Rolfe.”
“Who’s he?”
Benny Rolfe, Joe explained, was a prosperous businessman who was once a friend of Lucan’s. It was rumored that he financed Lucan’s sojourn abroad. “You must remember that if Lucan’s alive, he may have changed more radically in appearance than the mere passage of years can explain. He would have undergone perhaps extensive plastic surgery.”
“Then how would his friends recognize him?” “That’s the point. They would expect to not quite recognize him immediately; they would expect him to have undergone facial surgery. Which leaves the way wide open for a crook, posing as Lucan, making an understandably rapid visit to a friend, to pass a few general remarks, collect his money and run. Lucan could be dead while the conspiracies to elude the law continue. All I want to say, really, my dear, is that your search for the real Lucan might be fruitless.”
“Could he get away with it?”
“Enough,” said Joe, “has been written about Lucan to prompt even an amateur actor of feeble intelligence. He would be in a position to know practically every detail of the past. A fake Lucan might be entirely convincing.” “Obviously,” said Lacey, “you think Lucan’s dead.”
“I think nothing. I think nothing at all on the subject. His friends are divided fifty-fifty on the possibility that he killed himself soon after the murder. I should say fiftyfifty.”
“Would you know if you met him-“
“If he was real or fake? Yes, I think I should.
Perhaps . . .”
“Then let’s find him,” said Lacey, with so much of the enthusiasm of the novice that Joe was lost for words; he simply smiled. “Am I talking a lot of nonsense?” she said. “Yes and no. I must say that without trying, nobody gets anything, anywhere. And then, of course, the whole Lucan story is thoroughly surrealistic. The only real things about it are a girl’s battered body in a mail sack, his wife’s head wounds, her testimony that she had been attacked by him, and blood all over the place. Apart from those vital factors-and they are vital, to say the least, aren’t they?-the disappearance of Lucan partakes of the realistic-surrealistic. He was ready to disappear to avoid bankruptcy; on the other hand his friends were numerous. They seem to have been faithful in the class conscious sense. I find very little evidence that any of the friends, the aiders and abetters as they might be, cared a damn for Lucan the man.”
“Mummy found him quite amusing,” said Lacey. “But do you know, she told me that if she had that time over again-that moment when Lucan came to see her in a panic, talking about bloodshed in the basement of his home-she would simply ring the police. She wouldn’t try to cover up for him as she did. Something has happened to her conscience between then and now. Has this happened to other people who were involved at the time?”
“Oh, quite likely. We are not the same people as we were a quarter of a century ago. We are necessarily different in our ideas. In my view it is an economic phenomenon. We cannot afford to be snobs. Since Lucan’s day, snobs have been greatly emarginated. Not entirely. Benny Rolfe, who is reputed to be Lucan’s benefactor, is an old fashioned snob. Few people today would take Lucan and his pretensions seriously, as they rather tended to do in the seventies. I daresay even Benny Rolfe is tiring of Lucan, if he’s still alive.”
On the road to Caithness Joe and Lacey respectively marveled how they seemed to have “known each other all our lives.”
“You make me feel young again,” he said. She liked the sound of that. She was hardly expecting to track down the elusive, the perhaps nonexistent Earl; not really. It was the prospect of a chase that excited her, this promising and enjoyable beginning. They were on their way, now, to a house they had merely heard of, right in the far north of Scotland. It was assumed that Benny Rolfe, whose house it was, would very
“Who’s he?”
Benny Rolfe, Joe explained, was a prosperous businessman who was once a friend of Lucan’s. It was rumored that he financed Lucan’s sojourn abroad. “You must remember that if Lucan’s alive, he may have changed more radically in appearance than the mere passage of years can explain. He would have undergone perhaps extensive plastic surgery.”
“Then how would his friends recognize him?” “That’s the point. They would expect to not quite recognize him immediately; they would expect him to have undergone facial surgery. Which leaves the way wide open for a crook, posing as Lucan, making an understandably rapid visit to a friend, to pass a few general remarks, collect his money and run. Lucan could be dead while the conspiracies to elude the law continue. All I want to say, really, my dear, is that your search for the real Lucan might be fruitless.”
“Could he get away with it?”
“Enough,” said Joe, “has been written about Lucan to prompt even an amateur actor of feeble intelligence. He would be in a position to know practically every detail of the past. A fake Lucan might be entirely convincing.” “Obviously,” said Lacey, “you think Lucan’s dead.”
“I think nothing. I think nothing at all on the subject. His friends are divided fifty-fifty on the possibility that he killed himself soon after the murder. I should say fiftyfifty.”
“Would you know if you met him-“
“If he was real or fake? Yes, I think I should.
Perhaps . . .”
“Then let’s find him,” said Lacey, with so much of the enthusiasm of the novice that Joe was lost for words; he simply smiled. “Am I talking a lot of nonsense?” she said. “Yes and no. I must say that without trying, nobody gets anything, anywhere. And then, of course, the whole Lucan story is thoroughly surrealistic. The only real things about it are a girl’s battered body in a mail sack, his wife’s head wounds, her testimony that she had been attacked by him, and blood all over the place. Apart from those vital factors-and they are vital, to say the least, aren’t they?-the disappearance of Lucan partakes of the realistic-surrealistic. He was ready to disappear to avoid bankruptcy; on the other hand his friends were numerous. They seem to have been faithful in the class conscious sense. I find very little evidence that any of the friends, the aiders and abetters as they might be, cared a damn for Lucan the man.”
“Mummy found him quite amusing,” said Lacey. “But do you know, she told me that if she had that time over again-that moment when Lucan came to see her in a panic, talking about bloodshed in the basement of his home-she would simply ring the police. She wouldn’t try to cover up for him as she did. Something has happened to her conscience between then and now. Has this happened to other people who were involved at the time?”
“Oh, quite likely. We are not the same people as we were a quarter of a century ago. We are necessarily different in our ideas. In my view it is an economic phenomenon. We cannot afford to be snobs. Since Lucan’s day, snobs have been greatly emarginated. Not entirely. Benny Rolfe, who is reputed to be Lucan’s benefactor, is an old fashioned snob. Few people today would take Lucan and his pretensions seriously, as they rather tended to do in the seventies. I daresay even Benny Rolfe is tiring of Lucan, if he’s still alive.”
On the road to Caithness Joe and Lacey respectively marveled how they seemed to have “known each other all our lives.”
“You make me feel young again,” he said. She liked the sound of that. She was hardly expecting to track down the elusive, the perhaps nonexistent Earl; not really. It was the prospect of a chase that excited her, this promising and enjoyable beginning. They were on their way, now, to a house they had merely heard of, right in the far north of Scotland. It was assumed that Benny Rolfe, whose house it was, would very
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