Double Identity

by Margaret Peterson Haddix

  I stare at the words on the screen, and the wall I built between my thoughts and my feelings comes crashing down. I shiver, suddenly fully aware that I’m sitting alone in a dark room in the middle of the night, with just thin doors and fragile windows between me and anyone who might want to harm me. Joss and Myrlie are right upstairs, I tell myself, but I can’t believe that they would be much protection against a man like Dalton Van Dyne. Because if the man on the porch was Dalton Van Dyne, he doesn’t just want to talk to my father. He wants to show me off to the whole wide world, with proof that I am Elizabeth’s clone.

  He wants to ruin my life.

  THIRTY-FOUR

  “I don‘ t know, Bethany,” Joss says, squinting at the picture on the small screen. “I guess that could be the guy we saw.”

  “But not for sure,” Myrlie says.

  I woke them up, Joss and Myrlie, and now they’re huddled around the computer with me, looking at the old pictures of Dalton Van Dyne. Myrlie’s hair is sticking up in odd places and Joss has dark circles under her eyes that somehow make her look like a little girl again. Myrlie hugs her robe more tightly around her waist.

  “Where’s that quote that scared you so much?” she asks, rubbing the sleep from her eyes.

  I call up Van Dyne’s words again, and Joss and Myrlie read silently.

  “But, see, down here, Bethany, he says, ‘Don’t you think the world needs about fifty more of me?’” Joss says, pointing lower on the screen, to a paragraph I hadn’t read. “He’s talking about wanting to clone himself.”

  “It’s just talk,” Myrlie says gently. She rests a hand on my shoulder. “He was a public figure and he ran his mouth off about all sorts of things. It’s got nothing to do with you.”

  Except that word “clone,” I think.

  I see Myrlie and Joss exchanging glances that seem to say, The poor kid’s been under a lot of strain lately. Surely we can excuse a little paranoia.

  I don’t want their sympathy. I want action.

  “Let’s see what Bridgie has to say before we get too bent out of shape,” Joss suggests.

  “Fine,” I say bitterly. I reach out and stab at the button that clears the screen of greedy, selfish Dalton Van Dyne and his desire to replace God.

  So my only protection is a kindergarten teacher and a ninety-eight-pound female minister, I think. And they don’t even believe I’m in any danger.

  Joss yawns.

  “What time is it, anyway?” she asks.

  “Nearly six,” Myrlie says, squinting at the clock. “I might as well stay up, now. Do the two of you want breakfast or are you going back to bed?”

  I stare at her, openmouthed. How can she think about food at a time like this? I remember what she said the night before: You hand me a crying five year old, and I know exactly what to do. You give me a kid who doesn’t know his alphabet, and usually I can have him reading at least a little by the end of the year. People say I’m a comfort to have around at funerals. I’m pretty good beside hospital beds too. But this. I just don’t know. My parents left me with the wrong person. If they loved me as much as they always said they did, they would have had a better backup plan.

  “I—” Joss starts to answer, but just then the doorbell peals out.

  All three of us freeze—Joss midsentence, Myrlie halfway to the kitchen, me in the midst of reaching for the computer to shut it down. For all their cavalier talk a few minutes ago, they look just as stricken as I feel. Then Myrlie turns and moves briskly toward the door.

  Maybe she is brave, after all, I think.

  Myrlie peeks out the window, then yanks the door open.

  “Bridgie?” she says incredulously.

  She opens the screen door for him too, and he steps in, onto her hardwood floor. He’s got a piece of paper in his hand, but he’s holding it facedown. Even last night, after he’d investigated egged houses and toilet-papered trees, his uniform looked crisp and professional. Now he’s bleary-eyed and his uniform is rumpled, as if he’d just thrown it on. His shirt cuffs aren’t even buttoned.

  “I hope this isn’t too early,” he says. “I wouldn’t have stopped in except I saw your lights on.”

  “No, no, that’s fine,” Myrlie says. “As you can see, we’re up. We’re just not all …”—she glances down at her robe—“dressed.”

  “Have a seat,” Joss says.

  Bridgie perches on the edge of the couch. Myrlie and Joss settle around him. I stay by the computer.

