No, I don't think that particular unease of Nicola's survives actually meeting Foley, just that it's where her mind goes (somewhat inchoately and without being able fully to articulate what she means) when Peter tells his story about Selby, and that's what she's reaching for with her analogy with bullying prefects in boys' school stories.
In some ways it's ironic: what Nicola's trying to suggest is a reasonably common experience, unfortunately--not necessarily of sexual abuse itself, but of a child encountering an adult about whom things seem creepy and wrong. Whereas Foley actually is something more uncommon and more sinister: he's prepared, after all, to see the children murdered in his own pursuit of self-annihilation. (To this we shall come in Chapter 7).
I don't think Foley's an attractive character tempted into treachery, though. I think he's a type of psychopathic personality: superficial charm, poor impulse control, amorality, inability to empathise, lack of remorse or conscience. Patrick, for all he can be startlingly unattractive, isn't that.
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2014-06-29 05:44 pm (UTC)In some ways it's ironic: what Nicola's trying to suggest is a reasonably common experience, unfortunately--not necessarily of sexual abuse itself, but of a child encountering an adult about whom things seem creepy and wrong. Whereas Foley actually is something more uncommon and more sinister: he's prepared, after all, to see the children murdered in his own pursuit of self-annihilation. (To this we shall come in Chapter 7).
I don't think Foley's an attractive character tempted into treachery, though. I think he's a type of psychopathic personality: superficial charm, poor impulse control, amorality, inability to empathise, lack of remorse or conscience. Patrick, for all he can be startlingly unattractive, isn't that.