The Dictator's Double

Fictional account based on the life of Petar Shapollo, Enver Hoxha's double.

Part 1.

I am not a man, I am another man's shadow.

The officers do not talk to me till we are out of the city. They relax and smoke cigarettes but do not turn round, they have been told not to. You were good today Petar, they say, we will tell them you were good. It a small thing that means nothing, it is the pat on the head you give a child.

Angeliki brings something French again, braised chicken under a rich sauce with onions almost raw. You must eat Petar, they say, you must eat. Then bring me something I can eat, I say, but they never do. Always something French, something Italian, a man cannot get fat on this.

My wife cooks giblets and macaroni, fried goats cheese and yoghurt, she waits for me at our home in the mountains. My daughters attend the school, how old now? the oldest a young woman almost, perhaps she is married already, or would they wait? Every night as she puts them to bed their mother tells them of their father, she tells all the old stories, about how we met, how we drove to the sea, how we struggled in the early days before the business took off. She reminds them so they do not forget. Who would wait? A daughter cannot wait the way a wife can wait, a daughter must live her life. If I have a wife I am a man. If I have daughters I am a man. I am a man. I am Petar.

They weigh me again, they weigh me every week. There has been nothing this week but they weigh me anyway and I know another week has gone. I have a calendar I forget to mark, months pass and I do not turn the pages. You must eat Petar. The days drift by. I am a ghost. I am a shadow.

I am him. The barber cuts my hair with his photo as a reference. The tailor cuts my clothes to his measurements. I eat what he eats. I read what he reads.

The engagement is another factory opening in the capital, I watch the road signs from the back seat of the car and guess before we get there. The officer holds out a cigarette, do not speak, he says, you have a cold.

I do not have a cold.

You have a cold but do not sneeze, it is nothing this cold, it does not affect you, but do not speak.

I smile to show I have understood and take the cigarette. It is miles to go. Perhaps the cold is why I am here today, filling in for a man sick in bed. Perhaps there is no danger of assassination this time. I remember all the same.

My wife used to laugh about it. There you are Petar, on the television, there you are. Petar and his wife laughing in their home. One night I put on a beret and turned up at the barracks, the other men watching from behind the trees. It is a surprise inspection, I shouted, and had the commander lead me past his sleepy troops. We ran all the way back laughing and drinking. Perhaps that is how they found out. It does not matter. I remember the laughter of my wife better than when the officers came. After a while you forget all the bad times and remember only the good.

I give the minor officials a hard look. I give the more important officials a smile. The minor officials do not know to be frightened of a smile. Sometimes I am told who to frighten but today I am free to choose. There is a ceremony that blurs into warm words and handshakes and is over in seconds. I wonder who knows I am just a shadow. Perhaps none of them.

You were good Petar, we will tell them you were good.

That night Angeliki brings me coffee and fried eggs with cheese. She will not talk even if I ask her questions, she fusses nervously and lights my cigarette. She is like half a wife. Is she supposed to provide the other half? They assume I will take it if I want it. From my window I see her smoke and talk to the guards. Would she fight? Would it matter? I have a wife, I remind myself, who waits for me at my home. Angeliki brings me a glass of Raki in the evening, she offers nothing, it is assumed I will take it. I am a man, I may.

You must read this, they say. They will test me later. They used to beat me, early on, now they just threaten and look disappointed when I do not come up to standard. It is French again. I pull the dictionary from the shelf, I am too old to learn it properly. It is my greatest failure, my poor French. It is the one area where I do not satisfy.

I met him only once, after the surgery. He came to investigate the results. I had to stand next to him facing the mirror though I could barely stand. All those surgeons. My reflection caught me by surprise. If The West invades I will be sacrificed, if Russia invades I will be sacrificed, if there is an assassination, I will be sacrificed.

Remember this. Do not struggle, do not scream, do not cry out if possible. If you can walk, walk. If not, lay still. Above all look hopeful. Look as if you will survive.

