Mean Streets - The Tough Times of Darrin McCoy

[Grognardsw]

McCoy resumes mumbling in the Xaqloui tongue. As Archer closes the door of the interrogation room McCoy screams: "The time will come!"

[Inferno]

Sam Archer, private eye:

"We'll carve that on your tombstone," Archer snarled.

The detective left the prison, found a pay phone and called Agent Watson.
"This is Archer. Another dead end. McCoy's got nothing. He's another hophead patsie of the cult.
"I'm coming over. If you've got the time, I'd like to hear who and what was found at the warehouse where I was rescued; any lines on Carcosa's current whereabouts; and what the New York investigators have dug up so far, so I can figure out next steps."

[Grognardsw]

Archer visits Agent Watson later that day. The BOI man explains recent developments from the other investigators in New York (please see Undertows of Disbelief thread.) Book dealer Reginald claims to have seen Carcosa in a spell-induced (or drug-induced, thinks Archer) vision or dream.

The name James Ford comes up again in association with Carcosa. In a letter to the enigmatic cult figure, Ford brokered real estate deals in New Orleans and Phoenix. Archer is reminded of Marie Anne Levoui, who looked like a voodoo priestess from the Big Easy.

Regarding the warehouse, Agent Watson reports that they rounded up several immigrants, some illegal hooch, and dead cut-open bodies of several roosters, a cat and dog. Archer's hand was not found. The derelict warehouse did not belong to any of them. The immigrants were from Haiti and south Carribean islands, spoke only broken English and said they were homeless, using the building for shelter. They claimed not to know Anne Marie Levoui and Eduardo Hernandez, thinking them otger homeless people. Wanted posters for Levoiu and Hernandez have been issued to the Providence, Boston and New York police and BOI. No leads have turned up.

[Inferno]

(please see Undertows of Disbelief thread.)

Ok. Thanks. Please stand by.

[Grognardsw]

Agent Mulder


looks at Archer as the private eye ponders the report.

"Well, what do you think?"

[Inferno]

Sam Archer, private eye:

Archer looked as spent as a used firecracker. The files of this case all blurred together in his tired grey eyes. “The trail’s gone cold here,” the soft-boiled detective groaned wearily. “I’ll go to New York. See if the librarians have had any luck.”

It would be good to sleep in his own bed again.

Archer packed his things and got out of Dodge. On the train he hit the painkillers harder than time in Sing Sing. He emptied his hip flask of gin, and passed out in his seat. The conductor woke him for his ticket and Archer reached for it with his left hand.

[Grognardsw]

Sam Archer boards the train.



It rattles along to Brooklyn.



And arrives in Red Hook.







"Red Hook is a maze of hybrid squalor near the ancient waterfront opposite Governor’s Island, with dirty highways climbing the hill from the wharves to that higher ground where the decayed lengths of Clinton and Court Streets lead off toward the Borough Hall. Its houses are mostly of brick, dating from the first quarter to the middle of the nineteenth century, and some of the obscurer alleys and byways have that alluring antique flavour which conventional reading leads us to call “Dickensian”. The population is a hopeless tangle and enigma; Syrian, Spanish, Italian, and negro elements impinging upon one another, and fragments of Scandinavian and American belts lying not far distant. It is a babel of sound and filth, and sends out strange cries to answer the lapping of oily waves at its grimy piers and the monstrous organ litanies of the harbour whistles. Here long ago a brighter picture dwelt, with clear-eyed mariners on the lower streets and homes of taste and substance where the larger houses line the hill. One can trace the relics of this former happiness in the trim shapes of the buildings, the occasional graceful churches, and the evidences of original art and background in bits of detail here and there—a worn flight of steps, a battered doorway, a wormy pair of decorative columns or pilasters, or a fragment of once green space with bent and rusted iron railing. The houses are generally in solid blocks, and now and then a many-windowed cupola arises to tell of days when the households of captains and ship-owners watched the sea."

[Inferno]

Sam Archer, private eye:

Archer frowned at his empty flask, got off the train and went into the first speakeasy he could find. He set down his one grip next to a bar stool and said, "Gin. Straight. Better make it a double."

Archer chain smoked cigarettes and poured drinks down his throat until he was numb enough to slur his words. He settled up the tab, refilled his flask, stood up uneasily and, thus prepared in that fine state, set out to find the BOI's sewing circle of expert consultants.

The more I read Lovecraft's passages, the more I agree that the thing that really horrified HPL was catholic, muslim and black immigrants, and that they would breed with protestant whites.

[Grognardsw]

(In the timeline, Archer arrives the day after Dr. Clarke's briefing at the hotel which has just gone on in the Undertows of Disbelief thread.)

