The Murdoch Files: Volume 2

By Jeannie Meekins

Murdoch - the stereotypical hero of all B-Grade stories - is an idiot.

The Murdoch Files: Volume 2 follows Murdoch's adventures through the genres of the 1960s to the 1980s. Full colour has finally arrived! The world is full of glitz and glamour, and everything is larger than life. It is a time when action and adventure were high: where danger and death were all part of the days work; where men were men and women . . . weren't.

From urban city streets to beautiful Paris. From the North Pole to the sandy, sun soaked beaches. Through all the genres that made us cringe and cheer in equal amounts. Murdoch is still haplessly battling his way in and out of trouble, and winning the hearts of women along the way. But, alas, age is catching up with our hero. Can he still make the world a better place for all of us before he loses his mind - and his rugged good looks?

This volume contains the final 12 Murdoch adventures:
The Young and Very Naughty Boys
The Horrible Haunted Estate
Murdoch MD
The Big Daddy-o Beach Blanket Bingo Party
Two Days, Twenty Seven Minutes and Fifty Three Seconds in Paris
Murdoch Secret Agent
Gadzooka Vs Sushima
Murdoch Cop
Camp Scamps
Lizzie, come back, please
The Big Santa Christmas Caper
Free Gramps

Murdoch’s adventures are also available as individual books.

These satirical stories are written in the tradition of B-Grade stories, complete with all the stereotypes, creativity and effects – flaws and all.
The characters are purely fictitious. Any similarities with any person, living or dead, are entirely coincidental.
The stories are not meant to offend. If you may be offended, please don’t download.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jeannie Meekins
• Release date: Sep 28, 2015

Jeannie Meekins

Jeannie Meekins is an Australian writer who lives with her children and a couple of cats who think they own the computer. And if her dog could read, he’d be jealous, so it’s lucky that he can’t. Jeannie has also written over 10 books for children, many available through LearningIsland.com

Book preview

The Murdoch Files

Volume 2

The Murdoch Files

Volume 2

Text copyright (C) AT Davidson 2002 – 2012

Smashwords edition (C) 2015

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient.

If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your u se only, please go to Smashwords.com or any online bookstore and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

These satirical stories are written in the tradition of B-Grade stories, complete with all the stereotypes, creativity and effects – flaws and all.

The characters are purely fictitious.  Any similarities with any person, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

The stories are not meant to offend.  If you feel offended, please don’t download this book, or delete it from your system.

