Play@YSDC

O, I have lost my reputation! I have lost the immortal part of myself, and what remains is bestial.
:: Shakespeare, Othello

Hotel de Paris, Leicester Place
Friday, June 18, 1900

It is a warm day in late June, and the sky is still lit with the orangish glow of the setting sun. The clop of horse's hooves on the streets is beginning to die down as more and more people, their business for the day completed, make their way home. Cigar smoke fills the interior of the fashionable restaurant off Leicester Square, where three people of diverse backgrounds and social standings sit around a table, awaiting the arrival of a fourth.

Reginald Smythe surveys the two strangers seated at his table. The big, muscular man is over six and a half feet tall. Even seated, he towers over the others. Though he has a rough face, it is broken by a friendly smile. "Good evening," he says. "I'm Reg Smythe. I don't believe I've had the pleasure of meeting either of you before."

Richard Maurice is the name.
Richard nods to the two others. The man is dressed with a black suit with buttoned white shirt underneath it. A moment ago he handed a brimmed hat to the waiter. A mechanical clock hangs loosely from his suit pocket, indicating the man to be a wealthy man. He taps with a walking stick on the floor as he takes a sip from the glass of wine he ordered. The small framed man is adult – reaching his fifties with a sparse salt and pepper hair and shaved face.

The lady has arrived last, slightly rushed. She looks surprised at seeing the two seated gentlemen and sends a questioning look to the maitre'd. He shrugs and she seats herself at the table."Good evening. I'm Maud Marrick. Pleasure to meet you both. Are you here to meet Lord Godfrey?" She looks about late-twenties, nicely but sensibly dressed and carries a slightly larger bag than normal for most ladies.

"The pleasure is entirely mine," says Reg. "Yes, that's right, I'm here to meet Lord Godfrey. I take it that he has also asked you to join him this evening?"

Rising from his seat with a slight bow and a kiss to the lady's hand Richard confirms that he was invited by the Lord to the meeting.
Yes, I am. The lord is a business friend

A somewhat haughty-looking man - clearly of the highest caliber of upper-class - with a walking stick rushes in, accompanied by a second man, a nearly nondescript middle-aged man in a dapper suit. This man is attempting to help the man with the stick to his seat, but he will have none of it. Lord Godfrey, for this is who the man with the stick is, jerks his arm away from the other man and mumbles to himself. He seats himself opposite you and the dapper man sits in an adjacent chair.

"My apologies for running a bit late," he says. "These old legs aren't exactly what they used to be. My name, lady and gentlemen, is Lord Godfrey Sommers" - he shakes the hand of each of the assembled in turn - "and this is my solicitor, Mr. Clarence. I apologize once more for being so cryptic in the note I sent you. Have any of you any questions before we begin?"

"It's good to see you again, Lord Godfrey," says Reg. "I have questions, but I don't really know enough about the situation to know which ones I should ask. It's probably best if you explain it first."

RIchard Maurice

Lord Godfrey, it is pleasant to see you again after so many years.
Mr. Maurice, again, rises up his from his seat to welcome the older and respected lord with a firm shake. He nods to the solicitor and turns to the lord again.
First of all, how’s the Miss, is she in a good shape like the lord himself?

After finishing with the politeness Richard add
I’m very intriguing to know what help can I provide for the lord?

Lord Godfrey returns Richard's shake with all the vigor of his younger years - apparently, he's lost relatively little of his strength with age - and says, "Maggie's doing just fine, thank you for asking."

He turns a bit dour and concerned. "The matter concerns not me, but my son, Arthur. I believe Miss Marrick here is the only one acquainted with Arthur?" He clears his throat and continues. "He had been becoming estranged for quite some time - sounded preoccupied in his letters and whatnot. I presumed it to be just a young man making his own place in society, away from the shadow of his father." He looks distant. "Apparently, there had been some sort of altercation on the night of June 10, the night he... ahh... disappeared." A sigh. "We had matters swept under the rug, as it were - I want to avoid a scandal, obviously - I -" He begins to weep.

