Rankin

Rankin is the branch leader for the Fellowship in Moonglow during the time of Ultima VII. He is quite an egotistical man and his actions are rather suspicious. He's revealed to be quite a dangerous and unscrupulous man, resorting to murdering one of the members of his branch in order to keep the truth about him from getting out.

By Ultima VII, Rankin had not been in his job for a significant amount of time, since the branch in Moonglow was relatively new, and had only a few members. Rankin, however, was a very self-serving man, as Balayna, the treasurer of the branch, pointed out. Money frequently disappeared, and she suspected Rankin was behind it. After the Avatar told Balayna's suspicions to Rankin, he asked the Avatar to deliver a bottle to her. When the Avatar delivered this bottle, Balayna was killed shortly thereafter, when she took a whiff of the toxic contents. When confronted by the Avatar on the matter, Rankin played innocent, "wondering" what could possibly have happened to her.

When the Avatar retrieved the inner cube from the Cube Generator, Rankin was compelled to tell the truth by it: He had actually murdered Balayna to erase his tracks, so that no one could find his dirty dealings and theft. It wasn't revealed, however, if he was also involved in the Fellowship's true purpose for the Guardian.

Trivia

 * Rankin doesn't have many scruples. If the Avatar refuses to deliver the bottle, he instead kills Balayna in the night, and hides the body, acting innocent and "wondering" where she could be when confronted. One can also recognize his likeness and name both resemble former U.S. President Ronald Reagan.
 * In the french version of the game, telling Rankin about the liquor killing Balayna leads him to ask the Avatar to question the itinierant seller Addom who supposedly brought the liquor. However, no extra dialogue options with Addom appear, ending this story arc. In the original version of the game however, a usecode bug make the dialogue loop when trying to mention the liquor, thus rendering it impossible to trigger this extra step.