§ § § -- May 6, 1995

Half an hour passed before the door abruptly flew open and Lorimer strode into the study, looking very annoyed. Roarke and Leslie looked up. "Well, Mr. Lorimer, did you find what you sought?" Roarke inquired, while Leslie stared curiously at the three small, bleeding cuts on Lorimer's scrawny neck.

"I don't quite know," Lorimer grunted, scowling. "I found Farley all right, but everybody kept saying there was no such person. It took me twenty minutes just to get close enough to Farley to even talk to him. In the meantime I was dodging little poison darts and trying to avoid the advances of someone calling herself Princess Rima…and there must've been half a dozen kids throwing rocks at me. Then Farley himself finally came out of this little hut on stilts and stopped the whole farce with a couple words, and asked me what I was doing there. So I told him, and he insisted on taking me off into the trees before he'd even talk to me." He rubbed one of the cuts and examined the blood that smeared across his fingers, grimacing. "The guy honestly thinks he's Jungle Man. Cryin' out loud, he's gone right around the bend. His lawyer wanted to declare him dead. She might be better off doing just that. Anyway, I told him I needed him to come back at least long enough to explain what happened to him. He wasn't having it."

"That, Mr. Lorimer, is because Mr. Farley's fantasy was to actually become Jungle Man," Roarke explained. "He could get no other work in Hollywood, and his life had no further meaning for him in the guise of David Farley; so he assumed the identity of his television character, giving up the identity he was born with."

Lorimer stared at him. "That's what he told me, but it's completely insane. His lawyer could easily have him certified. What kind of crazy idiot goes off into some silly fantasy world forever?"

"Mr. Farley did," said Roarke. "And when I left him, he appeared quite intelligent and sane to me. Has that changed in the years since he became Jungle Man?"

Lorimer scowled even more and eyed the ceiling before reluctantly admitting, "No, he looked like all his marbles were in the right place." He sighed loudly in exasperation. "I had to settle for his signature granting power of attorney to his lawyer. He didn't care one bit what happened to his property in Hollywood. Can you believe that?"

"Yes, indeed I can," said Roarke calmly and smiled. "So I trust that your questions in regard to Mr. Farley have been conclusively answered?"

"I suppose they have to be," Lorimer grumbled. "No point in dwelling on it though. If I can't bring Farley back, then I'll haul Pete Gilbert's butt back."

"You're likely to have just as much trouble with Mr. Gilbert as you did with Mr. Farley," Leslie observed, remembering the fantasizer in question from her first summer on the island. "And by the way, you'll have to dress appropriately before you go after him."

Lorimer turned his scowl on her. "What's that supposed to mean?"

She got to her feet and picked up several folded garments from where they lay atop Roarke's desk; he had procured them while Lorimer was hunting for David Farley. "Go on back into the room you just came out of and change into these." She handed him the clothing and waited while he poked through the items with rising bewilderment.

"You know, you two are making this a lot harder than it needs to be," Lorimer complained irritably. "All I have to do is go in, get him and come out."

Roarke chuckled. "Mr. Lorimer, you must remember: you are on Fantasy Island, and the individuals you're seeking are now living in their fantasies. Consider the meaning of that, and try to be prepared for the unexpected. After all, we deal in the unexpected every day. If you really wish to find them, then you'll simply have to play along." He gestured toward the time-travel room. "You should find that room empty now, if you prefer to change your attire therein."

Lorimer rolled his eyes and stomped into the room, slamming the door behind him. Roarke and Leslie looked at each other and grinned a bit wearily. After a few minutes their guest reappeared, red-faced as much with anger as with embarrassment. "This is ridiculous, Roarke," he snapped, fingering the ruffled lace-up velvet shirt and ballooning knickers.

"Patience, Mr. Lorimer, patience," Roarke counseled. "Now if you'll come with us, we will take you to Mr. Gilbert."

Lorimer followed them out of the house, grumbling under his breath all the way and not letting up till Roarke had stopped the station wagon in front of a covered bridge. When Lorimer saw the fog that roiled within it, he stopped muttering and slowly got out of the car, eyeing it dubiously. "What's that?"

"That is where you must go in order to locate Pete Gilbert," Roarke said. "You need only walk through it; then, simply look for the nearest tavern and you should find him."

"Tavern? You mean a bar? Cripes, Gilbert's turned into a lush, is that it? Oh, his ex is gonna be thrilled stupid. She's gonna have to dry him out before she can deal with him. I wouldn't blame her if she decided to sue you, Roarke…that's gotta be the most irresponsible thing I've ever heard of. Imagine granting a guy's fantasy to go on a lifelong drinking binge! What's it been now, fifteen years? He's probably dead of cirrhosis by now."

"Why don't you go through the bridge and get the real story?" Leslie demanded, having heard enough. Lorimer glared at her, and she gave him an overly-sweet smile and goaded him, "Or are you afraid of what you'll find?"

"Don't push me, lady," Lorimer barked and turned to Roarke. "Are you and this smart-mouthed daughter of yours gonna be here when I bring Gilbert back?"

"We will wait, yes," Roarke agreed placidly, shifting gears into park and settling more comfortably behind the wheel. "Good luck, Mr. Lorimer."

