Mr. Monk is Cleaned Out by Lee Goldberg

how you look at it.”
    “Did you come here to accuse us of something?” Bob said. “If so, get it over with already.”
    “You’re filth,” Monk yelled, stabbing a finger at Bob. “Putrid, disgusting, horrific primordial slime that isn’t fit to walk among civilized men. You’re a blight on humanity, Bob Sebes.”
    I’d seen Monk confront a hundred murderers but I’d never seen anything approaching this level of moral outrage from him. He was shaking. Then again, nobody had ever stripped him of every penny he had to his name. I didn’t blame him for losing control.
    “I didn’t take your money,” Bob said.
    “Forget about the money,” Monk said. “It doesn’t matter anymore.”
    “It doesn’t?” I said.
    “Look at yourself, Bob. Your feet are being devoured by a parasitic fungus,” Monk said. “They look like Chia Pets. In the name of all that’s holy, wash your disgusting feet before the fungus spreads and the entire city is infested with your wanton pestilence.”
    We all stared at Monk for a long moment.
    “Okay,” Bob said softly, carefully. “I’ll soak my feet in some baking soda.”
    “Acid would be better,” Monk said. “Or amputation.”
    “We didn’t come here to criticize his personal hygiene,” Stottlemeyer said to Monk.
    “Perhaps if somebody did a long time ago, he wouldn’t have committed his heinous crimes,” Monk said. “The fungus has probably gone to his brain and rotted it away. He’s got fungal foot brain. That’s what happens when you engage in wanton pestilence!”
    There it was again, wanton pestilence . Monk really liked that phrase. I was waiting for him to throw the word feculence , another of his favorites, into the discussion, too.
    “Thanks a lot, Monk,” Disher said. “You’ve just handed Bob Sebes his entire defense strategy on a silver platter.”
    Stottlemeyer turned to Disher. “What’s he going to say? ‘I’m innocent, Your Honor. I had athlete’s foot’ ? ”
    “It’s the fungal-foot brain defense,” Disher said.
    “It’s absurd,” Stottlemeyer said.
    “Oh, really?” Disher said. “Thirty years ago, Dan White assassinated the mayor of San Francisco and a city supervisor and his defense was that he ate too many Twinkies. That got him off with voluntary manslaughter instead of premeditated murder.”
    “You’ve got a point,” Stottlemeyer said. “I stand corrected.”
    Bob looked at Monk. “Could athlete’s foot fungus really spread to the brain?”
    “It can spread everywhere,” Monk replied. “It’s probably creeping toward us right now.”
    Monk took a big step back. So did Disher.
    Stottlemeyer rubbed his temples. “Let’s forget about the foot fungus for a moment and talk instead about Russell Haxby. Can you think of anyone who might have wanted him dead?”
    “Are you saying he was murdered?” Anna asked.
    “I’m saying it’s a possibility. It looks like he died in an accident, but until we’re sure, we’re treating it as a homicide.”
    “Any of his coconspirators in the fraud could have done it,” Bob said. “Or any of the victims of his crime.”
    “Or you,” Disher said.
    “I couldn’t have killed Haxby. Maybe you haven’t noticed, Detective, but I can’t even go outside and pick up my morning newspaper without it being broadcast live on CNN. Besides, even if I could leave the house, this ankle bracelet tracks my every move. You can probably tell me the last time I walked from the kitchen to my bedroom. So how could I possibly have killed anyone?”
    “You could have hired someone to do it for you,” Disher said.
    “I needed Haxby alive,” Bob said. “But even if I wanted him dead, I don’t know any hit men and I don’t have any money to hire one if I did, do I?”
    “You tell me, Bob,” Stottlemeyer said. “Perhaps you’ve got some money stashed away in an offshore account somewhere. Or your wife does. If you do, you know we’re going to find it and any recent withdrawals either of