Doppelgänger

by Sean Munger

  The fragile equilibrium ended the following Tuesday, the second of November. It was election day. It began cheerfully enough. Julian, taking the day off from his law practice, stayed home for breakfast which was quite rare. Though thoroughly boring, his one-sided chatter was at least upbeat. “I just hope my father takes the loss well,” he babbled. “He was wounded deeply enough when I told him I was a Democrat, and he’s taken constant umbrage at my activism for the party here in New York. Tonight, hopefully, he’ll come to realize that the past is the past and being a Democrat is no longer synonymous with disunion, treason and Jefferson Davis. Who knows? Maybe we’ll even invite him to dinner as sort of a reconciliation.”

  He went off to his political meetings which would last well into the evening. Anine cared very little for politics, and as this Tuesday unfolded she had no idea what was happening in the city or the world outside the Green Parlor. It proved to be an uneventful day. Clea Wicks told her that a saucer had been found broken in the pantry but that was the only disturbance. Anine thought for a moment she felt the presence of the Abyssinian cat in the parlor but could not see it. The feeling went away soon enough.

  At shortly after eight o’clock in the evening, just as Anine was leaving the dining room after her customarily somber and solitary dinner, the front door burst open and Julian stumbled inside, in a state of rage and apoplexy unusual even for him.

  “Dirty bastards!” he roared at the entryway. “Dirty Republican thieves, they have no shame! How dare they even call themselves Americans? There’ll be an uprising, another civil war! It’s a fucking outrage!”

  He marched straight into the Red Parlor, wrenching off his necktie. Anine heard the glassy clatter of him removing the stopper from one of the liquor decanters.

  So, the Democrats lost. She’d been hoping for a Democratic victory for the sole reason that the opposite outcome would make Julian disagreeable. She debated with herself whether to go to him. She didn’t wish to annoy him, but with as deeply as the election mattered to him she thought it at least the sporting thing to do to offer him her condolences.

  She appeared at the door of the Red Parlor. He was standing in front of the fireplace, drinking—more like gulping—from a crystal tumbler of whiskey.

  “Your man lost?” she said.

  “Don’t gloat!” Julian blasted at her. “I don’t want to hear your arrogant, sanctimonious nonsense! You’ve been for Garfield since the beginning! You’ve undermined me at every turn!”

  “I know absolutely nothing about this Garfield person. I don’t even know what the issues are in American elections—”

  “Don’t lie to me!” Julian screamed. “You wanted Garfield to win because I was for Hancock! You oppose me at every turn, just on principle! Don’t even try to deny it! Every single thing I’ve tried to do, you’ve desperately wanted me to fail!”

  “Now that’s not true and you know it—”

  “Get out of my life, you bitch!” Julian suddenly swung around and hurled the tumbler directly at the portrait of Jefferson hanging above the fireplace. The glass shattered and the liquor made a wet splash cross Jefferson’s face. “You will never understand what it means to be an American!” he shouted. “You and your savage Viking country—where kings and noblemen play with peoples’ lives like chess pieces—how can you possibly understand this country? How can you understand anything except selfishness? The world does not fucking revolve around you! When are you going to get that through your head? Why are you trying to destroy me? Why are you trying to ruin my life? Why do you hate me so much?”

  He was virtually hysterical. Far from offering her condolences, Anine realized that all she’d done was to provoke yet another confrontation with him, this one over absolutely nothing. She turned and marched toward the door of the parlor.

  “Oww, stop it!” Julian cried. “That’s so fucking irritating!”

  What is he on about now? At the door, she turned to look at him. He was pacing between the fireplace and the end of the desk, covering his ears with his hands.

  “Stop it!” he shouted. “That sound…I can’t abide that sound!”

  The nub of unease in her stomach began to rise into something more. Except for the crackle of the fireplace, the Red Parlor was as silent as a tomb. She turned back toward him. “What is it?” she asked. “What do you hear?”

  “Can’t you hear it?” he shrieked. “Are you deaf?”

  “Julian, I don’t hear anything.”

