Monk pointed to Felder, who was doing his little victory dance. “That explains the footprints.”
“It does?”
“It’s his ritual. He does it whenever he wins,” Monk said. “Those steps match the sequence of bloody footprints at the bank.”
Stottlemeyer and Monk stepped closer to Felder, staring at his feet as he danced.
“I’ll be damned,” Stottlemeyer said, rubbing his bushy mustache.
Felder spun around and glowered at them. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
Stottlemeyer flashed his badge at Felder. “SFPD homicide. You’re under arrest for the murder of E. L. Lancaster, manager of Golden State Bank.”
Felder’s jaw dropped in astonishment. So did mine. Jaws were dropping everywhere.
Stottlemeyer cuffed Felder, read him his rights and started to lead him away.
Monk cleared his throat. “Aren’t you forgetting something?”
Stottlemeyer groaned, turned around and held up his badge so the parents in the Killer Cleat bleachers could see it.
“Hey, everybody, listen up,” the captain said. “You have two choices. Either sit in even numbers on even-numbered rows, or all of you have to sit together on one row.”
“Why?” one parent asked.
“It’s a safety issue,” Stottlemeyer said. “If you want to avoid a citation, I suggest you listen to him.” Stottlemeyer tipped his head toward Monk and then led Felder off the field.
The Slammers and their parents began to applaud. We were cheering about Harv Felder getting taken away in handcuffs, but that’s not how Monk saw it.
“See?” Monk said to me. “Everybody appreciates balanced seating.”
CHAPTER TWO
Mr. Monk and the Unlucky Break
I don’t think there’s anything in the soccer rule book that covers what to do when the coach of a team is arrested for murder during a game. The ref didn’t know how to deal with it. The parents of the Killer Cleats wanted to call it quits and take their kids home. Raul was glad to oblige—if the Killer Cleats agreed to forfeit the game. The Killer Cleats weren’t willing to take a loss, so the game went on.
Raul probably figured that the trauma of seeing their coach dragged off to jail would undermine the morale of the Killer Cleats to such a massive degree that we actually might have a chance to beat them. Instead, it just pissed them off. They returned to the field seething like a pack of rabid wolves.
Christy Clark, the Cleats’ forward, drove the ball right down the center of the field. She was as wide as two girls and plowed through everything, and everyone, in her path like a runaway bulldozer.
Most of the Slammers had the good sense to get the hell out of Christy’s way, the game be damned, except my dear, sweet, stubborn daughter.
Julie was not going to let that ball get past her. She grimaced and charged Christy.
I think I even heard Julie growl.
Christy and Julie bashed into each other like raging elk, kicking the ball between them as they butted against each other. Somehow Christy managed to kick the ball past Julie and knock her down.
My daughter hit the ground hard and let out an anguished cry that was equal parts pain and fury.
Christy and the Killer Cleats surged past Julie and made another goal, the whole team erupting in cheers.
At least they didn’t trample Julie, which I took as an act of rare mercy on their part. I stood up and waited for Julie to get to her feet.
Monk tugged at my shirt.
“You’re standing,” he said.
“I know that, Mr. Monk.”
“But everyone else is sitting,” Monk said. “You’re making a scene.”
“I’m concerned about my daughter.”
“What if another person stands up? Then it’s two people standing and everyone else sitting, and before you know it, the whole world collapses into anarchy.”
At that moment, my whole world was one twelve-year-old girl and she wasn’t standing up. I ran out onto the field. Raul joined me.
Monk stood and waved everyone else in the bleachers to follow, which they did, presumably cowed into obedience by Captain Stottlemeyer’s speech.
When Raul and I reached Julie, she was sitting up, cradling her right arm and trying very hard not to cry.
“Are you okay, honey?” I asked.
She shook her head. “I think my arm is broken.”
“It’s probably just a sprain,” Raul said.
He was accustomed to kids overreacting to the sudden pain of an unexpected fall. But he didn’t know Julie the way I did. When she was a baby, she once managed to wriggle out of her high chair and fell on the kitchen floor. Any other baby would have been wailing, but Julie sat there, fighting the urge to cry and furious with herself for not being able to succeed.
Julie was a fighter, like her dad.
