As I delve deeper into the labyrinth of "Bacchanal," I find myself resonating with Aggie Wiggs in reverse. Despite the incontrovertible evidence pointing towards Nile's involvement in Madison's disappearance, my conviction remains unshaken that he's not the culprit. After all the twists and turns, a straightforward explanation would be too pat, too simplistic, given the mess that has unfolded, far messier than we ever imagined. The notion that Nile is capable of evading justice is chilling, but we witness him do so by the end of this episode. Benitez's fight against Jarvis Yards emanates from the injustice of that endless impunity. But what if Nile is merely covering for someone? The most revealing revelation in this episode is that Nile owes the Ingrams a favor. The success or failure of Jarvis Yards matters to a network of people who have ample reasons to discredit Nile. For five episodes, Nile has been musing about everyone having a price, including himself.
Aggie needs to regain her focus to piece this all together. It's a futile endeavor if she's buddying up with her subject over a poorly aged Scotch. You're supposed to be inscrutable, woman! "Bacchanal" finds Aggie and Nile imbibing at her abode. Ever the observer, Nile notes that Aggie had stated she didn't drink. She demurs, citing a rough day. When she inquires about his bloodied hands from beating Abbott to death, he concocts a tale of being jumped outside his office. They briefly discuss Madison's parents, but Nile's true interest lies in Abbott, who he notes had a history of getting suspended from the Bureau for substance abuse. Nile senses Aggie's disappointment that the collected evidence suggests his innocence. This insight bolsters his confidence in his position with Aggie, prompting him to play "Psycho Killer" by the Talking Heads on the record player. His confidence swells when Aggie laughs at his suggestion that she'll persuade the world of his innocence. He tries to elicit information about what went wrong in her marriage, even pointing out she still wears her wedding band as a necklace, but Aggie tells him only that she and Shelley "grew apart." Confused by the concept of homosexuality, he wonders aloud if there's no part of Aggie that wants to have sex with him. Who wouldn't, given his charm? Isn't she just fascinated by him? Aggie, in her boozy state, finds this amusing rather than disturbing.
Meanwhile, Nina is at home wondering where her husband is. She texts and calls, but Nile isn't looking at his phone—he's scouring Cooper's room. Aggie follows him upstairs to tell him Nina is calling, only to find him there. At first, she asks him to come out, but when he invites her to sit with him, she agrees. They delve into Aggie's dad, who was arrested when she was just 12. We know he was supposed to be some kind of bad element—"a con man and a fraud," according to Aggie—but we still don't know the specifics of his crimes or their frequency. Aggie tells Nile that she wanted Cooper to have stability, which is why she bought the house when she came into money from her best seller and a three-book deal, the most she ever had. In the aftermath of Cooper's death, she is left with all the costs of the house and none of its payoffs. Aggie, struggling to stay afloat, is an outsider in Oyster Bay—a place where the über-rich go to lay low, where they know they'll blend in the landscape. That's why the Jarvises moved there, so Nile and Nina could be married in peace. Not that it's going all that peacefully. When Nile gets home at five in the morning after not answering her texts or calls, Nina is understandably pissed. He hasn't yet learned how to treat her like a wife, rather than a secret girlfriend, as it was after Madison's disappearance. She tells him that they moved to Long Island solely because Martin "made them." This is the first hint in this episode that Nile isn't as free as he would have everyone believe. His protests that his father can't tell him what to do have all the force and plausibility of a teenager's. He retorts that Nina misses "being the side piece to a dead woman." She slaps him, but he likes it, so she slaps him several more times and they have sex—a classic move on television: a domineering man likes to be dominated in the bedroom.
As the narrative unfolds, Nina catches a glimpse of a formidable, raw bruise on Nile's side. Before she can delve deeper, he vanishes into the horizon for a "big day" in the city. She turns to Rick, seeking answers, but he remains as impenetrable as ever. In a bid to elicit a response, she appeals to his sense of familial bonds, hinting at the injustice of his existence as a mere garage dweller within the family fold. However, we know that Rick's composure is unshakable, save for the possibility of something amiss with the dogs.
