Meet M. Cartwright, a man you never want to meet on the job.
By Locksmith H. Murcher (45023)

Tumbler M. Cartwright hasn’t been a member of the Order all that long, but you wouldn’t know it. In just two years, Marcus has climbed to the second rank as a Grand Lock, a feat that usually takes at least three times that. Or, as the current Chair semi-seriously put it, “I have no current plans to retire, but when I do I assume the decision will have been forcibly made for me, at the hands of Tumbler Cartwright.”

If you’ve never had occasion to utilize the services of the Preemptive Consequence Committee, their job description can be a little hard to pin down. “All kinds of Grand Lock requests are filled, every day,” Cartwright reflects between sips from a steaming cup of what he calls Earl Grey, but I saw how long he left the tea bag in there long enough and there’s no way that was anything more than tan hot water. “Sometimes I’m dealing with a boss who won’t give a member a day off, or a police officer who insists on following the law and doesn’t know the score. One time I had to deal with a librarian who was charging the daughter of a Barron for the cost of a book, even though it was just a couple of pages that fell out. That was an easy one.”

The short version is that when the Committee decides to honor a request, it’s their job to convince someone that whatever they believed before is now the wrong thing to believe. The Committee will help them arrive at this point by any means necessary. You might describe it as “thuggish behavior,” but if you do, it’s probably because you haven’t needed the Committee yet. Once you do, you’ll describe them as a godsend.

Hang on. There’s a knock at my door. Weird. It’s 2am.

On a Friday afternoon in December, I meet with Marcus Cartwright at his small apartment in Washington. He apologizes for taking a little bit too long to get to the door because he was in the midst of feeding his pet macaw, Vlad. (I never saw any evidence of this bird, but that’d be a weird thing to lie about, right?) Not yet in uniform, he wears a bright red Five for Fighting concert tee and tattered jeans. Looking down at his phone, he gives me a run-down of his agenda for the day. “A bank loan guy, a daughter’s boyfriend, and a dentist. And the council meeting. Hopefully a lunch can fit somewhere in there.” I ask him if this is a typical day for him. “The dentist threatening is kind of unusual… but yeah, that’s basically the way it goes.” Despite the fact that he’s outlining the particulars of a job that requires him to threaten and beat each of these people, his “pleased as punch” smile never leaves his face.

Marcus is here watching me type this article. He did not like the first draft. He is letting me know what will happen if he doesn’t like the final article. He is very sorry it has to be like this.

Watching him on an actual job, one can see the contradiction that is Marcus Cartwright unfold in real time. We sit in the dentist’s waiting room and he’s pure charm. His light blue uniform is formal, but in his demeanor he is nothing but casual. He loudly makes a pun about flossing, too stupid for publication, which elicits laughter from the waiting patients and, I am ashamed to admit, myself. But when the dentist he’s there to meet emerges from the back, rolling up his sleeves, the pun-loving charmer is gone. Now it’s just a maniacally smiling, incredibly imposing man who can meet you in front of the receptionist station, pick you up by your dentist scrubs, and hold you up against the wall of your practice without breaking his stride. I knew it was coming and I was still in awe.

From the perspective of one who is not on the Preemptive Consequence Committee, you might expect one of the hardest parts of the job to be convincing someone to bend to the will of the Order of the Grand Lock without ever revealing its existence to a non-member. Marcus manages to do this masterfully by weaving in the Royal “we” (“we would all be very upset if you suddenly raised your co-pay”), obtusely alluding to the power of the Faceless Order (“we don’t care if the insurance companies control the rates; the other way to solve this problem would be to have all the companies fail to recognize your license”), and to turn The Gesture into a weapon (hard to describe. A lot of poking and punching, using The Gesture’s movements.) The dentist gives in after a notably short period of time. Though the tone of the interaction might have changed abruptly, that smile was still plastered on Marcus’s face from beginning to end. Here was a guy who was loving every second of his life.

It’s hard to write with two large hands on your shoulders. Marcus says that it would be even harder to write without shoulders. I think he’s implying that he’s going to rip my arms off but I don’t ask for clarification. I decline his offer to make me tea.

On the whole, the current Chair of the P.C.C. was exceedingly more dour in attitude, but not when it came to discussing Marcus Cartwright. “I can say with confidence that I have yet to meet a member of the Committee as well-equipped for the job as Marcus. And keep in mind that I have to work with 10 other men and women on it every day, but I know that none of them would disagree. That’s how confident I am in this guy.” I started to ask her another question, but the Chair jumped back in. “Actually, no. Diane is going to be mad that I said that. But it’s better that she hears it.”

At the end of his long day, I tried to break past the jubilant exterior to what I assumed was the creamy melancholy center, but everything they teach you in journalism school to get those delicious, column-filling tears flowing had failed me. With ever attempt I made, the laughs got deeper, the “aw shucks”es got twangier, and the twinkle in his eye more hypnotic. In fact, the closest I got to an unguarded Cartwright happened when his charm was at it’s maximum level.

“Good. Good,” Marcus says. As a reward, he stops crushing one of my arms. I am glad he likes the article. I need him to like the article. Even more, I want him to like me.

While discussing his future within the Order and the P.C.C., I asked him directly: do you hope to be the new Chair one day? With this, his already wry smile somehow got wryier as he leaned back and said, “Why stop there?”

In the pregnant pause that followed, as he took a long sip of plain hot water, I shuddered to imagine an Order of the Grand Lock led by Marcus Cartwright. Not because I feared a tumultuous coup, but because I knew we would all gladly eat out of the palm of his hand like so many imaginary pet macaws. The future belongs to Marcus Cartwright. He knows this.

That is why he smiles.

I save the file. Marcus is gone. I’m not sure when he left. I’m not completely sure he was ever here. I glance around the room, then shudder.

No wait. There’s an empty mug and a bone dry teabag next to it. Yeah, he was here.