Mr. Monk Goes to Germany by Lee Goldberg (general ebook reader .TXT) 📕

minutes to synchronize our watches to the exact second, and another two minutes on top of that just to confirm they were ticking at the same rate.

Once we were done, I went up the hill to check whether Dr. Rahner was still at the hotel and to get a map of the trails.

The woman at the front desk informed me that Dr. Rahner was delivering a lecture in the ground-floor conference room. She gave me a trail map. It was in German but the illustrations were easy enough to follow.

Before heading off on patrol, I walked around the hotel looking in windows until I saw a ground-floor room full of people. I crept up close, ducked behind a bush, and peeked inside the window as inconspicuously as I could. I was worried that if anyone saw me—the crazy woman who’d tried to kill one of the attendees—they might call the police. It wouldn’t help our cause if Stoffmacher thought I was nuts, too.

I could see Dr. Rahner behind a podium, giving a Power-Pointpresentation. Dr. Kroger was in the audience, taking notes. His nose was swollen. I felt a little twinge of guilt. I don’t usually go around socking people. If Dr. Kroger turned out to be innocent, I was going to have to get him a fruit basket or something.

Now that I’d established that our target was still there, I slipped away, picked a trail at random, and started wandering. Within a few minutes, I was swallowed up by the dense forest and the temperature seemed to drop a good ten degrees. Since my mission was to patrol possible avenues of escape, I chose paths that allowed me to circle the property.

It was a waste of time, but I found it relaxing. The only sounds I heard were birdsong, the wind rustling through the trees, and my own footsteps on the dry leaves and dirt. There was nobody there but me.

I didn’t see anything but trees and brush. There were no storefronts full of things to buy and no advertisements trying to seduce me into spending my money.

The air was fresh and rich with the scents of pine, flowers, and moist earth. It was so nice to take a breath and not smell exhaust fumes, cigarette smoke, or something being fried.

But I did smell something familiar, something that reminded me of home, and not in a pleasant way. I sniffed again and followed the scent.

I didn’t have to go far. The trail led to a clearing with a muddy pond surrounded by weeds. There was a persistent buzz in the air, but it wasn’t from an electrical line.

It was from the flies, the ones drawn to the body of a man lying facedown on the trail. He was wearing jogging shorts, a T-shirt, and a bright white pair of new running shoes.

I didn’t have to take his pulse to know that he was dead.

CHAPTER TWENTY

Mr. Monk Meets Nature

I had a cell phone, but I didn’t know if I had reception. And even if I did, I didn’t have the number for the police station or know how to call information to get it.

I had no choice but to leave the body where it was, mark its location on my trail map, and go back to the hotel and ask the woman at the front desk to call the police.

So that’s what I did.

The woman at the front desk, the same one who gave me the trail map, looked at me with confusion after I told her what I wanted her to do.

“I’m not sure I understand,” she said.

“I’d like you to call Hauptkriminalkommissar Stoffmacher at the Lohr police station and tell him that I found a dead body on one of the trails.”

“A dead body of what?”

“A person,” I said. “A man.”

She was already pale, but she seemed to get even paler. If she lost any more color, someone might mistake her for a corpse, too.

“You saw a dead man?”

That’s what happens when you travel with Adrian Monk. He doesn’t even have to be with you.

“Yes, I did,” I said. “That’s why I’m asking you to call the police.”

“Was it one of our guests?” she asked.

“Does it matter?” I said. “Tell Stoffmacher I will meet him at the bridge.”

I walked out and headed down the hill. I could see Monk pacing, looking at his watch and glancing up at me. I didn’t have to see his face to feel his disapproval. I was late for my hourly check-in, but I thought I had a good excuse.

“We synchronized our watches,” Monk said as I approached. “So you know you’re twenty minutes late with your report.”

“Dr. Rahner is still at the hotel,” I said. “And either I found Bruno Leupolz or the homicide rate in this town is skyrocketing.”

“What are you talking about?”

It was nice not to be the one asking that question for a change.

“I found a dead man on the trail,” I said.

“You left it there?”

“What else was I supposed to do?” I said.

“Stay with the body and send a passerby back to notify the police.”

“It’s a wilderness trail,” I said. “There was nobody else around.”

Monk scowled. “That’s why they should have security cameras out there. And lights, paved roads, and sidewalks.”

“Then it wouldn’t be a wilderness trail anymore,” I said.

“It would be an orderliness trail,” Monk said, “which is always better.”

Two silver-and-blue police cruisers came up the road and stopped at the bridge. Officer Schust and another cop I recognizedfrom outside the Vigg house