The shop’s previous owner devoted himself to serving the finest beverages and educating his customers with refined reading materials. After his bankruptcy, Molly bought the place and set up a comfy parlor for working men and woman to talk, read, and relax.
Locals from all places in society gather to discuss the latest news, and share news of their own. Some patrons don't come to drink but instead use Bakers as an information brokerage office, buying and selling whatever knowledge they can. Policemen, criminals, lawyers, parsons, scientists and bankers all come to Barkers. The parlor is busiest mornings and afternoons, although some graveyard shift workers stop for coffee before their nightly labors.
Molly Barker (Business-minded badgerfolk)
Initiative: 5
Physical: 4
Mental: 7
Social: 6
Health: 6
Traits: Nose for Business +3, Motherly +2
Combat: Get out of my Parlor!, Claws (4)
Nahum Potter (Ogre Doorman)
Initiative: 6
Physical: 8
Mental: 5
Social: 4
Health: 12
Traits: Good memory for faces +2, Out you go! +3
Combat: Punch (6)
Layout
In the dry warm confines of Barker’s Coffee Room, the smell of percolating coffee oozes through the air. Nahum the doorman greets each customer and collects their fee. The parlor is an open room lit by gaslights and a large fireplace. Patrons sit at short tables, small booths, and (most coveted of all) in comfy chairs by the fire. Small baskets here and there contain local, continental, and American periodicals or newspapers.
A few young ladies in simple dresses wander the room, carrying trays of cigars, requested reading, or steaming hot coffee. Patrons gather around the tables to talk business and gossip, while solitary figures read in peace.
In the back of the parlor a slatted door opens to the storage room and kitchen. Cigar boxes, coffee bean sacks, old papers tied with string, and numerous rattraps litter one side of the room. An iron gas stove dominates the other. Molly shuffles incessantly between pots of boiling water, and coffee percolators, as younger girls roast meat, pour coffee, and prepare meals.
A staircase near Nahum the doorman’s post leads to the apartments on the first floor, and an empty office area for rent. All rooms are modest, but tidy with large windows open to the street.
Menu
Decent Cigars 3d
Beef and Carrot stew 5d
Toast and Butter 1d
Coffee (1 cup) 2d
Tea (1 cup) 2d
Ham and Eggs 6d
Reading materials
American Traveler
Athenaeum
Daily News
Daily Telegraph
Examiner
Evening Star
Morning Chronicle
Parish Weekly Gazette
Police Gazette
Post
Times
United Service Gazette
World
Encounters
Molly and a group of temperance women gather weekly to enjoy coffee and talk about the troubles of the age. Some patrons avoid visiting during their meetings.
A plump halfling, named Ronald Millchase, habitually reads by the fireplace. Ronald has an amazing memory, and for a shilling will recite articles published in the past month on any requested subject. For ten shillings he will recite articles published in the past ten years, although it does give him a headache.
Barker’s Coffee Room is popular with students needing a place to study late into the night. Molly Baker sometimes makes leaves a fresh pot of coffee for trusted customers planning to spend the night in her parlor.
A worse class of coffee house
To make Barkers a more unseemly coffee house here are a few changes and extra details.
The cost to enter Barker’s is one pence, but the doorman may charge more if the customer looks prosperous. Broken chairs and worm eaten tables clutter the dimly lit parlor with month-old penny papers strewn around them. Vagrants, having paid their pence, use the coffee house to get some sleep in a warm safe place. Molly makes the coffee out of any number of ingredients, but probably not coffee beans.
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