Doppelganger

by Byron Starr

  “You’re kidding,” Sam said with a genuine expression of shock on his face.

  Bill shook his head, “Started banging on the door in the middle of the night demandin’ to talk to me. I let him out and he led me right to Alma Carroll’s house, and sure enough she was dead.”

  Sam had the rubber band off the manila folder and was sorting through the papers. He then pulled out a picture and whistled in amazement. “Nasty work.” Sam said, then he asked, “Alma Carroll? Is that the sweet old black lady who worked in the school cafeteria since God was a babe?”

  “The same.”

  Sam shook his head in disgust and put the picture back. He then looked at Bill and asked the sixty-four dollar question. “What do you think about this Taylor boy?”

  “I don’t know, Sam. I just don’t know.”

  “You think he might be for real?”

  “I’m leanin’ that way.”

  Sam looked down at the thick folder, gave a low whistle and shook his head once again. “What have you got me into this time?” He turned back to Bill. “I’ll tell you what. You get back to your little nap. I’ll take this library you’ve given me back to Dad’s old place and look it over and we’ll talk about it tomorrow morning.”

  “All right. If you need to reach me, just call up here. I’ve sent Faye to her sister’s in Houston and moved into my office for the time being.”

  * * *

  That night the beast returned inside the city limits, but didn’t strike. Several times it detached its sight and went inside buildings to view the inhabitants, but every time it would withdraw its vision and then move on. Before morning it set off toward its den.

  When James woke up the next morning, the dream bothered him. It was like the beast was looking for something. No, that wasn’t it. It was more like the beast was scouting out its territory. Not unlike a man who is hungry, but not hungry enough for a meal yet, so he just peeks into the fridge to see what’s available.

  Chapter 12

  A Gun and a Badge

  It was 1:00 a.m., but Lisa was still up worrying about Jeremy. Dan, who worked offshore - fourteen days on, seven days off - always stayed up late. Lisa Chamblin was sitting on the couch and her husband Dan was sitting in his recliner watching the TV when the doorbell rang. Lisa had just got off the phone with Pastor Ronald Talley of the First Methodist Church in Newton. It had only been two days since Newton had enacted the dusk till dawn curfew. Since the school was having a teacher’s workday — giving the kids that Monday off — the church was having a lock-in on Sunday night for the teenagers to draw their attention away from the current crisis and to keep them from being tempted to break the curfew. Lisa, ever the worrisome mother, had called to make sure their son, Jeremy, was still there.

  “Who could it be at this time of night?” Lisa said.

  Dan leaned back in his recliner and looked through the multi-paned window set in their front door. “It’s Jeremy,” he said and turned back to the television. “Guess the lock-in got dull.”

  The doorbell rang again, but Lisa didn’t get up. “But I just got off the phone with Brother Talley. He said Jeremy was there.”

  “He probably snuck off,” Dan replied.

  This made sense. Only two weeks ago Jeremy’s parents had bought him a new sports car for his sixteenth birthday. Both weekends since his birthday, Jeremy had been riding around town right up to his own curfew, which was midnight. He was disgusted by the fact he had finally obtained his freedom only to have his wings clipped by a citywide curfew. Lisa had suspected Jeremy was using the lock-in as an excuse to go into town and go cruising around, curfew or no curfew. That’s why she’d been calling the church every hour since nightfall.

  But it seemed odd that Jeremy would be home. If he had managed to sneak out of the lock-in, he certainly wouldn’t be rushing home to admit what he’d done. He’d probably visit a few friends, then try to sneak back in the church before they noticed him gone. Not only that, while Lisa hadn’t actually talked to Jeremy, she had talked to Brother Talley and he’d said Jeremy was there. In fact, Brother Talley said he’d just seen him in the church’s fellowship hall raiding the refrigerator.

  The doorbell ran again and Jeremy’s voice came from outside, “Come on, Mom, let me in. It’s cold.”

  And why didn’t Jeremy just use his key? Had he lost it?

  “Lisa, are you going to let the boy in, or what?” Dan asked, without pulling his eyes away from the late night macho movie staring Sly Stallone.

