In recent years the British pensioner identified as Lord Lucan has moved from house to house in Australia.
He has been looked after by members of a Buddhist community and two young Englishmen have been acting as his carers.
But when they have attended open Buddhist prayer meetings with him, they have been surprised by the sudden appearance of two mystery men.
They just sat in the corner and observed proceedings. It has never been clear who they were.
The Aussie-based OAP carries his birth certificate with him - wherever he goes and often looks at it.
The Mirror tracked him down to a house in the suburbs of Brisbane.
When approached, he became stressed and agitated and declined to see us. He told his carers to tell us: “No, I’m not Lord Lucan.”
The Mirror understands the OAP has used various names, including Derek and Adam.
At some stage he spent some time in Nepal before settling in Australia in the 1980s.
At first he lived in Fremantle, just outside of Perth in Western Australia. He then moved to the South Australian capital Adelaide. Some years ago he moved to a home near Brisbane, Queensland.
The elderly Buddhist was a regular customer at a sushi restaurant in the city.
Despite not working, he never seemed short of money.
The Mirror understands that he told one friend: “I used to live in Belgravia and knew members of the Royal Family. In particular, I knew Princess Margaret. But some bad things happened in London and I had to leave.”
Lord “Lucky” Lucan lived in Belgravia and was one of the biggest names in the British -establishment. The Clermont Club casino in Mayfair was the centre of his life.
He was one of the founder members of an exclusive group dubbed the Clermont Set.
In his book The Gamblers, John Pearson wrote: “At the heart of the Set lay a belief that risk-takers are the people who make civilisation tick. Cruel, heartless and snobbish, they gambled with their fortunes and kept a stiff upper lip when they lost.
“This and a loyalty to each other transcended everything else.”
Other Clermont Club members included SAS founder David Stirling, James Bond novelist Ian Fleming, actor Peter Sellers, cricket tycoon Kerry Packer, artist Lucian Freud and Playboy executive Victor Lownes.
But Lucan’s closest pals were Clermont owner John Aspinall and the tycoon Sir James Goldsmith.
In 1960, Lucan won £26,000 – roughly £600,000 in today’s money – in 48 hours and he decided to be a professional gambler.
But, though regarded as a world-class backgammon player, he did less well at other games and lost more than he won overall.
Lucan particularly loved hanging out with Roddy Llewellyn, who had an affair with Princess Margaret.
Ten years ago – nearly 40 years after Lucan’s disappearance – an interview by a former casino -secretary supported the theory that Lucan had escaped.
Shirley Robey, who worked for Aspinall from 1979 to 1985, recalled that in 1980 she was summoned to a meeting in his office, where he was talking to Goldsmith – who died in 1997.
She said: “They were talking about John Bingham [Lucan]. The conversations were ‘what are we going to do?’, ‘have you been in touch?’”
The arrogant behaviour of Lucan’s friends always stoked conspiracy theories. Aspinall, in particular, enjoyed taunting detectives and the media by trumpeting the Clermont Set’s reputation for ruthlessness and snobbery.
As Lord Lucan’s wife was also attacked, Aspinall told police: “If she’d been my wife, I’d have bashed her to death five years before and so would you.”
Another of Lucan’s close pals was former jockey Bill Shand Kydd.
Bill’s elder half-brother, Peter, was married for 19 years to Princess Diana’s mother Frances after she left first husband Earl Spencer.
Bill’s wife was Christina, sister of Lucan’s wife Veronica.
On the night of the murder, Lucan fled to the house of friends in Uckfield, East Sussex, where he wrote two letters to Bill, who later read them out at the inquest into Rivett’s death.
Lucan had reportedly written: “I am only concerned about the children.
“If you can manage it I would like them to live with you.”
He added he was going to ground, writing: “I will lie doggo for a while.”
The sightings
There have been numerous “sightings” of Lord Lucan over the years, in various countries.
Most notoriously, there were claims he had been tracked down to India, where he was living as a character called Jungle Barry.
But those claims were quickly dismissed when the man was identified as a Northern folk singer.
The very first reported sighting of Lucan after his disappearance was in January 1975, when he
was supposedly spotted in Melbourne, Australia.
Then later that year he was allegedly seen in the French ports of St Malo and Cherbourg.
In 1978, Barbados police were asked by Scotland Yard to investigate reports that a British resident was sending money to Lord Lucan in South America.
In South Africa, police examined fingerprints left on a beer glass
by a man alleged to be Lucan in Cape Town.
Sightings were reported as far away as Mozambique and Zimbabwe but also closer to home in Greece and Switzerland.
