Dusk had fallen when the last ferry for the night landed with a thump on the monastery landing. Adrian rubbed his stomach as he jumped out; the bay's waves had been rougher than he'd expected. "Back, back up a few yards off the shore," he instructed the ferry pilot, "Don't let anyone except us off the island."

"Where do we look first, Monk," Christie asked him, drawing his gun.

"Back in the cave," Adrian held up his hand. Drilling could be heard distinctly from where they were standing, "But, but first, I'd like to make sure this time we've got better lighting."

"Right," Christie dug through his dashboard for flashlights. "Father, check each and every cell," Adrian instructed Father Fitzwater, "If your monks are in there, get them out; it could already be in there."

"It?" Natalie asked, "You didn't exactly explain what you learned, Mr. Monk."

"It was right on the paper, Natalie; you were only looking at what he'd written that concerned you," Adrian explained as they dashed towards the cave entrance, "They'd been buying up mice and shrews for a few months, Faracy and his wife, and a small heater. That could only mean they were taking care of...it," he grimaced in fear.

"And it is...?" she was starting to look a bit frustrated by his indirectness.

"New World pit viper," Adrian shivered openly, "It's native to Brazil, and the clerk said Faracy had been surveying oil there; he probably picked up a specimen while planning this. Every night he wanted to kill one of the monks, he slipped out in the dead of night and entered the cave. He knew the gratings underneath gave him the chance to commit the murder without being seen or noticed. He let the viper go up through the grating and waited until it bit its victim. Once he was sure he'd succeeded, he recalled it, probably with some of his mice, and I think he's using it again right now; the monks are praying from here until midnight, no one'll interrupt him."

He paused by the entrance to the cave until Christie came running up with a pair of flashlights. The three of them entered and hustled towards the sound of the drilling, only to be surprised by the glare of small arc lights from the end of the oil tunnel. A silhouette could be make out drilling at the walls, from which trickling sounds could be heard. Christie shut off his flashlight and crept up to the form. "Police, freeze!" he shouted as he jumped forward, but the figure did not initially stop, likely since the drilling drowned out every sound. He reached forward and shut off the switch, making the figure jump. "Mrs. Fred Faracy, I presume?" he asked, drawing his handcuffs.

"Look, it was all his idea!" she protested, "I told Fred to just exert pressure on the church; I never wanted him to resort to murder! I wanted to tell...!"

"And what have we here?" the sergeant glanced over the ridge in the cavern. A miniature submarine was moored in a large lagoon, with oil barrels stacked by it, "So this is how you get all the crude out of here without being noticed."

Adrian had in fact noticed something else; an empty terrarium by the wall with what was clearly a shed snake skin. "Where is your husband now, Mrs. Faracy?" he asked her breathlessly.

"He's off doing it again with that damn reptile!" she admitted.

"Which monk is he planning on killing!?"

"How am I supposed to know, he just goes up and down each row one at a time!"

"It's Brother Xavier tonight," Adrian realized, 'Natalie, tell the Father, it's Brother Xavier's cell. I'll try and stop Faracy."

"Right," she rushed towards the entrance. Adrian hustled up the cavern towards the monastery, weaving his way crazily around pools of oil on the floor. Sure enough, he could make out a figure standing by the grating farthest up the corridor on the right. "Faracy, hold it!" he cried out.

"Stay back, Monk!" the oil executive barked. Adrian heard a gun cocking. He slipped out of sight behind an outcropping. "It's over, Faracy, we know what you're up to," he called out, being sure to stay out of sight.

It's too late, Monk; he's got to be already dead by now," Faracy boasted, "Perhaps you'd like to meet my pet yourself?"

Before Adrian could answer, there came the crashing of wood from above; Brother Xavier's door had been broken in. "Quick, get it off him!" he heard Natalie cry out.

"Back!" Father Fitzwater roared. Adrian heard the thumping of his cane and an angry hissing that got substantially louder; the snake was coming back through the hole. "No, no, not at me!" Faracy shouted, "Hey Monk, say hello to MY little friend!"

Adrian seized up as a long shadow landed right next to him. He leaped backwards against the wall. "Not, not me!" he screeched at the viper, shining his flashlight directly at it. "Go, go on back to your boss!"

The snake, clearly enraged at having been beaten at in the cell, hissed loudly and kept coming. Adrian frantically seized loose rocks and flung it at him. All of them missed. He backed up as far against the wall as he could go. The viper's head raised upwards, ready to strike...

And then jerked about as no fewer than five bullets riddled it. It let out one final agonized hiss and went completely still. Adrian glanced up in surprise to see Christie step around the corner with his gun smoking. "You OK, Monk?" he asked breathlessly.

"I, I am now, Joe," Adrian inched along the wall to avoid touching the snake's body, "I think I...watch out!"

Christie was knocked to the ground as Faracy pushed him to the ground and dashed for the cave entrance. Adrian leaped out of the alcove and gave pursuit. He needn't have bothered, however, for no sooner did Faracy exit the cave than he was blindsided by an elderly blur and knocked hard to the ground. "What the hell!?" the oil executive groaned in agony, clutching his ribs.

