At the end, the tunnel opened into a subterranean labyrinth of columns, passageways and descending stairways. Jude knew the route, and without skipping a beat, he cut straight across the oppressive concrete concourse, half as wide as a football field. Ahead was a staircase with a black and white enamel sign reading UPTOWN, and as he reached it, he paused for a moment, held onto the handrail and peered back the way he had come. No one. He felt relief, and still catching his breath, he made every effort to collect himself and amble down the steps as if nothing had happened.
The platform was deserted — almost. Ahead of him, pacing slowly in the opposite direction, was a figure, a man in a leather coat. Jude stopped dead in his tracks. He squinted in the half-light and looked hard. Something about the figure was already familiar, an arrogance to the rolling stride. Instantly, a wave of fear passed through Jude. He did a double-take. It couldn't be. But it was. It was the same man!
He was unmistakable — there it was, the patch of white, gleaming like a wound. Jude slipped behind a column and hid there, his heart pounding, holding his breath and standing stiff so that not a stitch of clothing would show. He could hear the man walking up and down the platform; once he cleared his throat, an unpleasant bark of a sound. It was dumbfounding, beyond belief, there was simply no physical way for the man to have arrived ahead of him. How did he do it? For the moment, Jude banished the question and concentrated upon escape.
He chose his time carefully, waiting for a convergence of distractions. Soon enough, a subway pulled in two tracks over, emitting an ear-splitting racket that drowned out everything else. He watched until the man resumed his pacing and turned his back, and then he bolted and took the stairs two at a time, stopping at the top to look back. He could see the legs, still pacing. He raced across the concourse and through the turnstiles to the exit, then up more stairs and into the twilight air cleansed by rain.
Once outside on the sidewalk, Jude did not stop running. He ran to Third Avenue, then north for four blocks until he spotted a cab with a rear door swung open, one leg and high-heeled shoe dangling outside. Inside, a woman in an evening dress was laboriously counting her change. Jude held onto the door handle. She smiled at him as she stepped out, and he weakly smiled back, then jumped inside and gave his address. He fell against the backseat, spent and frightened.
The traffic was heavy and the cab moved slowly. It was not air-conditioned, and Jude lowered both windows as far as they would go. He could smell the perfume of the previous occupant, a powerful, exotic scent. A matchbook and a half-smoked cigarette lay on the floor. The driver switched on the radio, and a talk-show host was attacking a caller in an aggressive, nasal voice; something about welfare. Jude scanned the pavements on both sides. People were walking home from work, carrying briefcases and groceries. A young couple strolled down the sidewalk, arms around each other, easy as royalty.
The cab took a sharp turn, cutting off a pedestrian whose face, two feet away from Jude's, registered anger. It pulled up to Jude's building, a five-floor rent-controlled walk-up on East Seventy-fifth. Jude paid, tipping heavily, and looked both ways as he stepped out. Nothing untoward. The sun was hanging westward over the city, bleeding red upon the street.
Opening the front door, he entered the vestibule and passed his mailbox, filled with letters. He unlocked the second door and stepped into the dingy central stairwell with tiny, cracked black-and-white-tile floors and a rough staircase whose heavy banister was encrusted with layers of mud brown paint. It was a depressing space, and he usually hurried through it.
But this time he paused. He was breathing normally, but his senses were still alert from his flight from the subway; his vision was strong and hearing sharp, and he felt ready to spring at a moment's notice. And he thought he heard something — not much, nothing loud, a whisper of a sound from the shadows under the staircase. It was an indistinct rustling, the vague sound of someone drawing breath.
Jude took his foot off the first step and walked halfway down the hall, close enough to see a shivering, pathetic-looking figure in the shadows. Too small to be the man with the white hair.
"Come out of there," he commanded in a voice whose authority surprised even himself. "I can hear you. I know you're there. Come out."
Jude stepped closer.
There was a hint of movement in the darkness, more rustling, and then suddenly and all at once, a person materialized and stepped forward into the glare of the light from a dangling cord.
Jude was transfixed, struck dumb.
Before him stood a quivering tramp in rags, his long hair matted and falling to his shoulders. But there was no question — take away all that and it looked like Jude himself, almost exactly like him. It was his double, though oddly youthful despite the grime upon the face.
Then it spoke.
"Don't hurt me. Please don't hurt me."
The voice was shaking, scared. It carried an odd accent, slow and Southern-sounding, but unlike any Jude had heard before. And what really struck Jude was the timbre of the voice — it sounded just like the tapes he had heard of his own interviews. It sounded just like himself.
Chapter 13
"What's your name?"
It was such a basic question that Jude felt stupid for not asking it earlier. Certainly he was not thinking clearly. He was still reeling from the first sight of Skyler, this apparition that seemed like a nightmarish version of himself, all bony and straggly-haired like some Old Testament prophet come to preach Armageddon.
Nothing had fully prepared him for the shock of standing face to face with someone who looked so much like him — not the rumors and talk, not even the brief sighting outside the bookstore. Yes, he had been perplexed and intrigued by all that, but he hadn't seriously contemplated the reality that he had a double and that the double would one day step out of the shadows of the stairwell and sit down in his living room.
He kept staring at the mouth, the chin, the nose, the eyes. They looked just like his own. How can this be?
It was impossible. Yet it was real.
"Your name. What's your name?"
Jude repeated the question to the pathetic-looking figure perched on the edge of his couch, as he had had to repeat various other questions over the past twenty minutes. So far the double had done little to shed light on the enigma of his appearance.
"Skyler."
"Skyler? Is that your first or your last name?"
A look of bewilderment.
"Do you have parents? Brothers or sisters? Do they have the same name?"
Jude was feeling exasperated, and his interrogation was taking on a hard tone — probably not a good idea, he thought.
"No."
"Then let's assume it's your first name. How about a second name? Do you have any other name?"
Skyler hesitated, but only a moment. He was thinking.
"I guess you could say. Jimminy. We were all called Jimminies."
"Who is we?"
"All of us in the Age Group. On the island."
"What island? Is that where you come from? What's the name of the island?"
Again came that look of bewilderment, descending like a curtain.
"We didn't call it anything. We just lived there."
"What state was it in? What country? Is it America? Are you American?"
Skyler shrugged.
"I think so."
"Think so! Jesus Christ. How is it possible to grow up and not even know what the hell country you're in?"
The truth was, Skyler was wondering the same thing himself. He was also feeling wary. With good reason, for all he knew. He was not as shocked as Jude was to see a double of himself — the thought of finding Jude had been the sole purpose for coming to New York, and he had been searching for him for almost two weeks. Still, he recalled the jolt when he'd first set eyes on him in person as he was hiding behind a stoop across the street. Jude had stepped out of the door and there he was — someone who looked virtually identical and even had the same way of walking.