Murphy Bros. Private Investigators: Murphy on the Epistolary Arts

Sunday, January 2, 2011

Murphy on the Epistolary Arts

Hello folks, this is a Personal Communication from your favorite wise-cracking two-fisted shamus. Notice the Mailbag feature, running in the margin on the left (or, if you are logging in from a universe made of antimatter, on the right). Real people write in with their hopes… their dreams… occasionally enclosing cash (this is encouraged); and every single letter receives a prompt and courteous reply. Anyhow a reply.

You are encouraged to participate! If you can’t think of anything (positive) to say, just send the cash! And best of all -- there’s a Swell Contest going on, for the best Letter of the Month. If you win -- you’ll be the winner! The prize is the warm, gooey satisfaction you get when you can pat yourself on the back (an awkward gesture, but it can be done) for having given the mostest of your bestest. And in this economy, that’s about as good as it gets.

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From the Mailbag (SERIOUS ENQUIRIES ONLY)

Dear Mr. and Mr. Murphy:

As a law-enforcement professional, I am pleased that you boys have dedicated your lives to ridding the world of bad guys. Yet as a professional in the field of Law Enforcement, I am distressed that, every time you guys get near the china shop, you break the china. Please clean up your act(s)! I am asking you this in my capacity as a professional enforcer of the Law.

V/R,

Sgt. Lazaro

Greetings, sergeant!

You’re right; and we’re sorry for all the bad stuff we did, and will probably continue doing. But the next time we lift some long green off some yegg that don’t deserve it, we promise to donate it in its entirety to the Policeman’s Ball.

V/V/R,

The Murphys

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Dear Murphys:

Do you have any idea where I left my car keys?

-- Perplexed

Hey Perp.:

What is it about the Interwebs that brings the lamebrains out of the woodwork, always popping up with some off-topic rant or inane inquiry, even to a hi-class quality cultural joint like this one here (O yes we forgot to announce it: string quartet onsite Thursday, usual time, immediately following the poetry reading). We’ve got a good mind to -- No, waitaminit. Wait. Hey, you ain’t -- you wouldn’t be the previous owner of that Dodge what we borrowed and forgot to bring back? Cos in that case we can tell you: keys are still in the ignition, just where you considerately left them; only now broken off some. And hey, we’re really sorry. Really meant to bring it right back good is new. Only, the thing that happened was -- well it’s a long story -- actually a really funny one, keep you in stitches, except maybe for that part at the end where we total your car. Really really sorry about that.

Yours attritely,

Murphy X 2

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Messieurs Murphy:

I write to you in a matter of the utmost delicacy, requiring the most refined discretion. My enquiries have led me to believe that the two of you are of such character as can be relied upon not to (as they say) “spill the beans”.

The matter concerns a diamond -- or as I might say, * the * diamond : none other than that jewel which formed the splendid centerpiece of the crown of Sulayman the Magnificent, who took it in booty, during the wars.

As you may know from your reading of history, the gem in question first went missing in the thirteenth century -- the mystery was never solved -- only to resurface a century later in Amsterdam, in the possession of a secretive Jew. From him it was stolen by none other than Jacques le Cocu, and sold for a princely sum to certain merchants, whose identity remains obscure. From thence it was funneled to the private treasures of Frederick the Great -- only to be once again purloined, under the Ottomans, and sent on to Istanbul. There it now resides, in an underground chamber of the inner sanctum of the Topkapi Palace, under the heavy guard of eunuchs whose fanatical loyalty is unquestionable. For years it has lain there, untouched and unseen.

Yet at last comes a chink in its armor. I have proved able, via various bribes and stratagems, to obtain the combination to a lock which seals a hitherto unguessed-at private entrance to the subterranean chamber. I need you to accompany me, as lookouts, and to do battle with the halberd-wielding eunuchs should they get wind of this. Your payment will be substantial; but your real satisfaction will be to see this peerless jewel at last restored to its rightful owner.

Yours magnificently,

Monsieur le Comte Gran-Tord de Beauville

Dear Monsieur, or Beauville, or however it goes:

Thank you for yours of the sixteenth current. We have noted your proposal. I ran it past our Joey department, and he says, No dice. Sounds too much like repo.

--- --- ---

Dear Murphys:

A bad person stole my teddy-bear. Fluffy is now being held captive in a windowless room in a doorless tower within a moat-ringed castle, guarded by heavily-armed zombie deaf-mutes. Could you maybe get him back for me? I can’t actually pay you till my next allowance, but it shouldn’t be too hard. Here’s the secret plans:

(a) Kill all the zombies.

(b) Blow up the moat.

(c ) Get the bear.

Love,

Ginnie

Dear Ginnie:

We like that action. You’re on.

Meet us by the old oak.

-- M’s.

~ ~ ~

Yo homes!

Man you guys are just tewwwtally kewwwl…. yeww rewwwl, dewwwwdz…I rilly like it how you don’t take no guff from nobody, and how if you see a closed door, you just kick it down. As Casey Stengel put it: “L’audace! Toujours l’audace!”

