The Scapegoat

According to lore, everyone has a double somewhere in the world. Daphne du Maurier, who was born in London and educated in Paris weaves this story with plenty of suspense and surprises in store.

By chance, two men - one English, the other French - meet in a provincial railway station. Their resemblance is uncanny and they spend the next few hours talking and drinking - until John, the Englishman, falls into a drunken stupour. It's to be his last carefree moment, for when he wakes, his French companion has stolen his identity. So John steps into the Frenchman's shoes and becomes the owner of a chateau, the director of a failing business and the head of a large family. Indeed, the problems concerning the family are seemingly insurmountable, and at first the protagonist stumbles through one mistake after another; nevertheless no-one suspects he is not Jean, the Frenchman other than the dog. The double then attempts to put everyone's life to some order. Just when John is finally succeeding, Jean returns to claim his life back.

Why did John even think of going to Jean's chateau? But what other options did a man in his situation have, when he was robbed of his identity and nobody would beleive that this was true... they would only think Jean was faking it or has lost his mind.

Did you know that the word - "scapegoat" has its origins in the Bible? A goat over the head of which the high priest of the ancient Jews confessed the sins of the people on the Day of Atonement, after which it was allowed to escape: Lev. 16:7-26. The scapegoat was released, in a ceremony, into the wilderness to carry away the sins of Israel away from the camp... A scapegoat is a person, group, or thing upon whom the blame for the mistakes or crimes of others is thrust.

My favourite lines from the novel :

"One had no right to play about with people's lives. One should not interfere with their emotions. A word, a look, a smile, a frown, did something to another human being waking response or aversion and a web was woven which had no beginning and no end, spreading outward and inward too, merging, entangling, so that the struggle of one depended upon the struggle of the other."

"A business is like a home : it must have a head, a core and depending upon that centre, it either thrives or falls to pieces."

"There is no end to the evil in ourselves, just as there is no end to the good. It's a matter of choice. We struggle to climb or we struggle to fall. The thing is to discover which way we are going."

"If life is no good to you now, its because you went for what was exciting, what was amusing, what was new - never for what was lasting, what endured."

"Fate has made a beautiful mistake and we are together when we might have been apart. "

Reading the scapegoat stirred a pleothora of emotions in my own heart. I found it hard to turn every page and find the next disaster waiting to happen. I was constantly asking 'R' what happens next, but found myself narrating where i left the story. I am glad, i have finished reading it. Definitely, worth reading. This was my first Daphne du Maurier novel. Last year, i had watched the movie - Rebecca, published in 1938, her most famous novel made into a movie.