by Lee Goldberg
“Word is that a cop was killed,” Wyatt said. “Put me on the street and I’ll hunt down the bastard who did it.”
“We aren’t handling the investigation,” Monk said.
“It’s a homicide,” Wyatt said. “You’re the captain. Who else is gonna handle it? Parking enforcement?”
“Captain Stottlemeyer is back on duty,” Monk said.
“Of course he is, only hours after we exposed the alien conspiracy,” Chow said. “Coincidence? I think not. The cover-up is already beginning. Our ‘accidental’ and ‘natural’ deaths will follow shortly. There will be no trace left of us or our work here.”
“It was fun while it lasted,” Wyatt said. “Where do we turn in our badges?”
“You don’t,” Monk said. “Captain Stottlemeyer is handling the Milner homicide, and we’re continuing with these.”
“We are?” Chow said incredulously.
“We are,” Monk said.
“You’re very clever,” Chow said to the nearest computer monitor. “Plots within plots. Machinations within machinations. Boxes within boxes. I wonder what your endgame is?”
“Who is she talking to?” Porter asked Jasper.
“Them,” Jasper said.
“Oh.” Porter looked at his computer and waved at the screen. “Hey, how’s it going?”
Monk stepped up to the board and squinted at the astrological chart. I don’t know what made him think that squinting would suddenly give him the ability to make sense of what was in front of him, but I gave it a try, too. It didn’t make the mishmash any clearer to me.
The chart looked like a wheel. There was a narrow band around the outer ring filled with numbers, which were written as degrees, and dozens of symbols, none of which I recognized. It could have been Sanskrit, for all I knew. The inner ring was divided like a pizza into twelve slices, each of which was also filled with numbers and symbols. In the center of it all was another circle filled with multicolored intersecting lines that gave me a frightening flashback to high school geometry and Mr. Ross, the math teacher who continues to have a starring role in many of my nightmares.
“What were you able to learn about the witness from his astrological chart?” Monk asked Chow.
“Everything important about him except his name, address, and phone number,” Sparrow said. “Mercury is in Aquarius, and Venus is in Pisces, so you’re looking for someone who is charming and creative, but also probably secretive, greedy, and really full of himself. Uranus is in Leo, so this is a guy who likes his freedom, bucks authority, and has very litle self-discipline. I’d be worried about this Neptune in Scorpio; it means he’s capable of extreme violence.”
Monk turned to her, surprised. “You know about astrology, too?”
“My name is Sparrow,” she said. “What do you think?”
Monk stared at her blankly. He had no idea what she meant.
“What kind of parent names their kid Sparrow?” she said.
He still didn’t get it. She sighed, imbuing it with so much hopeless frustration, it was a wonder she could breathe at all.
“My parents are very New Age and consider themselves plugged into the cycles of nature,” she said. “And those cycles are all tied to the movement of the Earth around the sun, the most profound cycle of all.”
One of Sparrow’s parents was Frank Porter’s child. I had a hard time imagining one of his kids being that liberal and earthy. It must have been an act of rebellion against Frank that his kid never outgrew.
One of these days Julie was going to start acting out against me, just like I did against my parents. I couldn’t help wondering what form her rebellion would take. I figured I still had a couple of years left to prepare myself for it.
“So how does this chart help us locate the killer’s next victim?” Monk asked.
“It’s a map,” Sparrow said. “If you know how to read it.”
“The longitude and latitude on the chart indicates that Allegra’s unknown client was born in San Francisco,” Chow said. “These things here, around the outside of the chart, are ‘transits,’ which represent the daily motion of the planets. The transits are calculated based on where the subject lives now.”
“San Francisco,” Monk said.
I could see that glimmer in his eye. Chow hadn’t even finished her explanation, but I knew that the clues were all starting to fall into place in his mind.
