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Red Dead Redemption 2 (opens in new tab) isn’t short on mysteries. From the strange statues puzzle (opens in new tab) to the killer clue murder scene (opens in new tab), there are plenty of enigmas hidden in the wild West. And there’s one question players still haven’t been able to answer: where is Gavin?
Gavin, you may have guessed, is an NPC. According to his boater-wearing friend Nigel (pictured above), Gavin is a lovely English fellow who’s gone missing. Players have encountered Nigel all over the West, and as seen in this video from YouTuber Fizhy (opens in new tab), he always says the same thing: he and Gavin got separated, and now he’s nowhere to be found. He asks for your help, but Arthur automatically says he hasn’t seen Gavin and moves on. There’s seemingly no way to start up a quest to search for Gavin, but that’s only emboldened players to find him.
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The Red Dead Redemption subreddit (opens in new tab) is filled with posts written by increasingly confused players searching for Gavin. (Minor spoilers ahead) After seeing Nigel’s rattled, bedraggled state in the epilogue, some have speculated that Nigel has multiple personalities, one of which is Gavin. Others believe Gavin is actually a horse or a dog, and still others think he doesn’t exist at all, mainly because his character isn’t listed in the game’s credits.
Hungry for clues, players eventually got desperate and killed Nigel. As Gosunoobs (opens in new tab) reports, killing Nigel or knocking him out lets you loot his body and obtain the “Letter to Nigel from Tom,” in which a mystery man named Tom praises Nigel and Gavin’s apparent exploits as millionaire cowboys. Now, I’ve never met a cowboy millionaire, but I reckon they don’t look and live like Nigel, so this is almost certainly a total fabrication on his part.
The letter also notes that, curiously, Gavin never mentioned their wild success in the letters he sent home to the UK. Is it just Nigel spinning stories, then? Why would he lie on Gavin’s behalf? Is he covering for Gavin? Is Gavin involved in some plot that forced him to masquerade as a cowboy millionaire, and now Nigel’s gotten caught up in too? But then, if Nigel knows that, why is he surprised Gavin’s gone missing? Perhaps more importantly, what does Nigel stand to gain from Gavin’s alleged disappearance? We’ve been working under the assumption that Nigel is genuinely looking for Gavin, but what if it’s all an act and Nigel is in fact the reason Gavin is missing? Is that why he’s gone mad in the epilogue – he finally cracked under the guilt?
I’m not reaching, you’re reaching.
The letter says both Nigel and Gavin’s parents are happy for them, which would seem to debunk many of the wilder fan theories. At the end, the letter mentions a man named Brian Gold, who to my knowledge has yet to be found. According to Tom, Brian “said some real odd things” about Nigel, so many players believe Brian holds the key to Gavin’s location and identity. Does Brian know the truth? Is he even in the West, or is he back in the UK? At this point, I’m not even sure if Rockstar knows. This whole thing could be a wild goose chase with no solution, but try telling that to the growing mob of Red Dead detectives.
Perhaps Gavin’s story will be continued in Red Dead Online?
