by Lee Goldberg
“I doubt it,” Monk said.
“Why?” I said. “Why would the killer be here, of all places?”
Monk stopped and looked at me. “Think about it. This is the perfect place for him to hide. A small town clear across the world. Not just any small town, but one steeped in death and disease, one that was so horrific that it spawned an enduring nightmare like Snow White.”
“This is a lovely town,” I said. “Snow White is a beloved fable.”
“Lohr is the last place on earth I would ever look for him or ever visit,” Monk said. “He knew that.”
“And yet here you are, by sheer coincidence, in the one place on earth he chose to hide.”
“It’s fate,” he said.
“It’s ridiculous,” I said. “Besides, you don’t believe in coincidences, especially when murder is involved.”
“I do now,” Monk said.
I didn’t know whether or not Monk had actually seen a man with six fingers. But I didn’t believe for one moment that the man who ordered Trudy Monk’s death was hiding out in Lohr, Germany. It was obvious to me what was really happening.
“I have a much more logical explanation for what you saw,” I said.
“What could possibly be more logical than what I just told you?”
“You are in a place where you’ve never been and you have to adapt to a totally different language, culture, and way of life than you are familiar with. It makes you uncomfortable— you said so yourself last night. On top of that, you are facing a day where you have nothing to do. You couldn’t deal with it, so in a panic your mind invented something that would completely occupy your thoughts and distract you from all the frightening differences around you.”
Monk stared at me for a long moment before saying, “That is the craziest thing I’ve heard.”
“You can’t tolerate change and you can’t tolerate the idea of having a day off,” I said. “So you created a purpose for yourself that couldn’t be denied: finding Trudy’s killer, even though we are in the least likely place for you to find him.”
“Which is exactly why he is here,” Monk said. “You have just proven my point.”
“You didn’t listen to a word I said.”
“Yes, I did,” Monk said. “But just the words that made sense, which was roughly one out of ten.”
“You mean you only listened to what you wanted to hear.”
“Of course. Why would I do otherwise? That would be like intentionally eating something that makes you sick.”
I couldn’t argue with that analogy. It was totally accurate and unintentionally revealing. He couldn’t listen to anything that conflicted with his extraordinarily rigid worldview.
“So what do you want to do? A door-to-door search?”
“Good idea,” Monk said. “Let’s gather those kids who dress up as the Three Kings and get them to do another collection. We can tag along and see who opens the doors.”
“That doesn’t seem very practical, Mr. Monk. January sixth is a long way off and I don’t think anybody will be fooled.”
“You’re right. We don’t have the time to take the subtle approach,” Monk said.
“That was subtle?”
“We have to go to the police.”
“What can they do?” I said. “There hasn’t been a crime.”
“My wife was murdered,” Monk said.
“I know, Mr. Monk, and I don’t mean to deny the pain and loss that you feel. But she wasn’t killed here and there’s no evidence that the eleven-fingered man you saw, if you even saw him, was the man who did it.”
“That’s why we need the police,” Monk said. “If we find the man, we’ll find the evidence.”
“I have a better idea,” I said. “Let’s hold off doing anything until your appointment with Dr. Kroger tomorrow. Maybe he can help you work through the issues at the heart of all of this.”
“Tomorrow could be too late,” Monk said. “The killer could be packing up and preparing for his escape right now.”
“Okay, let’s see Dr. Kroger today.”
Dr. Kroger wouldn’t be too pleased, but Monk’s mental health took precedence as far as I was concerned.
“I don’t need a psychiatrist,” Monk said. “I need a special unit of trained detectives scouring this godforsaken place for the man who killed my wife.”
And with that, Monk marched off in search of the police and I saw my vacation slipping away into madness.
The Lohr police station wasn’t much larger than the tourist office and it was occupied by just two people: the female dispatcher and a uniformed officer at the counter, who turned out to be the same guy who’d witnessed Monk’s meltdown in the town square and carried him back to the car.
The officer’s name was Schust. To say he was unsympathetic to Monk’s request would be an understatement.
I could understand that, but I was on Monk’s side. Because when it comes down to it, despite whatever reservations I may have, my job is to support and assist Monk in any way I can.
