Mr. Monk Goes to the Firehouse

“How many does it take?”

“One thousand,” Monk said.

Julie and I both looked at him.

“You know the exact number?” I said.

“It was actually nine hundred and ninety-three,” Monk said. “But I broke seven more to make it even.”

“Of course,” I said. “Makes perfect sense.”

“Can you buy some more eggs today?” Julie asked me.

“I’m not buying a thousand eggs,” I said. “You’ll just have to learn two eggs at a time over breakfast each morning.”

“That could take years,” she whined.

“Now you have a goal in life,” I said.

Monk toasted some sourdough bread, which he cut into even halves and served to us on separate plates, along with oranges that were completely peeled and sliced in perfect wedges.

The breakfast was so perfect, in fact, it looked synthetic and strangely unappetizing, as if it were all made of plastic.

Julie had no such reservations. She devoured her breakfast, finishing up just as her ride to school arrived. She gave me a kiss on the cheek and ran out.

Monk cleared the table and I washed the dishes. After that, we were all alone with nothing to do. No murders to solve. No crimes to investigate.

“So what’s on the agenda for today?” I asked.

“Moving back into my house and cleaning,” Monk said. “Lots of cleaning.”

“You haven’t been there in days,” I said. “What is there to clean?”

“Every inch,” Monk said. “The entire building has been tented and pumped full of poison. It’s a death trap. We’re going to be on our hands and knees scrubbing for days.”

“You will; I won’t,” I said. “I signed on to be your assistant, not your maid. I’ll supervise.”

“What does that mean?”

“I’ll be sitting on the couch reading a magazine and watching you work,” I said. “If you miss a spot, I’ll let you know.”

I picked up my purse and my car keys. He grabbed his luggage and we went out to the car. Mrs. Throphamner was in her garden, already tending to her roses. I remembered I still owed her money.

“Good morning, Mrs. Throphamner,” I said. “Your flowers are looking lovely today.”

“So are you, dear,” she said.

At least she didn’t have any hard feelings.

“Oh,” Monk said. “I almost forgot.”

“Me, too,” I said, reaching into my purse. But before I could pay her, Stottlemeyer drove up and got out of his car.

Monk set down his suitcases and we walked over to greet him.

“Monk, Natalie,” Stottlemeyer said. “Beautiful day, isn’t it?”

“Sure is.” It amazed me that he could still appreciate it, considering a typical day meant he had plenty of ugliness and death in store. “Do you need Mr. Monk’s help on a case already?”

“Nope,” Stottlemeyer said. “I was on my way into the office and thought I’d stop by with the good news. We’ve got Breen.”

“We had Breen yesterday,” Monk said.

“We had cat hair yesterday,” Stottlemeyer said. “Today we’ve got a fingerprint. The crime lab found his prints inside a firefighter’s glove. He might have been able to explain away the cat hair, but he can’t talk himself out of that. You came through for me again, Monk, like you always do.”

“You too, Captain,” Monk said. “In fact, there’s something you can do for me right now.”

“Retie my shoes? Adjust my belt to a different loop? Change the license plate on my car so all the numbers are even?”

“Yes, that would be great,” Monk said. “And when you get a moment, could you also arrest Mrs. Throphamner?”

I glanced back at Mrs. Throphamner, who was coming out of her backyard with the hose.

“Don’t you think you’re going a bit overboard, Mr. Monk?” I said. “She fell in your lap by accident.”

Stottlemeyer looked past me. “That’s Mrs. Throphamner?”

“Yes,” Monk said.

“And she was in your lap?”

“Yes,” Monk said.

“Maybe it’s you I should arrest,” Stottlemeyer said.

Monk scowled at Stottlemeyer and went over to Mrs. Throphamer, who was rolling up the hose.

“Excuse me, Mrs. Throphamner?” Monk said. She turned around. “You’re under arrest for murder.”

“Murder?” I said. Actually, Mrs. Throphamner, Stottlemeyer, and I all said the same thing in unison. We sounded like a chorus.

“Her husband isn’t in a fishing cabin near Sacramento,” Monk said. “He’s buried in her backyard. That’s why she planted the most fragrant roses she could find and kept changing them—to hide the smell of his decomposing corpse.”

I knew that he was always right about murder, but this time he just had to be wrong. Mrs. Throphamner, a murderer? It was ridiculous.

Mrs. Throphamner sagged and let out a weary sigh. “How did you know?”

“It’s true?” I said, utterly shocked.

Mrs. Throphamner nodded. “I’m glad you found out. I’m so tired of tending the garden, and the guilt was driving me mad. I loved him so much.”

“I know you did,” Monk said. “That’s why you couldn’t entirely let go. That’s why you kept his teeth.”

“His teeth?” Stottlemeyer said.

“His dentures,” Monk said. “She’s got them in her mouth right now.”

“She does?” He narrowed his eyes and stared at her mouth, but she closed her lips and turned her head away. “How could you possibly know that, Monk?”

“When she babysits, Mrs. Throphamner likes to set her dentures on the table beside her while she watches TV,” Monk said. “I had the chance to examine them. They’re obviously male dentures. The maxillary lateral incisors are prominent and large, while a woman’s are narrower. Also, a male’s alveolar bone has a heavier arch, and the internal portion of the dentures—”

“Okay, okay,” Stottlemeyer interrupted, still watching Mrs. Throphamner’s face, waiting for a glimpse of her husband’s teeth. “I believe you. What tipped you off?”

“The flowers that Firefighter Joe brought on his date with Natalie,” Monk said. “He said they were to cover any lingering smell on him from the dump. That got me thinking about Mrs. Throphamner, and it all fell together after that.”

It took me a second, but then it all fell together for me, too. That was two days ago. I felt my whole body tighten with anger. My fists clenched. I think my toes did, too.

“Milton was cheating on me after forty years of marriage; can you believe that?” Mrs. Throphamner said. “The only thing he was fishing for in Sacramento was hanky-panky. I had to kill—”

“Wait a minute,” I snapped, cutting her off. I turned to Monk. “You’ve known since Wednesday that she’s a murderer and you didn’t tell me?”

“I was distracted by a lot of other things,” Monk said defensively. “I had three unsolved murders on my plate. We were both very busy.”

“You let me leave my daughter alone with this monster?”

“I knew how badly you needed a babysitter while we were on the case.”

“She’s a murderer!” I yelled.

“Well, yes. But other than that she’s very dependable,” Monk said.

“Dependable?” I took a step toward him, and Monk took five steps back. “She’s sucking on her dead husband’s teeth!”