For even if I do not, he will. Shadows can be shot, but shadows cannot be killed.

Part 2.

Two of the officers took the man away in the car. Angeliki cried, she assumed they were going to shoot him.

At the outskirts of town they let him out. They stopped and one of them opened the door. The man looked confused.

Is this it? he asked.

He is dead, said the officer. You are free to go.

The man did not move for a moment, and then dashed out of the car and backed away from the officer. Are you telling me the truth, he demanded.

The officer nodded. It is best if you go, he said, disappear.

My family, said the man.

The officer looked down. They are dead, he said, they were killed when you were first taken, just like the surgeons.

Dead? Said the man.

Dead, answered the officer.

Are there graves? The officer shrugged. He did not know.

I have nothing, said the man. The officer gave him some money, and offered him a cigarette which the man took. The officer climbed back in the car and held the lighter out of the window. When the man had lit his cigarette the officers turned the car around and drove away.

The man sat, for a while, by the side of the road, he smoked the cigarette and counted the money. Then he walked towards town.

He saw nobody for a time, a cart passed in the other direction but he kept his head down. After two miles he saw a child, a boy who ran away. Ten minutes later he saw three boys staring at him from behind a wall, they ran when he looked at them. He passed an old woman. The old woman saw him and gasped. More boys followed him at a distance, or perhaps the same ones again but there were more now. They fled whenever he turned. As he approached the outskirts of the town he passed a group of men sitting on a bench by the road. They watched him approach but as he got near they left. He walked past houses in empty streets. He was watched from behind wooden shutters, from the gaps of barely open doors.

As he walked further into town the buildings grew denser, there were more people to empty off the streets as he approached, more watched from the safety of their houses, more whispered as he passed. He was tired and thirsty, he was not used to walking, he wanted a drink and a smoke, but the kiosks and bars shut as he got to them. He hung his head and hunched his shoulders but it was too late, word was being passed ahead of him. Small crowds hung around corners and dogged his steps. There were more faces behind the windows, more footfalls out of sight.

A woman walked out with a small child and screamed. A man he could not see argued loudly, it is not him. A car squealed to a stop and the occupants ducked down and hid. A woman's voice screamed, it is a ghost. A boy threw a stone.

It struck him in the shoulder, not hard, but a surprise. The boy, perhaps twelve years old, said nothing and ran back behind a house. He turned away and another stone skidded across the road in front of him, he looked and another struck him on the ear, he put his hand up to feel for blood and two more landed about him. He saw a crowd of boys now, stepping up emboldened. He wanted to say something but had nothing to say, he wanted to say: I am not him, but he could not. The boys shouted as they threw, he ran, ghost, stay away ghost.

He staggered round a corner and bent double wheezing, his breath rasped in his chest, fighting to take in air between coughs. More boys came, men followed. A woman spat in his face. He tried to run again but barely managed fifty yards. The crowd kept up with him easily, they curled around and cut him off and cornered him against the wall. He put his arms around his head to protect against the stones, he ducked and flinched as they hit.

Go away ghost. It was a woman who struck him first with her fist. Then men. He fell under the blows and curled into a ball squeezing his eyes tight shut. I am not a man, he whispered to himself, I am a shadow. A shadow cannot be killed. He felt his blood between his fingers. He felt his clothes being torn from him. He felt himself pass out before it ended.

He woke, bruised and in pain, underneath a dirty blanket on the floor of a police cell. A policeman was sitting eating an apple and watching him.

You are not him, said the policeman. He is dead. You are a ghost.

I am a shadow.

It is the same thing.

He asked for water, and winced as he brought his hand up to his face. The policeman brought water and bread and cheese.

It would be better if you were a ghost, said the policeman. I will give you clothes and drive you out of town. That is all I will do. He gestured to the washbasin and gave the man a towel.

Where can I go?

