Inspector Cadaver (21 page)

At some point, on this green-painted table,
there had been another glass. Someone has removed it. Was it Félicie?

‘What did you do when you didn't
see Lapie?'

‘Nothing. I went into the kitchen, lit
the gas to boil the milk and drew water from the pump to wash the vegetables.'

‘After that?'

‘I stood on the old chair and changed
the fly-paper.'

‘Still with your hat on? Because you
wear a hat when you go shopping, don't you?'

‘I'm no scullery maid.'

‘When did you take your hat
off?'

‘When I took the milk pan off the
stove. I went up …'

Everything is brand new and fresh in the
house, which the old man christened ‘Cape Horn'. The staircase smells of
varnished pine. The treads creak.

‘So go up. I'll follow
you.'

She pushes open the door to her bedroom,
where a
box-mattress covered with flowered cretonne serves as a divan
and photos of film stars grace the walls.

‘So, I take off my hat. Then I think,
“Drat! I forgot to open the window in Monsieur Jules' room.”

‘I walk across the landing … I
open the door and I scream …'

Maigret is still drawing smoke from his
pipe, which he had refilled as he was crossing the garden. He studies a chalked shape on
the polished floor, the outline of Pegleg's body in the position it was in when it
was discovered on Monday morning.

‘And the revolver?' he asks.

‘There was no revolver. You know that
because you've read the report by the local police.'

Above the mantelpiece is a scale model of a
three-masted ship, and on the walls are a number of paintings all of sailing vessels. It
is like being in the house of an old, retired seafaring man, but the police lieutenant
who conducted the original investigation has told Maigret all about Pegleg's
strange adventure.

Jules Lapie was never a sailor but a
book-keeper with a firm of ship's chandlers at Fécamp supplying nautical
equipment – sails, ropes, pulleys – as well as provisions for long sea
voyages.

A thick-set bachelor, meticulous in his
habits, maybe obsessively so, with a generally grizzled air and a brother who is a
ship's carpenter.

One morning. Jules Lapie, then aged about
forty, goes aboard the
Sainte-Thérèse
, a three-master which is
sailing that same day for Chile, where it will take on a cargo of
phosphates. Lapie is given the humdrum job of ensuring that all the merchandise
ordered has been delivered and of collecting payment from the captain.

What happens next? The Fécamp matelots
are all too ready to have a laugh at the fastidious book-keeper's expense. He
always appears so ill at ease whenever his work takes him on board a ship. Glasses are
raised, as is the custom. They make him drink. God knows how much they made him drink to
get him so drunk.

However that may be, when with the high tide
the
Sainte-Thérèse
glides between the piers of the Normandy port and
heads out into the open sea, Jules Lapie, dead to the world, is snoring in a corner of
the hold while everyone believes he has gone ashore – at least that is what
everyone will say later.

The holds have been battened down. It is
only after two days that the book-keeper is found. The captain refuses to put about and
be diverted from his course, and that is how Lapie, who at that time still has both
legs, finds himself on the way to Cape Horn.

The adventure will cost him a leg, one day
when there's a sudden squall and he falls through an open hatch.

Years later, he will be killed by a single
shot from a revolver one Monday in springtime, a few minutes after leaving his tomato
seedlings to themselves, while Félicie goes shopping in Mélanie
Chochoi's brand-new store.

‘Let's go back
downstairs,' sighs Maigret.

The house is so quiet, so pleasant because
it is as clean as a new pin and filled with nice smells. To the right, the
dining room has been turned into a funeral parlour. The inspector
opens the door a little into the semi-dark interior, where the shutters are closed and
only thin slats of light squeeze into the room. The coffin has been laid on the table,
over which a sheet has been spread, and by its side is a hors d'œuvre dish
filled with holy water in which sprig of box tree was soaking.

Félicie waits in the doorway to the
kitchen.