Contents

The Young and Very Naughty Boys

The Horrible Haunted Estate

Murdoch MD

The Big Daddy-o Beach Blanket Bingo Party

Two Days, Twenty Seven Minutes and Fifty Three Seconds in Paris

Murdoch: Secret Agent

Gadzooka Vs Sushima

Murdoch Cop

Camp Scamps

Lizzie, come back, please

The Big Santa Christmas Caper

Free Gramps

About the Author

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The Young

And Very Naughty

Boys

We only see the very last of the overlaid white letters. It is as though we have been weeping. The vision is blurred, but we know all too well where we are. It is the black and white world of . . . Wait a minute! Now there is a car that is most definitely not of nineteen-forties vintage, or of the decade following. It seems to be a nineteen sixty Plymouth. We can’t see too clearly as it is night. In the early nineteen-sixties the world was still black and white (although a somehow crisper black and white). We know this from our old junior school photos of that era. We are feeling pretty good now. Time is moving along nicely. Perhaps we need never venture into the forties and fifties again? God, perhaps we will either fall asleep or get away from this place? We see the streets are wet. It has either been raining or the D.M.S.L.A.T.I.H.J.R (Department for Making Streets Look As Though It Has Just Rained) has been by recently. We see a group of five tall people silhouetted against the backdrop swagger towards us. It seems as though they all have their thumbs hitched into their belts. As they draw closer, we see that they wear leather jackets, cuffed baggy jeans and that they are not really as tall as we thought. They all wear their hair in high, greasy pompadours. Some smoke. Others don’t. One punches the arm of another and he then flinches and takes a swing back. The original aggressor ducks and pulls a length of chain attached to his belt and which is stowed in the inside pocket of his jacket. He swings it at his victim relentlessly, beating him about the head and shoulders. His victim falls, and when we see him in close up, we see that his face, chest and mouth are bleeding. The other three look on and chuckle, one for longer than the others. This one's name is Chuckles. The man who has just assaulted the fellow (who is Jerry, his best friend) is called Johnny. His real name is Paul (he is just called Johnny). The other two are Mike and Lester. We believe that these fellows are a street gang of the early sixties. They are outsiders, rebels without, because. They are cheap punks and when they address an older person, they call him dad, or perhaps knife him. They carry chains and knifes and they are subject to pimples and halitosis. They are Juvenile Delinquents or Young and Very Naughty Boys. They do most everything that kids do these days but, in many cases, they display a little more tact and tastefully choose their victims from assorted people they know to have actually done them wrong. There are no Drive-by shootings; those were more often practiced in the much earlier nineteen thirties. Johnny puts his chain away and there is a car approaching the Young and Very Naughty Boys from down the lane. It stops a yard or so from them. A rugged man with a Devil-may-care expression gets out of the driver’s side and walks up to them, only taking a cursory glance at the fallen and bloodied boy. He shakes his head and lights up a Lucky Strike. Cigarettes have gone up in price since last we saw this very familiar fellow smoking one.

‘Wazza matter, cop?’ one of The Young and Very Naughty Boys asks. Obviously the fellow is a plain clothes detective and known to them.

The cop sneers and slowly shakes his head.

We know him too. His name is Murdoch and we admit that we are rather surprised to see that he has joined the police force. Last time we saw him he was dangling naked from a suspension bridge high in the Andes.

‘What gives, punks?’ Murdoch says as he exhales a stream of smoke into Johnny’s face. Johnny sneers and his hand twitches. But he does not reach for his knife.

‘Nuthin, dad. Just takin’ in a little air, that’s all.’

The other boys nod and say, ‘Yeah . . . Yeah.’

Murdoch is nonplussed. He takes another draw from his cigarette. He looks down at the bloodied boy on the ground.

‘What happened here, punks?’

‘Nuthin, dad. He . . . fell down, that’s all . . . dig?’

Murdoch throws his cigarette to the ground and, like a flash of lightning, delivers a hard and stinging slap to the youth’s face. Murdoch flinches and flexes his injured hand as he draws it away.

‘I asked what happened here, you punks?’

‘Yeah, and I told ya, dad!’ Johnny exclaims. ‘Man, we guys just can’t go nowhere in this city without you coppers jiving us like this, dad. It's time to hit the road. We gonna get our boy here to see a doctor or somethin’. Ain’t that right, boys . . .?’ The others nod, including the bleeding youth on the ground.

‘Yeah J-Johnny,’ he says and bleeds some more. It is a great and noble thing to know Johnny and be in a street gang. Ask any kid you encounter.

Murdoch now has his injured hand inside his jacket pocket. Johnny’s hair is in a state of disarray. One greasy clump hangs over his face and dangles near his chin. With a flick of his head, it flies back into place. Murdoch is splashed with hair oil. He is incensed and wants to slap Johnny some more. But, as far as he knows, there is no crime in falling down bleeding in an alleyway, or being spattered with hair oil. Due to this, he must let the Young and Very Naughty Boys go.

Murdoch smiles. ‘Hey, you boys wouldn’t be smoking reefers, would you?’

The youths shake their heads. Johnny smirks after lifting his bleeding friend from the alleyway and throwing his arm over his shoulder.

‘Listen, dad—why don’t you just scram? We gotta get Jerry here to the sawbones, quick. Dig . . .?’

Murdoch looks on as the youths pass him. He stands watching, hands on hips, feet widely parted. He now looks a little like a demented Burt Lancaster. His face is illuminated as he lights up another Lucky Strike and exhales.