  He sat down in a wing chair, but immediately sprang up from it. His hands were still clapped over his ears. “The trumpet! It’s the goddamn trumpet…the one that Bradbury heard…” He winced. A strange sound came from his lips which were pulled back in an unnatural leer, baring his clenched teeth. It was a high-pitched squeal, like the screech of a hysterical child in the midst of a crying jag that was leaving him breathless. “Stop it!” he roared. “That sound…dear God, that sound…stop it, please, stop it!”

  Anine heard nothing. Strangely, imagining what he was hearing was even more disturbing than hearing it for herself. Julian winced again as if the sound was very high-pitched, piercing and deafening.

  “You fucking bitch!” he squealed. At first Anine thought Julian was addressing her, but she soon realized he was shouting at the doppelgänger. “No! No! I will never leave this house! I will never leave this house!”

  Julian moved his head rapidly from side to side. He gasped suddenly as if he was in severe pain. His chest heaved as he panted for breath. Then, strangely, he held his breath, ballooning out his cheeks. His face turned bright red almost instantly. Through it all he never took his hands from over his ears; in fact he pressed harder, as if trying to crush his own skull between them.

  Unease, which had become fear in a matter of seconds, now became panic. The doppelgänger is attacking. She bolted for the doors of the Red Parlor only to realize that they were closed. She grasped the handles of the pocket doors and tried to pull them open—but they held together as solidly as if banded with iron. They were trapped.

  Julian let out the breath he’d been holding. “No, I won’t!” he screamed. “I hate you! I’ll die before I let you have this house! Fitta! FITTA!” Then he took another deep breath and held it.

  Anine rattled the pocket doors. “Help!” she shouted, pounding on the doors. “Clea, Mr. Shoop, Mrs. Hennessey, anybody! Help, we’re trapped!”

  “FITTA!” Julian blasted. “I won’t listen to you anymore!” He held his breath again. Weak from lack of oxygen, he crumpled to the floor, still clutching his hands to his head against the silent torment of the trumpet.

  Anine looked over her shoulder at him. Doubling over, almost in a fetal position, he let out his long-held breath with a gasp. “Not true!” he shouted. “Parmenter killed the Indian! I was trying to stop him! I WAS TRYING TO STOP HIM!”

  Abandoning the door, Anine rushed to her husband’s side. She knelt down and touched his shoulder. He recoiled. “POOOOOH!” he let out the breath he’d been holding. Gasping, he screeched, “I’ll kill you! God damn it, I’ll kill you for this, you bitch!” There was no doubt he was in communication with the spöke. He took another breath, so deep his eyes bulged out of his head. She couldn’t even imagine why he kept holding his breath.

  “What is it saying?” she said. “What is it telling you?”

  Julian, his cheeks ballooned, looked up at her. Sweat was breaking out on his forehead and in fact all over his face. As he writhed over on his side Anine saw a wet dark spot spreading across his groin; he had urinated in his trousers.

  There was, finally, another sound besides the crackling of the fire. It was a terrible scraping noise, deep and grinding, like a metal implement digging into stone. Something above her fluttered. Anine looked up at the fireplace above them. The portrait of Thomas Jefferson was quivering, shaking slightly against the wall.

  The scraping continued. A ch
alky white gash, scored deep like the gouges in the silver tray, appeared on the left side of Jefferson’s face. It moved upwards, then curved around, forming a recognizable symbol: R.

  Julian let out his breath which he had been holding for more than a minute. He was trying to shout but he was so exhausted his voice was barely a whisper. “You’re trying to break me,” he gasped. “You won’t do it! I’ll kill you first, you hear me?”

  Another gouge traced itself into the canvas of the Jefferson painting. To the right of the R, a letter F formed, crooked, haphazard, like the writing of a child. It looked a little like the chalky hash marks, but the spöke seemed to have learned how to form recognizable words.

  Why can’t I hear the trumpet?