Roarke and Leslie watched while Lorimer, dressed in his frilly, fussy, old-fashioned clothing, jogged across the grass and vanished into the fog within the bridge. Then Leslie leaned forward from the middle seat of the car and asked, "Do you think I went too far?"

Roarke eyed her sidelong and then chuckled. "Actually, I suspect that Tattoo would have said very much the same thing had he been here." Leslie laughed and settled back in her seat for the wait.

This time around it took just over an hour before the fog within the bridge disgorged the bounty hunter. He approached them noticeably more slowly than he had left them; as he drew closer, Roarke and Leslie saw that his clothing was torn in a few places and he was coated head to toe with dark dust. One of the cuts he'd acquired earlier was bleeding again, and gleaming out from his dusty visage was a swelling and heavily-bruised eye.

"What happened, Mr. Lorimer?" asked Roarke with concern.

Lorimer collapsed into the front passenger seat, raising a body-length puff of the dust he wore and exuding the odor of dirt and sweat. Leslie caught Roarke's eye in the rearview mirror and they both grimaced slightly. "Got in a fight," Lorimer said, panting.

"Oh?" prompted Roarke.

"Fight, as in 'drunken brawl'?" suggested Leslie.

"No, fight, as in 'I made Pete Gilbert mad'," Lorimer corrected sourly between breaths. "He just looked at me the whole time I was explaining who I was and why I was there, gulping some foul-smelling brew out of a huge silver cup, but he didn't say a word—not even when I mentioned Faith, his ex. But then I told him Faith had hired me to bring him back, and he tossed the cup over his shoulder and hauled off and socked me."

"Without saying anything?" Leslie asked, amazed.

"Not one flippin' word," growled Lorimer, having caught enough breath to be able to expend some of it on his rising ire. "Not at least till he hit me. Then he grabbed me like some damn puppy, by the scruff of my neck, and dragged me all the way across the bar—"

"Tavern," Roarke and Leslie corrected simultaneously.

"Across the tavern," Lorimer snarled. "That's when he said, very calmly, that I could tell Faith from him that she could…" Here he paused, and his battered face took on a confused look. "He said, and I quote: 'She can find a blackguard of her own to bleed dry and hang from the rafters, and I shall remain Faithless forevermore'." He peered at Roarke. "Whatever that means. I mean, he sounded like everlastin' Shakespeare."

"Well, that would be somewhat appropriate," said Roarke. "You see, Mr. Gilbert prefers to remain a denizen of eighteenth-century England, and I have no doubt that fifteen years after retreating to that era, he has grown to sound like a native."

"You'd think he'd met Shakespeare, if he's making puns," Leslie remarked wryly.

Lorimer shifted his confused look to her. "What pun?" he said blankly. Leslie stared at him in disbelief, and he turned back to Roarke. "By the way, what's a blackguard?"

Roarke cleared his throat and again met Leslie's stare in the mirror, just for half a second. "Perhaps you should return to your bungalow and freshen up before you attempt to locate Duke McCall," he said, starting the car and propelling it forward. "And why don't you take your time, Mr. Lorimer? I will need some extra time to contact Mr. McCall."

"Is that so?" Lorimer demanded, brought out of his bewilderment by this reminder of his mission. "Don't tell me. McCall's fantasy was to become a drug lord, and he has a fortress in the mountains and ten million bodyguards all armed with AK-47s."

"No, nothing quite like that," Roarke assured him. "But he is somewhat…uh, remote, shall we say. I will call for you in approximately two hours."

Lorimer sighed loudly. "All right, all right. And while you're at it, get me a doctor so I can get this shiner looked at. Geez, why'd he have to go and do that? Eighteenth-century England, for cryin' out loud! The place stank to high heaven and all the women were half-dressed, and everybody was talking like some Shakespeare play. Couldn't understand most of what they said. What on earth could he see in that time?"

"Did you get him to sign a power of attorney?" Leslie asked curiously.

"No, and he informed me before he dropped me in the dirt that his lawyer, some guy named Mark Hendricks, has power of attorney and both Faith and I should go find him instead." Lorimer eyed Roarke with annoyance. "Why didn't you tell me that?"

"Would you have listened?" Leslie asked before Roarke could say anything.

Lorimer, caught out, snorted disgustedly and fell silent. Leslie grinned to herself and noted the amused gleam in Roarke's eye through the mirror. "I will call Dr. Ordoñez to have a look at your eye," Roarke said as though nothing had happened. "He's a fine doctor and should be able to help you. Here we are. As I said, take your time."

"Two hours, Roarke," Lorimer said. "I want to get this done, and I still have to go after Greta Gail O'Donahue." He half rolled out of the car and plodded up the steps of the bungalow; Roarke chuckled low so that only Leslie heard, and drove away.

"It's been some time since we've seen Nyah," Leslie noted on their way into the house. "I wonder what she's going to think about this whole thing."

"Very little, I'm sure," remarked Roarke amiably. "On the other hand, perhaps marriage has mellowed her a bit. Why don't you check with Mariki in regard to the noon meal while I address the problem."

Leslie nodded and went off to the kitchen; Roarke made a couple of quick phone calls, then went to stand between the open French shutters and gaze into the sky. Always before, it had been Nyah who had summoned him; but he knew how to call her when the need arose. The problem was whether she would bother to answer.