  “I was going to look into your questions first thing this morning,” Bridgie says. “But I couldn’t sleep.” He glances over at me, and looks away fast. “I got up in the middle of the night and checked my e-mail. And there was this bulletin …”

  “A bulletin?” Myrlie repeats, leaning forward.

  Bridgie nods. “It’s one of those cross-jurisdictional courtesy things. Police departments notify other police departments when suspected criminals or ex-cons move into their area.” He fiddles with the edge of the paper he’s holding. “Dalton Van Dyne wasn’t ordered to stay in the Chicago area as a condition of his release. He just has to let the authorities know where he goes.”

  “He is in Sanderfield,” I breathe.

  Bridgie peers over at me, but he still can’t quite make his eyes meet mine. He shrugs apologetically.

  “Yes,” he says. He flips over the paper in his hand. “Is this the man you saw?”

  THIRTY-FIVE

  I rush over to the couch and crane my neck to see the picture of Dalton Van Dyne as he looks now, after prison. It’s a grainy, security-camera-type shot, printed out from a computer, but it’s clear that Dalton Van Dyne doesn’t have chestnut-colored hair anymore, he doesn’t ooze confidence, he won’t make People magazine’s list of most eligible bachelors this year. In this picture, Dalton Van Dyne has ugly gray, grizzled, close-cropped hair, and his worn, heavily lined face stares warily at the camera.

  I have no doubts now.

  “That’s him,” Joss says grimly.

  Bridgie nods, as if he’s had his worst fears confirmed.

  “Why would he come here?” he asks. “Why would he be looking for Dr. Krull?”

  Joss and Myrlie look at me, and I can tell they’re wondering if I’ll advance the same theory I woke them up for, just an hour ago. Would they tell Bridgie the theory themselves, even if they don’t believe it?

  I bite my lip, all my fears fighting in my head.

  “My father might have worked for Dalton Van Dyne,” I say hesitantly. “Joss and I found a link on the Web yesterday.”

  “Let me see,” Bridgie says.

  Bridgie follows me back to the computer and seconds later I have my father’s name up on the screen, in the list of supposedly fictitious employees in a supposedly nonexistent office: “… Sandra Despre, Walter Krull, Antonio Perez, and Michael Sciullo never existed …”

  Bridgie backs away from the computer shaking his head.

  “This doesn’t make sense,” Bridgie said. “If Dr. Krull really worked for Van Dyne, and got a salary from him, then Van Dyne didn’t steal all that money. His defense attorney would have called Dr. Krull and the others to the witness stand to prove that Van Dyne wasn’t an embezzler. Or at least to prove that he didn’t embezzle everything. He wouldn’t have gotten such a long prison sentence if he hadn’t taken so much money.”

  “Maybe that’s why Uncle Walter changed his name and disappeared,” Joss says. “To avoid testifying.”

  “But why?” Myrlie asks, sounding even more bewildered than ever. “Why would Walter do that?”

  I remember Joss telling me that “Why?” was the question that religion answered; I remember telling her I didn’t know what my parents believed. But my father always told me to treat people fairly—when I was a little kid refusing to share my toys, he always told me I had to think about other people’s feelings. Were those just meaningless words? Was he secretly the type of person who would let someone go to prison for a long time when he could have spoken up and
stopped it?

  I’m back to the same question Myrlie had asked: Why would Walter do that?

  Bridgie’s watching my aunt and cousin. He clicks on the mouse to erase the whole Van Dyne story, and the screenful of disturbing words is replaced by Myrlie’s soothing wallpaper: a field of flowers.

  “This is upsetting you ladies,” Bridgie says quietly. “I want you to know that the Sanderfield Police will be keeping an eye on Mr. Van Dyne. And we’ll have extra patrols on your block, just in case.”

  “Thank you,” Myrlie says.

  I’m not comforted. I want an around-the-clock guard by Myrlie’s door. I want Dalton Van Dyne arrested.

  Some small voice in the back of my head whispers, But what if he’s really done nothing wrong? What if my father’s the true criminal?