"As you can imagine, this affair has weighed heavily on Lord Godfrey's mind," says Clarence, the solicitor. "At any rate, there had been rumors that Arthur had been associating with some unsavory characters in the West End theaters. Four days ago, we received a note. The man, if man it indeed was, hinted as to Arthur's fate if he did not get the 3,000 pounds for which he asked. Dark hints. He enclosed a key to Arthur's flat by way of proof, so we're obviously quite certain the writer, whoever they are, was indeed there." He looks over towards Lord Godfrey, who is still weeping with his head down. "We resolved to pay the blackmailer. But when I arrived at the appointed place and time, no one appeared to claim the money. And in the last three days, there has been no contact from either the blackmailer, or from Arthur."

Maud reaches over the table and takes Lord Godfrey's hand. "Dear Lord Godfrey, this is terrible news indeed, these last few days must have been awful for you. I can't believe the rumours; Arthur always had you uppermost in his mind in all he did; everything was done with the utmost propriety. However, I'm not sure it could be a straight-forward kidnapping. I last saw Arthur nearly two weeks ago and, I'm afraid to say, he didn't look his normal exuberant self."

"I'm sorry to hear that, Lord Godfrey," says Reg, a concerned expression on his face. "Of course I'll do my utmost to help locate your son and extricate him from these terrible circumstances. Do you still have the note? It might help if we could examine it. The choice of words may reveal something about the writer's mindset. Perhaps the handwriting can tell us something about whoever wrote it. I've read the Sherlock Holmes mysteries by Arthur Conan Doyle, and Holmes does that sort of thing. He'd be able to tell by the writing whether the writer was a man or a woman, whether he or she was left or right-handed, things like that. Of course, I'm not a handwriting expert, and we wouldn't want to show it to anyone not at this table."

"I agree with Reg, my Lord. We must find any clue we can from the letter." She stops for a moment to imagine Reg with calabash and deerstalker, and shakes her head. "Do you know of any other friends of Arthur's who may have seen him? Um," Maud looks shy, "What about his new lady friend? And have you been to his flat?"

"Thank you, my dear," says Lord Godfrey as he dabs at his eyes with a napkin. "Arthur not well? Was it poison, Miss Marrick? In the last few months, he had gone through quite an exhorbitant amount of his allowance, and quite quickly, too. Perhaps when Arthur ceased paying this person, they poisoned my boy..." Mr. Clarence motions for Lord Godfrey to cease this line of thinking. "Yes, of course. Thank you again for your help these past few days, Clarence. As to the letter, Reg, we destroyed it after we had resolved to pay the blackmailer. Mr. Clarence, however, did feel that the writing was similar to things he's seen from people under some form of duress.

"The last person to see him was a man named Giles, the landlord of his building in Islington. And presumably Mr. Borelli, a violinist who lives above him. Other than that, I'm afraid not. I'm not too familiar, after all, with the theater and music hall scene Arthur had been frequenting of late. The altercation to which I referred was on the night he vanished... with one of his oldest and closest friends, Peter Blaylock... I'm not quite sure what it was about. Apparently, Peter has taken ill. I fear I've not been to his flat personally; I just can't bring myself to go."

"Perfectly understandable," says Reg. "We can certainly pay him a visit. We may learn more from talking to Giles and Mr. Borelli too. All of this is very curious. It does seem that the blackmailer was being manipulated or coerced in some way by some third party, perhaps by being blackmailed as well. Could be that the blackmailer tried to break free of this controlling influence and thus did not show up to collect the payment."

Resting his arm on the Lord’s shoulder Richard tries to comfort the lord.
I will try my best to help you by supplying any of my resources
An experienced man as me that knows how to negotiate will prove useful to find Arthur.
He motions for the waiter to bring a cup of water and a glass of wine for the lord, clearly the man needs to drain his sorrow with a drink and calm down.

He turns to Reg and Maud and nods in agreement
So we have a close friend, a violinist, a landlord and a theatre to check

About this time a young man comes into the hotel out of breath and looking around while also trying to open his pocket watch. While his clothes seem to indicate he comes from money, he is unkempt and you can see a smudge of something on his face. His dark hair is cut short but not combed properly. His shoes look dusty, but not from lack of use. The dust appears closer to saw dust, though it does look like he spent a couple seconds trying to wipe them clean.
He appears to be arguing with the concierge of the hotel for a minute before the young man digs around in about 3 different pockets pulling out small pieces of paper and then shoving them back in before finally pulling out a fine looking card similar to the ones you received.

After looking at the card, the concierge appears to be in slight disbelief before pointing towards your table. You hear the concierge say something about introducing you, but it is difficult to hear from this distance. But you do hear the young man say "No thank you, I'll be fine."

