It’s possible that the thirty thousand London shareholders came to view de Bernales’ worth differently. Only one of his eight companies ever made any significant strike, none paid a dividend, and by 1939 all were ordered into liquidation. Illness alone – unless we would grossly speculate about good friends in high places – prevented de Bernales from facing criminal charges. But nothing that came to light about his dealings could sink him in the estimation of his adopted state. His obituary in the West Australian in 1963 was little short of adulatory. ‘With his death passes one of the most colourful personalities associated with this State, whose name has become a legend to a post-war generation who had not seen his tall, immaculately dressed figure, complete with gloves and spats and monocle – at race meetings or along St George’s Terrace, where he dominated any gathering . . . If history is correct – and it is reasonably so in this case – de Bernales emerged from each crisis with unruffled aplomb and with his creditors almost apologizing for any inconvenience they might have caused him.’

Reminiscing about him in the company of friends, a West Australian premier is reputed to have said, ‘I wouldn’t dare be with that man alone for half an hour for fear I’d give him the entire State.’

The bushranger turned respectable, in other words. Ned Kelly come to town. In silk socks and spats. And bringing a whiff of something European, something classical even, with him. Recalling ‘his magnificent physique, his sartorial perfection and personal charm’, Smith’s Weekly pronounced him AN ADONIS OF THE GOLDEN WEST.

Today it is still possible to see the mock Italian Baronial folly he built himself overlooking the Indian Ocean, on what would be a prime site for viewing the Americas Cup. Though now it serves as the Cottesloe Civic Centre, denuded of its gilt Italianate chairs and Louis XVI desks and incense jars from the Barbary Coast and intriguing statuary from Inca ruins in the Andes. Its library and ballroom don’t look much now either, only the jarrah panelling on the walls and the encircling romantic balustrade outside giving any clue to the earlier opulence.

Contemporary West Australian millionaires are less grandiose in their domestic ambitions. Spectacular seclusion would quickly call the bluff of their demotic pretensions and go down badly with the taxi drivers. None the less the opportunity to view ‘Perth’s famous prestigious riverfront homes’ is not one that a visitor to the city with spare time on his hands is expected to forgo. Jolly Jumbuk cruises, leaving from Barrack Street Jetty, specialize in pointing out to the avidly curious the dwellings of the avidly accumulative; and indeed many a purely recreational journey on the Swan is interrupted by the voice of the skipper telling you precisely to the dollar how much that jumble of turrets and towers to starboard has just changed hands for.