‘Darn fool kids,’ he sighs, turns and walks back to his car. In the background, we see someone in overalls hosing down the street.

*

Ah, now we see Murdoch back at the East six hundred and fifty third police station. He lies back in his chair and he is in his white shirt and thin, black tie. Maybe it is dark green, or red? The tie is loosened and askew. His top button is undone. Underneath, we can see the collar of his white T-shirt. His feet are on his desk. All around there are phones constantly ringing. Suddenly he starts and goes to drag his feet from the desk. He overbalances and, arms pin-wheeling to regain balance, he falls sideways onto the floor. He is up in a flash and he grabs his own phone. We had no idea it was ringing. In this noisy place how could you?

‘Yeah,’ he says and sits on the edge of his desk. He pulls out his packet of Lucky Strikes and lights one. ‘Uh huh . . . sure, okay,’ he says and nods. Then he aims the phone at the cradle and tosses it. It falls to the floor.

Ed McGriskey does this all of the time and each time the phone finds its mark. Murdoch figures that he’ll just have to keep on trying. Practice makes perfect. He is just about to reach for the phone again when the chief, Captain Asshead, approaches and calls for him to come into his office. Murdoch nods and swaggers across the room.

He walks into the captain’s office and the captain has already insinuated himself behind his desk. The captain sighs and indicates that Murdoch sits down and this Murdoch does.

‘Murdoch . . .’ Captain Asshead smiles. ‘You don’t mind if I call you Murdoch, do you?’ he asks and raises his eyebrows. Murdoch smiles back and gives his eyebrows a work out.

‘No, not at all, Captain. It’s my name.’

The captain looks down at his desk and nods. He says nothing for a moment, then: ‘Look, Murdoch, the Commissioner is giving us all types of heavy jive about these street gangs. The man says we should be able to clear it all up in a flash. They’re only kids, after all. Says there’s been too many knifings and such. You noticed any more than usual, Murdoch, huh?’

Murdoch shakes his head. ‘No, Captain, just a lot of bleeding kids falling down in dark alleyways. Other than that . . .’

‘Of course, but incidents like that are only to be expected,’ the captain nods. ‘Still, we ought to do something about it, Murdoch. You personally know anyone of the young adult variety?’

Murdoch frowns and rubs his chin. ‘Hmmm, hey, I think I do . . . my kid sister’s kid, Grazio. Why that boy’s so clean you could eat off of him, Captain.’

‘One of those kids who looks like he’s just got outta the shower, huh?’

‘Out of twenty-five showers, Captain Asshead,’ Murdoch corrects.

Captain Asshead’s eyes light up. We now notice he strongly resembles Robert Taylor, only he’s older still.

‘Maybe if you could have a talk with him . . .? Get a little insight into these crazy kids? Find out what kind of music they’re into, apart from this delinquent Rock and/or Roll . . .?’

‘Well, I guess I could give it a try, Captain . . .’

The captain smiles and pulls a packet of Lucky Strikes from his coat pocket. He offers Murdoch one and sighs, shaking his head. ‘I just don’t know where these kids get all their tough guy attitudes and bad habits from . . . Smoking reefers . . . geez . . .’

Murdoch accepts a light and nods. ‘I know what you mean, Captain. Those reefers are dangerous. I caught a punk kid smoking one just the other day. Well, did I give him what for? Grabbed the little punk by the neck and lifted him clear off the ground.’

The captain chuckles. ‘I miss being on the street . . .’

‘Then he starts going all red in the face, and I says—get this—I says: "Not so tough now, are you, you greasy punk?"

The captain is slapping the desk top and braying laughter. Murdoch takes a drag on his Lucky Strike and nearly chokes, turning what we assume is a bright red, as he also laughs. The captain notices this, points at him, and bellows more laughter. Soon both men are in stitches. The captain sighs and wipes his eyes.

‘You do that then, Murdoch. Ask this kid with the wop name what’s happening in the kid world. See if you can’t come up with something we don’t know, okay?’

