Wild West Campaign Update: The Prospector

The PCs are settling in to Tombstone, and for the most part finding it relatively quieter than either Dodge City or East Vegas. Not in terms of business, given that it's a silver boomtown, but in terms of law & order. The total dominance in the region of the Cowboy Gang ironically means that there's relatively little violence compared to the other cities they've been active in, since the Cowboys at this time are making a point of playing nice inside the city limits.  Their leadership, Curly Bill Brocius and Pa Clanton, keep the wilder members in line.

One surprise came in the fact that Doc Thomas decided, for reasons as yet unknown (though possibly due to some kind of disagreement with his boyfriend), to leave Tombstone behind.  OOC, this was due to the fact that Doc Thomas' player unfortunately had to quit the party. We all hope he'll come back soon, but for now Doc Thomas is out.

Crazy Miller has started operating his various businesses in town: a general store, a bar called the Argent Saloon, and a high-class brothel. Doc Taylor (formerly Kid Taylor) decided to carry on with his medical practice in spite of his partner leaving town; to make up for it he hired a couple of assistants: a veterinarian who wanted to try his hand at doctoring people, and an attractive young woman with no special talents other than eye candy. This detail got him into some trouble with his wife, until she figured out that the girl was bringing in clients just to see her.

The PC's prospector friend, Frenchy, had some bad news: his old friend and fellow prospector Packie had passed away.  Other Miller and Kid Taylor were present at the funeral.  Only to their surprise, Packie's coffin turned out to be full of rocks.  More interesting still, those rocks appeared to be rich with silver ore.

Town marshal Fred White is called in, and he interviews the Reverend Tanner. He suspects the reverend knows more than he's letting on, but can't bring himself to make a hard interrogation of a man of god. And since he has no body, or even any proof that there ever was a body, there really isn't any crime to investigate. 

Meanwhile, something more obviously criminal has taken place: Crazy Miller's character rolled a critical failure on his 'recruitment' skill, and ended up hiring a criminal to act as his teller in the saloon. The guy took off with over $500 in cash. Marshal White is called in on this one too, but when it's determined that the criminal left town, it became officially outside his jurisdiction. With county marshal Virgil Earp out of town, Crazy Miller decides to make his own illicit posse, with Other Miller, Jackson and Smiley.

Kid Taylor and Frenchy do some investigating of their own, chatting with the Reverend Tanner, who claims that the coffin which should have held Packie's body was dropped off by the prospector's supposed partner. They go check with the mining company's metallurgist, who says that the rock sample they took from the coffin was identical to one a young man had brought in to be tested a few days ago (Packie was not a young man). They break into the mining company's office (being closed on Sunday), and find out where Packie's claim was; and confirm that Packie didn't have a partner.

They interview the reverend again, and after a bit of intimidation get him to admit that in fact, it was Packie himself who brought the coffin, pleading with the reverend to hold his own 'funeral', though he refuses to tell them why he would do such a thing, or where Packie is; he had sworn to keep it secret.

So they ride out to the tombstone mines, and find Packie's dig is shuttered. A couple of neighboring prospectors claim they hadn't seen either Packie or his young assistant for several days. Bereft of clues, the duo head back to town, deciding that they've got to get the reverend to tell them the whole story.

The Miller gang, meanwhile, managed to track the saloon thief. Turns out he'd stolen the money to pay for and then run off with a Mexican bride. They tried to capture him but there was a brief shootout and he ended up dead.

When Kid/Doc Taylor and Frenchy got back to the Reverend's house, they found him being tortured by Packie's young assistant. It turns out that when the assistant realized Packie's claim had struck serious silver, he tried to threaten Packie into signing over half of the claim; Packie realized his life was in danger and thus faked his own death, hoping that the long delay that would follow his 'death' would force his assistant to give up and go elsewhere. But the assistant figured out the trick when the fraudulent funeral was uncovered, and was now trying to beat the location of Packie's hideout from the reverend.

There was a brief chase, and Taylor proved his shootist skills yet again, dropping two bullets into the assistant's chest.

That was it for this session.

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