  SCRAPE…SCRAPE…Julian had by now begun to breathe again in great jagged gasps. He too looked up at the Jefferson painting. The letters R F were visible, then, further to the right, a D, and to its left, L. As if writing with an invisible awl, the doppelgänger slowly scored a word into the picture:

  GARRFEILD

  Garfield. The doppelgänger was taunting Julian. As soon as he recognized the word he burst into a long crying sob. The sudden clutch of terror was over, and Anine realized the spöke had departed; it had said what it came to say.

  Julian, sobbing, released his ears. The imprints of his hands could be seen, red and throbbing, on his temples.

  “Oh, God,” he wailed, sounding now very much like a child. “Oh Christ, why does this thing hate us so much?” He blubbered, crying into his sleeve.

  Anine put her arm around him. For the first time in a very long time, he seemed to welcome her comfort.

  “It can’t help it,” she said. “It’s what it is.”

  “Did you hear it? That squeaky trumpet—that horrible, awful, squeaky trumpet—”

  “I didn’t hear anything. It was speaking to you alone.”

  He continued to cry. Only after a while did he look down and realize he was wet. “Oh, Jesus. I pissed myself. I pissed myself like a little baby. I’m sorry.”

  “It’s all right. I’ll help you get cleaned up.”

  “I’m so sorry.” He sobbed, propping his head against Anine’s shoulder. “I’m so sorry.”

  She held him for a while. It was very awkward. This was the first moment of real tenderness that had occurred between them in months, and that it had to come now—after what had just happened—seemed vile, an obscenity. She did not feel closer to Julian, though she should have. She felt dirty and used. The foulness of the spöke permeated her like a bone chill.

  Anine left the Red Parlor—the doors were now free—and rang a bell cord in the entryway. It was not Clea but Bryan Shoop who responded.

  “Did you hear me shouting?” she asked him. “We were pounding on the doors. They were stuck.”

  “No,” the teenager shrugged.

  “Surely you heard the commotion. Mr. Atherton was shouting at the top of his lungs.”

  “I heard nothing.”

  She was annoyed, but not at him. He’s probably telling the truth. The spöke wanted no one to interfere with its torment of us. She was mindful of Julian’s dignity. “Mr. Atherton spilled something in the parlor. Bring a towel and get one of his dressing gowns. Bring them to me here, then retire to your room. I’ll take care of him.”

  He went away and Anine remained in the dim entryway. The gas in the huge chandelier was turned low, unusually low. She walked over toward the dimmer switch on the wall. Suddenly, with what seemed like the force of a charging elephant, something invisible, strong and brutal shoved her with terrific savagery against the wall.

  All the air went out of her lungs instantly. “Unghhh!” She was spread-eagled, her right cheek pressed against the wallpaper. The suddenness of the attack shocked and terrified her. Again it felt like her corset was constricting around her—one of the spöke’s favorite tortures. In fact she could hear the threads and seams actually creaking against the whale-baleen stays just under her breasts. The doppelgänger was literally trying to smother her.

  Julian! Clea! Anyone, help! She tried to scream. Her mouth was open but no sound came out, only the last bit of air being squeezed out of her body. It felt as though an enormous hand was pressing on her, rolling her from foot to head, systematically flattening her.

  She noticed that her left hand was only a few inches from the gas dimmer switch.

  Something else seemed very strange, but through the pounding of her heart—straining terribly with no oxygen to sustain it—and the rush of adrenaline it took her several moments to notice it. She was pressed against the vertical wall of the entryway, but she could have sworn it felt like she was lying prone on the floor, as if the entire room had turned ninety degrees on its side.

  Screeeeeeeeeeee! Anine winced as a terrible high-pitched note sliced into her head like a steel cable. It was literally painful to hear, causing an instant sharp agony crackling against the inside of her skull. As the note changed in pitch she realized it was the sound of the silver trumpet—the voice of the doppelgänger.

  Then, through the trumpet, it spoke to her. “Don’t think I can’t do anything I want to you!” it said, shrieking so loud that it sounded like the bell of the silver horn was pressed right up against her ear. It was, unmistakably, a woman’s voice, and it spoke Swedish.

