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Frederick Willoughby

Page history last edited by Michael 3 years, 1 month ago

to the Index or the Cast List


 

 

Birth:  February 14th, 1898, in Cheshire; 2nd son of Lord Stembridge (age 34 as of 1932).

Education:  St Peters, York; Balliol College, Oxford.
The War interrupted his education; he spent two years in the Army as an infantry lieutenant in France, the Balkans and Palestine with 2nd Battalion of the London Scottish Regiment.

Clubs:  Bath, Alpine, RoehamptonLondon Scottish Golf Club (at Wimbledon), Austrian Alpine Club (HQ:  Innsbruck). His application to the MCC is nearing the top of the 20-year-long waiting list.
Interests:  golf (poorly - 30 handicap), cricket, climbing, hiking, sailing, swimming. He used to ride to hounds, but hasn't had the chance in years, and doesn't own a horse anymore. He played for the Gentlemen, once, in 1920. 

Appearance:  right-handed; 6' tall; dark hair brushed back, mustache, scar on right cheek from shrapnel during the War.

 

     Frederick Thomas Willoughby (aka "Freddie" to his school chums) is a slightly flummoxed, unfailingly decent and courteous, public-school chap. A sports enthusiast, he follows cricket closely, but his actual skill is in mountaineering. His accounts of expeditions in the Alpine Journal are sure to make even the most dangerous and desperate ascent sound dull and dry. He's got a share of income from the family estates (perhaps £300 per year), and brings in a pittance more by writing articles on travel (less than £600 per year). His diplomatic position brings him about £2000 per year, including allowances. His military experience didn't earn him any notable medals (besides all the usual campaign and victory medals), but he's at least not going to flinch at the sight of blood. He mostly learned to "eat disgusting rations with the appearance of stoicism."

     His immediate family are his sister, Violet; she's 2 years younger than him, and (as of 1932) is unmarried. His older brother, Alfred, is the current holder of the family title (Earl of Stembridge), and is raising a family in Cheshire. Formally (as in government correspondence, appointments, or in legal documents) Willoughby is "the Honourable Frederick Willoughby", being the younger son of an Earl. Here are his entries in social guides and the Army List.

     He has been a member of HBM Diplomatic Service for 12 years, and now the Second Secretary with the British embassy to Romania. Previous postings:

 

  • 1932 - 1933:  Second Secretary at Bucharest.

  • 1928 - 1932:  Third Secretary at Berlin.

  • 1924 - 1928:  Protocol Attache at Washington.

  • 1920 - 1924:  Vice-consul at Salzburg, Austria.

     

 

Residences

 

London

 

     #90 Florin Court, London EC1 (7th floor apartment, the building has a pool in the basement, and a roof garden).

 

Florin Court, in London

 

Bucharest

 

     From 1932:  the Carlton Bloc, Bulevardul Nicolae Bălcescu 11; this is a brand-new 14 story building, the tallest in Bucharest; he lives on the eighth floor, with a nice terrace overlooking the city.

 

the Carlton Bloc, Bucharest

Berlin

 

     From 1928 to 1932, Willoughby's home was a villa in the Potsdam suburb of Berlin:  Viktoriastraße 24.  The back of the house faced onto to (distant from the palace) grounds of the Charlottenhof Palace.

 

Belongings and Equipment

 

     He's got a vast wardrobe at his lodgings in Bucharest -- full court dress (fifth class), levee dress, half-dress, undress, super-formal, formal, semi-formal, informal, mourning dress, lounge suits, sport suits, summer weight clothing, and every other type of clothing and equipment (tall leather boots, court shoes, buckle shoes, cocked hat, court sword, etc.) required of a diplomat at a royal court. His current equipment is listed here.

 

Game Mechanics

 

 

STR 12
CON 14
DEX  9
APP 13 15
EDU 16
POW  8
INT 11
SIZ 13

hit points:  14

damage bonus:  +1d4


Artist (Illustration) (05%):  25%

Bargain (05%):  5%

Be Awesome (0%) 1%

Bicycle (20%):  20%

Bureaucratics (05%):  45%
Breakfall (10%):  10%

Climb (40%):  85%
Conceal (15%):  15%

Concentration (16%):  16%

Cricket (05%):  50%
Cricket Lore (00%):  40%
Credit Rating (15%):  60%
Dodge (18%):  23%

Drive Auto (20%):  20%

Etiquette (05%):  19%

Golf (05%):  10%
Heroic Aura (var):  30%, see below for details

Hide (10%):  10%

History (classical and British) (5%):  40%
Hunting (10%):  10%

Insight (05%):  5%

Jump (25%):  25%

Languages:

English (Spoken):  80%

English (Read/Write):  80%

Latin (Spoken):  15%

Latin (Read/Write):  30%

Ancient Greek (Spoken):  10%

Ancient Greek (Read/Write): 20%

Levantine Arabic (Spoken):  15% (he can't read Arabic script, except a few slogans)

