I was just about to head back inside when an idea stopped me dead in my tracks.
Patrick Murphy!
Cece had said that he was a cruise regular, exaggerating that he went on a hundred or so a year. Not that I’d normally choose to focus on a rude drunk, but Sam had seemed quite upset when she’d come back from escorting him to his room the day before. I wanted to know more about him—and now I had an excuse.
The previous night, Sam and I had spent a couple of hours studying the layout of the ship, trying to memorize the location of every point of interest. It wasn’t just for our own edification of course; it was also a job requirement. Unlike Sam though, I had the opportunity to wander the ship as I pleased—in fact, it was my duty to visit all the interesting parts—and so memorizing the location of everything was going to be a lot easier for me.
It was about a ten-minute walk from my spot on the constitutional deck to the VIP section, in which Mr. Murphy’s stateroom was located. When I arrived, I immediately made my way to the nearest crew station, where I found a printed list of passengers and their cabins for this section. His room was designated VIP-12.
Pleased at my own cleverness, I sauntered down the hallway with confidence, only to realize that particular corridor ended at VIP-10.
Confidence deflated, I returned to the crew station and made another attempt, this time successful.
Outside the cabin door was a sign reading “The Stateroom of Mr. And Mrs. Patrick Murphy.” Although the sign was of course only temporary, it looked like a permanent fixture and no doubt made the passengers in this section feel like they actually were Very Important People. Perhaps some of them really were.
Next to the door was an ornate lion’s head doorbell that, although undoubtedly made in China for pennies, looked like it had been borrowed from an Edwardian mansion. If there weren’t dozens of identical ones throughout this section of the ship, it certainly would’ve fooled me.
I pressed the button and was mildly disappointed that it rang with a normal ding-dong rather than a roar.
I waited patiently for five seconds, impatiently for another fifteen, and then I rang it again.
After my third attempt at ringing, I decided to change my tactics before giving up and finding someone else to interview. This time, I rapped on the door with my knuckles, regretting it as soon as I realized the ornate white door was actually painted steel. Banging your hand against a steel door is much more painful than doing so against a wooden one. My knocking produced less noise than the ouch I let out in painful surprise.
What I did notice, though, was that the door was not, in fact, fully shut. It was open just about an inch. I stared at the crack between the door and its frame. Was it open when I arrived? Or had it just opened?
I gave it a tentative push and the heavy door slowly began to swing inward.
“Hello?” I called through the crack.
There was no answer. I pushed the door a bit harder and it swung all the way open.
Peering inside, my eyes went wide with shock.
“Oh my…”
The room was so much nicer than mine it didn’t seem fair. While of course I understood that I was just a member of staff and this businessman was paying hundreds or thousands of dollars a night, seeing the difference left a kind of gnawing jealousy inside me.
I’d never be able to afford a room like this. Not in a hundred years.
The floor was laid with marble, and the walls were simply but tastefully decorated with a number of abstract art pieces.
And the lighting! Mine and Sam’s room had no windows and a single too-harsh fluorescent bulb that made the room achingly bright if it was on, or left us in pitch blackness if it was off. But here, there were large sliding windows which let in all the natural light to bounce off the brightly painted walls and copious mirrors spread throughout.
“Hello?” I called. “Mr. Murphy?” I put my head right in through the door but I didn’t yet step inside. “Is anyone there? The door’s open…”
I didn’t get a response. Quickly checking over my shoulder to make sure no one else was watching me, I stepped inside.
“He-llo!” I called, much louder than before, but in a friendly sing-song voice. I didn’t want to sound like a burglar—not that I knew what burglars sounded like.
I took another step inside and something caught my eye. Up ahead, I could see a rather expensive-looking leather sofa, but more importantly, behind it was a shoe sticking out.
The problem was… it didn’t look like it was just a shoe. I thought I could see it attached to a sock. But I couldn’t see any further due to the sofa and my current line of sight.
I took another step forward, moving slightly to the right to get a better viewing angle.
Oh, how I wished I hadn’t.
The shoe was most definitely attached to an entire leg, and presumably the rest of a person beyond.
“Are you sleeping!?” My voice was loud and high pitched, almost yelping. Calm down, I thought, calm down. I took three deep breaths.
“Are you passed out drunk on the floor?” I began to walk forward with nervous little steps. “Please be passed out drunk on the floor. Mr. Murphy! Mr. Murphy…”
Squeezing my hands into tight little fists, I forced myself to keep going. With another couple of steps, I could see right over the sofa and what it had been hiding.
“Oh… no.”
Patrick Murphy was laid out on the floor, a reddish-brown stain surrounding his head. From the angle of one of his arms, it was clear he wasn’t sleeping—not even a very drunk person could sleep at that painful angle.
Patrick Murphy had gone from dead drunk yesterday to actually dead today.
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Reunions and Revelations in Las Vegas: A Humorous Tiffany Black Mystery Page 22