With some concentration, Archer makes his way to the Brooklyn Red Hook district police station where he vaguely recalls a Detective Tom Malone was the local contact for the BOI. The desk sergeant looks at Archer, squinting his eye, perhaps smelling the private detective's breath. "Tom is here. Have a seat on the bench."

Five minutes later Detective Malone walks out. "Good day Mr. Archer. Agent Mulder mentioned you may be joining the BOI team here. They are at the Hotel Howard. I've phoned to let them know you're coming over. I trust you've read the briefing materials? Do you have any questions!"

[Inferno]

Sam Archer, private eye:

(In the timeline, Archer arrives the day after Dr. Clarke's briefing at the hotel which has just gone on in the Undertows of Disbelief thread.)

Sorry, does that mean I'm a day ahead of the other PCs?
If not, then...

"No," said Archer as he left the police department and unsteadily hailed a cab for the Hotel Howard.

If I am a day ahead of the other PCs, maybe Archer is put in the drunk tank to dry out?

[Grognardsw]

Yes, Archer is in the late morning of the next day from my IC post I made (discussing the astronomer.)

So the party will go to bed, wake up tomorrow, some will have a court appearance, then onto Konstantin Chertovski, which could be where Archer joins.

[Inferno]

So the party will go to bed, wake up tomorrow, some will have a court appearance, then onto Konstantin Chertovski, which could be where Archer joins.

Ok. That'll give me time to catch up on the game reading, while Archer sleeps it off.
Please PM me when you're ready to insert me back into the game.

[Grognardsw]

The Ledger of Dr. Clarke is a good recap.

viewtopic.php?f=168&t=5128

[Inferno]

Thanks for pointing me in the right direction.

[Grognardsw]

While cooling his heels, Archer remembers his friend Det. Andrew Sipowicz in Manhattan.

[Inferno]

Sorry. 'Cooling his heels' in the drunk tank?

[Grognardsw]

No, just in a general sort of way.

Archer checks in at the Hotel Howard. There is a message waiting for him from Agent Mulder of the BOI.

Welcome Mr. Archer,
We will be in court when you arrive but will be back by lunch time. The team plans to visit Konstantin Chertovski this afternoon.
See you soon,
(signed)
Agent William Mulder

[Inferno]

Sam Archer, private eye:

At the hotel, Archer orders up a pot of black coffee, gets a shower, shave, and a change of clothes.

He sends a message to Mulder that he'll join the team this afternoon.

Then he calls Andy to see if he'll go to breakfast with Archer at a dining car the two of them used to frequent when Archer was on the force.



After the pleasantries were dispensed with, Archer got around to asking, "Have you found anything on that bird, Chertovski, and the Shunned House in Brooklyn yet?"

[Grognardsw]

Det. Sipowicz takes a sip of coffee and answers Archer. "There is no local police file on Konstantin Chertovski. That means he hasn't been convicted or connected to any crimes. Chertovski is a retired man in his early 50s, alledgedly a philosopher and supporter of the arts. The "Shunned House" is an old sprawling Victorian known as the site of a double murder 25 years ago. Chertovski is the current owner of the house. This 'Shunned House' is long reputed to be haunted. Accidents and ill-fortune over the years, with a double murder 25 years ago of a couple. The house was supposedly abandoned at that time. Why the couple was in there and who killed them is unknown. Ten years later Konstantin Chertovski purchased the house He bought the Shunned House not long after the double murder. Brought it back from decrepitude and enlarged it with gables, dormers, odd porches, and doors opening up to open air. And that's only what you can see from the outside. Also put up a stone wall around the property. Today he uses it as a residence and also social center, art gallery and meeting place."

Archer recollects reading Chertovski's letter letter to Ubaid Hazrabad (found on The White Ship): "Received the goods and will distribute as discussed. Sources tell us it has been found. Get to Mt. Latmos and secure. Give greetings to our colleagues, they shoukd go if necessary.
Cthulhu fthagn brother,
Konstantin"

Given the evidence of a letter from Konstantin Chertovski letter found in Carcosa's apartment, on letterhead from the Shunned House (16 Shady Lane, Brooklyn, NY), Archer strongly suspects Chertovski to be involved in Carcosa's operation. From there, he assumes the cult. Chertovski's letter to Carcosa references import and export of unspecified goods in the U.S. (Boston, New York, New Orleans, Phoenix) and abroad (Amsterdam, London, Brugue/Belgium, Instanbul/Turkey). The Russian cites particular museums and collections that match those that were victims of thefts.

[Inferno]

Sam Archer, private eye:

Food and coffee would help the hangover. Archer ordered eggs over easy, bacon, hash brown potatoes, griddle cakes, buttered white toast with marmalade and coffee and coolly laid out the evidence connecting Chertovski to the Carcosa gang, now wanted for murder of a federal agent.

"Any chance at a warrant now?" he asked between bites. "The feds and their librarian book club are going to botch it again, and I've only the one hand left."