A Loyal Friend Helps Lord Lucan

Some car headlights woke me up. My skull jerking back into the head-rest, and then that sudden awful realisation as it dawned on me afresh just exactly what had happened. That same feeling you experience after a bad night at the tables, as you wake up and it slowly trickles through that you’ve lost a year’s wages on the single turn of a card.

Only this time, it was far worse. This was way more than just the ignominy of bankruptcy. That had occurred to any number of peers over the years. No - this was of a different category altogether. This was scandal on a grand scale.

At least the nap, however fitful, had helped sort out my potential courses of action. I could never escape by myself; I certainly, at that stage, didn’t want to give myself up to the police; and therefore, by ineluctable logic, I was left with but the one option. I would throw myself on a friend’s mercy and beg for his help.

But who to call?

I had, perhaps, a dozen friends who might have been prepared to help out. But I did what I had often done before in times of crisis. I called up John Aspinall.

There are several dramatis personae that crop up in my story, some with bit parts and some who were players. But of all these characters, it was John who was the stalwart. He did what he could, while still attempting to stay true to his lights as his gentlemen.

Of all my friends, it was only Aspinall - universally known to his friends as 'Aspers' - who had the deviousness, not to mention the thirst for adventure, to carry it off. More importantly, I knew he could keep a secret. Over the previous decade, I’d lost thousands to him at cards and backgammon, yet he’d never told a soul.

Eventually I found a phonebox in the middle of a Sussex village. I knew his number by heart. 

He picked up on the third ring. 'Yes?' It was not a kindly tone of voice - but then Aspers was not a kindly man. In fact, that one word greeting entirely summed up the man’s healthy scepticism for every man and every woman who crossed his path. Please don’t misunderstand me. Aspers would move mountains for his friends. But for the great unwashed general public, his attitude was always one of indifference bordering on contempt.

I pumped coins into the phone as the pips went.

'Aspers - it’s Lucky here. I’m - I’m -' I paused, not knowing how to continue. 'Aspers, I’ve done a terrible thing. An awful thing, and -' I trailed off.

'And you’d like me to help?'

'I - I need time to think,' I said. 'I might want to turn myself into the police later. I probably will turn myself into the police. But I just need time to sort things out in my head. I need to weigh up my options.'

'Right,' he said, all business-like. 'Where are you?'

'Somewhere near Uckfield. I’m parked up in a layby.'

'Does anybody know where you are?'

'I’ve been with Susan, Susan Maxwell-Scott, for a couple of hours.' I wondered for a moment what Susan was doing at that moment. 'She’s a lawyer, so she’s not going to lie to the police.'

'True. But Susan won’t necessarily tell them right away either. Let me think.' He started to click his tongue against the roof of his mouth. It was a familiar sound that I had heard many times at the gaming tables, as John had weighed up the odds of a finesse or a squeeze in a re-doubled grand slam.

The pips went again. I pushed in a few more coppers.

At length he spoke: 'Here’s a plan then. Why don’t you drop the car off in Newhaven. I’ll pick you up. Then you can lie low with me. How does that sound?'

I was lost for words. 'That - that would be perfect. Thank you Aspers. Thank you.'

'By the way, what is it?'

'I’m sorry?'

'What have you done, Johnny? What am I getting myself into? Is it murder?'

'I - I very much fear it is.'

Aspers grunted to himself. 'Be over as quick as I can. See you in about an hour by, let’s say, St Michael’s Church, that Medieval church on Newhaven’s hill overlooking the Ouse.'

'Thank you.' I was about to hang up, when a quite tangential thought entered my head. It was to be strangely prescient. 'Oh, one more thing Aspers, dear Aspers. Don’t tell a soul. Don’t tell a single person otherwise I’m undone.'

'I won’t.'

'Especially don’t tell Jimmy.'

'I won’t.'

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