Go east, to the mountains, there are gulags there where men have never seen a television. Perhaps you will be safe.

The man shivered.

Part 3.

They should evacuate us. They should have the marines and helicopters called in and get us out. This is lunacy.

It's the ambassador who wants to stay, he has two calls daily to Washington, one when they should be asleep and one when we should. They offered to evacuate us, Merkel told me, but the Ambassador refused.

The TV station is dead today, the rumour is that crowds stormed the station and killed the newsreaders. It doesn't make much difference they never told you anything useful anyway. We can still pick up the Italian channels but not many of us speak Italian. They have a journalist out there somewhere the poor bastard, if he's smart he'll have gone to his own embassy.

The embassy is like a fort. Nobody's goes in or out and marines guard the walls day and night. I asked a captain if they were going to pull us out. He said they had a ship ready and he didn't know why they hadn't already. I said we were not really in that much danger yet.

He said, the hell we're not.

Update on the regime this morning. There is no regime. Crowds stormed the palace last night and the guards just walked away. A Lieutenant said there are already some outside our gate and they were keeping tabs on the numbers.

What do they want, asked somebody.

What do you think they want, they want to go to America.

We go outside after the meeting taking our coffee and donuts with us. The crowd stand outside the gate, the soldiers stand inside, both watch the other and neither move.

By lunchtime they are twice as many. They haven't eaten, says the captain.

Will they try to get in?

Sooner or later.

Will they succeed.

Depends, he says. Depends if they're willing to die trying.

I go back inside and tell Merkel this. He will tell the Ambassador but says it will do no good. Our staying here is a point of pride now.

Ambassador to what? Somebody screams from behind the door. There's no damn country left.

I have no work to do and go back and watch the crowd. They have grown already, just in those few minutes. I catch a glimpse of him but I am not sure.

Did you see that? I ask the Captain.

See what?

I look again. Nothing, I say.

We watch the crowd gather. Few if any of them speak English and we do not understand what they are saying, but it is obvious what they want, they want in. At three the first tries to scale the gate, the marines scare him away just by stepping forward. Another tries it ten minutes later and the marines have to knock him off with the butts of their rifles. Twenty minutes later five try it at once and the marines fire warning shorts over their heads. They run and the crowd seems to disperse for a moment but are soon back. Around four thirty more try it, they do not run when the marines fire and in seconds the whole crowd surges forward and climbs the gate, clambering on top of one another, pulling those ahead of them back down in their rush to get over.

The marines fall back, civilians are supposed to go inside but we remain by the door so we can watch.

And then something happens in the crowd, the marines were on the point of opening fire but suddenly a commotion passes through the crowd that none of us understand. The crowd seems to forget about the embassy and turns in on itself. Then I see him, I see him with my own two eyes but I do not believe it. The crowd lash out at him, they beat him, I've never seen anything like it, they are not like people, they are like children, they are like hyenas in a television documentary.

The marines open fire. We cower ourselves even though they are firing away from us, and put our hands to our ears. They kill one man and wound another, the rest flee. I look up and see the man again, running away.

I run after him. I do not know why. Curiosity perhaps. But I do it. The captain follows me with his unit, he does not shout for me to come back, he saw what I saw.

We follow the man to an alleyway, he is not fast, and cannot run for long. When we turn the corner he is holding a knife to his own face.

The captain shouts for him to stop and he shouts something back none of us understand, and then, in one movement, he gouges out his eye.

The captain tries to give him first aid, they get a bandage over the wound. I can watch that but what I cannot look at is the eye laying there on the ground. I stand like a spare part, knowing it is right there, but not looking at it, looking at anything else but the eye.

Suddenly he stops screaming and looks up at us. Turns out he can speak English, take me to America, he says. We shake out heads. He looks sad but not surprised. Perhaps I will be safe now anyway.

He stands up and pulls away from the soldiers trying to help him and walks away. The captain grabs me by the shoulder. Come on, he says, we need to get back home.