“That’s right,” Chow said. “The transits indicate he lives in San Francisco. The solar return chart is pinned on his next birthday, which has the same transits, so that implies that he’s planning on sticking around here until then. Or at least, he was until he saw Allegra Doucet stabbed to death.”
Now it made sense, even to someone like me with no detective skills whatsoever.
“So that’s how the killer narrowed the field of possible witnesses,” I said. “He knows whoever was in Allegra Doucet’s bathroom the night of the murder was born in San Francisco on February twentieth, 1962, and is still living in the city. But how could he get a list of people who fit that description?”
“It’s in the public record,” Porter said. “All you’d have to do is cross-reference names gleaned from San Francisco birth certificates issued on February twentieth, 1962, with current data available from the Department of Motor Vehicles, the county tax rolls, voter registration lists, that kind of thing.”
“How hard would that be?” Monk said.
“Any twelve-year-old with an Internet connection could do it,” Arnie said. “I know a very hostile teenager who used that information to steal his teachers’ identities, get credit cards in their names, and go on a shopping spree.”
“Could you create the same list the killer has?” Monk asked Porter.
“Just give me a couple of hours,” he said. “But it might go faster if we could get that hostile kid to help me out.”
“No problem.” Arnie reached for the phone with his good hand. “I’ll pull my son out of school. He’ll jump at the opportunity to get near a computer keyboard again. He’s been insufferable ever since the judge banned him from any computer with an Internet connection. But I’m sure the judge would understand and grant him an exception. This is for a good cause.”
Monk turned to Wyatt. “After Frank gets that list together, I’d like you and Detective Chow to start contacting the people on it until you find Allegra Doucet’s client.”
“Assuming he or she isn’t already in the morgue,” Wyatt said.
“Shouldn’t you put them all under police protection?” I asked.
Monk shook his head. “Telling them to stay inside for the next hour or two and not open the door to any strangers should be all the protection they need.”
I smiled. Without coming right out and saying it, Monk had just revealed that he’d solved the mystery. He knew who the killer was.
“You think simply locking their doors is going to keep them safe?” Wyatt said.
That was the wrong question. Wyatt should have asked why Monk felt they needed to stay inside for just the next couple of hours.
“Only if the murderer is waiting for them outside their home or office right now,” Monk said. “But we’ll find out soon enough.”
“How?” Chow asked.
I grabbed my purse and jacket. “Because we’re heading out to arrest the killer right now. Isn’t that right, Mr. Monk?”
“That’s the plan,” Monk said.
It sounded like a very good plan to me.
Max Collins was leaving Madam Frost’s house as we pulled up alongside his silver Maserati Quattroporte, which is a much sexier and much more expensive description than “Italian four-door sedan.” He was dressed in an Armani suit that probably came standard with the car. Or maybe it was the other way around.
I double-parked in the street. Monk and I got out of the car. I assumed that Officer Curtis and her partner, in the black-and-white police quattroporte behind us, wouldn’t have my car ticketed and towed this time.
�
�Captain Monk, what an unexpected surprise,” Collins said.
“Didn’t Madam Frost tell you we were coming?” Monk asked.
“Did she know?” Collins said.
“If she didn’t,” Monk said, “she’s not very good at seeing the future, is she?”
“Unfortunately, astrology isn’t that precise. But Madam Frost did say some exciting things were in store for me.”
“I thought you were giving up on astrology,” I said.
“Only as an investment guide, as I told you before,” Collins said. “But I find it helpful in other areas of my life. Madam Frost has been advising me and my family for years.”
“Until Allegra Doucet came along,” Monk said.
“Madam Frost is like a beloved aunt; Allegra was more like a Playboy Playmate.” Collins shrugged. “She seduced me away. So, is that why you’re here, to ask me more questions about Allegra?”
“We’re here to arrest her murderer,” Monk said.
“Should I be calling my lawyer?”
“Perhaps you should ask Madam Frost that question,” Monk said.
