One of Twins by Ambrose Bierce - Short Story - Audiobook

Name: One of Twins by Ambrose Bierce - Short Story - Audiobook
Uploaded: 2025-06-04T02:06:11+00:00
Duration: 15 min 40 s
Channel: Quizlitbooks

Quizlitbooks

04/06/2025

🔥 ➡️ One of Twins by Ambrose Bierce - Short Story - Audiobook

One of Twins by Ambrose Bierce was first published in The San Francisco Examiner on October 28, 1888 and was included in Bierce's 1893 collection of supernatural tales Can Such Things Be?

https://quizlit.org/one-of-twins-by-ambrose-bierce

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Narrated by Jason Bennett, courtesy of librivox.org

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00:00one of twins by ambrose bierce a letter found among the papers of the late mortimer bar you ask me if in my experience as one of a pair of twins i ever observe anything unaccountable by the natural laws with which we have acquaintance

00:19as to that you shall judge perhaps we have not all acquaintance with the same natural laws you may know some that i do not and what is to me unaccountable may be very clear to you

00:31you knew my brother john that is you knew him when you knew that i was not present but neither you nor i believe any human being could distinguish between him and me if we chose to seem alike

00:45our parents could not ours is the only instance of which i have any knowledge of so close resemblance as that i speak of my brother john but i am not at all sure that his name was not henry and mine john

00:59we were regularly christened but afterwards in the very act of tattooing us with small distinguishing marks the operator lost his reckoning and although i bear upon my forearm a small h and he bore a j it is by no means certain that the letters ought not to have been transposed

01:19during our boyhood our parents tried to distinguish us more obviously by our clothing and other simple devices but we would so frequently exchange suits and otherwise circumvent the enemy that they abandoned all such ineffectual attempts

01:34and during all the years that we lived together at home everybody recognized the difficulty of the situation and made the best of it by calling us both

01:44i have often wondered at my father's forbearance in not branding us conspicuously upon our unworthy brows but as we were tolerably good boys and used our power of embarrassment and annoyance with commendable moderation we escaped the iron

02:00my father was in fact a singularly good-natured man and i think quietly enjoyed nature's practical joke soon after we had come to california and had settled at san jose where the only good fortune that awaited us was our meeting with so kind a friend as you

02:19the family as you know was broken up by the death of both my parents in the same week my father died insolvent and the homestead was sacrificed to pay his debts

02:30my sisters returned to relatives in the east but owing to your kindness john and i then twenty-two years of age obtained employment in san francisco in different quarters of the town

02:43circumstances did not permit us to live together and we saw each other infrequently sometimes not oftener than once a week as we had few acquaintances in common the fact of our extraordinary likeness was little known

02:57i come now to the matter of your inquiry one day soon after we had come to this city i was walking down market street late in the afternoon when i was accosted by a well-dressed man of middle age who after greeting me cordially said

03:12stevens i know of course that you do not go out much but i have told my wife about you and she would be glad to see you at the house i have a notion too that my girls are worth knowing suppose you come out to-morrow at six and dine with us en famille

03:29and then if the ladies can't amuse you afterward i'll stand in with a few games of billiards this was said with so bright a smile and so engaging a manner that i had not the heart to refuse and although i had never seen the man in my life i promptly replied

03:45you are very good sir and it will give me great pleasure to accept the invitation please present my compliments to mrs margovin and ask her to expect me with a shake of the hand and a pleasant parting word the man passed on

03:59that he had mistaken me for my brother was plain enough that was an error to which i was accustomed and which it was not my habit to rectify unless the matter seemed important but how had i known that this man's name was margovin

04:13it certainly is not a name that one would apply to a man at random with the probability that it would be right in point of fact the name was as strange to me as the man

04:23the next morning i hastened to where my brother was employed and met him coming out of the office with a number of bills that he was to collect i told him how i had committed him and added that if he didn't care to keep the engagement i should be delighted to continue the impersonation

04:40that's queer he said thoughtfully margovin is the only man in the office here whom i know well and like when he came in this morning and we had passed the usual greetings some singular impulse prompted me to say oh i beg your pardon mr margovin but i neglected to ask your address

04:59i got the address but what under the sun i was to do with it i did not know until now it's good of you to offer to take the consequences of your impudence but i'll eat that dinner myself if you please

05:11he ate a number of dinners at the same place more than were good for him i may add without disparaging their quality for he fell in love with miss margovin proposed marriage to her and was heartlessly accepted

05:25several weeks after i had been informed of the engagement but before it had been convenient for me to make the acquaintance of the young woman and her family i met one day on kearney street a handsome but somewhat dissipated-looking man whom something prompted me to follow and watch which i did without any scruple whatever

05:44he turned up geary street and followed it until he came to union square there he looked at his watch then entered the square he loitered about the paths for some time evidently waiting for some one

05:57presently he was joined by a fashionably dressed and beautiful young woman and the two walked away up stockton street i following

06:05i now felt the necessity of extreme caution for although the girl was a stranger it seemed to me that she would recognize me at a glance they made several turns from one street to another and finally after both had taken a hasty look all about which i narrowly evaded by stepping into a doorway

06:23they entered a house of which i do not care to state the location its location was better than its character i protest that my action in playing the spy upon these two strangers was without assignable motive

06:37it was one of which i might or might not be ashamed according to my estimate of the character of the person finding it out as an essential part of a narrative educed by your question it is related here without hesitancy or shame

06:51a week later john took me to the house of his prospective father-in-law and in miss margovin as you have already surmised but to my profound astonishment

07:01i recognized the heroine of that discreditable adventure a gloriously beautiful heroine of a discreditable adventure i must in justice admit that she was

