"Cool Luis romances the world"

 Sunday Express - Sunday 26 September 1993

"Basualdo went on to attract some of the most wealthy women in society - his choicest catch being Christina Onassis. 

They first set eyes on each other at a private dinner party, but he claims, he wasn't in the least bit flattered by her wealth. A year or two later they were an item. "She was sexually very demanding" he says. "But for a while at least he was happy". 

"Then I remembered Rubirosa's advice, "Heiresses are your future asset" he had told me. 

Then Luis and his girlfriend Lucy (when he had left his wife Clare), "together in Paris and almost penniless, they chanced to bump into a bored and decidedly overweight Christina Onassis, who immediately invited the couple to spend the summer with her on her private island of Skorpios. 

"In those days, Clare and I were madly in love and travelled everywhere together. So the idea of spending time on Christina's private island appealed to us both" But after two weeks they hated it so much that they decided to leave. "It was then Christina invited me to become her homme d'affaires, but I refused to accept unless Clare was included". 

Unfortunately Christina was at her most difficult. She had ballooned beyond belief was constantly popping pills, "Uppers, downers, sleepers, everything and anything" remembers Basualdo who was the only person capable of controlling her many mood swings. But for a purported £20,000 a month it was money well earned - especially as Clare was prepared to put up with the heiresses crazy demands even to the extent of allowing her to crawl occasionally into their king-sized bed when she felt particularly depressed. 

"But it's not true that Christina and I made love in the same bed as Clare," says Basualdo. 

He was dropped unceremoniously from Christina's payroll when Thierry Roussel appeared from the scene. When the warrant for his arrest was issued, he fled via Dublin and Amsterdam to the Argentine. But Clare it seems took him for all he was worth, Basuldo claims he loved her and was going to marry her, but in his absence he picked up a copy of the times and saw she had gotten engaged. 

Basuldo claims to be an "emotional bigamist." "In my head I have many wives. For me, being a monogamist is having too few women at the same time".