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Then the Evening Standard discovered an alleged Libyan connection. Bordes, trumpeted the paper, had made frequent trips to a posh Paris hotel, where a man alleged to be Gaddafi's cousin, Ahmed Gadaff al Daim, reportedly a major in the Libyan security service, also stayed. The unconfirmed tip elevated l'affaire Bordes to a possible matter of national security. Respectable newspapers, including the Sunday Times and the Observer, began covering the story. In the House of Commons, shocked M.P.s -- or at least those fortunate enough never to have been photographed with the lady -- demanded an investigation into how she had passed a security-clearance check. Bordes, who has not spoken to the press since the scandal broke, is said to be willing to sell her story for $1.75 million, leading at least one newspaper to speculate sourly that she had invented the Libyan love affair to boost her fee.
Nevertheless, parallels with the Profumo case proliferated, fanned by the fortuitously timed release of a controversial new movie, Scandal, based on the Profumo-Keeler affair. The film has been playing to packed audiences in London movie theaters. A Thatcher aide haughtily dismissed any suggestion of resemblance, protesting, "As far as we can ascertain, there is no political dimension at all to this."
The involvement of some journalists with Bordes gave the affair a rather novel dimension. Some papers took it lightly. The Sun, owned by Rupert Murdoch, who also owns the Sunday Times, edited by Bordes' former beau Neil, polled British national editors to find out if they too had trysted with Bordes. The Sun later issued an apology to Mail on Sunday Editor Stewart Steven, who complained that by leaving him out, the Sun had impugned his manhood. Observer Editor Trelford, a married man, was less amused and bitterly accused the Sun of overblowing his friendship with Bordes to draw attention away from Neil's affair with the lady. Sunday Telegraph Editor Peregrine Worsthorne, himself free from innuendo, joyously lambasted the other "supposed classy, upmarket, quality" papers for their editors whose fondness for the "company of bimbos" desecrated the dignity of the Fourth Estate.
The second time around rarely lives up to the original. The Profumo scandal ended in a tragedy worthy of the Laclos novel Les Liaisons Dangereuses: call girl Christine Keeler landed up in jail, Profumo resigned in disgrace, and the man who introduced them, Dr. Stephen Ward, committed suicide. The Bordes story will continue to amuse or offend, but it isn't likely to topple the government -- or the Profumo affair's secure place in British lore. Compared with Profumo, the Bordes affair seemed a watered-down remake, what the Burt Reynolds movie Switching Channels was to the Cary Grant classic His Girl Friday.