  Lisa finally got up and walked to the door. Jeremy stood there, his arms wrapped tightly around himself. Where’s his car? Lisa thought. Nothing seemed right, but there he was, standing in front of the door.

  “Mom?”

  Maybe he’s had an accident. All hesitation fled and Lisa unlocked the door in hurry.

  As soon as Lisa slipped the bolt, the door was pushed open and into her with incredible speed and force. She fell back, taking a coat rack down with her. Jeremy leaped over Lisa and into the living room.

  Dan was almost out of his chair. “What the hell’s gotten into ... ” From a position slightly behind the recliner, the Jeremy-thing swung at Dan in a wide hooking blow that was amazingly fast and catlike. The blow caught Dan on the back of his right shoulder.

  Lisa watched from the floor as she tried to untangle herself from the fallen coat rack with its numerous coats and hats. She couldn’t see anything in Jeremy’s hand. In fact, the blow was open handed, but when he hit his father on the shoulder, it made four deep gouges running from his upper arm to the middle of his back. Dan cried out and stood with his back arched in pain, looking up at the ceiling, his right arm trying in vain to reach over his right shoulder, and his left arm searching blindly for support. Jeremy then came around with a blow with his left hand, this one tearing deep gouges into the back of Dan’s head. The flayed strips of scalp hung loose, revealing the white skull underneath.

  Finally out from under the coat rack and the coats and hats, Lisa screamed as she gained her footing.

  Dan collapsed to the floor, and Jeremy turned to his mother. His posture was weird. His legs were bent, almost at right angles, and his arms hung straight down at his sides.

  “What’s wrong with you?” Lisa screamed.

  Jeremy sprang at her. The coat rack was still in her hands so Lisa threw it at Jeremy and ran screaming out the front door and onto the porch.

  As she descended the front porch steps and started across the yard, she risked a look over her shoulder. Jeremy was bounding along the front porch running on all fours like an ape. He reached the edge of the porch and leaped for her, hitting her right in the middle of the back.

  He was on top of her, “Jer. . .” was all she managed to get out before he sank his teeth into her left shoulder.

  Lisa screamed.

  * * *

  Over the last two days, activity at the Sheriff’s Department had increased dramatically. Captain Jones had used his influence to bring in outside help. Six state troopers were reassigned to Newton to help patrol the area and over a dozen game wardens were brought in from all over the state. A team of bloodhounds was even brought in to track down whoever or whatever was doing all the killings, although a brief, yet heavy, rainstorm on the night after Sam’s arrival made using the dogs on any of the old tracks impossible.

  It was 9:00 a.m. when Mrs. Thelma Burke called and said her neighbor’s kid had run to her house wailing and shouting. She managed to calm the boy enough to make sense of his hysterics. He told her he had come home from a lock-in at the Methodist Church and found someone dead in his front yard. The body had been torn to shreds, but the poor boy had recognized his mother’s bracelet.

  One of the new game wardens was first on the scene. Bill was second. As Bill drove up, he could tell that the game warden was spooked. The officer had parked his SUV behind Dan Chamblin’s pickup. He was between these two vehicles, leaning on his truck. His rifle was gripped tightly in his hands and it looked like he w
as ready to start blazing away at the first sign of movement.

  Bill hadn’t been sleeping too well since he’d changed his residence to his office, and adding a new killing to the five already being investigated didn’t do much to improve his already gruff disposition.

  “Put that damn gun up before you accidentally shoot someone,” he told the game warden as he approached.

  The man was as white as a ghost and his hands were trembling. At first he didn’t move or speak, then he managed a “Yes, sir,” but still didn’t move an inch. In the grass, right in front of the game warden, lay the breakfast he had eaten two and a half hours ago.

  Bill walked over to where the game warden was standing and he saw what had the man so shaken up. A vaguely human form lay sprawled in a patch of bloodstained grass near the middle of the yard. All of the meat was eaten away across both shoulders and on down the left side of the back. The left arm looked like it had been chewed off; the forearm lay about two feet above the body, and the upper left arm and left shoulder from the left side of the neck to the uppermost ribs was missing.

