Mr. Bean, who is an invention of the comic Rowan Atkinson, had the measure of Mohammed Al Fayed. When they met at Harrods, Al Fayed, who was as hungry for celebrity endorsement as he was for young women, stuck his hand out in greeting. Mr. Bean also stuck his hand out: then he put his finger to his nose and waggled it, as children do to show contempt. Sometimes popular culture – and children of popular culture – can tell the truth. Sometimes only they will.
The emerging Al Fayed scandal has an awful familiarity: as soon as you hear it, you know it is true. My response is less grief than ennui, and, as ever, a sense of the wreckage of women’s common dreams: being treated as worthless can ruin you. At least twenty women, one as young as fifteen, say Al Fayed attacked them at locations including Harrods, the ghastly Knightsbridge emporium he owned until 2010. It’s said that Harrods will sell you anything, and he seems to have taken that principle to heart. It is likely he will join the growing gallery of the famous and unpunished twentieth century predator: the CPS declined to charge Al Fayed, who died last year. How many more are still to come?
