It is supposed to be a red flag if someone upping and leaving suddenly is a 'totally out of character' thing for them to do. That has to apply to Bob. He had 81 years to demonstrate any predilection for disappearing, and never did.
You have to go back 60 years, and then all you find is a young man sent to a marine camp and never returning to his fiance. But even then, he didn't disappear. Everyone knew where he was, and he did even return to live in MO for a while.
Even his daughters, who at times have seemed to consider Bob capable of the strangest behaviour (with no good reason, that I can find) have never suggested he was the type of person to walk away from his financial and property interests. Just the opposite, in fact. They have suggested he disappeared to 'punish them', but that sounds like nonsense to me. He'd already told them to stay away from him once, so he could easily have done that again, in my opinion.
I will never believe Bob went missing voluntarily. He would have taken Fontelle and his hard-earned money with him. I only wish he had.
BBM
I absolutely agree with you; I did consider whether Bob may have left voluntarily but rejected the idea because of Bob's history and his plans for the future.
The bolded part suddenly leapt out at me and I made a weird connection. I've been reading an
excellent book by Lundy Bancroft called
Why Does He Do That? It is about abusive intimate relationships and while the focus of the book is primarily on domestic violence between male abusers and female victims (because that is the population Bancroft had been working with for 15 years when the book was written), the vast majority of it is applicable to any intimate relationship where abuse is taking place.
And... BINGO!!!!!
The author makes the point that all abusers share a common set of characteristics but which characteristics are most prominent in an individual abuser is both individual and, to a certain extent, cultural. One of the common characteristics of abusers is that it is all about the abuser, all the time. From the abuser's point of view, it doesn't matter what situation the victim is going through the really important story should be about the abuser. One of the anecdotes in his book is about a woman whose child went missing for 48 hours and her abusive husband then exploded and abused her because he said she wasn't paying enough attention to him. To her abuser. Never mind that pesky kid, she should have been paying attention to him.
Remind you of something? It sure reminds me of something.
BTW, Bancroft draws a bright line between the ordinary sort of quarrelling that almost every couple goes through and abuse by pointing out that in a non-abusive relationship, things like name calling, slamming doors, throwing objects around, yelling, etc, may occur occasionally but neither partner is frightened by those behaviours. They may well be ashamed of themselves afterwards but there was no intention to frighten and no fear on either side.
The very same behaviours in an abusive relationship are part of an ongoing pattern of fear, intimidation and control.
So sometimes a given behaviour can be abusive and sometimes it's not abusive; the way to differentiate is by the effect on the victim and on the overall pattern of the relationship. Such a useful and obvious way to differentiate between acting immaturely and acting abusively!
I haven't seen any evidence that suggests to me that Bob felt in any way intimidated or fearful of his barber. I haven't seen any proof that the money he gave her was anything other than a gift (that opinion is based on the judge's ruling in the civil court suit about that money).
We know that Bob did give his daughters a sizeable chunk of money each to get them to leave him alone after the death of his first wife, Georgia.
Same behaviour, different emotions?
