When Stenfalk asked Vevoda’s management was asked about what had happened to Zapadi, Obradovic and Ledurga a few days after their disappearances, he was told that they were dissatisfied with their wages and had “gone overseas in search of more remunerative work.” In spite, Stenfalk gathered all of Vevoda’s workers for a walkout. In response, however, the company’s doors were padlocked and Detectives suddenly appeared, roaming around the building. The workers begin to get desperate as their meager savings disappear.

Jen and Eric’s comments
Eric highlights the text, “how little effort they had put into concocting a plausible story,” responding to it with, “Is that so much worse than a lie that’s the product of centuries worth of effort?” which is referring to a book his parents are passionate about. He criticizes them for not talking to “anyone who doesn’t share their feelings about it,” revealing the tension between Eric and his parents.

A reference to one of Straka’s works, “A Wineblood’s Mine”

“I’ve felt condescension from them before, he said, and dislike too, and pettiness and opportunism, but never contempt. Something has changed.”

Eric: “See the Hobo Preacher’s “History of Capitalism” speech in Wineblood.

There does not currently seem to be an explanation for the reference to this speech on this page.