  THIRTY-SIX

  There’s nothing to do after Bridge leaves. Myrlie and Joss loll on the couch and I sprawl in the computer chair, and the way we’re all sitting reminds me of crime scenes in movies, the chalk drawings on pavement showing where the bodies fell.

  Shell-shocked, I think. We’re shell-shocked.

  Having Bridgie show up with his official notification and his picture of Dalton Van Dyne—newly released from prison, mysteriously appearing in Sanderfield, asking for my dad—is the first concrete proof we’ve had that my parents aren’t crazy. (Not completely crazy, anyway.) I miss that explanation now; I long for the time when I thought my parents were merely insane.

  “You didn’t tell him,” I murmur to Myrlie and Joss. “You didn’t tell Bridgie that my mom says they cloned Elizabeth, that that might be the link between my dad and Van Dyne, that I might be—”

  “Bridgie’s not conducting an investigation,” Myrlie says. “He wasn’t seeking information. He just wants to protect us.”

  Joss turns her head and looks at her mother, and I can’t read the expression on either of their faces. I remember a movie I saw once, where a murderer confessed his crime to a priest, but the priest wasn’t allowed to tell anyone. It was something about the murderer’s sins being between him and God, and the priest had taken an oath of confidentiality. Was being a minister like being a priest? Do teachers ever promise to keep secrets too?

  “I know how it must have been,” I say dully, because I think I’ve just now figured out the final pieces in the puzzle. “Dalton Van Dyne paid my dad to … to produce me. Van Dyne just wanted to brag to the world, ‘Look what I made happen! Look what my money did!’ But then Van Dyne got caught stealing other money, and he didn’t want anyone else to get the credit for the first cloned human, so he didn’t say anything about what my dad had done. And then when Van Dyne went to prison, my parents took me away, and they kept changing their names so he couldn’t track them down. But Van Dyne found out where they were, and they thought they could hide me here and they could be like decoys or something, running away, throwing him off from finding me. But Van Dyne didn’t fall for it. He found me first. Because I kept calling my dad’s cell phone from here that first day, probably. But now he’s just biding his time, waiting to get his proof, maybe, before he steals me back….”

  I wait for Myrlie and Joss to protest, to say, “That’s ridiculous, you’re imagining things, that can’t be the explanation.” But they just stare at me uncertainly. Something else strikes me.

  “Oh, no,” I moan. “Where’s Elizabeth buried?”

  “In Sanderfield Cemetery,” Joss says. “On the west side of town. We would have passed it Monday when we went to the state park, except that I took a detour.”

  She’s looking at me as if she has no idea why I asked.

  “Don’t you see?” I say. “He could go there, he could …” I can’t quite bring myself to say the horrific words: dig up her body. This is too grisly, even worse than the graverobbers in Tom Sawyer, even worse than ghost stories my friends and I whispered at sleepovers. “He could get his proof at the cemetery,” I choke out. I struggle up from my chair, my leg throbbing, my muscles aching from raking nearly the entire yard yesterday, except for the area around Elizabeth’s tree. “We have to go there, we have to stop him….”

  I’m trying to race for the door, but I feel like I’m back in one of my nightmares, where I run and run but just can’t get away from everyone who’s chasing me. Myrlie reaches out and grabs my arm.

  “No,” she says. Her voice and her grip are both so solid and firm, the fight goes out of me and I sag against her. “None of us are going to the cemetery,” she says. “I’ll call Bridgie and let him know—”

  “Don’t tell him everything,” I beg. “Please. I don’t want him to know anything about me being Elizabeth’s clone.”

  I’m so ashamed, suddenly. Joss said none of this was my fault, but I just can’t believe it. The way Bridgie looks at me, it’s like he blames me for everything. It’s like Elizabeth was a star, and I’m just a piece of dust trying to impersonate her, trying to steal the love people had for her, trying to bring back all their grief and rub their faces in it.

  “I won’t tell him that,” Myrlie says. “I promise. You can listen.”

  I trail her to the kitchen and all but press my head against the phone receiver while she talks.

  “Bridgie?” Myrlie says. “Bethany thinks Van Dyne might go to Sanderfield Cemetery.”

  I hear a crackle on the other end that’s probably Bridgie saying, “Why would he do that?”