Gary walks up to your table. He is about 6 feet high and appears to be in good physical shape and stronger than your average man. "I apologize for my lateness Lord Sommers, sometimes I lose track of time in my workshop. It is a pleasure to finally meet you, Arthur always spoke so highly of you. Gary Cupp, how may I be of service sir. But I was not expecting this..." as he looks around the table. "Sirs, Miss." Gary has a bit of a confused look on his face realizing for the first time this might not be Arthur's father throwing a birthday or engagement party for his son, which is what he had assumed.

"Good evening, Mr. Cupp," says Reg. He looks even bigger and stronger than Gary, about a head taller. "I'm Reg Smythe."

"Sir, it is a pleasure to meet you," Gary responds, while pulling up a chair and taking a seat. "I'm sorry I'm late, can you catch me up on what is going on?"

Maud hides a smile at the two men sizing each other up. "How do you do Mr Cupp? I'm Miss Maud Marrick." she bows her head in greeting and wonders at the gentleman's dusty dress.

Gary stands and nods towards Maud, "Very fine, thank you. A pleasure to meet you miss Marrick. Please call me Gary ." and he sits back down.

"I take it you are a friend of Arthur's, Gary," says Reg. "I've never met him, but I know Lord Godfrey Sommers from the Sudan. Arthur seems to have disappeared on the night of June 10, following an altercation with one of his oldest friends, Peter Blaylock, who has taken ill. Perhaps you've met him too? Arthur has been frequenting the West End theatre and music hall scene of late. The last people to see him were his landlord, Giles, and his upstairs neighbor, a violinist named Mr. Borelli. To make matters worse, Lord Godfrey received a note four days ago written by an unknown blackmailer demanding 3,000 pounds - yet the blackmailer did not show up to collect the money." He scracthes his chin. "Where did the blackmailer say to meet, and at what time? Though he - or she - never appeared there, the location and the time of day might tell us something. The blackmailer may have chosen a place convenient to home or place of business."

ooc Handy,oh man can you pic a different font color? Yellow on light blue hurts my eyes every time I look at it. ;)

"My God," Gary responds a bit too loud drawing some attention. After a second, when people go back to their own business, he continues in a more civil tone. "My apologies, this is just a shock. What have the police done about this? To answer your question, yes Arthur was a friend. I mean not close, but friends. He was an assistant in an architect drawing class at University. We met several times after class to discuss a wide range of topics. We might have been closer if not for Pete... I mean Mr. Blaylock. We never saw eye to eye on my direction of studies." Gary stopped, pausing for a few seconds trying to take in everything said so far. He then pulls a small book out of his coat pocket and then a wooden pencil and began to write notes.
"Please tell me everything including what the police said. June tenth, that was over a week ago. Then four days before the ransom note was received, then they didn't show up to pick up the ransom? Very odd. I'll need to see the note of course I can run some tests on it. Sir Binet has made some wonderful breakthroughs on handwriting analysis, and we need to visit Arthur's flat."
He pauses another second and then says, "Sir I would not worry too much about them not picking up the ransom, I think it very possible this is not a kidnap for blackmail. It is possible someone else is trying to profit off this unfortunate event. I'll need more proof to substantiate my hypothesis of course. Who knew Arthur was missing between June 10th and the 14th?"

OOC,I'm sorry. It's orange, but I'll use a darker shade from now on. Is this better?

"Lord Godfrey would not have wanted to involve the police," explains Reg. "Doing so would also mean a terrible scandal. So he has called us here to ask for our help instead."

Richard sneered quietly to himself as Gary entered, it was uncivilized to be unkempt and let the lord wait ... but there was something with the anxious student, he was eager to help and compensate for his rudeness for being late.
Richard decides to study the young man so he kept silence, hearing what the man will come up with and then he will share his knowledge with the man’s ideas.

"Of course, we wouldn't want a scandal," Gary responded. "I'm rambling, sorry. Please let me know what you have come up with so far."

ooc,yea the darker orange is better. Thx, not trying to be a tool, that light orange just jabbed daggers in my eyes.

Maud looks at the newcomer in wonder. "My goodness Mr Cupp, I mean, Gary. You really do know a lot about investigating. You've barely sat down and already know more about it than I do. I applaud your genius. And I agree with you about borrowing the key to visit the flat."

