Monk S7.E2 Mr. Monk and the Genius (July 25th, 2008)

Monk and Natlie are hanging out at Monk’s house. Monk is writing out Natalie’s paycheck and as usual it is taking forever. When he finally finishes it, Natalie is upset since her check isn’t as large as she expected it to be. They fight over the paycheck a little when a woman shows up at the house. Her name is Linda. She tells Monk that she thinks her husband is going to kill her. Her husband is Patrick who is one of the smartest people in the world. Linda tells Monk that Patrick tells her every night that he is going to kill her and that his plan is perfect so no one will be able to trace the murder to him. Linda thinks he is going to act on his plan pretty soon since he recently took out a $10 million life insurance policy out on her. Linda tells Monk that he won’t be able to save her but she gives him a $5,000 check to prove that Patrick killed her.

Linda returns home after meeting with Monk. She is in a panicked state. The servants think she is paranoid but when they go to check up on her she is dead. Meanwhile at the police station Stottlemeyer is trying to get Linda protection when the call comes in that she is dead. Monk blames himself for not being able to save her. Linda’s body is examined and it is determined that she died of natural causes. Monk knows Patrick poisoned her though.

Patrick flies into town (he was in Canada for a chess tournament) in order to grief the death of his wife. The police question him when he arrives since they think it is suspicious that he continued his chess match even after he heard that his wife died. Patrick tells the police that he had nothing to do with it and says the Linda died of natural causes since she did have quite a few health problems including being an alcoholic.

Monk decides that he needs to find out as much information about Patrick if he hopes of ever solving the case. Monk meets with a chess player named Eric who plays for money in the park. Julie plays him in chess since he will only talk to him if someone plays him. Eric almost beat Patrick in chess and he tells Monk that Patrick always wins since he studies other people’s actions and sets up traps to catch them. Monk then solves the case of how Patrick killed Linda. Monk meets with Patrick at a funeral home and tells him how he killed his wife. Patrick realized that Linda had started drinking again and had a hidden stash of booze. He then poisoned some of the alcohol and that killed her. Since Linda hid the alcohol as soon as she poured a glass the police never found it. Monk is so excited that he outsmarted Patrick. There is one problem though. They can’t do a toxicalogy since Patrick had Linda’s body cremated.

Monk decides that he can’t be outsmarted by Patrick again. While he stakes out his house, he has Natalie read him the books Patrick has wrote about chess so he can get inside his head. Patrick knows that they are spying on him so he comes out to the car and offers them some drinks. Natalie actually drinks hers but spits it out when Monk mentions that if it was poisoned they could arrest Patrick. As soon as they are about to leave Monk notices some flowers in Patrick’s garden. The flower can be turned into a very dangerous poison. Monk takes the plant to Stottlemeyer but it is far from enough proof to convict Patrick. Monk then hints towards making the poison himself and framing Patrick. Stottlemeyer tries to talk Monk out of it.

Monk doesn’t listen and he ends up making the poison. He sneaks into Patrick’s house through the window and plants the poison. Monk changes his mind though and takes the poison and plans to leave when the light turns on. Patrick is sitting there watching Monk plant the evidence. Patrick new Monk would try to frame him and even opened the window for him to sneak in. They get to talking and Patrick says he won’t press charges and then he taunts Monk saying that he will never solve the case. Out of their conversation, Monk finds out that Patrick was married in the past and his wife died the same way as Linda. Monk brings this to the district attorney and convinces him to exume the body of Patrick’s wife. The toxicology comes back negative though (he didn’t poison his wife).

Monk doesn’t know what to do. He decides to head to a local chess tournament where Patrick is playing four chess masters at the same time. Monk realizes that the only way he is going to be able to talk with Patrick is if he can play him in a game of chess. Julie flirts with Eric (the boy from the park) and gets him to give Monk his spot. The chess game begins and Patrick easily finishes off the other three competitiors (Monk can’t even make a move since he is so indecisive). Monk solves the case though based on one of the moves that Patrick performs in one of the other games. Patrick switches his rook and king and this leads Monk to realize that Patrick switched the gravestones for his ex wife the day before they exumed the body (they exumed the wrong body). The police exume the correct body and Patrick is arrested for the murder of both his wives.

Monk and Natalie are hanging out at Monk’s house and Natalie tells Monk how proud she is. She then asks Monk for his autograph and Monk ends up signing a piece of paper. It actually turns out to be the check from Linda that Monk refused to cash. Natalie then deposits the check so Monk can acutally pay her what he owes her.