Ken Follett - the Third Twin (1996)

Jim stood up. “Want a beer, kid?”

“Sure,” Harvey said.

Jim had an annoying tendency to encourage Harvey in bad habits. “Forget the beer,” Berrington snapped. “Jim, why don’t you and Preston go into the drawing room and let us two talk.” The drawing room was a stiffly formal space that Berrington never used.

Preston and Jim left. Berrington got up and hugged Harvey. “I love you, son,” he said. “Even though you’re wicked.”

“Am I wicked?”

“What you did to that poor girl in the basement of the gym was one of the most wicked things a man can do.”

Harvey shrugged.

Dear God, I failed to instill in him any sense of right and wrong, Berrington thought. But it was too late now for such regrets. “Sit down and listen for a minute,” he said.

Harvey sat.

“Your mother and I tried for years to have a baby, but there were problems,” he said “At the time, Preston was working on in vitro fertilization, where the sperm and the egg are brought together in the laboratory and then the embryo is implanted in the womb.”

“Are you saying I was a test-tube baby?”

“This is secret. You must never tell anyone, all your life. Not even your mother.”

“She doesn’t know?” Harvey said in astonishment.

“There’s more to it than that. Preston took one live embryo and split it, forming twins.”

“That’s the guy who’s been arrested for the rape?’

“He split it more than once.”

Harvey nodded. All of them had the same quick intelligence. “How many?” he said.

“Eight.”

“Wow. And I guess the sperm didn’t come from you.”

“No.”

“Who?”

“An army lieutenant from Fort Bragg: tall, strong, fit, intelligent, aggressive, and good-looking.”

“And the mother?”

“A civilian typist from West Point, similarly well favored.”

A wounded grin twisted the boy’s handsome face. “My real parents.”

Berrington winced. “No, they’re not,” he said. “You grew in your mother’s belly. She gave birth to you, and believe me it hurt. We watched you take your first unsteady steps, and struggle to maneuver a spoonful of mashed potato into your mouth, and lisp your first words.”

Watching his son’s face, Berrington could not tell whether Harvey believed him or not.

“Hell, we loved you more and more as you became less lovable. Every damn year the same reports from school: ‘He is very aggressive, he has not yet learned to share, he hits other children, he has difficulty with team games, he disrupts the class, he must learn to respect members of the opposite sex.’ Every time you got expelled from a school we trudged around begging and pleading to get you into another one. We tried cajoling you, beating you, withdrawing privileges. We took you to three different child psychologists. You made our lives miserable.”

“Are you saying I ruined the marriage?”

“No, son, I did that all on my own. What I’m trying to tell you is that I love you whatever you do, just like any other parent.”

Harvey was still troubled. “Why are you telling me now?”

“Steve Logan, one of your doubles, was a subject for study in my department. I had a hell of a shock when I saw him, as you may imagine. Then the police arrested him for the rape of Lisa Hoxton. But one of the professors, Jeannie Ferrami, got suspicious. To cut a long story short, she’s tracked you down. She wants to prove Steve Logan’s innocence. And she probably wants to expose the whole story of the clones and ruin me.”

“She’s the woman I met in Philadelphia.”

Berrington was mystified. “You’ve met her?”

“Uncle Jim called me and told me to give her a scare.”

Berrington was enraged. “The son of a bitch, I’m going to tear his fucking head off his shoulders—”

“Calm down, Dad, nothing happened. I went for a ride in her car. She’s cute, in her way.”

Berrington controlled himself with an effort. “Your uncle Jim has always been irresponsible in his attitude to you. He likes your wildness, no doubt because he’s such an uptight asshole himself.”

“I like him.”

“Let’s talk about what we have to do. We need to know Jeannie Ferrami’s intentions, especially over the next twenty-four hours. You need to know whether she has any evidence that links you to Lisa Hoxton. We can’t think of any way to get to her—but one.”

Harvey nodded. “You want me to go talk to her, pretending to be Steve Logan.”

“Yes.”

He grinned. “Sounds fun.”

Berrington groaned. “Don’t do anything foolish, please. Just talk to her.”

“Want me to go right away?”

“Yes, please. I hate to ask you to do this—but it’s for you as much as for me.”

“Relax, Dad—what could happen?”

“Maybe I worry too much. I guess there’s no great danger in going to a girl’s apartment.”

“What if the real Steve is there?”

“Check the cars in the street. He has a Datsun like yours; that’s another reason the police were so sure he was the perpetrator.”

“No kidding!”

“You’re like identical twins, you make the same choices. If his car is there, don’t go in. Call me, and we’ll try to think of some way to get him out.”

“Suppose he walked there?”

“He lives in Washington.”

“Okay.” Harvey stood up. “What’s the girl’s address?”

“She lives in Hampden.” Berrington scribbled the street address on a card and handed it over. “Be careful, okay?”

“Sure. See you sooner, Montezuma.”

Berrington forced a smile. “In a flash, succotash.”

56

HARVEY CRUISED UP AND DOWN JEANNIE’S STREET, LOOKING for a car just like his own. There were lots of elderly automobiles, but no rusty light-colored Datsuns. Steve Logan was not around.

He pulled into a slot near her house and turned off the engine. He sat thinking for a moment. He would need his wits about him. He was glad he had not drunk that beer Uncle Jim had offered him.

He knew she would take him for Steve, because she had done so once before, in Philadelphia. The two of them were identical in appearance. But conversation would be more tricky. She would make references to all sorts of things he was supposed to know about. He would have to answer without betraying his ignorance. He had to keep her confidence long enough to find out what evidence she had against him and what she planned to do with her knowledge. It would be very easy to make a slip and betray himself.

But even while he thought soberly about the daunting challenge of impersonating Steve, he could hardly contain his excitement at the prospect of seeing her again. What he had done in her car had been the most thrilling sexual encounter he had ever had. It was even better than being in the women’s locker room when they were all panicking. He got aroused every time he thought about ripping her clothes while the car swerved all over the expressway.

He knew he should concentrate on his task now. He must not think of her face contorted in fear and her strong legs writhing. He ought to get the information from her and leave. But all his life he had never been able to do the sensible thing.

Jeannie called police headquarters as soon as she got home. She knew Mish would not be there, but she left a message asking her to call urgently. “Didn’t you leave an urgent message for her earlier today?” she was asked.

“Yes, but this is another one, just as important.”

“I’ll do my best to pass it on,” the voice said skeptically.

Next she called Steve’s house, but there was no reply. She guessed he and Lorraine were with their lawyer, trying to get Charles freed, and he would call when he could.