The restaurant was crowded with locals slurping from enormous bowls of saimin. I saw two empty stools. I hurried over and sat down on one of them before someone else could walk in and snag them. I moved so fast that I scraped my knees again trying to fit them underneath the counter.
Monk stood beside me, behind the empty stool.
“Sit down, Mr. Monk.”
“When hell freezes over.” He did a full-body cringe. “And even then, probably not.”
“Why?” I asked. “There’s nothing on the stool, and the counter looks clean to me.”
He motioned to the wall. I expected to see a gecko crawling up the faded wood, but instead it was a sign that read: PLEASE DON’T STICK GUM UNDER THE COUNTER.
“There’s nothing to worry about. I didn’t get any gum on my knees.” I turned to the Hawaiian man next to me. “Did you get any gum on yours?”
The man shook his head and slurped up some noodles.
“See, it’s clean.” I turned back to see Monk staring at the Hawaiian woman sitting beside him. Each time she slurped up some soup, she spit some broth on the counter in front of Monk’s stool.
She became aware of Monk staring disapprovingly at her. She looked over her shoulder at him and he mimed wiping his mouth. The woman, obviously offended, turned back to her soup and slurped even louder.
I could see this just wasn’t going to work out.
“Okay, Mr. Monk. You win.” I sighed and got up from the counter. “We’ll find somewhere else to eat.”
Just as we were about to walk out, I spotted the liliko’i pies on display by the cash register. If I couldn’t eat there, at least I could take some of their famous dessert with me.
“Wait,” I said as we reached the door. “I want to get a slice of pie.”
“You can’t get just a slice,” Monk said.
“Yes, I can,” I said, pointing to the menu on the wall. “They sell it by the slice.”
“But if you buy a slice, the pie won’t be whole,” he said. “An entire pie will be wasted.”
“No, it won’t. They’ll simply sell more slices from the same pie.”
“Who would buy a piece from a pie that’s already been eaten?”
“I’m not sticking my face in the pie. They cut the slice out and I eat the slice. I never come into physical contact with the rest of the pie.”
“The sanctity of the pie is still being violated.”
I gave him a look. “The sanctity of the pie?”
“You have to respect it. You should buy the whole pie,” Monk said. “It’s the right thing to do.”
“What am I going to do with an entire pie?”
“Take it back and put it in the refrigerator.”
“The refrigerator in my room is way too small and crowded with—” I stopped myself. I’d forgotten we were staying in the bungalow now. “Good idea, Mr. Monk. I guess it hasn’t sunk in yet that we’ve moved. We’ve got a whole refrigerator we can fill up.”
I motioned to the waitress, a woman old enough to be my great-grandmother, and ordered a pie. She put it in a box. I was reaching into my purse for the money to pay her when I saw the look on Monk’s face.
It was an expression of pure contentment, total self-confidence, and sweet victory.
I didn’t know how it happened, but I knew for certain that it had. Our sightseeing for the day was over and my relaxing vacation was about to begin.
Monk had solved the case.
19
Mr. Monk and the Pie
We went straight to the Lihue police station to see Lieutenant Kealoha. Monk suggested that Kealoha re-interview the maids and that he send a forensics team back to the bungalow right away to examine an area they overlooked the first time.
Kealoha began to defend the forensics team, but it wasn’t necessary. Nobody would have blamed them for their omission. It would have been like dusting the inside of the chimney for prints. There’s no reason to do it unless you think the killer is Santa Claus.
We waited at the station with Kealoha while his men did as Monk suggested. I was starving, so Kealoha shared his SPAM musubi and li hing mui with me. Monk declined. The musubi was a chunk of SPAM on a square of rice, wrapped in dry seaweed. It wasn’t bad. But the li hing mui, which was dried salted fruit, was hard to swallow. I wanted to be polite, so I choked it down with a smile and even took a second piece.
I wanted to return the favor by sharing my pie with Kealoha, but Monk wouldn’t let me. He said he needed it for something.
So, bored and eager for something sweet to wash the taste of the li hing mui out of my mouth, I left the two of them and walked down the street to a shack that served Shave Ice in sixty different flavors, from guava to root beer.
The Shave Ice was like a Sno-Kone, only instead of using crushed ice, they gathered the fine powder created by shaving a block of ice with a knife. The ball of powder was placed on top of a scoop of macadamia-nut ice cream in a cup and doused with fruit syrup.
The chilly dessert flash-froze my brain and gave me a sugar jolt that was like being revived with de-fibrilator paddles. Shave Ice is refreshing and sweet but it should come with a surgeon general’s warning.
When I got back to the police station, Kealoha was beaming. In the time I’d been gone, Monk had solved two burglaries and a missing-person case. And more important, the forensics team had reported back from the bungalow. When I asked what they’d found, Monk wouldn’t tell me.
“It will ruin the surprise,” he said.
Kealoha went off to find Lance Vaughan and Roxanne Shaw and bring them to our bungalow, where we would meet them all, and the truth behind Helen Gruber’s murder would finally be revealed.
Monk was so wrapped up in the case, he