Jam-Boy

Dear Mr. Jam-Boy:

Thank you for your appreciative letter. Casey Stengel is indeed among our favorite authors.

Only, how’s about you go out and buy a couple copies of our g*d-d*mned book, you so eager and all, stead of showering us with your silly witticisms. Our sales are in the terlet, as Casey would say. Epigrams, we can’t eat!

Steamed,

M&M

~ ~ ~

Dear Mr. Murphy and Mr. Murphy (respectively):

Do you handle Missing Persons cases? I need you to find my husband. He has disappeared.

It has got me really worried. Can’t eat -- can’t sleep. It is his turn to take out the garbage and he is nowhere to be found.

-- Nervous in Newark

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Dear Nervous in Newark:

Missing Persons cases are in fact our bread and butter; and in this case we can share with you some of our expertise for free.

Have you tried looking in the den, in front of the teevee? That is where husbands tend to disappear to, in a case like this. Heck, that’s what *we’d * do.

-- The Murphys

~ ~ ~

Hey Murphys,

I married this babe in Vegas the other day (musta been drunk), but now I’m done with her and want to dump her. Think you could come up with some compromising photographs, maybe Photo-Shop ‘em if need be? There’s an extra fiver in it for you if you can help me ditch her fast, cause I already got another hot date for tonight.

-- Rex

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Rex:

We do not normally do divorce cases, but in your case we’ll make an exception.

*** I divorce thee; I divorce thee; I divorce thee! ***

This formula is valid, under Islamic law.

You have just been read out of the human race.

From the Cracker Barrel

Murphy on the “Allah”/”God” question

Okay fine — not my line — not my deal at all. But it’s all so stupid, I just gotta say something.

Y’see: Folks, they all got these languages. Like, your grandmama spoke Italian, and mine spoke — well, we never knew my dad, and my mom skipped town, but anyhow, somewhere, back in the Old Country, back in the day, great-great-grandfather Patrick and great-great-grandmother Molly were chatting away there in Irish. Capisc’?

So take French. My fans will know this as the frog-talk that I spoke, a little, to such tremendous effect, in one of my famous cases (“Murphy on the Mount”). So like, you & me, we say: “sh*t”; and in France they say, “merde” — pardon my French, it’s actually the only French word I know. So help me out here, dictionary.

Right. We say, “doggie”, and they say, “chien”. And we say, “table”, and they say — well how about that, they say “table” too, only they pronounce it funny. And— here, key point: we say, “God” (like when we’re praying — you gotta not take this name in vain), and the French say — when they’re praying — …. “Dieu”.

Different words — same idea.

— Only, you say: Reeelly? Is it the same idea reeeally?

Well listen, back in Ireland, we got Catholics and we got Protestants, and they both say “God”, but the stupid ones hate each other, and each says the other

guy got his head up his… (checking out the dictionary now — they was French, they’d say “cul”), and if the other guy says “God” (probably not praying, he just hit his thumb with a hammer), he probably means some purple moon-god with three heads or something; but anyhow, no way those bums know what they are talking about.

And in fact they don’t. And we don’t. I mean, How could we? God is infinite — on top of and at the bottom of and behind of, all things. And us? We’re just us, just doing our best, scraping by. And when any one of us says, “God”, it is really just a prayer: saying, “Thou — there — up there, somewhere — Do thou help us to comprehend…” (My Greek buddies got a word for this: Eleison, Kyrie.)

So we do, most of us, mostly the best that we can; but of “God” we got only the vaguest idea. So we just keep on, keeping on — slipping and sinning and screwing things up, century after century; until one day, God gets fed up, and he sends down his only, lonely, begotten son, to straighten things out. — Least that’s what us Catholics believe; the Protestants, I don’t know.

So where was I? — Yes! — You got, probably, somewhere in your bloodlines, your great-great-great-great-….grandmother Fatima, back from when the Crusaders were over there, laying about them with cutlasses; but after a hard day of crusading, a man’s mind turns to other matters; and lo, behold, that dark-haired beauty, her eyes like almonds, her eyes like diamonds — shy, yet inviting — drawing water from the well. And she’s from the other camp, the bad guys; but that ewer is so heavy, and you you’re a knight, right? and a knight does not leave a damsel to her distress, no no no, Saracen or no Saracen; so maybe he will offer her his services, and maybe later she will offer up a cup of the purest, to his parched lips… Anyway, that’s the story of your great-great-etcetera-grandmother Fatima.

So what did Fatima say; and what does her great-great-(you get the idea)-granddaughter, say today, when praying?

They say: “Allah”. Allah! Meaning it, whatever it means.

And they don’t understand what exactly it does mean, any more than we do, any more than you do, any more than that preacher-man who thinks he does know the real deal and you don’t — any more than does any of us, when we say “God”.

But it’s the same prayer…..

For our French and Arabic speaking readers, here's an interesting exploration of the topic:

Allah, c'est Dieu