  But what happened next did not feel like a woman at all. The same invisible hand that had flattened her against the wall now suddenly forced her legs apart under her skirt. She gasped, realizing at once she could breathe, almost as if she’d forgotten how—was that what happened to Julian?—and as she gulped for another breath of air, which felt in this desperate moment like it would be her last, she looked down and saw the bustle of her skirt rising, roughly and sharply. An invisible spear, needle-sharp and icy cold, suddenly arrowed its way between her buttocks, pressing painfully on her anus. There was barely enough air in her lungs for her to emit a feeble scream.

  Anine lunged. The force was pressing her so hard against the wall that she felt as though it actually lengthened her body. Her fingers reached the dimmer switch. She twisted it as hard as she could. The gas came up, bright blazing yellow, and instantly the nightmare was over.

  “Ma’am?”

  Anine let out the breath she realized she’d unconsciously been holding. “POOOOH!” Her vision clouded. She grasped at the bosom of her dress, which was unmarred; she looked over and saw Bryan Shoop standing before her, a towel and one of Julian’s silk dressing-gowns draped over his arm.

  Dear God, what just happened? She looked down at herself. Her dress was in perfect order. She was standing up against the wall, but nothing was the matter.

  She paused only a moment, then walked forward, snatched the towel and the dressing-gown and headed for the door of the Red Parlor. She suddenly understood the frantic threats her husband had shrieked at the doppelgänger. The spöke’s hatred of them was quickly becoming mutual.

  Anine did not sleep at all during the night. When morning came she was literally nodding off to sleep while trying to eat breakfast. Julian returned home from his office at mid-morning, which to Anine’s recollection had never happened before. He met her in the entryway. He too looked haggard and sleepless, his eyes ringed with dark bags. He was carrying a crumpled telegraph form in his hand.

  “I came from the telegraph office,” he said. “Aunt Lucretia has agreed to put you up for a couple of weeks at her winter home in St. Augustine. You may pack three trunks. The boat sails tonight at eight. Bring your nigger maid with you because she sure as hell isn’t staying here. I’ll sell the house while you’re gone. When you get back you’ll give me a son. Don’t even open your bitch mouth to complain.”

  Then, shuffling like an old man, he walked right past her toward the doors of the Red Parlor, never meeting her gaze. The telegraph sheet dropped lazily from his hand and lay in a ball on the carpet. She did not pic
k it up.

  Chapter Fifteen

  The Job

  Of course Julian Atherton had no intention of selling the house. The horrors that he had seen and experienced there—worst of all the assault by the doppelgänger in his own parlor—had strengthened, rather than weakened, his resolve to make the house his own. There had been more times in the past few weeks than he cared to admit to himself that he’d been tempted to take Anine and Dr. Dorr’s advice, sell out and leave. The evening after the horrifying séance he came very close to deciding this. After all, it’s just a house, he thought. We could make a fresh start. I am going to have to live with Anine for a long time whether I like it or not. Pretending otherwise is foolish. But the brazenness and spite of the doppelgänger rankled him. This was his house. Mrs. Quain didn’t live here anymore. He would not be turned out of his own home.

  Once this decision had been made the next course of action was grimly inevitable. He had few moral qualms about it. He did not buy Dorr’s explanation that the doppelgänger was some sort of schizoid opposite, that Mrs. Quain’s supposed happiness and gentleness were the precise qualities that spawned the spirit’s ugliness and rancor. To Julian, the doppelgänger was Mrs. Quain’s spirit, and it was indubitably foul. To snuff out such a person would be a great service to the world. The only question was how best to do it and how not to get caught.

  When Anine left on the boat to St. Augustine Julian was relieved. He was quite tired of her and relished the notion of three weeks, or perhaps even longer, without her. He did not wish to stay in the gloomy house alone with the specter and feared that if he did, it might somehow learn of his plans. Immediately after Anine and Miss Wicks left the house he dispatched Bryan Shoop to reserve him a room at the Grand Hotel on Broadway. He tossed some clothes into a portmanteau and then rang for Mrs. Hennessey. As she entered the Red Parlor he was writing out a check for her.