Murdoch wipes his eyes and gets to his feet. ‘Okay, Captain, will do,’ he says, then looks down at the seat and, before pushing it back towards the desk, looks down again, takes out his handkerchief and gives it a quick wipe.

We see Murdoch back behind his desk. He has the phone in his hand. He aims for the cradle but misses. The whole unit falls to the floor with a loud DING!

*

‘Hello, Uncle Murdoch, sir,’ Grazio says.

Murdoch smiles, walks up to the boy, places him in a headlock and messes his coiffure with his right hand. When the boy begins to sob, Murdoch sets him free. Grazio flinches when Murdoch’s hand comes to rest on his shoulder.

‘How’s it going, Grazio?’ Murdoch asks and then smiles. He doesn’t look like Burt Lancaster at all now. We see, in the light of day, that he has aged considerably. He is (we note with shock) also developing a paunch. Grazio wipes his eyes with the back of his hand and smiles. ‘Um, pretty okay, Uncle Murdoch,’ he sniffles.

The scene fades as the two turn and walk in through the front door of a house.

Then we see a sunny shot of the outside of what we guess is the same house. It is double-storeyed and has a white picket fence neatly surrounding it. We can hear disembodied voices and, for a moment, we panic before realising that it is Murdoch, his sister and his nephew, talking inside:

‘—so I says . . . I says, Take it to the cleaners if you don’t like the smell . . . ’

‘Oh, that’s very funny of you, Murdoch. Could you pass the peas when you’ve finished with them, please . . .?’

‘Yeah. Then this other punk comes up and he says, Hey, what‘re you looking at? So, I look right back at him and I says, I’m #* if I know. You tell me! ’

‘. . . Murdoch, could you pass the peas, please . . .?’

‘I tell you, Eunice, it’s a laugh a minute on the Police Force—tee hee . . .’

‘Er . . . Uncle Murdoch, sir. Could you pass—’

*SLAP!*

‘Don’t you talk to me that way, you punk kid!’

Then we hear a chair being dragged away from the table, then sobbing. Then we hear another chair being dragged along the linoleum. Then we are suddenly in the kitchen of Murdoch’s sister, Eunice’s, house. She looks angry. She looks like Anne Francis in pain. She stands before the table with her hands on her hips; feet widely parted . . .

‘Murdoch . . . you didn’t have to strike him like that!’

Murdoch holds an empty bowl of peas in his hand. On the table his plate is piled with them. He looks up at his sister with a forlorn expression.

‘Oh, come on, Eunice. You’re overreacting!’

‘No I’m not. Things have been difficult for Grazio lately. Since his father’s passing, he’s been very quiet and remote. He lacks the confidence of other boys his age. I am coming to think that perhaps, due to the changes in his body during adolescence, coupled with the lack of masculine camaraderie in the household, that he may very well be turning inwardly to his inner psyche and may becoming outwardly coupled with a slight upwardly spiralling Oedipus Complex and a rather disturbing downward display of exhibitionism towards those of the same gender. I think that if you continue to strike him, he will become—’

‘The hell any nephew of mine will turn faggot!’ Murdoch interrupts.

‘What?’ Eunice says, shaking her head.

‘Well, look Eunice, I can read between the lines, you know? What that boy needs is to get outside and get his hands dirty—get rid of that stupid hairstyle of his and play some manly sports, like gridiron, baseball; go on camping and hunting trips, go to the boxing ring, watch some wrestling . . . You know, all those manly things that you can only do correctly with other men.’

We see Eunice shaking her head in disbelief. But we could be wrong, we suppose.

‘He needs some understanding, Murdoch. That’s all.’

‘Ah,’ Murdoch growls, dismissing this comment with a wave of his hand. ‘That’s what the trouble is with kids nowadays. They’re understood to death. Why, look at us, Eunice . . . Mom and Pop never understood us at all. Too much understanding and you get these street punks that the department has been having so much trouble with lately. Sure, they come from the poor parts of town and sleep with cockroaches and play tag with rats. But they’ve always done that—they done it in our day too.