So seeing her now, eyes filled with tears, told me more than any X-ray ever could. If she said her arm was broken, it was.
I looked up and saw Monk organizing the reluctant parents into a circle around us. According to Monk-think, if one spectator was on the field, then all the spectators had to be out there. Monk had a pained expression on his face, even more so than Julie. He leaned down and whispered in my ear.
“Get ahold of yourself, woman,” Monk said. “This is no way to behave in public.”
“We’re going to the hospital, Mr. Monk,” I said.
“Why would you want to do a crazy thing like that?” he said, exasperated, as Raul and I gently lifted Julie to her feet.
“Can’t you see that Julie has hurt herself?” I said as we led Julie toward the parking lot. Even though I was pretty sure she’d broken her arm, I didn’t want to confirm her fears by saying it aloud.
“You can’t take her to a hospital,” he said, trailing after us, insistently waving the other parents to follow. “They’re full of sick people!”
“That’s where we’re going,” I said. “If you want to take a taxi home, be my guest.”
He groaned. “That’s like giving me a choice between slitting my own throat and shooting myself.”
But he came with us anyway.
The doctor had already given Julie a preliminary exam and she’d just returned from having her arm x-rayed when Monk finally joined us. He opened the curtain surrounding Julie’s bed in the ER as if he was stepping out onto a stage.
Ladies and gentlemen, give it up for Adrian Monk!
He’d managed to find a hospital patient gown to put over his clothes, rubber gloves for his hands and a surgical mask to cover his nose and mouth.
It was quite a sight and well worth the wait. He brought a smile to Julie’s face when she needed it the most—not that he meant to.
“What?” Monk asked us, totally oblivious to his clownish appearance.
“Don’t take this the wrong way, Mr. Monk,” Julie said, “but you look silly.”
“I think what you mean is ‘sensibly dressed.’ ”
“You’re right,” she said, sharing a glance with me. “That’s exactly what I meant.”
“I’m relieved to hear you say that,” he said as he wheeled in a cart containing gowns, gloves and masks for us both. “It may not be too late to save you, too.”
“From what?” I said.
“You name it,” he said. “The black death, Ebola, scurvy.”
“You can’t catch scurvy,” Julie said. “You get it from not eating enough oranges.”
“That’s an old wives’ tale,” Monk said, handing out our garments, “from wives who later died of scurvy.”
That’s when the doctor came in. He had such a grim expression on his youthful face, I was afraid he was going to tell us Julie had a brain tumor.
“I’m afraid you have a broken wrist,” the doctor said. “The good news is that it’s a clean break. You’ll only have to wear a cast for a couple weeks.”
If that was all, why did he have to look so serious? Maybe he thought it made him appear more
learned and mature so he wouldn’t get a lot of flack from patients for being so young.
Actually, it made him look like he’d eaten something for lunch that decided to fight back.
“Do I get to pick the color for my cast?” Julie asked.
“Absolutely,” he said and waved over an ER nurse.
She walked behind Monk and held up a chart with a dozen sample plaster colors for Julie to see. There was something vaguely familiar about the nurse, but I couldn’t place her.
She had thick, curly brown hair with blond highlights and stood with attitude. By that, I mean she had a certain rough confidence about her, the kind that’s like a scar. It’s a toughness you can only get on the streets, and not the ones you find in suburban housing tracts. Growing up in suburbia, you end up with a pampered confidence that comes from knowing you have mutual funds earning money for you.
“We have a wide selection of colors to choose from,” the doctor said. “Or you can go with white and rent your arm out for advertising.”
“Really?” Julie replied. “What does that pay?”
I was taken aback by the question. When had Julie become so entrepreneurial?
“I’m kidding,” the doctor said.
“But it’s not a bad idea.” Julie looked at me. “We could go around to local businesses, like the pizza parlor or the bike shop, and see if they’d be interested in using my arm as a walking billboard.”
This broken wrist was revealing a whole new side of my daughter to me.
“You have a deal,” I said.
“You could offer them a special rate to advertise on both arms,” Monk added.
“But I don’t have a cast on my left arm,” Julie said.
“You will,” he said, nodding.
“No, I won’t,” she said.
“It’s what they do in these situations.”
