The Case of the Blonde Following the Blonde

We’ve tentitively started the Dark Pulp game this last Saturday.  The setting is a ‘romantacized’ version of 1920′s Chicago.  We’ll focus our viewpoint on the Gilhooly Detective Agency, founded by Tom “Fat Tom” Gilhooley (PC) and Stella Proschenko (Allied NPC) who brings contacts with the darker side of the town to the table.  On their payroll is Candance Proschenko (Allied NPC) who acts as the Agency’s Secretary and Girl Friday and Q, a white South African who works as mechanic, inventor, gunsmith and the like.

In addition Tom has John Redman (aka Billy Tiger) a full blood Cherokee from Oklahoma (PC) on full time retainer for when he needs a little backup or some clandestine searching.  John had some troubles in Oklahoma, something about making late night withdrawals from various finanical institutions and is in Chicago enjoying the lack of heat in the great Fall weather. So to speak…  He plays the part of the Sneak.

Helena Chernisova (PC) is a Russian immigrant to Chicago, an ex-nurse and medical researcher she had to leave the business after she was let go to make way for a relative of the hospital administrator.  Her response to the termination has made her less than welcome at other hospitals after the administrator made a few spiteful phone calls.  To make ends meet she’s applying her research skills at Tom’s bequest.  She plays the part of the Thinker.

And of course there’s Tom himself.  An honest cop in a corrupt town he had no future in the Chicago Police Department and left the force days ahead of an ‘accident’ that would have probably proven fatal.  He keeps a ready hand with a $10 in it for those he knows on the force and everyone knows Tom’s both generous and a man of his word.

We join our heroes with Tom at the office…

Tom was kicked back and eating some cake and having coffee when Candace popped in and informed him that someone was downstairs to see her mother Stella and did he want to take it since Stella was currently in New York attending the wedding of a relative.

Tom, having nothing else on his plate other than cake, had the woman sent up.  She turned out to be a street walker by the name of Missy and an old employee of Stella’s back when Stella was in the ‘life’. She had a story about some of her friends disappearing and stories of others.  The cops so far had been of no help, “So a whore has moved on, so what?” and Missy in desperation decided to look up her old boss.

Missy spins a story of overhearing a conversation between a friend of hers and the woman’s boyfriend.  The boyfriend is an O’Toole, an Irish gang that runs girls in a section of town near Chinatown.   The man was scared and from what little she could make out she thinks the O’Toole’s are involved in the missing girls.  The next morning both of them were packed and gone.  It was then that she decided to come see Stella.

Tom hears her out and decides to look into it.  Tom does have a bit of a White Knight complex and women in distress, even prostitutes warrant his concern.

He sends Helena and John out to investigate.  They go and talk to a few of the girls and get not much for their trouble.  [DM's Note: Remember these girls understand money or intimidation and aren't likely to spill their guts to strangers without one or the other...]

They stop off at a diner to grab a cup of coffee and try and squeeze some information out of counter man and waitress and enter separately with John going to the counter for coffee and Helena a booth where she orders coffee and apple pie.

They pick up a description of both of Missy’s missing friends and they’re both tall blondes.  Coincidence or the start of a theme?

While Helena is sitting there a man sits down at her booth and offers to hook her up with some action.  Helena says she’s looking for her boss, not herself and doesn’t get much information from the man.  John notices when he sits that he’s packing heat and keeps an eye on him.

They leave and head back to the office and tell Tom what they found out.

Spending the next few days they investigate the morgue where Helena finds out that there’s a Jane Doe that fits the general Tall Blonde description and manages to see the body claiming her cousin is missing.   She notes that the body seems to have a void in the chest/abdomen area under the sheet.   She arranges to have a date with the Assistant Medical Examiner to try and get more information out of him where she finds out the body is being handled by the senior M.E.  Helena learns the hard way that people don’t like questions and perhaps the honest direct approach might not be the best approach.

John Redman sneaks into the morgue and steals the last years ledgers to see if there are other mentions of Jane Doe’s that fit this description.  Unfortunately he’s unable to get the current ledger which is kept in the recieving area where there is always someone on duty.   Later he sneaks back into the morgue and steals the case files on Jane Doe and replaces the stolen ledgers.   He also learns through an acquaintance the O’Tooles are selling women overseas or that’s a story that’s circulating about the gang.

They find out information on the O’Tooles through Tom’s contacts and learn they’ve ‘gone to the mattresses’ in an old office building in Chinatown.  THey cruise by in their sedan and find a car full of thugs parked outside.  John reconoiters the back alleys and finds another guy guarding the back door.  Rather than risk a confrontation they retreat to plan their next moves.

Unfortunately all their nosing about has attracted attention and Mick O’Toole the leader of the O’Toole gang shows and tells them in no uncertain terms to back the hell off.   He offers to hire them to take a vacation and when Tom doesn’t go for it makes some fairly (un)veiled threats that bad things might happen if they don’t.  John with uncanny insight picks up that Mick is scared pantsless which might make him a dangerous man, even more so than he might otherwise be.

The doorman to the building, being on Tom’s secret payroll to pass along information, sends up word that two of the O’Toole’s head off down the  street from the sedan loaded with them that Mick arrived in.  Tom calls down to the diner on the corner and finds out they’re holed up there.

He and John go have a talk with them.  A slight altercation takes place and one of them makes his escape after shoving Fat Tom halfway across the room out of the booth and bolting like a rabbit out the door.

The other one isn’t quite so awesome and they learn that the O’Tooles are in fact acquiring women for a buyer and that they missed a delivery and the buyer is very very upset about that and now a bunch of their boys have vanished.   They’re collecting girls now to try and make up their delivery schedule.   He was a little confused about Tom’s insinuations that the same buyer had hired Tom but he was scared enough that he just didn’t quite get it.

After thoroughly scaring the thug more, Tom lets him go and they head back to the office where he deposited the two 38′s they took off the thugs.

Aftermath:

All in all this is the first RPG session in going on 30+ years of playing that I’ve ever had where there wasn’t a fight of any kind.  Not a single punch was thrown or a cartridge fired although guns were brandished at times.  Part of this could I’m sure be laid at the feet that the first part of the session was character building and during the session one of my son’s got sick and spewed all over himself and the couch which neccesitated a time out for clean up.

I’ll get the podcast out as I can this week, I go on call tomorrow for the next week so time might be at a premium for me.