AEG clones...send them in

James Wynn · 14 Dec 2008, 17:44 · from 2008-December.txt.gz

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From: crushtv at gmail.com (James Wynn)
Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2008 11:44:27 -0600
Subject: (urth) AEG clones...send them in
References: <000901c95d65$1a9ac340$3dcf4a0c@rclackey><28BF0500BD5348C8B8159A932165B8FB@GATEWAY>
	<005701c95dd1$a39a0d60$8fd24a0c@rclackey>
Message-ID: <3910D3B029F54B689BEA13A5DCD28E0D@GATEWAY>

>The waitress at Rusterman's who looked like Alexis Cabana asked Cassie if
>she was really there to meet Mr. Rosenquist, and said that he was a friend
>of Mr. Rusterman.[...]Cousin indeed. We know that Rusterman is really Reis.
>Also at Rusterman's, Reis said:
>"You were wearing green the first time I saw you."
>"In the play? I wasn't. That was brown."
>"So it was. I was thinking of the party. I took you home, remember?"
>Cassie nodded. "Thank you. You saw _The Red Spot_, though. The final
>performance."
>"I didn't. I know I said I did, but that was . . ."
>"Diplomacy?"
>"Yes, exactly. India had given me tickets, and I didn't want to admit I
> hadn't used them."(119)
>
>Diplomacy? Cassie had seen him in the audience (53), and at the
>cast party he said he had been there. (66) So was he lying then
>or now? So who did she see in the audience?

Well, well, well, Roy. Now we are getting someplace. Welcome. We've been 
expecting you. (bwahahaha)
You see, after Norma's murder, she reflects on the cops query about who 
would want to killer her:

"She had said, 'Nobody! Nobody at all,' but now, as she prepared for bed, 
she wondered whether that answer had been the right one. Bill Ries was a 
murderer and Wally Rosenquist was Bill Reis. But her? Did you give diamond 
bracelets to women you meant to murder." (181)

This is a motif of Wolfe's that occurs from with regularity: The protagonist 
knows that someone is ostensibly operating merely under another alias but 
behaves as if it makes the him a different person. Or the protagonist 
recognizes two separate personalities as the same in some bizarre way for 
bizarre reasons. If Wally and Bill are truely the same person, then Cassie's 
mental wrangling is irrational. Crazy.

But what if Cassie is on to something without realizing it? What if the guy 
who gave Cassie the gold bracelet and the guy who gave her the diamond one 
are *not* the same person. What if the guy who took the deadly gold bracelet 
back were not the guy who gave it to her? What if Wally R. is *not* the 
fellow that the President called one of the most evil men in the world? What 
if the Rusterman cousin is *not* the same person as Rosenquist or Reis? That 
clarifies a lot. Well, actually, it doesn't. But it opens the possibility of 
clarifying a lot. Okay. You've convinced me. We have ourselves a clone story 
here.

J.

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