Bought Men

[Samuel Moyer]

As Oedipa does start to put some of the facts together (169-170) she finds
that everything can be traced back to the dead man - Pierce.  The Stamps,
Zaph's Book Store and the shopping complex (with Tremaine's Surplus),
Yoyodyne, San Narcisco College, The Tank Theatre... not to forget Lake
Inverarity.

    Meaning what?  That Bortz, along with Metzger, Cohen,
    Driblette, Koteks, the tattoed sailor in San Francisco, the
    WASTE carriers she'd seen - that all of them were Pierce
    Inverarity's men?  Bought?  Or loyal, for free, for fun, to
    some grandiose practical joke he'd cooked up, all for her
    embarrassment, or terrorizing, or moral improvement?
    (170)



The motel she stays in is not owned by Peirce - right?  And then neither are
the Paranoids... they are her link to the play (one of the girls recalled
the play when they were at Lake Inverarity)?

You have to excuse me if I don't get it yet, but I am not sure that P.I. is
dead, and so I am buying into all the mystery here.....  so under this
scenario, I figure that it could be Pierce pulling her back into his world
in some bizzare way... but what about all the players that probably couldn't
be bought by Pierce?  Like Driblette - would he walk into the sea for P.I.?
Or Mucho and Hilarious?  How could he get a girlfriend of a Paranoids player
on a boat in the middle of Lake Inverarity to drop the line about the play?
Seems a little far fetched.

I favor the theory (currently) that all this has been there all along,
Pierce was involved, but she stumbles on it .  Why doesn't she research the
details of his death?  His reason for adding her as executrix?    She lets
that slide by with one question to Metzger I think.

More later,

Sam