(urth) "Goodbye Old Buddy" -- Pirate Freedom murder mystery, take two

Dave Tallman davetallman at msn.com
Mon Dec 1 08:23:28 PST 2008


I previously posted a theory that Chris/Ignacio had killed Valentin and set
Captain Burt up for betrayal by Lesage. I now think that idea was mistaken.

Chris says confessions that don't confess are useless (p. 281). He spends
time justifying why he will break his vow of chastity (p. 321). If he was
planning all of these other horrible crimes, wouldn't he leave
justifications for these also? It's also improbable that he would set
Captain Burt up for betrayal in a way that could get Novia killed or raped.
There are alternatives if other time travelers are involved. In particular,
Captain Burt and Lesage could be time-travelers.

Start with the man who received this confessional manuscript, or a criminal
associate of his who got hold of it. Couldn't that man see a golden
opportunity to become a rich pirate himself? From what Chris said about the
wristwatches (p. 20) it looks like the whole monastery went back in time a
year or more before Chris left. The man who would become Lesage could have
hitched a ride and gotten out to establish himself before Chris did. He
would have all the advance knowledge he needed to carry out the killing of
Valentin and the betrayal of Captain Burt. In this case, Valentin's master
was not the same man. The bogus Lesage killed Valentin, and put out a large
reward he knew he would never have to pay, in order to misappropriate this
background story for himself.

Taking the theory a step further, it's possible that "Captain Burt" was a
young criminal associate of Lesage taken back in time to play that role.
There are a few hints:

   1. Captain Burt is marked as a time traveler by his anachronistic use of
   the racial slur "Dago" (p. 39), which wasn't used until the 1800's (the age
   of pirates was circa 1650). He also translates a ship's name ("Saint
   Charity" p. 39) which a real man of the sea would never do (p. 232).
   2. He hints that he gets the Jersey/New Jersey joke (pp. 39, 138).
   3. Burt is taller than the average person of the time, though shorter
   than Chris ("...the deck beams just cleared his head. I had to crouch in
   that cabin, just like I crouched in our cabin on *Sabina*" p. 279).
   4. "The *Weald* was the first to put out. At the time, I thought nothing
   of it." (p. 287). Why would Chris ever think something of it? He may have
   had suspicions that Burt had a secret rendezvous with Lesage. Lesage
   probably kept his knowledge secret from his accomplice, and only told him
   what he needed to know just before it was necessary. He certainly didn't
   tell him about the betrayal.
   5. From the narrative, the time-travelers might have expected that
   near-death in the past would send them back as adults to the time of their
   own birth. Chris came back when he nearly died in the hurricane. This may be
   the source of Burt's confidence at the end (p. 304).
   6. If Burt did come back to his own time and survived (a modern ER might
   have saved him (p. 303)), there's one more thing he might do. He might have
   a son genetically engineered, and name him Chris. Burt may be the mysterious
   father who trained his son in criminal survival techniques and then left in
   him the monastery to go back in time. Memories of the attack on Portobello
   made Chris dream of his father (p. 235). Could he have recognized Burt as a
   young version of his father on a subconscious level?

The time paradoxes in all this boggle the mind. But this seems far more
satisfying than the original "evil scheming Chris" theory.
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