Byron Starr - Doppelgänger

Finally they turned on to Houston Street and could see flashing lights ahead.

“Bingo,” Bob said, grinning.

As they pulled up to the scene they could see there were already two ambulances, two county patrol cars, and one city patrol car. There were also about six cars and pickups parked behind these vehicles. An officer was talking to a group of people near the back of one of the patrol cars; the people in the group were making frantic gestures, obviously demanding to be let in the house.

“Those look like they might be our newest victim’s relatives,” Bob said motioning toward the small crowd. “Let’s see if we can get an interview.” Bob bounded out and got his camera out of the back. With Jana in the lead, they started across the road toward the small crowd where a deputy was having difficulty explaining to the small, frantic crowd that they had to stay away from the scene.

Jana overheard the deputy tell the people, “The girls are okay. They’ve locked themselves in the room and won’t let us in, but I promise you they are just fine.”

“Why can’t I see my daughter?” one angry parent shouted.

“Why did Tom Barrett get to go in?” another called out.

“Sheriff Oates wanted to take only a few people to try to talk to the kids. He didn’t want to upset them.”

No across the road and approaching the crowd, Jana turned to Bob, “Please tell me you’re getting this.”

“Not set up yet,” Bob replied, as he slung the camera to his shoulder.

The deputy turned and saw Jana and her cameraman approaching. He obviously had his hands full with the gathering of parents, so he opted for reinforcements. He turned to the house and called out, “Bill! I need you out here.”

Sheriff Oates appeared at the door to the house. He jogged across the yard on an interception course. A big man in a western sports coat came out of the door behind him; she recognized him as Captain Sam Jones, a Texas Ranger who had been brought in to help the investigation. The sheriff got between Jana and the crowd and put his hand up.

Bob aimed the camera at the two of them.

“Sheriff Oates, could you please tell us what is going on here?” Jana asked smiling her loveliest smile. Let’s see you get out of this one, you redneck son of a bitch, she thought.

“I’ll tell you what’s going on Mrs. Parish: you’re in violation of a citywide curfew.” She could tell he had more to say but he managed to hold his tongue — this time. Oh yes, she had him now.

Jana pressed on. “Sheriff Oates, is this another one of the strange unsolved killings that’s been going on in the area?” she asked, putting special emphasis on the word unsolved. “Is it true your department has no leads and no suspects on these terrible crimes? Is it true that a former suspect is now a deputy in your department?”

The sheriff’s cheeks darkened. “Mrs. Parish, you go back to your van right now, or I will personally escort you to jail, by God.”

Got him! Jana thought. Then she continued, “Sheriff Oates, are you saying…”

“Sheriff Oates, please allow me to handle this.” Captain Jones interrupted in a smooth, well-enunciated Texas accent.

Sheriff Oates turned to the Ranger and at first seemed like he was going to argue. Then he simply nodded and walked away without saying another word. At first Jana was somewhat at a loss. She wanted to corner the sheriff, and she almost had him. Still, there was hope; if she could pick up where she left off, maybe she could get some information from this big cowboy that might bring him down.

“Captain Jones…” Jana started

“Please, call me, Sam,” Sam said, removing his hat and extending his hand.

Slightly baffled, Jana quickly touched his hand and started over. “Captain Jones, can you please tell us what is going on here?”

“I do wish I could, ma’am, but since it’s all still under investigation, my hands are tied,” Captain Jones politely drawled in the smooth voice of a true Southern gentleman.

“Is this another of the unsolved killings that have been going on in the area?”

“Now, Mrs. Parish, like I said, I can’t say anything right now, but I’ll tell ya’ll what I’ll do, I’ll write up a statement and run it over to the Pineywoods first thing in the morning. For right now, though, y’all need to get back to the hotel.”

Jana asked a few more questions, hoping either to pester Captain Jones into losing his composure or to stall long enough to catch something exciting on film. After five minutes, Jana started repeating her questions and Captain Jones brought this to her attention. He smoothly suggested that he might consider an interview if they would go back to their hotel. Of course he never committed to anything; he just suggested it might be possible. After about five more minutes of smooth talking, Jana and Bob were on their way back to the hotel, half convinced it had been their idea to leave.

The next morning Captain Jones’ statement was delivered by the manager of the Pineywoods Hotel in a sealed envelope. The letter was every bit as evasive as Captain Jones had been in person. The statement said someone had died, but it didn’t even state that they had been killed. When it mentioned the cause of the death, the letter evasively said: foul play has not been ruled out.

Jana also found that nothing came of the semi-promised interview. Every time she called the Sheriff’s Office and asked for Captain Sam Jones, the dispatcher would tell her he had just stepped out and he would return her call as soon as he returned. Of course, he never did.

The rest of the day was spent running about town trying to find out what had happened, but in Newton it seemed the rumors were almost as common as the pine trees. It was next to impossible to decipher what had really happened. By the end of the day, one of the few things Jana was sure about was that someone had been killed the night before. Other stories, such as a half dozen teenagers killed and a shootout between one of the deputies and a serial killer could have some truth to them, but it was impossible to tell how much.

When Jana finally went to bed late that afternoon, she was exhausted and aggravated.

Later that night, Jana was in the middle of a dream about her ex-husband Lance that involved very little clothes and a lot of heavy breathing, when she felt someone shaking her. She could faintly hear someone through the fog of her slowly fading deep sleep.

Jana, Get up.

“Lance?” she mumbled drowsily.

Jana heard someone laugh, then say, “No, it’s your other boyfriend.” She could now clearly hear Bob’s voice.

Her eyes were still unfocused, but she could make out Bob’s shape beside her bed. “What are you doing in my room?” Jana snapped.

“I saw something outside my window.”

Jana was still groggy from her sleep and a little embarrassed about the dream he had caught her in the middle of, not to mention a little miffed that Bob had caused the dream to end. “Get out of my room right now! I have a right to my own privacy.”

Bob said, slowly as if he was speaking to a child, “Jana, I think I saw our monster.”

Jana finally grasped what he said. “Where?” she asked.

“Across the street.”

“What did it look like?” Jana said as she raised up in the bed. Her ample breasts were visible through her flimsy white nightgown.

Bob was aware that before Jana had her baby she had been a quite a knockout, but in the last two years of working with her he never saw her as anything more than an irritable bitch. Now he found himself staring at her breasts wondering what they would feel like.

Jana followed his eyes to her breasts and pulled the covers up to cover them. Then it was her turn to speak slowly, like she was speaking to a child. “What did it look like, Bob?”