The nurse was starting to fidget, tapping her foot on the floor in frustration.
“But my left wrist isn’t broken,” Julie said.
“It doesn’t matter,” he said. “It’s standard medical procedure.”
“You want me to put a cast on her left wrist?” the doctor asked Monk incredulously.
“Doesn’t that go without saying?”
“No,” the doctor said, “it doesn’t.”
“You can’t put a cast on only one wrist,” Monk said. “She’ll be off-balance.”
“The cast isn’t that heavy,” the doctor said. “I can assure you that her balance will be just fine.”
“It will if she has a cast on both arms.” Monk turned to me. “Where did this guy go to medical school? If I were you, I’d get a second opinion.”
The nurse’s face was growing tense and a flush was rising on her cheeks. She looked like she might hit Monk with that display board she was holding.
I knew what she was feeling all too well. I had to bring this ridiculous debate to an end before Monk needed medical attention.
“Julie is not getting a cast on her left wrist, Mr. Monk,” I said, “because it’s not broken.”
“You aren’t thinking rationally. You’re clearly in shock over Julie’s injury. You ought to have a doctor look at you.” Monk glanced dismissively at the doctor. “A real one.”
“I don’t want a cast on both wrists,” Julie said to me.
“Don’t worry, honey,” I said. “It’s not going to happen.”
“Of course it is,” Monk said. “She can’t leave here imbalanced.”
“You mean unbalanced,” the doctor said, “not imbalanced.”
“What do you know?” Monk said.
“I know you’re imbalanced for thinking she’s unbalanced, ” he said, smiling at his own cleverness.
Monk was not amused. “You’re under arrest.”
“For what?” the doctor asked.
“Impersonating a doctor.”
“Are you a police officer?”
“I’m a consultant to the police,” Monk said. “I investigate homicides.”
“I haven’t killed anyone,” the doctor said.
“Not yet,” Monk said. “But if you keep practicing medicine like this, you will.”
The nurse suddenly threw the display card against the wall in a fit of anger, startling us all.
“That’s enough, Adrian,” she said. “Believe it or not, the whole world doesn’t revolve around you and your special needs. This poor girl has been through enough today without having to deal with you, too. So shut up and let us do our jobs.”
Monk jerked at the sound of her voice, his eyes going wide with shock.
The nurse took a deep, calming breath and then looked at me. “I’m sorry about that, but this is an argument you can’t win. Trust me. The only way any of us is going to get any peace is if we put a cast on Julie’s left wrist.”
Before I could object, the nurse stepped up to Julie. “Don’t worry, honey. After the cast dries, I’m going to cut it off, put some Velcro straps on it and give it to you. That way, you can put it on whenever Adrian is around and take it off the instant he leaves. Problem solved.”
Adrian? Hearing Monk addressed that way by a person I assumed was a complete stranger to him startled me a bit. I’d never heard anyone but Monk’s brother and his shrink refer to him by his first name. I assumed that familiarity was simply a calming and controlling technique nurses and other medical professionals used to deal with emotionally or psychologically disturbed individuals.
“Or I could have this guy committed,” the doctor said, narrowing his eyes at Monk. “That would solve the problem, too.”
“I appreciate the offer, but I think we’ll go with the second cast,” I said, turning to Julie. “If that’s okay with you.”
“Yeah,” Julie said. “I just want to go home.”
The nurse smiled. “Don’t we all. I’ll be right back.”
She left to get whatever she needed to make the cast. Monk hadn’t moved since she’d spoken. I don’t think he’d even blinked. I was impressed with the decisive way she’d handled the situation, and I appreciated it, but I couldn’t figure out why her speaking up shocked Monk into silence.
The doctor said something about us coming back in a couple weeks, gave me a prescription for painkillers for Julie and then he left to treat another patient.
I looked at Monk. He seemed frozen in place.
“Would you mind staying with Julie for a minute?” I asked him.
Monk nodded ever so slightly. He wasn’t going anywhere.
I caught up with the nurse at the supply cabinet.
“Excuse me,” I said. “I just wanted to say thank you for helping out. Sometimes my friend can be difficult to handle.”
Mr. Monk and the Two Assistants Page 2