07:13but that fact has only this importance her beauty was such a surprise to me that it cast a doubt upon her identity with the young woman i had seen before how could the marvellous fascination of her face have failed to strike me at that time

07:28but no there was no possibility of error the difference was due to costume light and general surroundings john and i passed the evening at the house enduring with the fortitude of long experience such delicate banter as our likeness naturally suggested

07:47when the young lady and i were left alone for a few minutes i looked her squarely in the face and said with sudden gravity you too miss margovin have a double i saw her last tuesday afternoon in union square

08:01she trained her great grey eyes upon me for a moment but her glance was a trifle less steady than my own and she withdrew it fixing it on the tip of her shoe

08:11was she very like me she asked with an indifference which i thought a little overdone so like said i that i greatly admired her and being unwilling to lose sight of her i confessed that i followed her until

08:25miss margovin are you sure that you understand she was now pale but entirely calm she again raised her eyes to mine with a look that did not falter what do you wish me to do she asked you need not fear to name your terms i accept them

08:42it was plain even in the brief time given me for reflection that in dealing with this girl ordinary methods would not do and ordinary exactions were needless

08:52miss margovin i said doubtless with something of the compassion in my voice that i had in my heart it is impossible not to think you the victim of some horrible compulsion rather than impose new embarrassments upon you i would prefer to aid you to regain your freedom

09:09she shook her head sadly and hopelessly and i continued with agitation your beauty unnerves me i am disarmed by your frankness and your distress

09:21if you are free to act upon conscience you will i believe do what you conceive to be best if you are not well heaven help us all you have nothing to fear from me but such opposition to this marriage as i can try to justify on on other grounds

09:38these were not my exact words but that was the sense of them as nearly as my sudden and conflicting emotions permitted me to express it i rose and left her without another look at her met the others as they re-entered the room and said as calmly as i could

09:54i have been bidding miss margovin good-evening it is later than i thought john decided to go with me in the street he asked if i had observed anything singular in julia's manner i thought her ill i replied that is why i left nothing more was said

10:13the next evening i came late to my lodgings the events of the previous evening had made me nervous and ill i had tried to cure myself and attain to clear thinking by walking in the open air

10:25but i was oppressed with the horrible presentiment of evil a presentiment which i could not formulate it was a chill foggy night my clothing and hair were damp and i shook with cold in my dressing-gown and slippers before a blazing grate of coals i was even more uncomfortable

10:43i no longer shivered but shuddered there is a difference the dread of some impending calamity was so strong and dispiriting that i tried to drive it away by inviting a real sorrow tried to dispel the conception of a terrible future by substituting the memory of a painful past

11:02i recalled the death of my parents and endeavoured to fix my mind upon the last sad scenes at their bedsides and their graves it all seemed vague and unreal as having occurred ages ago and to another person

11:16suddenly striking through my thought and parting it as a tense chord is parted by the stroke of steel i can think of no other comparison i heard a sharp cry as of one in mortal agony

11:29the voice was that of my brother and seemed to come from the street outside my window i sprang to the window and threw it open a street lamp directly opposite threw a wan and ghastly light upon the wet pavement and the fronts of the houses

11:43a single policeman with upturned collar was leaning against a gate-post quietly smoking a cigar no one else was in sight i closed the window and pulled down the shade seated myself before the fire and tried to fix my mind upon my surroundings

12:01by way of assisting by performance of some familiar act i looked at my watch it marked half-past eleven again i heard that awful cry it seemed in the room at my side

12:15i was frightened and for some moments had not the power to move a few minutes later i have no recollection of the intermediate time i found myself hurrying along an unfamiliar street as fast as i could walk

12:28i did not know where i was nor whither i was going but presently sprang up the steps of a house before which were two or three carriages and in which were moving lights and a subdued confusion of voices

12:40it was the house of mr margovin you know good friend what had occurred there in one chamber lay julia margovin hours dead by poison in another john stephens bleeding from a pistol wound in the chest inflicted by his own hand

12:57as i burst into the room pushed aside the physician's and laid my hand upon his forehead he unclosed his eyes stared blankly closed them slowly and died without a sign

13:10i knew no more until six weeks afterward when i had been nursed back to life by your own saintly wife in your own beautiful home all of that you know but what you do not know is this which however has no bearing upon the subject of your psychological researches

13:27at least not upon that branch of them in which with a delicacy and consideration all your own you have asked for less assistance than i think i have given you one moonlit night several years afterward i was passing through union square

13:42the hour was late and the square deserted certain memories of the past naturally came into my mind as i came to the spot where i had once witnessed that fateful assignation

13:53and with that unaccountable perversity which prompts us to dwell upon thoughts of the most painful character i seated myself upon one of the benches to indulge them a man entered the square and came along the walk toward me

14:06his hands were clasped behind him his head was bowed he seemed to observe nothing as he approached the shadow in which i sat i recognized him as the man whom i had seen meet julia margovin years before at that spot

14:22but he was terribly altered grey worn and haggard dissipation and vice were evident in every look illness was no less apparent

14:32his clothing was in disorder his hair fell across his forehead in a derangement which was at once uncanny and picturesque he looked fitter for restraint than liberty the restraint of a hospital

14:46with no defined purpose i rose and confronted him he raised his head and looked me full in the face i have no words to describe the ghastly change that came over his own it was a look of unspeakable terror he thought himself eye to eye with a ghost

15:03but he was a courageous man damn you john stephens he cried and lifting his trembling arm he dashed his fist feebly at my face and fell headlong upon the gravel as i walked away

15:18somebody found him there stone dead nothing more is known of him not even his name to know of a man that he is dead should be enough

15:30end of one of twins by ambrose