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After calling Lt. Disher to ensure that the station has Dave Newburn's file, I decide to stop by to pick it up. In it will be all the details of his life, including his jobs and information about his wife. I'll bet Disher will be excited, to be part of such a daring rebellion from Stottlemeyer's staunch belief in the man's suicide.
I tell Monk to stay in the vehicle while I retrieve the papers. I am met by Disher, who has a big grin on his face and the file in his hand. While displaying my sweetest smile, I sweep the file from his hand and thank him in one graceful movement. "Disher, could you make certain that the medical examiner doesn't get rid of the body yet?" I ask earnestly. I then lean in closer to him, preparing to whisper. "Please keep this top secret," I murmur into his ear. He smiles and gives me a thumbs-up sign.
"Of course," he replies. "Your secret is safe wi—"
"Shhhhhh…." I put my finger to my lips, as I back out of the doorway.
I soon return to the Cherokee with file in hand. I can see Monk smiling inside the car. "H-how did you get away from Disher so quickly?" he asks me as I slip into the driver's seat.
"That's my little secret," I say, as I give him a big smile. He smiles back unsteadily, as if he's unsure of what to think about my response.
We head back to my house in a matter of minutes, and immediately Monk plants himself on my couch to finger through the file. I have some work to do in the kitchen, and I open the door of the refrigerator to get the vegetables for the salad. After several seconds of intense study, he stands up, overjoyed with a discovery.
"The man…. Dave Newburn… was thirty-five years old!" he exclaims.
I leave the refrigerator door opened and stand in the doorway to view the look on his face. He is smiling, beaming, in fact, and I can't recall if I have seen him smile quite like that before. I doubt it.
"So…" I try to sound casual. "what does that mean?"
He is panting with excitement. "It means…. his teeth couldn't have all been fake. That's not his body!" He is swinging his hands around animatedly, and I have to admit, he really is impressive.
"Well, what are you going to do now?" I ask, with a little less excitement. I really am enthralled with the turn of events, but I don't want to show it just yet until we find out for sure.
"We have to tell the captain! We have to find out why this man faked his own suicide, and whose skeleton was found in that building."
"But his teeth are all pulled out…" I point out. "He doesn't have fingerprints…."
"That may be a problem," Monk says. "I'll figure something out; someone had to go missing…."
I notice that Monk's occasional stuttering and pauses in speech disappear when he is excited. He seems almost normal right now, besides the fact that he is wearing a perfectly pressed, heavy blazer in summery California weather, and in my stuffy house, no less. His smile is truly contagious, as I am now smiling. Smiling and hoping that he is right.
After a short phone call ensuring that the captain is still at the station, we blaze down there in my vehicle, and hastily make our way to Stottlemeyer's office. The captain is sitting at his desk with his feet propped up, talking to Disher, who is seated nearby. I really hate to have to see the smile wipe off his face when Monk tells him.
He opens the door for us and allows us to come in, but Monk is so excited that he stops in the doorway to reveal the results of his investigation.
"That body in the building… that wasn't Dave Newburn's body," he says loudly, taking occasional gulps of air. Apparently his lungs aren't used to this kind of stimulation.
"What are you talking about, Monk? The dental records match and the suicide letter matches Dave Newburn's writing." Stottlemeyer is going to take a while to be convinced.
"Dave Newburn was thirty-five," Monk explains. "All the teeth are false teeth. They aren't dentures either. A person in their thirties wouldn't lose all their teeth like that…. And even if they did, they would get dentures."
Disher is obviously convinced. He is leaning in his seat towards us, eyes bright with excitement. He was part of our little plan.
"How did you find out that he was thirty-five?" Stottlemeyer demands.
Monk's smile wipes off his face. "The file…." he mumbles
The captain turns to Disher, causing his smile to immediately subside. "Did you give them the file?"
I'd feel so bad if Disher gets in trouble for this, so I speak up. "I made him give it to us. I took it from him," I state confidently.
Monk looks over at me, understanding. "So that's how you got out so quickly…." It's really not the complete truth, mind you, but I am not going to correct his assumptions.
"Ms. Teeger," the captain says. "I didn't think you were capable of such—"
"Captain," Monk interrupts. "That body… I am almost certain that is not Dave Newburn's body."
"How certain?" he says, raising his eyebrows. Monk sighs.
"Do we have to go through this again? I'm 90 to 95 percent certain!"
"Well, what would make you more, or less, certain?" the captain is obviously disgusted by Monk's confidence in blowing his explanation out of the water, and hastily removes his feet from the desk.
"I'd like to talk to Dave Newburn's wife," he states quietly, looking down at his shoes. "They only separated a month or so ago. She may be involved, but I'm not sure."
"You know I can't get you a warrant on that, but if she talks on her own volition, that's fine." He sighs, obviously upset. He glares at Monk for a few minutes, and I have no idea what he's going to say next.
"Why can't you just let me gloat, for once, Monk?" he grumbles childishly, the disappointment apparent in his change of stance and the tone of voice.
We turn around to leave, not wishing to rub it in his face. I'm sure Monk only had good intentions for telling him. Let's face it, he is very naïve and so couldn't have had any other meaning for his explaining his views to the captain.
After a restless night of sleep, I wake much earlier than usual, ready to delve further into this case with my employer. I shower quickly, eat some breakfast, and await his call. He calls at precisely 8 am, and I plan to pick him up in twenty minutes to drive to the wife's new home about an hour away.
I call my parents to pick up Julie, who would otherwise be alone all day, and have her hang out at their place, and I abruptly head out the door. I reach Monk's apartment in record time, but he is already at the base of the steps. For some reason he stands in place for a minute, as if it's completely normal to remain in place once the ride has arrived, and then proceeds to get into the vehicle. "You're early," he says, smiling, and, hearing a compliment, I forget to ask him about his minute-long hesitancy. I must have arrived on an odd number.
Before he can spout off random directions, I whip out a huge map, unfold it onto the steering wheel, and recite the road names to follow out loud. Hopefully he gets the point. He attempts to straighten out the folds in the paper, honking the Cherokee's horn instead. After his face changes from red to normal coloration in his embarrassment cycle, I put the map away and begin our trip.
It's a pretty easy route to follow; we will follow Interstate 880 for practically the whole trip. I keep the radio halfway up in case he reconsiders my being early. Instead he points out my minuscule driving errors, such as my not using blinkers to return to the slow lane, or my passing a really slow semi on the right.
"Don't you realize how dangerous this is!" he cries, holding onto the door and the dashboard simultaneously. "You're in his blind spot! And you—you're not even supposed to pass on the right!"
"It's alright, Mr. Monk, I've done this before," I say, wondering how a man who can't drive is actually telling me what I'm doing wrong right now.
"He is going to smush us to bits!" he cries, not releasing his grip.
I glance over at him. "Is that a technical term, 'smush?'" I comment. He doesn't say anything, instead staring at the side of the big tractor trailer.
Although we pass the truck safely, he doesn't compliment my dexterity and driving skills, instead enveloping himself in a nervous silence that I can feel in the air. He doesn't discuss the case either, but I think maybe it's because he doesn't want to jinx the situation by becoming too hopeful.
