he heard Ruth. She was speaking in a whisper. ‘Arnold, there are seventy candles on that cake. I just counted them.’
The odds were getting longer and longer.
‘Mr Smith, do you mind if …’
‘Gus, call me Gus. You’re Arnold, is that right?’
‘Yes, that’s right. Gus, would it be okay if my wife calls my family over? Just for a minute. This is so uncanny. I’m sure they wouldn’t believe it if I told them.’
‘Sure,’ Gus replied. ‘Look at my lot here. They can see you and they still can’t believe it. I’m not sure if I believe it myself.’
‘My name is Ruth. I am pleased to meet you but to be honest I’m a bit freaked out.’
‘This is Helena,’ Gus said, pointing to the woman on his left who was still staring at Arnold.
‘Hi, pleased to meet you.’ When Helena spoke, her voice was barely above a whisper.
‘Back in a sec,’ Ruth said and headed off in the direction they came from. She was back two minutes later with the family in tow. They clearly had no idea what to expect. Ruth had asked them to follow her but said nothing else.
‘Holy shit,’ Michael cried out. ‘Sorry, sorry for my language,’ he added. ‘I can’t believe this. Don’t tell me you have a twin brother that you’ve never told us about, Dad.’
Arnold laughed. ‘No, I don’t, Michael. Meet Gus, Gus Smith and next to him is his wife Helena. Believe me, son, I’m just as stunned as you are, as we all are.’
All at once, the eight people at the table stood up. Gus introduced them. There was his son Peter and his wife Gertie and daughter Lisa, another son, Raymond, his wife Mary and son Rolf. Arnold then introduced his family, his son Michael and his wife Helen and their daughters, Karen and Rachel and finally his son, Paul. There were a lot of ‘hello’s, ‘pleased to meet you’, and remarks like, ‘can you believe it’, ‘is this weird or what’ and several ‘cools’ from the younger members of both families.
‘I’ve heard about this phenomenon,’ Helen then said. ‘Doppelganger, that’s what it’s called, isn’t it. We are all supposed to have one somewhere, or so the story goes. There is someone somewhere who looks like us, or near enough. But this is something more. You two are absolutely identical.’
‘I agree with you, Helen,’ Gus said. ‘When I look at Arnold, it’s like looking in the mirror, but I don’t have a twin brother. I don’t have any siblings. I’m an only child. And in any case, I’m from the United States, Milwaukee. That’s in Wisconsin, if you didn’t know. And I guess from your accents that you’re Australian.’
‘From Melbourne,’ Arnold said.
‘So,’ Gus continued, ‘We might look identical, but we’re definitely not related. I bet if you look up the internet there will be other examples of such strong similarities. There have to be.’
‘I agree,’ Arnold said. ‘And I also don’t have a twin brother. I have a sister and she looks nothing like me.’
The scene was drawing the attention of the other diners, as the sight of fifteen people milling around, chatting, is bound to do. A few waiters were looking in their direction, and not with looks of approval.
‘I think we are making a bit of a scene,’ Ruth said. ‘Can I suggest that you two men, you doppelgangers, have a chat, somewhere quiet. That is if you want to. I’m tired, I’m going back to our cabin and I’m sure the others will have no trouble finding something to do.’
‘Good idea,’ Arnold said. ‘How about it, Gus, you want to have a drink and a chat?’
‘Sure, why not,’ was Gus’s reply, although he sounded less than enthusiastic.
After another five or six minutes of everyone milling around and half a dozen or so muted conversations, the group went their separate ways, leaving Arnold and Gus on their own. An awkward silence followed, which was broken by Arnold.
‘Shall we go down to deck five. We can have a drink in the Piazza bar.’
‘Fine,’ Gus replied.
After a few minutes the elevator arrived and two minutes after that, they were seated at a corner table, a waiter hovering over them, ready to take their order.
‘What’s your poison?’ Arnold asked.
‘Bourbon, straight,’ Gus replied.
‘I am a Scotch man,’ Arnold said. ‘Single malt preferably.’
‘Jim Beam, rocks,’ Gus said, looking up at the waiter.
‘A Talisker for me, neat. This one’s on me,’ Arnold said. He pulled the cabin card out of his pocket and handed it to the waiter.
Another silence, again broken by Arnold.
‘So, Gus, what do you do? Are you retired or still working?’
‘Still working,’ Gus replied. Then, after a hesitation. ‘I’m a doctor. A cardiologist. I work at the Aurora St Luke Medical Centre in Milwaukee. It’s quite well known,’ he added. ‘We are one of the top centres in robotic assisted heart surgery. That’s not what I do. I leave that to the younger guys.’
Arnold just stared at him and kept staring. Finally, Gus asked, ‘Is everything okay? Is there a problem?’
‘Not exactly a problem,’ Arnold finally said. ‘This goes well beyond coincidence. I am a cardiologist too. I worked in a hospital for years, I’m now in private practice.’
It was Gus’s turn to stare. He then laughed. ‘This is like an episode of reality TV. I’m expecting a guy with a camera to appear at any moment.’
Arnold laughed too. ‘Pity the others have gone. They would not believe this. Not for a minute.’
There was another awkward pause and then Gus asked, ‘Rosen, is that a Jewish name?’
Arnold was taken aback by the question.
‘Yes,’ he replied. ‘I’m Jewish. Is that a problem for you?’
Gus hesitated. ‘No, not really. It’s just that, well, I haven’t mixed much with Jews before. Which is strange, considering I’m a doctor and the profession is full of them. But maybe not where I come from, Milwaukee.’
‘Well, now you’ve met one, Gus,’ Arnold said, his tone distinctly cool. He then added, ‘As you can see, I haven’t got horns growing out of my head and I’m not about to eat your children. I’m a normal person, at least I’d like to think I am.’
‘Take it easy. I didn’t mean to offend you. I’m a bit embarrassed saying this, especially as we’ve just met and what I said wasn’t meant to be personal, but I was brought up with a lot of negative views about Jewish people.’
‘What does that even mean?’ Arnold asked. He could feel himself becoming agitated and it showed.
‘How much do you know about Milwaukee?’
‘Not much. I’ve heard about it and I think it’s got something to do with beer. That’s all I know.’
‘You’re right about the beer, but that’s not what I’m getting at. Forty per cent of Milwaukee’s population have German ancestry. I am among that forty per cent. You have to understand my background. Gus Smith was born Gustav Schmidt. My parents were German. My father fought for Germany in World War Two. I was brought up with stories about Germany after the First World War, a war Germany lost because of the Jews, or so my father used to tell me. The Jews were to blame for everything that was wrong in Germany. I was young then, impressionable, and I worshipped my father. It was decades later, long after he was gone, that I finally realised how distorted his version of the truth was. But I guess, deep down, some of what he told me stuck. Please accept my apology.