Fascinating update on the mystery of just where Jeffrey Epstein got all his money in this new report from the Times. The gist is that the entire fortune, the whole spectacle, may stem from (and perhaps may not go beyond) somehow brainwashing or casting a spell over a single billionaire.

Epstein appears to have taken over more or less the entirety of Leslie Wexner’s financial and professional life, even down to giving him power of attorney over him and his fortune. Here’s the document. It’s not limited but rather all-encompassing and of indefinite duration. Epstein managed Wexner’s wealth, excluded numerous friends and longtime business associates, managed his products. Over this time various properties and money, which had been Wexner’s, migrated into the possession of Epstein.

Critically, Wexner was the owner (and developer into a global brand) of Victoria’s Secret. Epstein used the ownerships of VS to attempt to make himself into a gatekeeper of some sort for young female models trying to get a break with the blockbuster brand. The new story reveals two alleged sexual assaults (the two women in question were adults) tied to Victoria’s Secret and suggests this may have been a pattern.

The story reads like something out of fiction where a young operator takes over the life of an aged billionaire widow or decrepit old plutocrat and enriches himself at their expense, fencing off relatives and business associates in the process. The mystery is that Wexner was a relatively young man (in his fifties) when most of this happened. (Wexner was 53 when he signed the power of attorney linked above.) Blackmail of some sort is an obvious suggestion. And something like that may well have figured into it. But what is described in the article seems more total and all-encompassing than something blackmail would explain.