French (Spoken):  40%
French (Read/Write):  20%
German (Spoken):  40%

German (Read/Write):  20%

Russian (Spoken):  05%

Russian (Read/Write):  05%

Library Use (25%):  25%

Listen (25%):  25%

Mathematics (32%):  32%

Mechanical Repair (25%):  25%

Military Science (20%):  20%

Perception (15%):  15%

Persuade (15%):  15%
Pilot Aircraft (1%):  35%

Resilience (42%):  42%

Ride (15%):  20%
Sailing (1%):  20%

Science, Basic (5%):  5%

Sneak (10%):  15%

Spot Hidden (25%):  30%

Survival (Polar & Alpine) (05%):  35%

Survival (18%):  18%

Swim (25%):  60%

Throw (25%):  25%

Block (05%):  5%

Fist/Punch (40%):  40%

Grapple (25%):  25%

Rifle/Shotgun (25%):  50%
Handgun (20%):  35%

 

Heroic Aura

     When communicating in languages at 75% or more, if the character succeeds at a Heroic Aura skill check, they can test their APP vs a POW of 10 … this gives the character and allies who can hear and understand +1 to movement, +15% to combat or other heroic tasks. I.E., not "Come on everybody, we've got to finish the choreography for this show -- the curtain goes up in 30 minutes!"

     There is not a fixed base percentage for this skill; the referee will adjudicate the starting value. The effect is certainly not cumulative from the same "heroic leader", but can probably be applied as often as heroic incidents occur.

     Duration is variable -- probably "until the immediate problem has receded."

 

Monday, February 2nd, 1931

 

weather:  low temperature 23° F; high temperature 30° F; a windy day, with heavy fog, and a week's accumulation of snow on the ground.

 

     After the events of Sandstorm In Siwa, Willoughby found himself in his office at the British embassy in Berlin at 70 Wilhelmstraße, on a Monday, the 2nd day of February in 1931. He was dressed in the solar topee, light-weight linen suit, and minor adventuring gear he'd been carrying when "sucked through" the portal in the Siwa Oasis.

     Papers and maps on his desk were mostly about a joint Anglo-German plan to summit Victory Peak in the summer of the next year. The Alpine Club, and the German and Austrian Alpine Club (Deutscher und Österreichischer Alpenverein)

     He took a telephone call from the Landespolizei in Saxony, asking him to travel to Leipzig to accept the body of a British subject, Rotha Beryl Lintorn-Orman, who'd hung herself in the woods west of Leipzig. Willoughby agreed, distractedly; he wrote up a letter to the Foreign Office, in London, asking for information about Lintorn-Orman's passport and travel history, any other unusual notes in her Foreign Office folder, and a copy of her passport photograph (to compare to the one he presumed the Saxon police had found). He placed this letter in the outbound basket for the next diplomatic pouch.

     His binoculars, game-bag and other unsuitable possessions he placed in a lower drawer of his desk. Finding a coat and hat on the coat rack, he went downstairs to the commissionaire -- trying to avoid meeting any senior diplomats -- and changed a five pound note for some German money, asked for some of the day's newspapers, and had a taxicab hailed. At his home, his housekeeper let him in, and he drew a bath, dressed for dinner, and while waiting to eat, looked over the newspapers he'd picked up, along with the Army List, the Navy List, the Foreign Office List, the Dominions and Colonial Office List, a Kelley's Handbook of Distinguished People and Burke's Guide to the Peerage, Baronetcy, Knightage and Landed Gentry of the United Kingdom, and John Wisden's Cricketers' Almanack for 1930.

 

Clearly the most important reference work available. "Let's see .. British Honduras ... "

 

     The Berliner Tageblatt didn't have any changes to world history different from "his original time" in 1931; the Leipziger papers were likewise not very revealing. The French and British newspapers, a day or two old, gave no clues of any variation from the history he remembered. He didn't recall being involved in the return of a dead woman's body, but of course this was a minor event in the life of a Third Secretary.

    He composed a couple of telegrams to be sent in the morning ...

 


 

 

 

 

Comments (8)

Michael said

at 9:48 pm on Jan 27, 2015

Took my checks, woot, all succeed!

Michael said

at 2:16 pm on Mar 2, 2014

Nonsense; if you had been in the rowing club, it'd be nothing but "let's have White row us, he was a wet Bob in school." You're better off with cricket; nobody expects you to save the world with cricket.

Kirk said

at 2:41 pm on Mar 2, 2014

Or, I foolishly followed Father's advice and took up crew, much to my future regret.

Kirk said

at 1:55 pm on Mar 2, 2014

Makes a fellow wonder if he should have been a wet-Bob after all.

Michael said

at 1:53 pm on Mar 2, 2014

I figure any willingness or tendency to jaunt off, away from civilization, will both make Kevin's job easier, and lead to more Thrilling Adventures.

Michael said

at 12:50 pm on Mar 2, 2014

Veddy!

Kirk said

at 12:40 pm on Mar 2, 2014

Does this mean Freddie takes Teddie sailing regularly?

Michael said

at 12:29 am on Mar 2, 2014

Decided to remove Rugby skill, doubt it'll come up …Sailing will add to referee options

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