Nina reveals to Rick about Nile's bruise, confident it did not stem from Aggie, who was too inebriated to even fend off Nile if her life depended on it. As Aggie wakes up in Cooper's room, where Nile had tenderly tucked her in, she immediately suffers from a queasy upchuck. She scours the living room, gathering debris and discarding her pack of cigarettes (respectfully, Aggie; smoking is the least of your concerns right now).
Rick, on the other hand, was not with Nile the previous night. Instead, he was with Martin, counting cash and concocting a scheme to navigate the housing subcommittee vote. Rick did voice his concerns about Nile's recklessness to his father, but Martin was unfazed. As soon as Jarvis Yards is passed, Martin disowns Nile's "kamikaze bullshit" forever.
The plan to sway the vote involves that cash and Rick's appearance at a dimly lit alleyway in a rainy night. He introduces a kid named Johnny to Officer Eddie from the NYPD. He hands them their share of a $30,000 lump sum to be split six ways and gives Johnny a "Right to Home" T-shirt. The next day, as protesters gather at the Jarvis Yards site to hear Benitez speak and prepare for a rally, Johnny is there in his new tee. He spots Eddie across the crowd and, as Benitez speaks, he yells at him that he is a fascist pig. Eddie pushes him back, chaos ensues, and the press labels it a "riot." Martin watches the news from home with satisfaction, as Benitez watches helplessly from afar.
Nile spends the day fixing his own situation, to his father's probable disappointment. He leaves Abbott's corpse in the trunk of Abbott's own car in the parking lot of one of MHJ's properties. The first thing Nile does is remove its license plate and replace it with a new one. Then, he takes all of Abbott's possessions, including the burner phone used to communicate with Aggie, and drives the car to a junkyard. There, he pays the attending worker to bump him to the top of the line and watches the car get crushed, with blood dripping from the trunk. Most people in the Bureau are under the impression that Abbott is still out sick, but Erika is starting to suspect something is wrong. He hasn't answered any of her texts or calls.
By the end of the episode, Aggie will be looking for him too. As Nile disposes of Abbott's body, Aggie tries to mend her own situation with Shelley. In a state of hungover shame, she drags herself to Bushwick to apologize in person - or rather through a crack in the door that Shelley has left ajar. Aggie says everything she thinks Shelley wants to hear: Shelley was right about everything; she is selfish. But she's not a monster, she maintains, echoing Nile. She admits that she always needs an enemy, someone to fight with, but she never meant that person to be Shelley, whom she loves. Aggie begs for Shelley's forgiveness and another chance to prove she can be better. She sobs through her words.
As Aggie received the call from Christopher Ingram, Madison's brother, her spirits were dampened. He sought to impart information his parents had withheld about Nile, but their meeting was fraught with suspicion from Christopher. He could tell by the way she admitted a possible misjudgment on Nile that she had succumbed to his "charm and persuasion." Aggie's frankness about her shift in perspective on Nile's innocence, coupled with her hostility, were not her most commendable moments as a journalist. Nevertheless, Christopher revealed the scoop: The Ingrams held a substantial financial stake in Jarvis Yards. They had covered half of the $200 million debt the Jarvises owed in exchange for five ownership points in the development. It was after this deal, facilitated through the Ingram family trust, that Madison vanished. Christopher believed his parents' belief in Nile's innocence to be genuine, albeit it was intertwined with their investment. Moreover, Madison had seemed terrified of Nile. A month before her disappearance, she called Christopher to profess her love, "whatever happened." Christopher gave Aggie a box of Madison's belongings he had retrieved from her house, "things [he] didn't want Nile to have." Inside, Aggie found a birding diary. As she flipped through its pages, she noticed one entry had been torn out. Recalling Christopher's mention of Madison's previous suicidal tendencies and James's account of Nile saving her life, she rushed to retrieve her copy of Madison's suicide note. It fit the rip in the diary like a puzzle piece. She called Abbott to share the news, but it was Nile who answered the call, amidst throwing Abbott's belongings into the Hudson. Naturally, Nile couldn't pick up the call, and Aggie's persistence once again bit her in the butt. She texted, "He killed Madison. I have proof." Nile texted back as Abbott, "Wait till I see you. Tell no one," and tossed the phone into the river.
