Read those first previous episodes.
In a frantic search for clues to track down Lord Lucan, the next piece of crucial information comes from the suspected killer himself.
Like Dupont de Ligonnès, whom the English press will later compare to Lucan, the fugitive decided before he disappeared to share his version of the facts with his relatives.
When he found out the contents of the two letters addressed to him, his brother-in-law, Bill Shand Kydd, immediately contacted Scotland Yard.
In addition to the bloodstains on one of the envelopes, a postmark shows they were mailed from Uckfield, about an hour and a half’s drive from the capital. Police connect to a member of Lucan’s inner circle, Ian Maxwell-Scott, who is installed there with his wife and children.
He explains that on the night of 7/8 November 1974, the date of Sandra Rivett’s assassination, he stayed in London to play at the Clermont Club. Investigators questioned his wife Susan on the way to his home in leafy Sussex. She confirms that Lord Lucan arrived at her home at around 11:30pm looking for her husband. Why didn’t she contact the police? His answer leaves her stunned: “Because I didn’t see a reason to.”
Three days have passed since the murder, giving Lucan plenty of time to organize his escape.
Susan’s version will never vary by a comma. Surprised to see him at this late hour and so far from London as he should have been in Clermont, she had greeted an excited and shaken Lucan. Then, over a few glasses of whiskey, he listened at length to that “terrible evening of misunderstandings” that resulted in the death of his children’s nanny.
She had found this story perfectly believable. After all, he wasn’t covered in blood (the outfit she describes is similar to that of Lady Lucan’s description); no sooner had she noticed a large wet spot on his trousers. She had then given him some Valium pills to calm his nerves as well as something to write about.
Lucan, after phoning his mother (brief conversation recorded by the police), had given her the letters he had taken the time to write and asked her to post them herself. He then plunged into the night at the wheel of the Ford Corsair, which he had borrowed from his friend Michael Stoop.
Did his friend Susan, a trained lawyer, help Lucan escape? | Screenshot by David O’Neill via YouTube
fool’s game
Susan Maxwell-Scott would have been the last person to speak to Lucan.
At least this is the official version.
But the police are convinced that Susan knows more than she says.
Abandoned by a debt-strangled, unloving gambling husband, this mother of six withers away in her run-down country home. She took to drowning her sorrows in alcohol. Admitted to the bar in 1957, this intelligent woman put her career on hold by marrying Ian. The conventions of the time and her husband stifled her ambitions.
The “Eton Mafia” (referring to the most elite school in the country) closes its ranks around the killer.
Her in-depth knowledge of the law and her frustration make her the accomplice of choice in the eyes of investigators. His behavior is all the more suspicious: Susan knew better than anyone that she should have warned the authorities. Furthermore, her weakness for John (whom she describes to the press as a kind and caring man) is well known to all and is corroborated by multiple witnesses.
What role does she really play in what looks like a fool’s game?
Never explain
As of November 11, the whereabouts of the fugitive are still unknown. The police on the case grow impatient with the Omerta, which appears to be being forced upon them by part of Lucan’s entourage. The “Eton Mafia” (referring to the country’s most elite school), they assure, is closing ranks around the killer. The reaction of the Flormans, heirs to Scandinavian airline SAS, illustrates the behavior they are facing.
The family lives a few hundred yards from 46 Lower Belgrave Street. Her daughter is a classmate of Frances, the eldest Lucan. It would have been impossible for them to ignore the tragedy, and yet Madeleine Florman did not see fit to warn the police about a serious incident: on the evening of November 7, someone rang the doorbell. A male voice crackled incoherently over the intercom. As she got ready to sleep, she chose to ignore the intruder.
“It’s the police problem, not mine. After all, they are trained to find out the facts.”
Madeleine Florman, member of Lord and Lady Lucan’s entourage
A few minutes later the phone rang again: this time she recognized Lucan’s very excited voice. Stunned, Madeleine Florman interrupted the conversation.
The next morning, she was fascinated by the discovery of mysterious brown stains on the steps outside her front door.
But why didn’t you report anything? Annoyed response from the person concerned: “But that’s the problem of the police, not mine. After all, they are trained to find out the facts.”
‘Wanted for murder’: Roy Ranson, the police inspector in charge of the investigation, answers questions from the press. An international arrest warrant has just been issued. | West Midland Font via Flickr (Creative Commons) | Screenshot by David O’Neill via YouTube – edited by Slate.fr
International manhunt
Examination of the stains confirms that it is blood, a mixture of groups A and B – those of Veronica and Sandra respectively. We find the same thing in the car Lucan left behind in Newhaven.
In the trunk rests a lead pipe that bears the notches of a saw, wrapped in fabric and similar to the murder weapon. The residents’ questions lead nowhere: nobody saw the driver of the abandoned Ford Corsair.
Lucan’s friends are said to have urgently organized a secret lunch after the murder.
Did he jump off a cliff? Was he hiding in the underground labyrinth of the nearby military fortress to kill himself? In order to comb through the region, a thousand police officers would have to be mobilized for a month. The army lends a hand by involving a hundred soldiers for three days. We even use a microlight to take photos with an X-ray machine, with no result. Would getting out of the car be a way to cover the tracks to save time?
On November 14, the Daily Express announces the opening of an “international counting hunt”. About thirty homes scattered across Europe, the United States and the West Indies, all belonging to the fugitive’s relatives, are under surveillance.
Investigators are convinced that someone or several people are protecting him. Christina and Bill Shand Kydd, as well as other Lucanian relatives, are extensively questioned. Everyone says they don’t know where John is hiding, but assures they would order him to surrender if he contacted them.
The press finally gets wind of an event that fuels the theory: Lucan’s friends urgently organized a secret lunch after the murder.
Nothing can stop the rumor of a pact.
For some protagonists, the consequences will prove dramatic.
Episode 5 coming soon.