“Perhaps Mr. Monk hasn’t made the situation clear,” I said. “He is a special consultant to the San Francisco Police Department and he’s investigating a murder.”
Officer Schust looked skeptically at Monk. “He’s a detective?”
“The best in America,” I said.
I didn’t believe Monk was right, but I had to do whatever I could to help his cause. Besides, I figured the sooner I could prove to him that either he was delusional or the six-fingered man he saw wasn’t the killer, the sooner we could get back to enjoying our vacation.
“He’s afraid of cobblestones,” Schust said.
“If you were smart, you would be, too,” Monk said. “One wrong move and you could break your neck. Those streets should be paved.”
“We aren’t going to pave the streets,” Schust said. “And we aren’t going to do a door-to-door search for an eleven-fingered man either.”
“I want to see whoever is in charge here,” I said.
“You’ll have to come back another time,” Schust said. “Hauptkriminalkommissar Stoffmacher is unavailable.”
“We’ll wait,” Monk said.
“He could be gone all day,” the officer said. “He’s investigating a homicide.”
“Perfect,” I said. “Point us to the crime scene so Mr. Monk can solve the murder and the Hauptkriminalkommissar can focus all of his attention on finding our man.”
“A crime scene is not a tourist attraction,” Schust said. “We’re done here, Fräulein Teeger.”
The officer turned and went back to his desk. When Monk looked at me, his expression of steely determination was back.
“This isn’t such a big town. It shouldn’t be too hard to find the crime scene,” Monk said. “We’ll just drive around until we find a bunch of police cars.”
“They still won’t let us cross the police line,” I said. “What we need is an introduction. Wait here.”
I stepped outside, took out my cell phone, and called Captain Stottlemeyer. I hadn’t forgotten that we were nine hours ahead of San Francisco, but this was an emergency.
Stottlemeyer answered groggily. “Yeah.”
“It’s Natalie, Captain. I need a favor.”
“Do you know what time it is here?”
“Let me ask you a question,” I said. “Did you arrest that crazy woman for murdering her sleazy son-in-law?”
“Yeah, we did,” Stottlemeyer said. “Can I go back to sleep now?”
“I need more details,” I said.
“Monk was right. Her fingerprints were all over the iron. When she was confronted with the evidence, she spilled the whole thing. We couldn’t shut her up. Satisfied?”
“So you’re in Mr. Monk’s debt,” I said.
“Yeah, I owe him one,” Stottlemeyer said. “When he gets back, I’ll let him organize my desk.”
“That’s not going to be enough,” I said.
“He gets paid for this,” Stottlemeyer said.
“You fired him, remember? He did this out of the kindness of his heart and a deep, abiding sense of public service.”
“He did it because he’s compulsive and he can’t let go of this stuff.”
“That doesn’t matter. The fact is, you’d still be heading nowhere on this case if he hadn’t taken time out of his dream vacation to help you. Now all he’s asking for is a small favor in return.”
“What did you have in mind?”
“We need you to call the police in Lohr, Germany, and convince them that Mr. Monk is a very important and respected member of the San Francisco Police Department.”
“Why do they have to know that?”
“Does it matter?”
“Yeah, because a call like that makes whatever Monk is doing official and a reflection on our department. And second, if you’re hesitating to tell me why you need me to vouch for him, it must be something big. Has he stumbled on a dead body already?”
I sighed. “Mr. Monk caught a glimpse of a man in a crowd today and then lost him. We need the police to help us find the guy.”
“What has the guy done? Was he missing a button on his shirt? Was he only wearing one earring? Was his shoe untied?”
“He had six fingers on his right hand.”
“Oh hell,” Stottlemeyer said.
“You see my predicament.”
“Do you really believe that’s what Monk saw?”
“What’s important is that he believes it,” I said. “Nothing means more to him than finding Trudy’s killer. Even if there’s only a one-in-a-billion chance that he’s right, we have to support him, no matter what.”
“This could end up being a tragic embarrassment for him and for us,” Stottlemeyer said.
“I know,” I said. “But what choice do we have? We’re his friends.”
“Where are you again?”
“Lohr, Germany,” I said. “Snow White’s hometown.”
