Hello Forteans. I am new. I joined this site because I have some books by David Paulides on missing people that I want to take to the used book store - and I thought I would drop by here first to record my thoughts. But that's another thread. I read through this long thread and could not resist adding my two cents.
1. Damien, is it possible your friend Frank avoided - narrowly avoided? - an assault, or robbery, at the hands of a duo of urban criminals. Nicola lures him up to an isolated spot where they planned on robbing him, but somehow something went wrong - the vibes were off - and they fled the scene instead.
After seeing all the photos that Simon B posted I could not help but think "Girl, what are you doing? Get yourself out of there. Don't go wandering off into the woods with a strange man". It would not be hard for her to say "Oh,my dog - gotta run - see ya". And I think Frank suggested something along those lines when he says
I suddenly became very uneasy in her company.
She was gorgeous, I thought, and must have been chatted-up so many times before; surely she must have been aware of the dangers of going off with strangers… and yet here she was, alone, with a stranger (me) in a dark (even though it was day), secluded spot.
Then when they are at a pre-arranged spot Nicola is suddenly enraged - as a distraction - and then Leather Boy is there. The fact that she appears differently, older, can be attributed to his shock and disorientation and adrenaline.
But then somehow it falls apart and they depart without Frank quite seeing how. And nothing happens.
If i am at the scene of an accident and I meet up with you later and I say "I saw some awful scenes at this accident today", then you believe me and listen uncritically. If I say "I went to a performance of a stage magician, and he induced a young woman into a wooden box and sawed her in half. I saw it. It really happened. He split the box in half and showed us", then you understand that I have been under the influence of some deliberate deception. Deception that involved some skillful direction of my attention towards and away from the rapid activites and just the right times. So by virtue of your sophistication you can re-interpret my account without necessarily contradicting it.
So then I come to FT forum and say, 'yes this really happened. I saw it. I don't understand it but it really happened to me'. And that is true and not true at the same time. I absolutely did see what happened on that stage. But from another perspective I know that something else probably really happened. It just depends on how we interpret things.