‘In short, you know nothing, you saw
nothing, you have no thoughts whatsoever about the visitor who might have called on your
… employer – let's just say Jules Lapie – when you were out
…'

She holds his gaze but does not reply.

‘And you are sure that when you got
back there was only one glass on the table in the garden?'

‘I only saw one. Now, if you can see
two …'

‘Did Lapie get many visitors?'

Maigret sits down next to the butane gas
stove and would not say no to a glass of something, preferably of the rosé
Félicie mentioned, the barrel of which he has glimpsed in the cool darkness of the
wine store. The sun is rising in the sky and steadily drawing up the morning dampness.

‘He didn't like visitors.'

A strange man whose life must have been
turned inside out by his journey round Cape Horn! Back in Fécamp where, despite his
wooden leg, people could not help smiling at his adventure, he keeps more to himself
than ever and begins a long legal battle with the owners of the
Sainte-Thérèse
. A battle which he would win by sheer persistence.
He claims the company is at fault, that he was kept on board
against his will and that consequently the owners are responsible for his accident. He
sets the highest value on the loss of his leg and in court judgement is given in his
favour, recognizing his right to sizeable compensation.

The people of Fécamp find it all
amusing. He avoids them; he also moves away from the sea, which he loathes, and is one
of the first to be seduced by the glossy prospectus put out by the creators of
Jeanneville.

Needing a servant, he sends for a young
woman he knew as a girl in Fécamp.

‘How long have you been living here
with him?'

‘Seven years.'

‘You are twenty-four now. So you were
seventeen when …'

He allows his thoughts to wander, then
suddenly asks:

‘Do you have a boyfriend?'

She looks at him without replying.

‘I asked if you have a
boyfriend.'

‘My private life is my
business.'

‘Does he come here?'

‘I don't have to answer
that.'

Dammit, he could box her ears for her! There
are moments when Maigret feels like swatting her or taking her by the shoulders and
giving her a good shake.

‘No matter, I'll find out in the
end …'

‘You won't find out
anything.'

‘Oh, so I won't find out
anything …'

He stops himself. This is too silly for
words! Is he going to stand here arguing with this girl?

‘You're sure
there isn't anything you want to tell me? Think hard, while there's still
time.'

‘I've thought about it.'

‘You're not hiding
anything?'

‘I'd be surprised if I had
anything left to hide. They say you're very clever at making people talk!'

‘Well, we'll see.'

‘You've seen everything!'

‘What do you think you'll do
when the family comes and Jules Lapie has been laid to rest?'

‘No idea.'

‘Would you want to stay on
here?'

‘Maybe.'

‘Do you think you'll be left
anything?'

‘Very possibly.'

Maigret does not entirely succeed in keeping
his temper.

‘Be that as it may, my girl,
there's one thing I must ask you to remember. As long as the investigation remains
ongoing, you are not to leave without first informing the police.'

‘So I am not allowed to move out of
the house?'

‘No!'

‘What if I wanted to go away somewhere
else?'

‘You'll have to ask for my
authorization.'

‘Do you think I killed him?'

‘I'll think whatever I like, and
that is none of your business!'

He has had enough. He is furious. He is
angry with himself for allowing himself to be reduced to such a state by a kid named
Félicie. Twenty-four years old? Come off it! She's a kid of twelve or
thirteen who is playing God
only knows what sort of games and takes
herself very seriously.

‘Goodbye!'

‘Goodbye!'

‘By the way, how will you manage for
food?'

‘Don't you worry about me! I
won't let myself die of hunger.'

He is sure she won't. He can imagine
her, after he's gone, sitting down at the table in the kitchen and slowly eating
whatever there is while she reads one of those cheap novels she buys from Madame
Chochoi.

Maigret is incandescent. He has been taken
for a ride, in front of everybody, and worse, taken for a ride by that poisonous
creature, Félicie.