"We were informed just before you arrived that they had destroyed the letter after they resolved to pay the blackmailer," Reg tells Gary, "but a key to Arthur's flat had been enclosed with it as proof. If we could have that key, that might help. There may be more hints as to his whereabouts and what has befallen him there."

Gary smiles sheepishly at Maud, "Miss I doubt if I know more about it than you, but like any good investigation a hypothesis should put forth and then evidence gathered to either prove or disprove said hypothesis. That is a shame about the letter Reg. It could have proved useful, but again I think it is either an opportunist or used as a diversionary tactic to slow down any investigation. I would propose we build a complete time-line. Of all the events. This would give us a clearer picture of when things happened."

"It is a shame that the letter is no more," says Reg. "I had asked to see it to before you arrived. Still, Clarence here did notice that the writer seemed to be under some sort of duress, and we do have several avenues of investigation to follow. Perhaps we should assemble the evidence first and then come up with a hypothesis to explain it. Otherwise, we are merely speculating, and our speculations may distort our view of the evidence. A timeline is a good idea, and we have the basics of it, but there is much more to learn."

Maud thinks for a moment. "I think I can possibly start the time line. I last saw Arthur two weeks ago. He was looking haggard; he blamed it on a late night drinking bout but now I'm not so sure. He also mentioned a woman he'd met, I got the impression he was romantically involved and was considering marriage." She shrugs.

"Well a key is hardly evidence of kidnapping. But I agree lets look at all the evidence. What exactly made you first realize Arthur had gone missing?" Gary asked.

You can add another hypothesis to your list, my boy
Richard say to Gary and then turns to Lord Godfrey

Without any intentions to insult you my good lord as I do not question the education Arthur received from you but…
Richard say, choosing his words carefully.

What are the chances that Arthur is in need for money or is in trouble and tries to fake his own abduction?
Trying to guide the lord for answers to neglect the possibility of a mischief by Arthur
When you last met, did he had any signs of stress or tried to cover a personal stress of some sort?

"I think we need to gather all the evidence first. Arthur was a good man. He may have gotten himself mixed up into something over his head, but lets not jump to conclusions just yet. Is there anymore I missed for my being late? And sir you did mention you received a note, how was the note delivered?" Gary asked.

"The note and the key were simply left on our doorstep one morning," says Lord Godfrey, sliding the key across the table towards the party. "As I said, I myself haven't been to Arthur's flat, but both Mr. Clarence and the police said that nothing appeared out of place. When last I saw him, Arthur seemed generally alright - a bit the worse for wear, as Miss Marrick says, but I had assumed this to be the result of late nights with the, ahh, bad sort he had been consorting with. And to corroborate another part of Miss Marrick's story, he did mention in his last letter that he had met some woman. Some actress, I'd imagine." He sighs. "Do not worry about giving offense, Richard... I suppose that is a possibility we must consider. I'd of course rather that it weren't so, but... and in answer to your question, Reg, the meeting with the blackmailer was to take place in Wellclose Square, off Leman Street."

Maud frowns. "Leman st, Leman st. That's Aldgate isn't it? A really scruffy part of town; I wouldn't like to walk around there with £3000 in my pocket. I was just thinking my Lord. It's a long shot but I know a few people in the theatre business from my tours. I could discreetly ask around for any word on Arthur."

"Aldgate, yes -- not quite so bad as some parts, but on the edge of the East End. And certainly, ask around and see if you can find out anything more, Miss Marrick -- the more working on this, the better. I trust in your discretion on this matter, however."

Mr. Clarence speaks up. "Lord Godfrey, I really should be leaving now," he says as he glances at his watch and crushes out his cigar. "I told my wife I'd be home, and believe me, the murderers and thieves I normally deal with are positively easy going compared to her once she's angered."

"Very well, Clarence." The solicitor shakes hands with Lord Godfrey and the assembled party, rises, and leaves. "I believe we may be finishing up here; are there any other questions?" Lord Godfrey asks. Then he looks up towards two people walking in this direction -- a mustached man with short dark hair, accompanied by a young woman who looks somewhat out of her element. Lord Godfrey whispers to the party, "Abner Travisham, troublemaker extraordinaire. Try to say as little as possible of what is going on here. We don't need him getting any more ideas about what was going on here than he likely already has."

Move to the "Investigation Begins" thread.