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orson - try googling flare gun for 36ac, 29dn involves archaic measures

Thank you, planks. I had tried googling that name before along with various combinations of naval officer, american, US, etc but with no luck.

Olrson - we cut is W then a Hebrew measure (first letter H)

Dryden, don't give up!

1. You are right, but you're only half way to solving the unclued entry. Unfairly, perhaps, a substitution *is* required in *one* of the intersecting across clues.

2. Where a grid entry appears to have either limited or no potential for substitution, you need to keep in mind *not only* that two entries remain unchanged *but also* that the preamble doesn't say that substitutions will only occur in intersecting cells. It also doesn't say that clashes, where they do occur, must be resolved in favour of one of the two that initially appear!

3. The 'shortened' entries aren't shortened.

This is a brilliantly constructed puzzle that I thought at first was unsolvable. The only way I got there was to write out all the (apparently) possible clashing *and* non-clashing possibilities and stare at them for a very long time.

The required pairs do indeed read non-consecutively, but my breakthrough came from studying the downs first; I've given all the other thematic hints I can, short of spelling everything out, in my earlier posts.

Good luck!

Ionacarr - can you confirm whether the unclued entry is in fact pairs of letters?

Unclued: it is and it isn't!

Presumably the longer one "hides" the shorter one.

Just as I was about to give up the pairs of letters and unclued entry suddenly made sense. Somebody referred to a novel earlier in the thread? I have no idea what novel that might be.

Planks, I'm not sure, but I think they might have been referring to the twins, Cora and Clarice, from Gormenghast.

ionacarr, thanks for your help and encouragement. I shall press on, but the prospect of staring for ages at potential letter pairs doesn't exactly thrill me.

unclued, you have the right answer to 7d. HE needs the answer (read as two entities) to make 'that lady'.

orson, the old word for know is sometimes used whimsically today - 'I ___ not' for 'I don't know'.
For 29d, if you have Chambers CD Rome version enter Hebrew in the all-text search, then scan for a word that is equivalent to 8 or 12 logs. If you don't have that, then consult Bradford's list of measures (3 letters).