As if on cue, Madam Frost stepped out of her house and hobbled toward us, leaning heavily on her thick, knobby cane, which looked old enough to have belonged to Merlin himself. Her skin was withered, and her hair was gray, but her eyes blazed with startling intensity. In that moment I believed that not only could she peer into the future, but straight into my soul.
“Do you know why they’re here, Madam Frost?” Collins said.
Madam Frost nodded sagely. That was a skill I didn’t possess. I couldn’t nod sagely if my life depended on it. If I tried, I’d just look like I’d eaten something very sour.
“I foresaw this moment days ago,” she said.
“Was that before you killed Allegra Doucet?” Monk said. “Or was it after you murdered John Yamada, Diane Truby, and Scott Eggers?”
Max stared at Monk in disbelief. “You think Madam Frost killed Allegra and three other people?”
“I know she did,” Monk said. “There’s no doubt about it.”
“He’s never wrong about this stuff,” I said, though I was pretty surprised by his statement, too.
“You can’t be serious,” Collins said. “Madam Frost is a frail woman in her sixties. Allegra was a young woman in top physical condition. Do you really think Madam Frost could have taken her?”
“You’re underestimating Madam Frost, which was Allegra Doucet’s fatal mistake,” Monk said.
Madam Frost didn’t say a word; she just stared at Monk with those penetrating eyes. Monk looked right back at her unflinchingly. When he’s solved a case and is confronting the killer, Monk never wavers. It’s the one time he seems to be completely at ease with himself and the world around him. He’s in his zone.
“Allegra was a fraud who stole all of Madam Frost’s clients and was driving her out of business,” Monk continued. “Madam Frost couldn’t compete with Allegra, so she killed her. Here’s what happened....”
And Monk laid it out, taking great pleasure in the telling. He didn’t have to give the performance; he could simply have arrested Madam Frost and saved it all for the district attorney. But where was the fun in that? This was the moment he lived for in every investigation.
Monk told us that Madam Frost walked in the front door of Allegra’s house on Friday night, probably on some friendly pretense. When Allegra rose from her chair, Madam Frost stabbed her in the chest and kept on stabbing. Allegra never had the chance to fight back. She was dead before she hit the floor.
That was when Madam Frost heard the toilet flush and realized that there was someone else in the house. By the time she got to the bathroom, whoever it was had escaped out the window. Madam Frost was too old and frail to chase after him to his car, so she examined the astrological chart on Allegra’s computer screen to get the clues she’d need to hunt the witness down.
“Madam Frost isn’t quite as averse to computers as she would like us to believe,” Monk said. “She used the Internet to compile a list of possible witnesses based on the information she learned from the chart.”
Monk explained that she was in a hurry to kill them before the witness, whoever he was, had a chance to go to the police. That was why all three killings looked improvised—because they were. And like Allegra Doucet, they were all attacked by surprise or from behind. She couldn’t take the risk that one of them might resist, because she wasn’t physically capable of subduing them.
“When we came to see you Saturday morning, you were walking up to your house,” Monk said. “You had to park your car, the one you’d just used to run over John Yamada, on a side street, because the police were blocking your driveway.”
“Let’s open up your garage and take a look at your car,” I said. “I bet the front end is smashed.”
“A lot of people my age have dented cars,” Madam Frost said. “Unfortunately, I’m not as good a driver as I used to be. A few weeks ago I hit a lamppost.”
“Lampposts don’t bleed,” I said. “Yamada’s blood and other trace evidence will be on your car—even if you’ve had it washed since the murder.”
I had no idea if that was true. All of my forensic knowledge came from watching reruns of CSI, but I said it with the confidence that comes from complete ignorance, and she didn’t jump to contradict me. So I got cocky.
“And they found mud that dripped off your car at the crime scene,” I said. “The lab should have no trouble tracing it to this neighborhood.”
Again, another big guess on my part, but I was having too much fun to care. I had never played detective before; I never would have dared with Captain Stottlemeyer and Disher and all those crime scene techs around. But since it was just Monk and two uniformed officers this time, I figured I could indulge myself a little.