‘Now these new-fangled psychologists are running around and saying that these punks need understanding, not a kick to the blunt end of the body with the sharp end of the foot, which is what they do need. Mark my words, Eunice, before too long we’re gonna have a country full of whining sissies, wearing leather jackets and spitting on the sidewalk. Next we’ll have kids avoiding the army and whining that they won’t kill! Then, if that keeps up, we’ll have kids growing their hair long and carrying flowers around with them. Punks . . . all of them just punks!’

Eunice is still shaking her head. Murdoch takes a deep breath and smiles. He looks at his sister.

‘Coffee on . . .?’

The lights go out. They don’t dim and flicker like they used to. And it is only for a split second. Then we see Murdoch sipping from a coffee cup and sitting on the end of a bed in a bedroom which has a STOP sign fastened to a wall and a pennant which reads: LIVERDALE HIGH, on another. Murdoch, we see, is looking at the stop sign and clucking his tongue. It is city property. If this wasn’t his nephew he would beat and arrest the punk. Grazio who (we now notice) looks like a cloned representation of a young Frankie Avalon.

‘So what’s new on the Hit Parade, Grazio?’ Murdoch smiles.

Grazio smiles back, reluctantly. He gets up from the bed and walks over to something that looks like a small reinforced cardboard briefcase. He places it on his bed and opens it. When the top is folded back on its hinges, we see a turntable. On it, there is a forty five rpm vinyl record.

‘So, what’s that platter, Grazio?’ Murdoch smiles uneasily.

‘Ricky Nelson, sir,’ Grazio says.

Murdoch smiles vacantly and nods his head. ‘That Ozzie and Harriet are fine people, Grazio. Little Ricky has to be a model teenager then—right?’

‘Yes, Uncle Murdoch, sir.’

‘So then, it’s a platter that matters. That right, Grazio . . .?’

‘Um . . . yes sir.’

‘Well, spin the disk, son . . . let’s hear it.’

‘Yes sir . . . right away, sir,’ Grazio says and, with trembling hands, plugs the unit into the wall socket. Immediately the disk spins around and Grazio lifts the stylus and places it gently on the record. Grazio stares at his uncle uneasily. We are almost wont to believe he not only fears him, but despises him.

"Oh-oh, my Sweet Sue, she looks like a queen—

She howls like a dog—

You know what I mean—?"

Suddenly, Murdoch flies up from the bed, spilling his coffee cup. He lifts the portable record player from the desk and then hurls it against the wall. Sparks shower out and it begins to smoke. As he does this, he bears a striking resemblance to B-grade movie actor, John Ireland.

‘U-Uncle M-Murd-doch . . .?’

We see that Grazio is now cringing on his bed. Murdoch stands, considering the destroyed and smoking appliance. He sighs, lowers his head and then rubs his chin. He then looks up at Grazio. The young man flinches.

‘Look, I tell you what, Grazio . . . how about next Saturday we both go to the fights? There's nothing like seeing two fellows striking each other in the head and bleeding profusely to get you feeling better about yourself. What do you say, son?’

‘Y-y-yes, U-U-U-ncl-l-le M-Mur-d-doch, s-sir . . .’

We see Murdoch smiling in close up. ‘Good, then it’s a date,’ he says, and frowns, ‘Ah, wait, no, not a date, an . . .? An outing . . . Yes, an outing to the fights—that’s it . . .’

Grazio is trembling. We see tiny flames licking upwards from the destroyed record player. ‘Y-yes . . . a-an ou-outing, sir . . .’

Murdoch reaches forward and Grazio folds himself into the foetal position. Murdoch messes the young man’s hair and frowns. ‘Okay, till then . . . then . . .’

As Murdoch leaves the room, we hear the muffled sound of Grazio frantically beating at the blazing record player with a blanket.

Then the lights go out for a second, and the scene changes. Murdoch has another coffee and is talking to Eunice, whilst leaning against the kitchen counter.

‘Say, what did the dago die of again?’

‘What?’ Eunice says.