  “It’s just a guess,” Myrlie says. “But think about it. If this guy’s mad at Walter and Hillary, wouldn’t vandalizing Elizabeth’s grave be a particularly cruel form of revenge?”

  I pull back from the phone, I’m so amazed at Myrlie. She isn’t lying, but she also isn’t giving anything away. As far as I’m concerned, she’s a genius.

  “Uh-huh,” she’s saying to Bridgie. “Well, that’s not a surprise.”

  I peer at Myrlie’s troubled face. Then I understand.

  “They found out that Van Dyne really was the one who placed the ad in the newspaper,” I say aloud.

  Myrlie winces and nods at me, though she’s still listening to Bridgie on the phone.

  Van Dyne probably knows all my father’s aliases, I think. He knows all about us.

  “We have had a few phone calls where the person on the other end just hangs up,” Myrlie says.

  Was that Van Dyne too? I wonder. I remember Sunday morning, picking up the phone and crying out, “Daddy, why didn’t you call yesterday?” before I even said hello. Was Van Dyne on the other end of the line?

  I’ve lost track of Myrlie’s phone conversation. Then I realize her voice has changed now. She almost sounds happy.

  “Oh, really?” she’s saying into the phone. “That’s great. Thanks.”

  When she hangs up, I stare at her, waiting for her to explain what’s so great. Maybe they’ve found my parents; maybe they’ve arrested Dalton Van Dyne for phone harassment and sent him back to prison for the rest of his life; maybe they’ve just happened to have turned up blood tests that prove that Elizabeth and I are two totally different people….

  But Myrlie’s expression is conflicted.

  “Bridgie says he called the state association of small-town police divisions, just for some advice. One thing led to another, and it turns out prosecutors always felt they were missing something in the case against Van Dyne, thirteen years ago, and, well …”

  “What?” I demand.

  “The FBI’s going to be here too, watching Van Dyne. Protecting us.”

  Nosing around, I think. Talking to people. Finding out more than I want anyone else to know.

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  Joss and Myrlie make no attempt to keep me from sitting around fidgeting and worrying today. They’re sitting around fidgeting and worrying too, although sometimes their eyes close. I’m not sure if they’re sleeping or praying.

  I can’t do either. I sit by the front window and peer out. Myrlie calls her school to say she’s taking another day off work, and I watch the school buses come and go. Every hour or
so a police car creeps by. People walk their dogs; they push babies in strollers. Two women stop on the corner to chat, while their toddlers play in a pile of leaves. They cast worried glances at the dark clouds in the sky, and move on.

  That could have been Myrlie and Mom, thirty years ago, I think. I bet anything the two of them stood in that very spot chatting, while Joss and Elizabeth played in the leaves. Sanderfield was Elizabeth’s world, just an ordinary place to grow up, a place where grandparents planted trees to celebrate new babies in the family. But Sanderfield wasn’t enough for Elizabeth; she wanted to dazzle the entire nation, the entire planet.

  Sanderfield would be enough for me, I think. Just to be an ordinary kid in an ordinary place …

  Lightning flashes and thunder cracks and the skies open, sending down sheets of rain. The rain brings down a torrent of leaves from all the trees in Myrlie’s front yard. Everything is falling down, falling apart. And through the glaze of rain and falling leaves, I see a dark car glide by.

  “There he is!” I shriek. “He’s right outside.”

  Joss comes and stands beside me, and together we watch the car slip out of sight.

  “Call the police!” I say.

  Joss shakes her head.

  “They can’t arrest him just for driving down a street,” she says.

  The phone rings, and I think maybe Joss is wrong; maybe this is Bridgie telling us they’ve captured Van Dyne and we’re safe and secure once again. I sprint into the kitchen and grab the phone before Joss or Myrlie even have a chance to move.

  “Bethany?”

  It’s my mother’s voice and, miracle of miracles, she knows who I am.

  “Oh, Mom,” I whimper.

  “He doesn’t know I’m calling, I’m not supposed to call, but I had to say good-bye.”

  “No, Mom, you—”

  Myrlie’s standing beside me and she’s got her hand outstretched, like I’m supposed to give her the phone. I press it tighter against my ear and turn my back on her.