Aztec Gold (part 1)

Game Date: Friday, 14 March 1947
Date Played: 20 September 2003

Late afternoon, Jeff and Jack are closing up the office which Nick 'the Claw' Hamer comes up the stairs and meets them in the corridor. The boss, Vincenzo Giuliani, wants to see them and Benny, Gabi and Nate at 7pm sharp at the Blue Parrot nightclub.

Jack makes the phone calls and they arrive at the appointed hour. Nick makes them wait until a bruiser at the bar is distracted by a busty cigarette girl dropping her load into his lap. Nick ushers them quickly through a door marked 'Office'. The guy at the bar, Nick says, is Robert McGee, a homicide detective commonly known as Violets after the particularly strong cologne he routinely wears. He's been seconded to the Sternwood-District Attorney anti-corruption crusade, very bad for business.

They are shown into Giuliani's office and offered chairs. The man himself is finishing his desert and will not be interrupted until he's done. Around the walls are examples of the best art money can buy or 'family' could smuggle out of Europe after the war. This seems to be more than a projected image of wealth and taste. In all respects, Vincenzo Giuliani appears to be the very model of an aristocratic Italian gentleman.

On the table is a gold statuette about nine inches high in a design which suggests its Central American origin.

Giuliani says that the agency has hurt his plans greatly by breaking up the Vivian Sternwood caper. He gave Healey the money for Sternwood to use to buy out her debt in exchange for making some stag films. Giuliani was planning on using these to stop Horace Sterwood's support of DA's anti-corruption crusade. How can Sternwood make any claim to a moral high ground when his own daughter films her indiscretions? But, there is a way that the agency can pay off its 'debt' to Giuliani. He hands them a telegram which reads:

I have the third Mocté statue. If you want the chance to bid for it, be at Lot 2503 Pasedena Highway, 10pm tonight. Bring your statue to prove you are interested. No statue, no bid.

The statuette on his desk is one of three is stolen from Montezuma by Cortez and together, they are priceless. A collector would pay anything to have the complete set. Giuliani has the statue of Tlaloc, the Aztec rain god. A collector named Lindley Paul has the statue of Centeotl, the corn god. The third statue was lost in 1821 somewhere in Mexico.

Giuliani has been unable to contact Paul to determine whether he has received a similar telegram or has found the third statuette.

He says that he cannot send his own people to look after this matter as they are all being watched too carefully by the police and the DA's task force. If the agency successfully gains possession of the third statue, he will easily be able to convince Paul to sell his and the agency's 'debt' will be deemed repaid in full. If they fail, however, Giuliani will be very 'disappointed'.