Conversation · Evrart Claire

When you meet this Titus, tell him about this. See what he has to say.

"I've talked to the boys and it turns out the hanging was a cover-up. They were helping a woman named Klaasje."

"Of course, they just blew smoke up my ass..." There's disappointment in his voice. "I guess they're not as tough as they say they are. Or there's more to this than meets the eye."

"You're disappointed."

"I'm not," he says with a widest of smiles. "But I guess you need to talk to this Klaasje person now. What a job!"

"Do you know Klaasje?"

"Oh, the chick Titus and the boys have been hanging around all winter?" He chuckles. "She has them wrapped around her finger. They're paying her rent, bringing her stuff..."

"Maybe that's connected too?" He seems excited by the possibility. "I'm not some genius judge of character. What happened here is up to you to figure out, Harry."

"You said the lynching and the strike are related. How?"

"By now I'm sure you've figured out who the dead man was working for -- the bad guys. Wild Pines. Sent to scare us. Another violent measure of the top hats against us flat caps."

"What do you mean?"

"Harry, this strike is the culmination of many many, mistakes made by the Wild Pines Group. They tried to shut the strike down by sending in armed mercenaries."

"You mean our victim?"

He nods gravely. "A security contractor. Can you imagine that? Workers standing in peaceful protest -- united in the spirit of fellowship! -- and they send hired killers to mow us down with machine gun fire."

He performs a motion, as if spraying bullets from a machine gun.

"I'm talking beasts, hardened killers from proxy wars in Yeesut, Semenine, Saramiriza -- you name it, they've done it. Raping, killing, burning villages -- killing little children for the Señorita Pineapple company, Harry..."

Those Señorita Pineapple people are scary motherfuckers, decimating your state if you don't give them your pineapples.

"Everything they did there, they brought over here. They want to turn Revachol into a Third World slum. Honestly, the only thing they didn't do, is kill the village elephant."

"Hold on, you have a village elephant?"

"No, Harry, the elephant is metaphorical and so is the village, but the mercs -- and their brutality -- are very real."

"Go on."

"Now, I haven't personally witnessed the brutalities out there. I have the luxury of staying in my container, you see -- if I need to go somewhere, they just move my container." He laughs.

"Wait, they move the container?"

"Yes! I'm an old man, Harry. My legs aren't what they used to be. They lift my office with that big crane. It's actually very fun, you should try it."

"But enough about me and my fun container." His face turns serious. "The killers the company hired... I think there were three of them. All hardened commando-types."

"One of them got downright suicidal. Getting drunk, violent, a little rapey..." He shakes his head. "Even their own negotiator couldn't control him. That's your boy, the one who likes hanging out and trees."

"By negotiator you mean Joyce?"

"Harry," he says, ignoring the lieutenant, "what you need to realize is -- we dockworkers are not pushovers."

"We got grit, Harry -- this whole neighbourhood does. Push us hard enough and we push back -- and when we do..." He raises his finger. "We push to kill."

An entire neighbourhood of... killers.

"Wait, the whole neighbourhood is in on it?"

"Potentially, Harry, potentially. We got arm wrestling champions, rowing club people, ex-coal miners -- tough guys, all ready to spring into action for their home base."

"Who exactly did the pushing?"

"There's a militant wing inside the Union. A group of people whose duties don't involve manual labour, but peacekeeping in the neighbourhood. Making sure everything runs smoothly."

That sounds a bit like organized crime.

"They're like you guys," he nods to you and the lieutenant. "Idealistic people who want to make sure bad things don't happen. And if they already have... well, punishment must follow."

Again: that sounds like organized crime.

"So these idealists killed our victim?"

"Mhmh. One day Titus Hardie -- leader of this peacekeeping faction -- comes up to me and says: 'Boss, socialist-democratic fervour drove us to take it upon ourselves to kill this beast that was burdening the land.'"

"He probably worded it differently, but that was the idea. Sure sounded to me like they killed him." He chuckles. "I gave them two weeks paid leave and told them to lay low to avoid retaliation."

"Aren't you worried we might arrest them for this?"

"Oh, I'm not at all worried about that. These are not the kind of men who get arrested. They're Martinaise boys, tough and gritty. I'd like to see the man who takes them in." He chuckles. "Besides I sent my lawyergirl to look after them."

Uncertainty belies his boasting. In the end, though, he believes it -- or at least, he wants to believe.

So he doesn't want to counter with a narrative that exonerates the Union. But why?

Despite his boastful tone, he's having doubts about something -- but what?

Maybe he doesn't believe the boys really had it in them. They're his boys after all.

"I think you're sharing information with the police, because you don't think they actually did it."

"That's very clever, Harry. Yes. They might have said it just to impress some girls or something." He rubs his chin. "But Titus has a bad temper, so the chances are 50-50."

He thinks it's closer to 60-40. 60 they didn't do it.

"Okay. Another question."

"Certainly, Harry."

If he's just boasting then it sure doesn't feel like that to you. He's not worried.

He places a lot of faith in that lawyergirl. Perhaps this is a tactical error? Anyway.

"Are you not afraid that we're going to arrest them?"

"Did they kill the hanged man?"

"What makes you think the Wild Pines negotiator can't control them?"

"How did he end up hanging from that tree?"

"Harry, what you need to realize is -- we dockworkers are not pushovers."

"Go on."

"About my fun container?" He chuckles. "It's a hoot, Harry. Who knows, maybe you'll be in here the next time they move it. It will be very fun, I promise."