“I thought her hometown was Disneyland.”
“It wasn’t.”
“Next you’re going to tell me Sleeping Beauty didn’t live there either,” Stottlemeyer said. “Give me a few minutes. I have to wake some people up.”
I went back into the police station and sat down next to Monk in one of the two chairs in the lobby.
“What did you do?” Monk asked.
“I called Captain Stottlemeyer,” I said.
“Is he going to help us?”
I gave Monk a look. “Has he ever let you down?”
A half hour passed. The officer and the dispatcher were clearly annoyed to have us sitting there, but they couldn’t really throw us out.
I told Monk that Betty had been arrested, but he just shrugged. He never doubted that she was guilty, no more than he doubted himself about seeing the man with eleven fingers.
The dispatcher’s phone rang. She answered it and motioned to Schust to pick up the extension. He did.
The officer listened for a moment, looked over at us with astonishment, hung up, and made another call. He spoke to someone for a few minutes, glancing at us repeatedly as he did, then ended the call and walked over to us.
“I apologize, Mr. Monk, if I offended you in any way,” Schust said. “I’ve been ordered by the leader of the regional police to take you to see Hauptkriminalkommissar Stoffmacher right away. Please come with me.”
The officer led us outside to his car. As we followed him, Monk looked at me for an explanation. I shrugged.
“You must have friends in high places,” I said.
“I’m afraid of heights,” Monk said. “That’s why I’m glad I have two friends down here with me that I can always count on.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Mr. Monk Sees a Corpse
We’d barely been in Germany for twenty-four hours and we were about to see a dead body. It’s not exactly on my list of things to do when I go someplace new. But the same thing happened when Monk followed me to Hawaii, when we went to a wine tasting in Napa, and when he was a guest at my brother’s wedding. Wherever Monk goes, you can always count on a dead body showing up sooner or later.
Maybe that’s why he never received invitations to weddings, anniversaries, birthdays, parties, movie screenings, time-share presentations, or anything else. Nothing kills a good time faster than a killing. He attracts more death than Jessica Fletcher and she’s practically the Grim Reaper in a housedress.
The crime scene was one of those duplexes built in the foothills below the forest, right under the shadow of the Franziskushohe. The duplex was a wide A-frame with matching front doors and windows. I’m sure that Monk appreciated the perfect symmetry.
An officer was unfurling red-and-white-striped police tape and wrapping it around trees and streetlights on the property to secure it in place. The police tape read: POLIZEIABSPERRUNG. The one thing I’d already noticed about the German language was that it seemed to cram entire sentences into one long, incomprehensible word.
Schust lifted the tape up so we could pass under it and then he escorted us into the right-side portion of the duplex.
It was a tiny place, maybe seven hundred square feet, with the living room and kitchen on the first floor and the bedroom on the second. The decor was thrift-shop Euroseventies, with lots of bright colors.
The victim was a man who appeared to me to be in his early thirties. He was sprawled on his side on the floor, a gun not far from his hand. His hair was matted with blood. This definitely wasn’t what I’d had in mind for sightseeing.
There were two men standing over the body. The men were both in off-the-rack suits and ties, which was the same underpaid-plainclothes-cop attire you’d see in America. I guess some things are true everywhere—cops aren’t paid enough and people kill.
One of the men had an enormous black mustache that looked like a crow had been caught in an oil slick, tried to fly, and crashed into his face instead. The elaborate mustache completely overpowered his face and, frankly, the entire room.
The other man was younger, with an earnest, puppy-dog expression on his pale, baby face. He gripped his notepad and pen as if they were life preservers.
“Hauptkriminalkommissar Stoffmacher,” Schust said to the man with the outrageous mustache, “this is Adrian Monk and his assistant, Natalie Teeger.”
Stoffmacher offered Monk his hand.
“Welcome to Lohr, Mr. Monk. Your reputation precedes you,” he said and waved Officer Schust away. The officer left.
“You’ve heard of me?” Monk shook Stoffmacher’s hand.
“You were preceded by a phone call by my superiors,” Stoffmacher said. “They tell me you are the top detective in San Francisco, perhaps in all of America.”
