Mr. Monk and the Two Assistants by Goldberg, Lee (books for students to read .TXT) 📕

“He goes to mass every morning?”

“Ronald is a real straight arrow,” Maurice said. “Punctual, clean, extremely organized.”

“You’re lying,” Monk said.

Maurice turned to him. “Excuse me?”

“Look at that wall.” Monk motioned to the shoes again. “No organized, God-fearing man would allow that.”

The salesman looked at me. “Is he off his meds?”

“Maybe Ronald is at his girlfriend’s house and overslept, ” I said.

“Ronald doesn’t have a girlfriend at the moment,” Maurice said.

“I could have sworn he mentioned her to me,” I said. “He said they liked to go skinny-dipping at Baker Beach.”

“Ronald? Never. He won’t even wear short-sleeved shirts.” Maurice eyed me suspiciously. “This is a small store and I’ve worked here for five years. I can’t recall ever seeing you or your friend here before.”

“Maybe you just didn’t notice us,” I said.

That was when Monk whirled around and pointed at the other salesman.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Monk snapped.

The other salesman, who was easily in his twenties but still seemed to have the awkward gawkiness of an adolescent, froze in midstride with an open shoe box in his hand.

“I’m, um, returning these shoes to the back room,” the other salesman squeaked.

“You can’t,” Monk said.

“Why not?”

“Because they were on her feet.” Monk pointed accusingly at a female customer, startling the poor woman who was tugging at her loose socks. She was in her fifties and had a hairstyle that looked like it had been done in 1972 and flash-frozen on her head.

“I was only trying them on,” she said meekly.

“You try, you buy,” Monk said. “That’s the law.”

“No, it isn’t,” Maurice said.

“But they don’t fit,” the woman said.

“You should have thought of that before you put them on your feet,” Monk said.

“I’m wearing socks,” she said.

“You weren’t wearing any when you came in,” Monk said.

“They gave these to me,” she said, gesturing to the other salesman, “so I could try on the shoes.”

Monk turned to Maurice. “You gave her those filthy socks? How many other disgusting feet have they been on?”

“Disgusting?” she said. “My feet aren’t disgusting.”

“They weren’t when you came in, but they certainly are now,” Monk said. “Don’t handle any food with them.”

“I don’t eat food with my feet!” she exclaimed. “I’m not a monkey.”

“Then you have no excuse for sticking your feet in every shoe you see, do you?”

Like I said, finesse.

Maurice glared at us both. “That’s enough. Leave immediately or I’ll call the police.”

“You know what, Maurice? I think that’s an excellent idea.” I handed him my cell phone. “You can use my phone. Ask for Captain Leland Stottlemeyer.”

I know it would have been a lot easier if I’d just had the captain call the shoe store before we went there. But, technically,this wasn’t an official homicide investigation yet, and if Monk went out on his own and got into a situation that was potentially embarrassing to the department, Stottlemeyer could still plausibly claim ignorance.

I didn’t used to think about the politics of Stottlemeyer’s job, but during the unofficial police strike a while back, Monk was reinstated as captain of homicide and I got a firsthand glimpse at how things worked in the department. I realized afterward that protecting Stottlemeyer was, in a way, simply an extension of my job protecting Monk.

But finesse hadn’t worked, things were going badly, and we hadn’t mined the information we needed. I had no choice. I had to bring Stottlemeyer into it.

Of course, this also meant that Stottlemeyer had to tell Maurice that his coworker was dead.

The good news, though, was that Maurice and Ronald weren’t close, so while the news was surprising, it wasn’t devastating. Nevertheless, Maurice closed the store for the day, politely hustled the customers out and sat down with us to answer our questions.

We should have left the store when Maurice threw us out and not bothered to bring Stottlemeyer into the situation, because, as it turned out, Maurice didn’t have much to add beyond what he’d already told me.

“I worked with the guy for five years and I really don’t know him any better today than I did on the day we met,” Maurice said. “He wasn’t somebody who let you inside.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“We’re in the shoe business. It’s awfully slow here most of the time, and when that happens, there isn’t much to do except stand around and talk to each other, you know?” Maurice said. “So you talk about your girlfriends, your families, things you’ve done, places you’ve been. Ronald never talked about anything you’d remember.”

“Did Ronald have any enemies?” Monk asked.

“He was a shoe salesman,” Maurice said.

“Shoe salesmen don’t make enemies?” I said.

“It’s not a job that inflames passions,” Maurice said, then glanced at Monk. “At least not usually.”

“What about in his personal life?” I said.

“What personal life?” Maurice said.

“Everybody has a personal life,” I said.

“Not everybody,” Monk said.

Good point.

“Even so,” I said, “he could have been a real rat bastard outside of this store. Maybe he slept with married women, ripped off old ladies, betrayed his friends.”

“I wish he had,” Maurice said. “Then at least he would have had something interesting to talk about. Ron was a nice guy but he was insanely dull. It was almost like he worked at it.”

Monk cocked his head. “What do you mean by that?”

Maurice shrugged. “Nobody could actually be that boring. To be honest, I’m not surprised he had a secret life.”

“What makes you think he had a secret life?” I asked.

“He was skinny-dipping at Baker Beach, wasn’t he?” Maurice replied. “The guy I knew, or didn’t know, wouldn’t have done that.”

“Maybe he didn’t,” Monk said.

“Did he ever mention anybody else in his life?” I asked. “Someone who