We knocked on Gregorio Dumas’s front door a half hour later. He look as if he patronized the same groomer as his dog. His fluffy mane of golden hair was styled into an enormous, flowing pompadour. His silhouette reminded me of a French poodle, which, by the way, was the animal he happened to own.
Coincidence? I don’t think so.
The guy was short and fat, with gold rings on every finger and necklaces and medallions draped around his neck. All his bling had a tacky canine theme, like the enormous, diamond-encrusted dog bone on the gold chain around his neck. He stood at his front door in a silk kimono, smirking with haughty superiority and evident distaste at his guests on the stoop, who happened to be Mr. Monk and me. Behind the two of us was the fire station where Sparky was killed.
“You obviously like dogs,” Monk said after introducing us and explaining why were there.
“You are a detective,” Gregorio said in a voice that was equal parts Ricardo Montalban and Fran Drescher. “Are all your deductions as brilliant as that?”
He stepped aside to let us in. It looked like he’d inherited his home furnishings from an elderly relative who did a lot of shopping at Levitz in 1978. The upholstery reminded me of the Impala station wagon my parents used to have.
An entire wall of shelves overflowed with dog show trophies, award ribbons, and framed photos of Letitia and her proud owner. Seeing the pictures, I was convinced I was right about their sharing the same groomer.
“If you like dogs so much,” Monk said, “you must be heartbroken about what happened to Sparky.”
“He was a rapist,” Gregorio said. “A canine sex offender.”
“C’mon,” I said. “We’re talking about dogs here.”
“Letitia is not a dog; she’s a symbol of perfection and beauty, the reigning queen of the canine world,” Gregorio said. “Or she was until Sparky ruined her life.”
He swept his arm in front of the wall of honors. “She’s won hundreds of American Kennel Club competitions, including Best in Show at the Tournament of Champions. Letitia earned over sixty thousand dollars in prize money and endorsements last year alone.”
“So you’re living off your dog,” Monk said.
“She enjoys the fruits of her success,” Gregorio said. “She lives better than I do.”
“She couldn’t live worse,” Monk muttered.
Gregorio led us through the kitchen. The laundry room was a modified pantry, and Monk paused to look in at a fresh load of clothes, underwear, and towels folded on the dryer.
“Mr. Monk,” I said, drawing his attention away before he started to refold everything or, worse, began giving his lecture on the importance of separating clothes by type of garment into their own stacks.
Gregorio opened the door to the backyard, which was dominated by a miniature Victorian cottage with a cedar-shingled roof, gables, cupola, bay windows, and a wraparound porch with flower boxes. There were a bunch of rubber chew toys on the porch, including a bone, a squeaky ball, a hot dog, and a cat. There was a high fence ringed with razor wire surrounding the yard.
“You’ve got to treat royalty like royalty,” Gregorio said.
“All that,” I said, “for a dog? I could live in there.”
“How many bathrooms does it have?” Monk asked.
“Show dogs are judged by teeth, muscle tone, bone structure, coat texture, and, most important, how they carry themselves. Their gait, their balance, how all the elements fit together. A dog who lives in a castle walks like a queen. That’s what she was, a queen.”
“You keep talking about Letitia in the past tense,” Monk said. “What happened to her?”
“Sparky’s lust,” Gregorio said. He whistled for the dog.
Letitia bounded out of her mansion. The French poodle still had her astonishingly white, fluffy hair and her regal bearing, but she was almost as rotund as her owner.
“Sparky knocked her up,” Gregorio said.
She went straight for Monk and shoved her nose toward his crotch. Monk blocked her with his hands and squealed when her wet nose made contact with his skin.
“I’ve been hit,” he said, backing into the living room while the dog pushed him along, trying to get her nose past his hands.
“Now she’s just a pregnant bitch,” Gregorio said as he returned to the living room. I followed him. “Soon she’ll be fat and swollen with big, bloated udders. But that’s nothing compared to what she’s going to look like after she squeezes out a litter of puppies.”
Monk grabbed a pillow from the couch and placed it protectively in front of his groin. So the enthusiastic dog angled around for a sniff at his butt instead. He dropped into a chair, covered his lap with the pillow, and pinched his knees together.
I could have helped Monk, of course. But after the morning ordeal with the bathroom, I was enjoying some payback.
“Surely she can get back into shape,” I said. After all, I thought, I bounced back to my old form after my pregnancy, didn’t I?
“Sagging teats, wrinkly skin, bloodshot eyes; that’s her future,” he said. “A shriveled-up shell of her old self. I warned those firemen something bad would happen if they let their spotted monster run wild through the neighborhood whenever they left the station.”
There was a mirror on the wall. I looked at my reflection, wondering if that was what Joe was going to see at dinner tonight: sagging teats, wrinkly skin, bloodshot eyes.
“It’s not like she bred with a show dog. Sparky was common street trash,” Gregorio said. “Can you imagine what those mixed-breed mongrel monsters are gonna look like? I won’t shed any tears over Sparky.”
Letitia jumped up on the couch beside Monk and started licking his cheek.
“Help,” Monk squeaked.
“Sounds like you hated Sparky enough to kill him,” I said.
“Except I didn’t,” Gregorio said.
“Is that the best you can do?” I said.
“Help,” Monk squeaked again.
I grabbed Letitia by the collar and pulled her away from Monk, who bolted out the front door and closed it behind him.
“If I was gonna kill him, I would have done it before he knocked up Letitia,” Gregorio said, taking Letitia from me. “What good would it do me now?”
“How about revenge?” Monk said from outside, his voice muffled by the door.
“I won’t say it didn’t cross my mind,” Gregorio said.
“What?” Monk said.
“It crossed my mind,” Gregorio yelled. “But I’m suing the San Francisco Fire Department for Letitia’s lost earning potential instead.”
“Where were you last night between ten P.M. and two A.M.?” I asked Gregorio.
“Here,” Gregorio said. “Alone.”
“That’s not much of an alibi,” I said.
“I don’t need one,” Gregorio said. “Because I didn’t do it.”
“Could you speak up?” Monk called out.
“I didn’t do it,” Gregorio yelled back. “Ask the fireman.”
Monk opened the door a crack, just enough to stick his face in. “What fireman?”
“The one I saw coming out of the station about ten thirty,” Gregorio said.
“But they all left at ten to fight a fire,” I said.
“I know that. Don’t you think I’ve got ears? It’s a real joy to live across the street from a fire station, let me tell you. Anyway, the blaring sirens at ten; then a half hour later that damn hell-dog of theirs starts barking. I looked out my window to see if he was trotting over here to defile Letitia some more, but the barking stopped and I didn’t see anything. Five minutes later, Letitia starts barking, so I look out the window again, thinking Sparky’s on his way over for some action, and I see a fireman walking out.”