  Bill had seen quite a few of these recently, but the sight still stunned him for a few seconds. Then he turned to the game warden. “Hurst,” he read off the game warden’s nameplate, “did you check inside?”

  “N-No.”

  Without another word, Bill started toward the door.

  When Bill first walked inside the double-wide trailer, he noticed the fallen coat rack, coats, and hats in the doorway. He called out to see if anyone was home but got no answer. Bill then continued into the living room where he looked briefly around, before going into the kitchen. He looked through all the bedrooms, found nothing, and was walking back into the living room when he noticed a pair of socked feet sticking out from behind the coffee table. Another victim, no doubt. The coffee table had apparently concealed the body from sight when Bill had first come in. This body was not nearly as bad off as the one in the yard. Blood was all over its back from a nasty wound across the shoulders. Another more serious wound was on the back of its head leaving a portion of the skull bare. In some areas where the skull was visible, deep grooves could be seen across the bone; a small amount of grey matter had even seeped out in one area.

  Bill leaned down to investigate the wound; it seemed that the blood was still seeping out. Bill reached and felt the body’s arm. It was warm.

  He’s alive!

  * * *

  Jana may have only been a reporter for six years, but she knew how to find out when the game was afoot. She and Bob were currently staying in adjoining rooms at the Pineywoods Inn, a ratty little twelve-room motel on Highway 190, just around the corner from the Newton County Jail. At a little after nine o’clock Bob had called her into his room to tell her there was a lot of activity on their police scanner. They listened in but every time the sheriff (she would recognize his voice anywhere) came on he would tell someone to turn to a coded channel. Then the phone rang in Jana’s room. It was Alice Pender, a little old lady who owned a beauty shop in town. Jana knew beauty shops were the prime source for good gossip in a small town and had promised Mrs. Pender a reward if she came up with any useful information. Alice told Jana she had heard that the monster-thing, as she called it, had attacked the Burke family. Jana asked if Alice knew where the Burke family lived; she did. Jana quickly jotted down the address.

  “We’re in business, Bob,” Jana called out and they were loaded up and on the road in less than fifteen minutes.

  They headed out of town on Wood’s Community Road. Around ten miles south of town they took a right down a dirt road. They continued for another mile passing three houses.

  “Well, here it is,” Jana said, sounding disgusted. There was a quaint little house with a cyclone fence surrounding the yard. The mailbox was painted to resemble a Holstein cow complete with head and tail; on its side it read J. T. Burke. There was no sign of any police activity whatsoever.

  “Well, this certainly doesn’t look like the scene of a vicious attack to me,” Bob commented while he turned into the drive. “Looks more like a wild goose chase.”

  Jana ignored her cameraman and stepped out of the van. They had driven this far; she might as well ask some questions.

  She had just reached to open the gate when Bob thrust his head out the window and yelled, “Hey, Jana! Look!”

  Flying down the dirt road, coming from the direction Bob and Jana had been heading, they could see an ambulance with its lights on. It was kicking up quite a cloud of dust as it tore past them on its way to the hospital in Jasper.

  “Get in!” Bob yelled.

  Jana ran back to the passenger side and climbed in. Bob didn’t even wait for her to get the door shut before throwing the van into reverse and slamming his foot down on the accelerator. Jana was tossed forward but managed to catch herself before she hit the dash. Just as suddenly, she was propelled back into the seat be the car’s forward momentum.

  “Jesus, Bob, slow down,” Jana said, but she was ignored.

  Driving at breakneck speed, the white van streaked up the dirt road. When they topped the next hill, Bob let up off the gas and grinned ear to ear, “Bingo.”

  It looked like a peace officer convention: three Newton County Sheriff’s Department cars, three game warden’s vehicles, and two state trooper’s patrol cars. As they drove up and parked on the shoulder across from the house, Bob looked in his rearview and saw a long black Suburban approaching. Recognizing the vehicle, Bob smiled and said, “Look at this.”

  Jana turned around. “We’re in luck. That’s from the local funeral home.”

