" I said, leading Bridget down the path towards the figure.

  "Damned right," he growled. He was wearing the same Tshirt as before. Where were the bullet holes, where were the bandages?

  "But how?" I said. "He shot you twice."

  Otis fingered the T-shirt.

  "Haven't you heard? They can bullet-proof anything these days."

  Bridget and I were sitting at a table at the rear of the Bogota Magic Circle's club. Ernest Beacon had already debriefed us.The doppelganger was locked away in a Peruvian prison cell. I didn't rate his chances of survival.

  I'd asked casually about Harry, the bounty hunter, but Ernest hadn't heard from him. Nothing strange in that. Necessarily.

  Now he joined us again, seating himself rather gingerly. He had the worst-fitting dinner jacket I'd ever seen. It was far too big for him.

  "Bomb-proof?"

  He shook his head.

  "My performance jacket."

  When he sat down he carefully patted his pockets then gingerly put his hand inside his jacket.

  I assumed he was looking for cigarettes but his hand came out empty. He wriggled a little.

  "I'm up next," he whispered. "My debut. Just waiting for them to call my name."

  A voice reverberated from the speaker above our heads.

  "And now will you please welcome Ernie Beacon."

  "Ernest at work, Ernie here," he said as he waddled down the aisle and took the steps to the stage two at a time. I realized now why the dinner jacket was so big.

  "What was all that wriggling about?" Bridget said.

  "Trying not to squash his pigeons," I said. "His pockets are full of them."

  "Naturally. I thought they used rubber ones, otherwise they'd have a pocket full of pigeon shit after a week of regular bookings."

  Ernie produced two pigeons in quick succession. He didn't get the action quite right with either of them. The first time he proffered it nervously, as if afraid it was going to peck him after being cooped up in his jacket pocket. He seemed frankly surprised the second one was still alive.

  I'd been worried about Bridget. Injuring Porras in such a brutal way was a terrible thing for anyone to cope with. But she'd gone back to her usual self the previous day when we'd said our goodbyes to Otis and Richard. I'd also been worried what effect meeting his doppelganger would have on Otis, but he too had seemed jubilant.

  "Well, it's the perfect get-out, isn't it?" Richard said. "If Conchita catches him out he can say, wasn't me, must have been someone impersonating me."

  "She won't fall for that," I said.

  "I suggested he had his Johnson bullet-proofed just in case-though I don't know how the stuff works with knives."

  It was when Richard invited us to dinner that I realized Bridget was on the mend.

  "Got the chief of some remote Amazonian tribe coming to dinner with us-thought you might like to sit next to him, Bridget."

  "Forget it-I don't talk to yokels."

  "Yokels? This guy's from a Stone Age tribe whose ways are unchanged for 2,000 years, for God's sake."

  "If his ways have been unchanged for 2,000 years we're not going to have much to talk about are we? Maybe berries or a hundred things to do with wood lice. And your starter for ten is rubbery plants."

  Richard ploughed on. "He can trace his lineage back to the last chief of the Incas."

  "And what's so special about the Incas? According to my friend Professor Madrid here, the entire Inca nation was defeated by a dozen Spaniards because the Incas were frightened of one horse. Like I said-yokels.

  "It's that double standard you see," she carried on, in full flow now, "what's the difference between a boring person in the English countryside and here-nothing except the plate through the lip, and not everybody in Sussex wears those."

  "You're very chipper," I said to Richard, "considering the concert ended in disaster."

  I was angry with him since I'd discovered that not only hadn't they miked me up, they also hadn't lit me for the film. I'd been totally in the dark throughout the entire show-no cheap comments, please-except when I fell over on stage with the microphone, and they explained that away by saying I was a drunk who'd broken through security.

  "What do you mean?" Richard said now.

  "I mean Geoff Bartram walking out and shooting the star of the show, what do you think I mean?"

  I'd been right about the passports-Otis was carrying one for a Geoff Bartram.

  Ric
hard laughed.

  "The audience thought that was part of the show. Fitting climax to the song to have the doppelganger appear.They went nuts."

  Back in the club Bridget nudged me.

  "Did you notice Otis was still off with me this morning?" she said as Ernest left the stage to mild applause. "And after all I did for him.You'd think we'd never spent the night together."

  I should have changed the subject but I couldn't think of anything to say. I'd been dreading this moment ever since I'd given some thought to what Geoff Bartram had been up to whilst masquerading as Otis.

  The silence hung between us. Then Bridget began to wail.

  In researching Two to Tango I found the following books useful: Simon Strong: Whitewash, Pablo Escobar, and the Cocaine Wars (Pan 1996); The South American Handbook, 72nd edition (Trade & Travel Handbooks 1996); Peter Frost: Exploring Cusco (Nuevas Imagenes 1989).

  Just as I completed this novel my knowledge of the hostage-taking situation in Colombia was enhanced by a magazine article: "Adventures in the Ransom Trade" by William Prochnau (Vanity Fair May 1998).

  No Laughing Matter

  by Peter Guttridge

  Tom Sharpe meets Raymond Chandler in No Laughing Matter a humorous and brilliant debut that will keep readers on a knife's edge of suspense until the bittersweet end.

  When a naked woman flashes past Nick Madrid's hotel window, it's quite a surprise. For Madrid's room is on the fourteenth floor, and the hotel doesn't have an outside elevator. The management is horrified when Cissie Parker lands in the swimming pool-not only is she killed, but she makes a real mess of the shallow end.

  In Montreal for the Just for Laughs festival, Madrid, a journalist who prefers practicing yoga to interviewing the stars, turns gumshoe to answer the question: Did she fall or was she pushed? The trail leads first to the mean streets of Edinburgh and then to Los Angeles, where the truth lurks among the dark secrets of Hollywood.

  " ... a near laugh-riot."