‘Well, Grazio’s father. Who did you think I was talking about?’

‘Well, for your information, Murdoch, his name was Carmine. And you know darned well that you shot him!’

Murdoch rests his cup on the counter and rubs his chin. ‘Oh yeah . . . Yeah, that’s right.’

Eunice rests her head in her hands and sighs.

‘Well, he was raping that striptease artist, after all, Eunice . . .’

Eunice looks up. She is shaking her head in disbelief. ‘He was robbing a jewellery store!’

‘Huh? . . . Oh, yeah, so he was. Raping a stripper; robbing a jeweller—pretty much the same type of thing.’

‘Get out, Murdoch!’

‘Huh?’ Murdoch frowns. ‘How’s that again?’

‘I said, GET OUT!’

Eunice is on her feet, trembling with rage. Murdoch looks at his watch and decides he is late. He exits the kitchen. Then, as he is about to walk down the front steps with Eunice behind him and ready to slam the door shut, he smiles and turns.

‘The kid and I are going to the fights next Satur—’

The door slams in his face before he can finish. He gets to his car and wonders why the hell he had come here in the first place. He smiles, shakes his head and gets in the vehicle.

We have a five minute interlude of Murdoch behind the wheel of his car. The background shows us that he has driven to Queens, via San Francisco. Then the lights dim again and we see Murdoch behind his desk, flinging the telephone receiver. He misses several times.

*

A man wearing a dark, straw trilby, with a wide, shiny band and a tie which is loosened to expose the undone top button of his white shirt, enters the room. He stands, arms crossed, and watches as Murdoch aims the phone for the cradle. He walks behind and, as Murdoch is on the back swing, he grabs the phone from him and tosses it straight onto the cradle. Murdoch turns and screams: ‘How do you do that?’

The man’s name is Ed McGriskey. Like Murdoch, he is a cop. A slightly better one, we think.

‘Murdoch,’ he says, bending forward so he can see Murdoch better as the latter covers his face with both hands, ‘there’s been a knifing. Two punks were seen running from the scene of the crime. The officer on patrol said they had high, greasy pompadours and were wearing leather jackets.’

Murdoch removes his hands from his face. ‘Pompadours . . . leather jackets?’

‘Yeah, you know, Murdoch. They're those hairstyles that are all greasy and piled up high on the head. And leather, well, that's the treated hide of cattle—’

Murdoch looks up at his colleague and looks around for his hat, before recalling that he doesn’t own one. He believes that compulsive hat wearing was the cause of his personality disorder. Still, he admires McGriskey’s hat very much.

If worse came to worse, and he had to wear one, it would be in the style of McGriskey’s.

We watch as Murdoch follows McGriskey out to their car. The street has been worked on by The Department for Making Streets Look, etc. etc. Instead of a man wearing white overalls, we see a tall cowboy with a limp amble by in the background holding a hose.

Then the scene changes. There are the flashing domes of the squad cars and a small crowd of people grouped around a covered body. The cover is bloodstained, we think. It could just as easily be chocolate syrup. The grouped people all have their hands on their hips and feet widely parted. Murdoch sighs and shakes his head on seeing this and gets out of the car, following McGriskey.

‘What have we got here?’ Murdoch asks of a uniformed man. The man says nothing at first, then: ‘Whadd’ya think? We’re waiting for the unveiling of a statue, or somethin’?’

Murdoch becomes angry. Then, turning to the man, notices that the uniform he wears is that of a street cleaner.

‘Buzz off, Poindexter,’ he says and the street cleaner shakes his head and leaves. Murdoch walks towards the sheet covered body and, while McGriskey speaks to the officer who discovered the body, he lifts the cover.

‘The victim is female,’ Murdoch begins, ‘aged between . . . oh, sixteen to sixty five. Fair hair and . . .’ He reaches forward and pries open one eyelid. ‘Blue eyes. Approximately, oh—say . . . ten feet four inches tall. Distinguishing features . . . hmm . . . small, gaping wound to left breast—’

‘Murdoch, what are you doing?’ McGriskey asks.

