“So?”
“They were for his mistress, Lizzie Draper,” Monk said. “I saw the same bouquet in her house yesterday.”
I don’t know how Monk noticed the bouquet, since his gaze was locked on Lizzie Draper’s cleavage the whole time we were there. Monk must have astonishing peripheral vision. It was the same extraordinary bouquet Lizzie was using as a model for the painting she was working on.
“Even if that’s true,” Stottlemeyer said, “what does that have to do with Esther Stoval’s murder?”
“Esther Stoval spied on her neighbors. She used binoculars to look into her neighbors’ homes and took pictures,” Monk said. “She once turned a neighbor in to the cable company for watching ESPN with an illegal converter box.”
“I’m surprised she lived as long as she did,” Stottlemeyer said. “You don’t come between a man and his sports.”
“I think Esther had incriminating photos of Lucas Breen and Lizzie Draper and threatened to show them to his wife if he didn’t halt the condominium project. A divorce could have cost him tens of millions of dollars. That’s why Breen killed Esther.”
Stottlemeyer shook his head. “That’s a mighty big leap, even for you, Monk.”
“That’s what happened,” Monk said.
I was sure he was right. Stottlemeyer was sure, too. Because if there is one thing Monk is always right about, it’s murder. And Monk knew that we knew. Which made the situation all the more frustrating for the captain.
Stottlemeyer held up the bouquet. “And this is all you’ve got?”
“We also have her buttons,” Monk said.
“Her buttons?”
“I couldn’t help noticing them,” he said.
That was probably the biggest understatement of the day.
“The letters ‘LB’ were written on them,” Monk said. “At the time I thought it was a brand name, but it wasn’t. It was a monogram. The shirt she was wearing was handmade for Lucas Breen.”
11
Mr. Monk and the Suspect Smell
We reconvened in Stottlemeyer’s office, where he put the bouquet in an empty Big Gulp cup and filled it with water. Vases aren’t easy to come by in the homicide department of the SFPD.
Disher came in and stared at Monk with dismay. “What’s wrong? Are you feeling all right?”
“I feel fine,” Monk said.
“Are you sure?”
“Positive,” Monk said. “Why do you ask?”
“It’s just that I’ve never seen you so, so . . .” Disher searched for the right word. “Unbuttoned.”
“Unbuttoned?” Monk said.
Disher motioned to his collar. “Your top two buttons are unbuttoned.”
“Oh, my God.” Monk immediately flushed with embarrassment and buttoned his collar up. “How long have I been naked? Why didn’t you say something?”
“It was two buttons, Mr. Monk,” I said.
“Word is probably spreading all over the department right now!” Monk said.
“I’m sure nobody noticed,” Stottlemeyer said.
“I strolled in here half-naked. They aren’t blind.” He buried his face in his hands. “I’m so ashamed.”
“You’re among friends, Monk.” Stottlemeyer came around his desk and squeezed Monk’s shoulder reassuringly. “Nobody is going to say anything. You have my word.”
Monk looked up, stricken. “Could you talk to them for me?”
“Sure,” Stottlemeyer said. “Who?”
“Everyone,” Monk said. “Every officer in the building.”
“Okay, I can do that,” Stottlemeyer said. “But could I wait until after we discuss how we’re going to prove that Lucas Breen killed Esther Stoval?”
“That’s not going to be easy,” Disher said. “There’s no physical evidence that puts him in that house when Esther was killed.”
“Or anybody else,” Stottlemeyer said.
“He did it,” Monk said. “If we work backward from there, we’ll find something.”
“He’s got a rock-solid alibi.” Disher went to Stottlemeyer’s computer and clicked a few keys. “I’ve pulled dozens of press photos off the net of Breen and his wife arriving at eight P.M. and departing at midnight. I talked to the photographers and got the approximate times the photos were taken from them.”
“Good work,” Stottlemeyer said.
Disher angled Stottlemeyer’s monitor so we could see the pictures on the screen. Sure enough, there were photos from various angles from different photographers of Breen and his wife in their raincoats, huddled under an umbrella and rushing into the lobby from the rain. There were also photos of the Breens leaving at midnight with the governor and his wife.
“There were five hundred guests at that event. I doubt anybody can account for his movements the whole night,” Monk said. “The Excelsior has dozens of exits. He could have left the hotel and come back and no one would have noticed.”
“Pull the security-camera footage from the hotel,” Stottlemeyer told Disher. “Maybe there’s something. And talk to some of the guests and hotel staff, see if anybody noticed he was gone.”
“Breen built the Excelsior. I’m sure he knows how to get in and out without being seen,” Disher said. “Besides, leaving the hotel doesn’t put him in Esther’s house, holding a pillow to her face.”
“One step at a time,” Stottlemeyer said.
“Okay,” Disher said. “So what does a train robber who died in 1906 have to do with all this?”
“Nothing,” Monk said. “That has to do with the murder of a firehouse dog.”
“You’re trying to solve a one-hundred-year-old murder of a dog?”
“Sparky was murdered Friday night,” I said.
“By a ghost?” Disher said.
“Whoa.” Stottlemeyer raised a hand. “Could somebody please tell me what’s going on?”
“In the late eighteen hundreds, Roderick Turlock and his gang robbed trains that were carrying bank cars filled with gold coins,” Disher said. “The Pinkertons finally tracked him down to a boardinghouse in San Francisco, where he was killed in a shoot-out, taking his secret with him.”
“What secret?” Monk asked.
“What he did with the stolen gold,” Disher said. “Most of it was never found. Legend has it that he buried it somewhere.”
“That’s real interesting, but can we discuss San Francisco’s rich and colorful history another time?” Stottlemeyer said. “We’ve got a murder to solve here and no evidence whatsoever.”
“You’re forgetting about the buttons,” Monk said. “And the flowers.”
“Right, of course. The flowers.” Stottlemeyer snatched the bouquet out of the Big Gulp cup. “Tell you what, Randy, I’ll take these over to the DA right now while you and Monk go arrest Breen.”
Stottlemeyer marched to his door. Disher stood in place, not sure what to do.
“You want me to . . . I mean, should I . . . ?” Disher looked at Monk. “Is he serious?”
“No, I’m not serious.” Stottlemeyer pivoted on his heels and waved the bouquet as he spoke, shaking off some of the petals. “Lucas Breen is on the Police Commission, for God’s sake. What we need is his DNA all over the crime scene, twenty-two eyewitnesses who saw him there, and a video of him smothering the old hag. And then maybe, maybe, we’ve got something to go on.”
Stottlemeyer shoved Disher out of the way, slammed the bouquet back into the Big Gulp cup, and took a seat behind his desk. He took a deep breath, then glanced at Monk.
“Tell me how you think he did it.”
“I think he left the hotel, killed Esther, set fire to her house, then went back to the party.”
“That’s not a very cunning plan,” Disher said.
“It worked, didn’t it?” Stottlemeyer said. “Did you check out Lizzie Draper’s alibi?”