"Who?"
*Sigh*,"Murph."
"Murph?"
"You know who I'm talking about, Shorty. Lt. Murphy." Tannehill glared at the desk sergeant, who, with an additional foot of height provided by the desk pedestal, was able to glare back down at Tannehill with a height advantage of about two feet.
"Oh! Lt. Murphy. It can get confusing here sometimes," Shorty rolled his wrist vaguely a few times in the direction of the precinct. "We recruit heavily from families of Irish descent and Murphy is a common surname."
"I'm aware," Tannehill paused. "I'm not the one who scheduled this appointment, so if you want to keep Lew-ten-ent Murph-ee waiting, I've got all day."
"You sure it's Lt. Murphy you want and not Sgt. Murphy," Shorty continued undaunted, "they're both detectives and civilians often get them confused." Lt. Murphy's sudden appearance through the precinct door prevented the desk sergeant from continuing to stake out his bureaucratic territory.
"Let's head back to my office, CH," Murphy glanced sideways at Shorty and nodded while holding the door open for Tannehill. "Can I get you anything? Need a coffee?"
"I'm fine, thanks," Tannehill walked past Shorty and caught the desk sergeant smiling in triumphant defiance. Once the door closed, he continued. "Good thing you've got him up front. Nothing's gonna get past him be it wild-eyed criminal or long-held grudge."
"He's just doing his job."
"Making me list every possible Murphy in the department?"
"Ensuring the precinct operates in an efficient and orderly manner without any unwanted trespassers."
"Gee, thanks."
"You know what I meant."
"I'm flattered that he still holds a special glee in keeping me frustrated." They continued walking past a short row of desks.
Tannehill whistled, "nice digs," as the two men arrived at an office with Detective Lt. D. Murphy stenciled on the open door. Cramped into the tiny space was a small wooden desk fraying at the edges with a large dent near the center, a swivel chair behind it rivaling Tannehill's for comfort, two squat industrial chairs in front - one with a hole exposing its internal padding - and a three-shelf bookcase off to the side crowned with a dead fern.
"It's hard to avoid the trappings of luxury when you're as important as I am. Please. Have a seat."
Tannehill chose the industrial chair with the exposed padding. "Certainly an upgrade from my office. With the exception of the overwhelming smell of bleach that adds that nostalgic touch of home, of course."
Murphy grunted. "So, what have you heard?"
"What have I heard?" Tannehill was confused. "Aren't you the detective investigating the case? Don't you have anything to tell me?"
"We'll get to that. I assume you haven't been sitting idly by."
"You assume correctly."
"Well?"
"Do you remember the other night at the diner when you asked if I thought the case I was working earlier in the day was connected to the job on Snell?"
"Yeah."
"Yeah. Well. I was non-committal at the time, but I'm less non-committal now."
"Please. Do explain." Murphy pulled a note pad and pencil from his coat pocket.
"I was able to get that name you wanted for follow up. It's Bruner. Emily Bruner. I canvassed her apartment building for a while yesterday and, as fortune decided to favor me, I was able to discover her identity."
"Ok," Murphy jotted the name down, "it's a name. Why do you think she has any connection to this noise?"
"Well, as fortune continued to favor me, I encountered her at a jazz club and we had a chance to chat."
"Oh, I see," Murphy paused and chuckled. "Was this one of your regular jazz clubs or a new one you were trying out? Did you have a chance to sit in on a set or two and play piano?"
"Knock it off, wise guy. Do you want to hear what I have to say or not?"
"Ok, ok. So, somehow, you inexplicably (a) went to a jazz club and (b) encountered this dame at the same jazz club?"
"Yup."
"And immediately upon meeting you she copped to your partner's murder and threw herself at your mercy?"
"Yup. She also informed me that it was she, not Leopold and Loeb, who murdered little Bobby Franks. You get her for this and that and they just might promote you to mayor."
"Alright, alright, point taken. I'll stop. Go on."
"Well, after chatting with her, she wished me a fond farewell by name."
"That's not all that unusual. It's what people normally do in social circumstances."
"Except I didn't tell her my name."
"You sure?"
"I'm a pretty astute observer of determining when my own name passes by my own lips."
"So, based on this evidence, you're ready to send her to the hangman? That she knows your name?"
"I said it made me less non-committal about her involvement. Rather than egging me on, why don't you take a step back and look at the angles for a second? Is it possible that she may have heard my name somewhere else? Certainly. For all I know she's had a secret crush on me and picked just the right time to stoke my interest."
"But, this is also the same woman I was casing at the same time my partner was getting offed. Coincidence?" Tannehill shrugged exaggeratedly. "Sure, why not, but that's a lot of coincidence. Like I said, I don't know what her involvement is here. For all I know, Snell fed her a description of me and the two planned an elaborate joke to act like she knew me if I ever met her. Hell, she may not even know Snell's dead and thinks he'll get a kick out of the joke when they see each other again."
"Still, unless coincidence really does come into play here, whatever her involvement, her impromptu introduction ties her in with Snell somehow."
Murphy was chewing on his pencil, "you've got a point."
"Yes, I've got a point," Tannehill snorted.
"Hey," Murphy put up his hands in defense, "don't get bent out of shape. I didn't say the dots you're connecting don't make sense. But I can't just go up to her and arrest her because she knows your name. I need to figure out how to play this."
"Play this? You're a detective lieutenant for god's sake. Far be it for me to tell you how to do your job, but I do have a few suggestions based on previous experience. Why don't you look her up and ask her about the night in question? We know she has an alibi because it's the same as mine, but maybe something shakes loose during your chat that piques your interest."
"We could do that."
"You could do that?" Tannehill leaned back heavily in his chair, "Murph, you're a good cop. I've worked with you for a long time. I recommended you for promotion. But are you going to let department apathy settle in and drop a promising lead because you need to find a way to 'play this'? Why not just state what you really think and declare the case closed so that your dinner plans aren't interrupted? It's what everyone else around here does."
Murphy's voice dropped ominously. "Watch it CH. You're not exactly playing in friendly territory right now," he growled. "I promise you, we'll follow up on this, but it has to be in a time and a manner of my choosing so I don't randomly bully citizens simply for knowing someone's name."
"Fine." The two men stared at each other for an eternity. "That's all I have at the moment. You said you have something to share with me?"
Murphy's voice loosened and he started gnawing on his pencil again. "Well, now. This is where things get interesting. We're not certain that Snell died of a gunshot wound."
[Author's note: This edition breaks records at 1309 words for a running total of 15457. I was originally going to discuss Murphy's finding in this chapter, but it looks like that'll fit nicely in a chapter of its own. When I first wrote Shorty, I made his nickname literal. I decided to make it ironic to show that Tannehill isn't afraid (or lacks the common sense to avoid) to battle someone who's significantly taller than he is.]
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