That capsule from the pigeon

[thekumquat]

At the end of Thuggery, Patrick realises he has the capsule of drugs, presumably pretty pure cocaine, from the pigeon they found, and hands it to Peter, in exchange for his rosary being returned to him.
"Souvenir? Fair exchange is no robbery..."

What do people think would happen to it eventually?

My feeling is Peter would persuade Patrick to sell it to someone in London, as Patrick lives there most of the time and may well go to school there later, mostly because I can't conceive of any scenario where a certain P. Marlow plus an ounce of Class A substance doesn't go horribly wrong, but open to all suggestions.

Google suggests that wholesale cocaine in the early 80s was being sold for around £200 a gram, so I suspect they would be tempted to try to sell the stuff. Or would they chuck it in the river, never to be seen again until a swan started choking on it?

Comments

[nineveh_uk]

I'm going to attempt the non-catastrophic version...

Peter's worst mistakes often seem to come when he is afraid of losing face. But that isn't a risk here. Patrick gave it to him, he can't ask for it back. No-one knows he has it and can dare him about it. Peter realises he doesn't know how to sell it himself, and though he is not the world's best amateur psychologist grasps that asking Patrick to sell it is a non-started because he would start to go off on something about leading people into sin*. He gets rid of the harness, which is something he doesn't want, shoves in in an envelope in a place that won't be looked for, and goes back to school.

Because Peter does in fact have one sensible friend! Selby. Back at Dartmouth he tells Selby what has happened. Should he dump the stuff or what? Selby being both sensible and possessed of fewer hang-ups than seemingly anyone else in the novel he grasps that they are in no position to sell it, that taking it to school would be disastrous, and that they should either get rid of it, keep it for the future (should e.g. Peter end up at University in stead of in the navy), or use it themselves. So next holidays he visits or Peter visits him that is just what the do. They have some extremely entertaining evenings and use the stuff over time, or if they worry about the risk, flush it down the loo.

*What he doesn't grasp is that Patrick has deliberately shoved it to Peter because otherwise he absolutely would have taken it himself.

Nice theory

[thekumquat]

I like this. I'm not convinced Selby is quite that sensible, just more sensible than Peter...

Of course a value of sensible that involves using uncut cocaine would fit that view nicely!

Agree Patrick quite likely shoved it onto Peter to resist temptation.