THE MAN WHO HAUNTED HIMSELF

While driving home from his London office, Harold Pelham, a director of the marine technology company Freeman, Pelham & Dawson, seems to undergo a sudden personality change and starts to drive both fast and recklessly, imagining himself in a sports car, and ending in a serious high-speed crash. On the operating table he briefly suffers clinical death, after which there briefly appear to be two heartbeats on the monitor.

After he recovers from the accident, Pelham notices odd things occurring and people acting strangely, and he gradually finds his life in turmoil. Friends, colleagues and acquaintances claim to have seen him in places where he has no memory of having been or of doing things he can't recall, involving behaving in rash ways quite out of character. When he gets home from work he finds a friend is at his house for a drink which he doesn't recall arranging, and an attractive girl at the company swimming pool casts him a knowing glance. At bedtime he and his wife have a somewhat tense but amicable discussion about their recent lack of a sex life. His wife also notices a mysterious silver car which she sees parked outside their house, but gives it no further thought. The driver of the car is then seen lighting a cigarette and snapping the match stick in half after he blows it out, exactly as Pelham does.

There seems to be a spy at work trying to force a merger with a rival company.

Soon Pelham suspects there is a "double" masquerading as him.

On a night out at the company club with his wife, he hopes to energise their relationship by indulging her request to go gambling, but he is tense and clearly not interested. As they are about to leave he bumps into the attractive girl, who sees his wife a short distance away and says "I didn't know you were married." His wife notices the exchange and is furious. Pelham finds out where the girl lives and confronts her; confused, she makes it clear that "he" was having an affair with her. He angrily denies the affair.

At work Pelham discovers that he apparently was supporting a merger that he now opposes with the board. He confronts an executive of the other company, who explains how the two of them had clandestinely arranged the deal in a series of meetings, to "his" (the double's) benefit as well as the company's, when "he" revealed a "top secret" technology breakthrough his company was about to make. When he confronts the rival firm (run by Ashton) he is reminded of three secret meetings: at the top of The Monument; in the London Planetarium; and in a boat on The Serpentine.

Distraught and unable to explain the unfolding events he consults a psychiatrist, Dr Harris, and undergoes extended treatment in his clinic. Harris explains that he doesn't believe Pelham is mad but perhaps was acting out of a subconscious desire to break out of his obsessively rigid lifestyle. Pelham agrees to be admitted to the psychiatrist's clinic for a few days' observation.

On his discharge Harris persuades Pelham to adopt some less conventional behaviour, so he goes to work dressed quite differently. However, during his time away, the double finalised the merger and took his wife out on the town, culminating in their going home and having sex together.

Pelham calls his home from the office and is astonished when the phone is answered by someone claiming to be himself. He drives home and comes face to face with his double, who insists he is the real Pelham. The family and his best friend are all there and side with the double.

After asking the others to let the two of them speak alone, the double tells the "real" Pelham that the new clothes were a mistake, and explains how on the operating table the double was "let out" but there is only room in this world for one of them. Both insist they will go to the police.

The real Pelham drives off in his car, agitated. The double immediately leaves and pursues him in the sports car. Dr Harris happens to see both men and is shocked. After a high-speed chase in the rain, the two cars race towards each other on a bridge. The real Pelham swerves off into the river, and just before he hits the water his image fades away.

The double stops and looks down into the water and then, to the sound of a double heartbeat, he briefly clutches his chest as if in extreme pain, but the spasm soon passes and he becomes calm: there is once more only one Pelham.