Doppelganger by Geoffrey West Page B

beige
soft-leather furniture perched on the deep blue heavy-pile carpet. The far wall
of the room was mostly comprised of vast windows, allowing a view across this
valley towards the mountains. On the glass-topped coffee table beside the sofa
was a leaflet entitled The Bryn-y-Gare Valley – home to exotic flora and fauna
since Roman times ...
    The study – for want of a better
word – was also larger-than-life, and was reassuringly bookish, with row upon
row of books on the shelves, including, to my delight, my own books published
by Truecrime Publications. I wandered over and studied them: Fred and Rose’s
Secrets and Too Many Rotten Apples . Much of the remainder of the
books were, naturally, published by Truecrime Publications.
    The writing desk was equipped
with an excellent computer that had the latest word-processing package
installed on it. When I’m working in one place, as opposed to jotting things
down on the move, I prefer a big screen to that of a laptop. It didn’t take me
long to bring in all my papers and notes and tapes for transcribing, then to
download the completed parts of Hero or Villain? from my laptop onto the
desktop machine. The internet connection worked, so did the telephone. That was
one big relief, as I’d imagined that reception might have been impossible in
this hilly area, for Llantrissant Manor appeared to be in a valley between
mountains.
    So for the next few days I got
stuck in.
    On the Friday night I had my
nightmare again, where I’m being choked to death and the light is disappearing.
Yet right in the middle of it I saw Douglas’s face. He was smiling, looking as
he’d done in the days I’d first met him, when he had the large grey moustache
and no beard. He was saying something, but I couldn't make out what it was, and
while he was talking he was frowning, as if he was imparting some deep secret.
Then he waved, smiled and walked off purposefully – I could just make out
someone in the distance with their arms outstretched to welcome him.
    I woke up with a splitting
headache, my heart racing, and looked at the bedside clock: 4 am.
    When I got up the following
morning there was a text message on my phone.
    Douglas died at 4am this
morning. Will let you know about funeral. Love, Cecile .
     
    *
* * *
     
    It wasn’t really a shock, for I’d
been half expecting it. The coincidence of the dream was grizzly, but you hear
about things like that happening now and again. People talk about telepathy,
life after death, surges of electrical activity in the brain at the point of
passing, but nobody really has a clue, it’s all just guesswork. All I know is I
found it comforting, that if it was some kind of near-death telepathy, that
Douglas was happy in his final moments.
    After that the days were fairly
dreary: typing away, revising, editing, transcribing the words. There was
plenty of food in the freezer and everything I could possibly need in the
cupboards, and although I’m a lousy cook I managed to fry sausages and eggs,
and prepare chips in the oven. Plus of course brewing plenty of mugs of real
coffee.
    Was I lonely? Yes. But I phoned
Lucy every day at six o’clock, and she told me about the people she’d met in
the shop, how interesting York was, all about a historic road called The
Shambles, and the endless American tourists who admired the beautiful doll’
houses she was selling. We talked about everything: the weather, the news on
the television and radio, how my work was progressing. She was planning to come
back to Canterbury this weekend, should have arrived there last night, so I was
looking forward to travelling back to see her tomorrow night, if she could stay
until Monday.
    And after all that slog Hero
or Villain? was finally finished. It was midnight, ten days after I’d first
come to Llantrissant Manor, and I hadn’t seen a soul in all that time. The
phone rang and I picked up, wondering who’d be ringing at this time.
    “Jack?”
    I recognised Stuart’s