‘Examining the body, McGriskey. What do you think I’m doing?’

‘The Medical Examiner needs to see it first. We shouldn’t even so much as look at it before he gives us the okay!’

‘Oh yeah?’

‘Yeah, that’s right. Standard procedure, Murdoch.’

‘Oh yeah . . .?’

‘Yeah, Murdoch.’

‘Think you’re tough, don’t you, McGriskey?’

‘Yeah . . . yeah, I do, Murdoch . . .’

‘Oh yeah . . .?’

‘Oh yeah . . .’

We watch as Murdoch shoves McGriskey with the heel of his hand and the other cop staggers back slightly. We feel a little nauseous now. Perhaps McGriskey will, in anger, pull his gun on Murdoch and shoot the maniac?

‘Don’t push me around in front of the men like that, Murdoch,’ McGriskey says in a subdued tone. Murdoch places his hands on his hips and chuckles. McGriskey approaches Murdoch until they are almost nose to nose.

‘You’re an idiot, Murdoch. You know that? You’re washed up—a has-been!’

‘Oh yeah, McGriskey—Mr. Phone Tosser supreme. Well, let me tell you something: I’m a better man than you, man and boy, ever was.’

‘Tell it to someone who cares and can remember that far back, Murdoch. You’re a paranoid schizophrenic. You have no idea what you’re doing half of the time and you can’t toss a phone onto its cradle for peanuts!’

‘Paranoid schizophrenic? I’m in two minds about how to take that, McGriskey!’

‘Take it, or leave it, Murdoch.

‘Oh yeah . . .?’

‘Oh yeah,’ McGriskey growls.

‘Well, we’ll see . . . Mr Poopypants . . .!’

Before this argument has time to develop into a scuffle, the M.E. arrives and sees Murdoch. He rubs his forehead and shakes his head.

Obviously Murdoch is getting worse. In days gone by, he was goofy, but tolerable. We wonder just how much longer Murdoch can survive this gig.

The M.E. uncovers the body and begins his preliminary examination:

‘Male . . . aged fifteen. Auburn hair . . . brown eyes . . . approximately, oh—five foot, eight inches . . .’

The M.E. gets to his feet. ‘This kid’s been stabbed to death,’ he says and walks off. The further away from Murdoch, the better, as far as he is concerned. Murdoch frowns and rubs his chin.

‘I know who did this,’ he says to no one in particular.

*

Suddenly, after a brief lights out, we are looking at a group of all but uninhabitable, rat and cockroach infested dwellings on the Lower West of the Upper East Side, but just a smidgeon to the North. We wonder how such buildings could be tolerated in the most wealthy and powerful nation on earth. But we try not to think about this too much. Then we are inside one of these hovels. There is the smell of pungent cooking oil, garlic, re-fried beans, stale sweat and staler feet. We see a door before us, which is in need of a paint job. It is as solid looking as plywood. As if to prove this, a foot swings forward and the whole door collapses, falling inside and onto the floor with a pathetic slap. There is a chubby middle-aged woman wearing a white slip, with curlers in her hair. A cigarette stub is pasted to her mouth. She sits at a table on an orange crate. She turns slightly to look at us.

‘Yeah, can I help ya?’

‘Yeah, you can help, lady. I’m here to see that no good, knife and chain wielding, punk son of yours. Where does he hide out?’

We know the voice. It is Murdoch for sure. Then . . .

Yes, there he is, hands on hips, feet widely parted, assuming his hero cop posture. He moves through the room kicking at every door he comes to. They all collapse. The woman follows his progress, rather disinterestedly, her cigarette—a Lucky Strike—smouldering.

‘He’s in the john,’ she says.

‘Where’s the john, lady, or do I have to slap it out of you?’

She hitches her thumb over her right shoulder.

‘Good thinking, lady,’ Murdoch says, lighting a Lucky Strike of his own. He throws the dead match onto the floor and prances across the room towards the john.

After kicking in the door, he encounters a young, skinny black boy