It is now Thursday. Lapie's family
have arrived: his brother Ernest, the ship's carpenter from Fécamp, a rough
sort of man with hair cropped short and a face pitted with scars left by small-pox; his
wife, who is very fat and has a moustache; their two children, whom she herds before her
the way geese are driven in fields; then a nephew, a young man of nineteen, Jacques
Pétillon by name, who has come from Paris, feverish and rather sickly, who is
regarded with suspicion by the Lapie tribe.

There is as yet no cemetery at Jeanneville.
The funeral cortege winds its way to Orgeval, in whose parish the new development lies.
The great talking point of the day is the crepe veil worn by Félicie. Where on
earth did she find it? It is only later that Maigret learns that she borrowed it from
Madame Chochoi.

Félicie does not wait
to be shown to her place but takes it, at the head of the procession. She walks in front
of the family, ramrod straight, a perfect image of grief, dabbing her eyes with a
black-edged handkerchief, also probably on loan from Mélanie, which she has
sprinkled liberally with cheap perfume.

Sergeant Lucas, who has spent the night at
Jeanneville, is present alongside Maigret. Both follow the cortege along a dusty lane.
Larks sing in the clear air.

‘She knows something, it's
obvious. No matter how clever she thinks she is, she'll trip herself up in the
end.'

Lucas agrees. The doors of the small church
remain open during the prayer of absolution, so that the atmosphere inside smells more
of spring than of incense. It is not very far to the graveside.

After the service is over, the family has to
return to the house for the reading of the will.

‘Why would my brother have made a
will?' says an astonished Ernest Lapie. ‘It's not the custom in our
family.'

‘According to Félicie
…'

‘Félicie! Félicie!
It's always Félicie …'

Shoulders are shrugged helplessly.

She brazenly edges to the front and manages
to be first to throw a shovelful of earth down on to the coffin? Then she turns away
tearfully and walks off so quickly that it seems inevitable that she will trip over.

‘Don't let her out of your
sight, Lucas.'

She walks on, without stopping, through the
streets and back lanes of Orgeval. Then suddenly Lucas, who is barely fifty metres
behind her, emerges too late into an almost
completely empty road, at
the end of which a van is vanishing around a corner.

He opens the door of an inn.

‘Tell me … That van which has
just driven off …'

‘Van? It belongs to Louvet, the garage
mechanic. He was here a minute ago, having a drink.'

‘Did he give anyone a lift?'

‘Don't know … Don't
think so … I haven't been outside …'

‘Do you know where he'd be
going?'

‘Paris, like he does every
Thursday.'

Lucas hurries off to the post office, which,
fortunately for him, is just across the road.

‘Hello? … Yes … It's
Lucas … Hurry … Avan, pretty beat up … Wait a second …'

He turns to the woman behind the counter.

‘Do you know the registration number
of the van belonging to Monsieur Louvet, the mechanic?'

‘Sorry … All I can remember is
that it ends with an eight …'

‘Are you still there? …
Registration number ends in eight … A young woman wearing mourning clothes …
Hello? … Don't cut us off … No … I don't think
there's any need to arrest her … Just put a tail on her … Got that?
… The chief will phone you himself.'

He rejoins Maigret, who is walking by
himself behind the family along the lane which leads from Orgeval to Jeanneville.

‘She's gone …'

‘What?'

‘She must have got
into the van as it was setting off. I just had time to see it disappear round the
corner. I phoned Quai des Orfèvres. They are alerting all divisions. They'll
watch the main toads into Paris.'

So, Félicie has gone! Simply, in the
full light of day, under the eyes and noses so to speak of Maigret and his best
sergeant! Vanished, despite that enormous mourning veil which would make her
recognizable from a kilometre away!

Members of the family who turn round from
time to time to look back at the two policemen are amazed to see no trace of
Félicie. She has taken the front-door key with her. They have to get into the house
by going through the garden. Maigret raises the blinds in the dining room, where the bed
sheet and the sprig of box are still on the table and an after-smell of candle hangs in
the air.