“This is insane,” Collins said. “Look at her. Does she really look like a mass murderer to you?”
“What are they supposed to look like?” I asked, though I actually agreed with him. She didn’t strike me as a very scary figure.
“Well, for one thing, they don’t have bad knees and shuffle around on canes,” Collins replied.
“That’s why Madam Frost grabbed an empty vegetable crate from a grocery store on her way to kill Diane Truby,” Monk said, shifting his gaze back to Madam Frost. “You needed something to sit on while you waited for your victim to stroll by.”
“You’re not making any sense,” Collins said.
I could see how Monk’s comments might seem like gibberish to Collins, but he was making a lot of sense to me. I felt the satisfying mental snap of an obscure clue falling into place. I realized that was what Monk must feel, only a thousand times stronger, when he solved a case.
Monk had been very puzzled by the crate. I remembered him wondering why the killer had bothered bringing it along. Frank Porter had suggested that maybe the killer, like himself, had sore feet or a bad back. Neither Monk nor Porter realized it at the time, but Porter was right.
“You pushed Diane in front of a speeding bus and then crept away in the pandemonium,” Monk said. “But you left the crate behind. That was a mistake.”
“I wonder if you left a fingerprint on it somewhere,” I said, just to give her something else to worry about.
“You also waited for Scott Eggers in an alley,” Monk said. “You hit him from behind and then smothered him with a bag you took out of the trash.”
“I’m guessing you whacked him with that cane,” I said.
“So am I,” Monk said. That was a big relief because it really was a wild guess on my part.
“How hard do you think it would be for the crime lab to find a speck of Eggers’s blood on that cane, Mr. Monk?”
“Not hard at all,” Monk replied, meeting Madam Frost’s eye, the intensity of her gaze diminishing like a flashlight running out of batteries. She was caught, and she knew it.
“All their accusations are ridiculous,” Collins assured Madam Frost. “I’ll line you up with a top
criminal defense attorney, but even a bad lawyer could tear this flimsy case apart.”
“I don’t think so,” Madam Frost said.
“Don’t worry,” Collins said. “These two are full of crap.”
“The evidence is overwhelming, even without a witness,” Madam Frost said. “I killed them all, just like they said.”
Collins looked at Madam Frost as if she’d suddenly transformed into a werewolf. His jaw dropped, his eyes widened, and I think maybe his hair even stood on end, but I can’t be entirely sure. Let’s just say he was shocked and leave it at that.
“I’m not a cop, Mr. Monk,” I said, “but I think this would probably be a good time to read Madam Frost her rights.”
“Can I?” Monk said.
“You’re the captain,” I said.
Monk took a little card out of his pocket, cleared his throat, and read aloud from it. He told Madam Frost she had the right to remain silent, have an attorney present before questioning, and all that good stuff. He enjoyed it so much, he offered to read it a second time just to be sure Madam Frost was clear on her rights.
“I know my rights, thank you,” Madam Frost said.
Monk had waited a long time for the opportunity to read someone their rights and wanted to savor it. It think it reinforced for him that he was really a cop again.
“That section about the lawyer can be confusing,” Monk said. “We should probably go over that part again.”
“I waive my rights,” she said. “There’s no point reading them to me again. I killed Allegra Doucet and the others.”
Monk glanced at Max Collins. “Would you like to hear them?”
“Am I being arrested for something?” Collins asked.
“No,” Monk said. “But everyone should know their rights under the law.”
“I’ll pass,” Collins said.
Disappointed, Monk slipped the card back into his pocket.
I still had one more question for Madam Frost about her killing spree that Monk hadn’t answered.
“You killed Allegra Doucet on Friday night,” I said. “When no witnesses came forward on Saturday after you ran over Yamada and pushed Truby in front of a bus, why did you keep killing? Why didn’t you assume you’d killed the right person or that the witness was going to keep quiet?”