  They got out and got their gear set up. As Jana and Bob crossed the road they were met by a state trooper wearing reflective chrome sunglasses. “Sorry, this is a crime scene,” the trooper said, shifting a toothpick from one corner of his mouth to the other as he spoke.

  “I can see that,” Jana snapped, she turned to see if Bob was filming. He was. After giving her hair one final toss to add a little body, she put on her best concerned reporter face and asked, “Does this have anything to do with the strange murders that have been going on in the area?”

  “I’m not at liberty to say.”

  Jana started around the trooper, but he blocked her path.

  The house was a good three-hundred feet off the road, but it appeared that the entire area was being considered part of the crime scene and was now off limits. Jana looked at the mailbox. It read: Dan & Lisa Chamblin. She took out a pen and pad and jotted this down.

  The camera was focused in as close as it could get as a man in a suit and two of the deputies placed what appeared to be a dead body on a stretcher, then loaded the stretcher into the suburban.

  “Are you getting this?” Jana asked.

  “Yeah.”

  The man in the suit came back and picked up something else that was under a bloody sheet. (When they later played the tape in Bob’s hotel room, they would see a hand barely visible from under the sheet. It was a severed arm.) Bob kept the camera aimed on the suburban. The man in the suit climbed in, pulled out of the drive, and headed to town, followed by one of the deputy’s cars.

  Jana smiled into the camera, giving a brief narrative of the situation while the black Suburban exited stage left in the background. Once the SUV was out of sight, Jana lowered her microphone and Bob slowly panned the camera away from her and back to the crime scene.

  “Sound off?” Jana asked.

  “No.”

  “Turn it off.”

  “Okay.”

  “I’m curious, Bob. Why isn’t the coroner coming to get the bodies?”

  “Jana, honey,” Bob said without taking the camera from his shoulder or his eye out of the camera’s viewer, “you’re really in the boonies out here. In little towns like this they don’t have a coroner, and probably don’t know what one is. They send the bodies off somewhere to be autopsied.”

  “Oh.”

  “That’s good, though,” Bob continued, still filming, “B
etter chance of finding someone willing to talk in a coroner’s office in Houston where there’s a few dozen employees than finding someone willing to turn informant when there’s only one pathologist and an aide or two.”

  Not much later, all of the other cars, except for the one belonging to the state trooper who was keeping them off the crime scene, departed. Seeing that they weren’t going to get access to the crime scene, Jana and Bob also headed back to town.

  * * *

  James was standing at the front door to the sheriff’s office when Bill’s patrol car pulled up. Today the sheriff was accompanied by a large man in a western-cut sports jacket.

  “Good to see you, James. You saved me a phone call,” Bill said.

  At first this made James think he was about to be arrested and charged with murder again. However, instead of arresting James, Bill introduced him to the huge fellow standing beside him. “James, this is Captain Sam Jones of the Texas Rangers. Sam, this is James Taylor.”

  Sam and James shook hands and exchanged pleasantries.

  Bill invited James into his office and told Debra to tell Emilio to come on in the office as soon as she saw him. Before they went into the office, Debra asked if anyone wanted coffee. All three answered, “Yes.” She asked how each liked their coffee and started to the squad room.

  They had just taken their seats when Emilio came in trying to manage carrying four cups of coffee. “Juan Valdez, at your service,” Emilio said in a greatly exaggerated Spanish accent as he entered, causing Bill, Sam, and James to bark out a round of genuine laughter despite the severity of the situation at hand.

  Emilio passed out the coffee while the laughter tapered off to chuckles.

  After taking his first sip of coffee, Bill began. “All right, we’re on a short schedule here, so let’s get down to business. In about an hour and a half the hounds will be ready at the Chamblin place.” Bill glanced over to Sam to make sure his time was correct. Sam nodded and Bill continued. “The handler’s name is Larry Williams. He’ll be nominally in command there, but his hands’ll be full tryin’ to keep around a dozen dogs under control. Me and Sam are a little too old to be chasin’ dogs around in the woods, so we’ll be back here monitoring the progress. I want you,” Bill nodded at Emilio, “to be there and keep in constant contact with me and Sam.”