"Father?" Adrian was amazed as a winded Father Fitzwater planted both a foot and his cane on Faracy's chest to hold him down.

"Oh, I knew I still had the old sprint left in there somewhere," the priest smiled. He turned to see Natalie coming back over from the monastery. "He is all right then?" he inquired.

"Yes, he wasn't bitten," she said in relief, "In fact he slept through the whole thing."

"Dear Xavier, always devoted to the routine," Father Fitzwater chuckled. He helped heft Faracy up so Christie could cuff him. "You, sir, should consider trying the life of a monk," he told the killer firmly, "And where you're going now, at least you'll have all the time to consider it."

"My lawyer's going to have a field day with you people!" Faracy snarled, "If you think...!!"

"Oh just shut up Fred! It's over!" his wife barked from over by the cave entrance, "You pushed it too far this time, and I'm not helping you out of this one!"

"You better not have breathed anything to them, Lisa!" he snapped at her.

"No, she didn't, but we already figured the whole thing out," Adrian told him, "Here's what happened; unable to find new substantial oil deposits overseas, you were out boating on the bay trying to plan out your next move, and turned on your sonar oil finder I saw in your sub in the lagoon."

"You barely had five seconds to look in there," Natalie was amazed.

"Like, like I said, it's, it's a blessing, and a curse," Adrian said. He turned back to Faracy and continued, "You were amazed when it showed that there was a tremendous deposit underneath this island. So big, in fact, that you got greedy and decided you wouldn't tell Omnipresent about it; you would excavate it yourself and sell it on the black market for a fortune. So you told Omnipresent you'd be on vacation for a while, then approached the diocese about selling you the island. But the archbishop turned you down flat no matter how much you offered him for it. So you decided the best approach would be to kill off every monk on the island, then buy it dirt cheap once the diocese sold it off. You cased the island and took note that Charles Schickram was a dead ringer for you. So you waited until he went out for the weekly food, then you grabbed him outside the market, got all the relevant information about himself out of him, then killed him and took his place. You convinced your wife that she'd reap a fortune by helping you out, so you and her took that sub from Omnipresent's fleet and drilled out the oil every night."

"And believe me, it was the stupidest thing I ever did in my life!" Mrs. Faracy griped, "If you had to spend ten hours a night in a dirty tunnel drilling for filthy crude with equipment that breaks down every ten minutes, you'd be on the verge of insanity too!"

"But then why would he bother telling you that Mitch killed Trudy, Mr. Monk?" Natalie interrupted, "I still don't get how that ties in with everything."

"Quite simple really, Natalie, it's same thing we've put up with the last couple of weeks," Adrian advanced towards Faracy, "Fred here is one of my biggest fans. He watches the show every week, don't you Fred? And you couldn't stand the thought of anyone replacing Sharona. So you were conspiring to find some way to make me get rid of Natalie so I'd bring her back. When you were pressing Schickram for important information, he must have blurted out that he'd hated Mitch and had tried to set him up. And you realized you had a golden opportunity in the palm of your hands. So you thought up the most horrible thing imaginable to pin on him, and that was the murder of my wife...although I see you'd thought out other ways too," he held up the paper that had blown into his face. "How the hell's you get your hands on that!?" Faracy demanded.

"We're weighing several possibilities, Fred," Adrian straightened out the paper further and read some of the things on it that had lines drawn through them, "'Mitch has ties to bin Laden,' 'Mitch strafed innocent civilians in Kosovo,' 'Mitch was a serial killer with twenty-seven victims before he died.' I do have to commend you on original planning, Fred, I don't think any of the extremists I've met so far have thought that deeply."

"It was all for a good cause, Monk," Faracy said unapologetically, "I thought you'd be more grateful that I was willing to try."

"Mitch is the man I love more than my own life!" Natalie thundered at him, thoroughly enraged, "When you attack him, you attack me!"

"Hey you want to know something, lady, you're NOTHING!!" Faracy spat back at her, "You're nobody, you understand, nobody! And if you ever thought you would be anything compared to Sharona Fleming, you're stupid too! Monk here is better off without you and your...!"

Without even realizing it, Adrian slugged Faracy hard across the face. "In fact, Natalie's made my life better than I could have ever hoped it would be again!" he found himself barking, "So just shut up, Fred, you haven't changed anything! It's over, I've moved on, and I'm happy for it!"

"That's why you're stupid too!" he ranted, clutching his nose.

"Oh will you just drop it for once!" his wife shouted at him. "Honestly, I got over the nurse going right away," she confessed to everyone, "It's been a nightmare listening to him go on and on about how she needs to come back no matter what, I can't stand him anymore!"

"Good, because I can't stand you either!" barked back, "All you've done since I brought you in on this is complain, complain, complain!!"

"When you act so controllingly and treat me like a servant, why shouldn't I!" Mrs. Faracy retorted. "You want to know how he made it look like I shot him, Monk?" she told the detective with a wry expression, "He rigged up a set of exploding packets on his back filled with fake blood; he gave me the time to drive by, and I set off a buzzer you'll find in that sub that electronically detonated them."

"You...!!" Faracy lunged forward and had to be restrained by Christie.

"Sorry Fred, but I'm not spending thirty years in a filthy jail when the whole thing was your damn idea!" she bellowed at him.

"OK you two, why don't we go take this inside somewhere," Christie took them by the shoulders and led them off--still screaming vile things at each other--towards the ferry, "Clearly the two of you have a load to work on."

"And I'd like to thank you all for being patient with me during my time here," Adrian told the surviving monks some time later in front of the monastery's door, "And for being patient while I cleaned out your cells one last time, and then the chapel and the dining room and...well, you get the idea. I, I just have one last request; say a prayer for my wife tonight, if that's OK. I want her to know everything's OK down here again."

The monks nodded, some of them looking touched by the detective's emotional plea for Trudy. Adrian dared to shake all their hands and waved for Natalie to hand over several wipes at once. He walked over to Father Fitzwater. "Thank, thank you for everything, Father," he told the vicar with a smile, "May, maybe I'll give your God more of a chance from here on; like I said, with no other reason for it,maybe it was him who brought that evidence to us."

"Remember, he's always watching you, Mr. Monk," Father Fitzwater smiled knowingly, "And he's there to listen if you need advice. And if you need any worldly advice, feel free to call me at any time."

The ferry pilot honked his horn impatiently. "Better get going, then," the detective said, managing one last wave goodbye to the priest. He and Natalie hustled towards the dock and got onboard. "I'm, I'm glad this case is over with now," he remarked as they pulled back out into the bay.

"First thing we do when we get back is call up the base and set everything straight with Mitch once and for all," Natalie declared, "At least that part of his record will be clear now. So now we'll..."

She noticed her employer looked rather glum. "What?" she asked.

"Oh, it's just...you know, Natalie, I'm, I am glad Mitch didn't kill Trudy, but, part of me...I just would have like to have gotten another break back there," Adrian admitted, "It, it felt like I was so close to some kind of resolution, and then to have it evaporate again..."

"Mr. Monk, you know you'll find the answer some day," she told him sympathetically, putting her hand on top of his, "No point in obsessing over what doesn't happen in life. Whatever God does have in store, he'll bring to you when it's time."

"Which, which brings me to another point; you do promise you're not going to invoke God every single time we're together," Adrian posed to her, "I'm, I am giving him a chance like I told the Father, but I'd rather do it on my own terms, agreed?"

"Fair enough," Natalie nodded.

"And no more drawing any weapons of any kind on me or anyone who says anything about Mitch?"

"Trust me, Mr. Monk, I've vowed to be more open to a clearer image of him," she swore, "I guess it took something like that to make me realize I still need to let go of him some more."

She glanced towards the bow and brightened. "Oh look," she pointed. A familiar figure was waiting for them at the ferry launch. "Hey Monk, Natalie, I got word the two of you were here," Captain Stottlemeyer greeted them cordially as the ferry touched back on the mainland and the ramp slid down.

"How, how did the ceremony go, Captain?" Adrian asked him, eagerly stepping back onto dry land, relieved he probably wouldn't have to make the arduous trek across the bay again.

"Couldn't have been better," Stottlemeyer said proudly, "The governor's still especially proud we saved his life, so he saved some special words for us. How about you two? Joe mentioned something about a bust here. Anything exciting?"

"Uh, no, not, not really anything that interesting," Adrian exchanged a knowing wink with Natalie, "Rather boring case actually, very routine. Nothing really important about it."

On the other side of the island at that moment, an anguished Brother Rufus was rowing away from the island in a small rowboat. He was dialing a cell phone in his hands, his fingers shaking as he pressed each number. There were four rings before the other end picked up. "Who is it!?" snapped the voice on the other end.

"It's me, Judge," Brother Rufus told him with a visible amount of contempt in his voice.

"So you've finally broken your code of silence, Rufus? Not that much commitment on your part."

"It's all over," Brother Rufus stopped the boat in the middle of the bay and hefted the anchor--no longer attached to its chain--in his free hand, "I've seen Adrian Monk, and no amount of words can describe how sorry I feel for what we did to him when we blew up his wife."

"I'm warning you, Rufus!" the voice bellowed angrily, "If I find you've breathed ANYTHING to Monk, not just you but everyone you've ever cared for is dead!"

"That won't make any difference, Judge, because I'm a dead man now anyway," Brother Rufus walked towards the stern, anchor in hand, "No amount of penitance I've done or can ever do will make up for what we did to him, so I'm ending it now. But I want you to know before I go that Monk'll find you out in time. I've stashed enough evidence I've got in a safe place, and it's only a matter of time before he finds it and brings you down harder than you can imagine. Oh yes, soon enough you're going to realize that God does exist after all, and the punishment he's got waiting for you is named Adrian Monk."

"RUFUS!!" roared the voice, but the monk was no longer listening as he dove overboard with the anchor in his hands, his body quickly sinking forever to the bottom of the bay.

THE END (??)