Maigret Gets Angry (6 page)

He looked at his wife, who merely gazed at him
with simplicity but determination.

‘This is a very difficult time for us,
inspector, and my mother-in-law's obstinacy bodes even worse to come. You've met
her. I don't know what you make of her.'

Maigret, in any case, took good care not to tell
him, because he sensed that Charles Malik was beginning to flounder and was summoning his wife
to his aid once more.

‘Remember, Mother is eighty-two years
old,' she said. ‘It's all too easy to forget because she has so much energy
… Sadly, her mind isn't always as alert as her body. She's completely
devastated by the death of my daughter, who was her favourite.'

‘I appreciate that, madame.'

‘You can see, now, the atmosphere we have
been living in since the tragedy. Mother has got it into her head that there is some mystery
behind it.'

‘The inspector has certainly gathered
that,' continued Charles Malik. ‘Don't get upset, darling … My wife is
very highly strung, inspector. We all are at the moment. Our affection for my mother-in-law
alone is stopping us from taking the steps that would seem necessary. That is why we are asking
you …'

Maigret pricked up his ears.

‘… we are asking you … to
carefully weigh up the pros and cons before—'

Goodness! Could it have been this bumbling, tubby
man who had fired at Maigret the previous evening? There was
nothing implausible about this notion that had just occurred to
him.

Ernest Malik was a cold-blooded animal and most
likely, if he had fired, he would have aimed more accurately. Whereas Charles, on the other hand
…

‘I understand your situation,'
continued the master of the house, leaning on the mantelpiece in a more family-portrait pose
than ever. ‘It is delicate, very delicate. In short—'

‘In short,' broke in Maigret, in his
most ingratiating tone, ‘I wonder what on earth I'm doing here.'

He covertly watched Charles Malik and caught his
little tremor of delight.

That was exactly what they had wanted him to say.
What was he doing there, in fact? No one had invited him, other than an old woman of eighty-two
who wasn't completely compos mentis.

‘I wouldn't go so far as to say
that,' Charles Malik corrected him, very much the gentleman, ‘given that you are a
friend of Ernest's, I think it would be better—'

‘Tell me.'

‘Yes … I think it would be fitting,
or rather desirable, that you do not overly encourage my mother-in-law in these ideas which
… that—'

‘You are convinced, Monsieur Malik, that
your daughter's death was absolutely natural?'

‘I think it was an accident.'

He was blushing, but had replied firmly.

‘And what about you, madame?'

The handkerchief was just a tiny ball in her
hand.

‘I think the same as my husband.'

‘In that case, clearly …'

He was giving them hope. He could sense them
swelling with the hope that they were going to be forever rid of his burdensome presence.

‘… I am obliged to accept your
brother's invitation. Then, if nothing happens, if no new developments require my presence
…'

He rose, almost as ill-at-ease as they were. He
was eager to be outside, to take a deep breath of fresh air.

‘So I'll see you in a little
while,' Charles Malik was saying. ‘I apologize for not showing you out, but I still
have things to do.'

‘Don't mention it. My humble
respects, madame.'

He was still in the grounds, walking down
towards the Seine, when he was struck by a noise. It was that of the handle of a rural telephone
turning, with the short ring signalling that the call had been heard.

‘He has telephoned his brother to report
back to him,' thought Maigret.

And he believed he could guess what was being
said:

‘Phew! He's leaving. He promised. As
long as nothing happens at lunch.'

A tug-boat was pulling its eight barges towards
the Haute Seine, and it was a tug-boat with a green triangle, an Amorelle and Campois tug-boat;
the barges were also Amorelle and Campois.

It was only half past eleven. He couldn't
face going to L'Ange, where there was nothing for him to do. He walked
along the riverbank mulling over his confused thoughts. He paused
like a sightseer in front of Ernest Malik's luxury pontoon. He had his back to the
Maliks' residence.

‘Well! Maigret?'

It was Ernest Malik, dressed this time in a grey
salt-and-pepper suit and wearing white kid shoes and a panama hat.

‘My brother has just telephoned
me.'

‘I know.'

‘Apparently you have already had enough of
my mother-in-law's nonsense.'

There was something suppressed in his voice,
something emphatic in his eyes.

‘If I understand correctly, you want to get
back to your wife and your lettuce patch?'

Then, without knowing why (perhaps that is what
is known as inspiration), Maigret, making himself heavier, thicker, more inert than ever,
replied:

‘No.'

Malik reacted. Despite all his sang-froid, he
could not help himself. For a moment, he looked like someone trying to swallow his saliva, and
his Adam's apple visibly rose and fell two or three times.

‘Ah! …'

A brief glance about them, but he wasn't
planning to push Maigret into the Seine.

‘We still have a good while ahead of us
before the guests arrive. We usually lunch late. Come into my study for a moment.'

Not a word was spoken as they crossed the
grounds.
Maigret glimpsed Madame Malik arranging
flowers in the vases in the drawing room.

They skirted the house, and Malik walked ahead of
his guest into a fairly vast study, with deep leather armchairs and walls decorated with model
ships.

‘You may smoke.'

He carefully shut the door and half-lowered the
Venetian blinds, because the sun was streaming into the room. At last he sat down at his desk
and started fiddling with a crystal paper knife.

Maigret had perched on the arm of an armchair and
was slowly filling his pipe, giving the impression that his mind was a blank. When the silence
had gone on for some time, he asked quietly:

‘Where is your son?'

‘Which one?'

Then, correcting himself:

‘This is not about my son.'

‘It's about me, isn't
it?'

‘What do you mean?'

‘Nothing.'

‘Well! Yes, it is about you.'

Beside this wiry, elegant man with refined,
well-groomed features, Maigret cut an oafish figure.

‘How much are you offering me?'

‘What makes you think that I was planning
to offer you anything?'

‘I imagine you are.'

‘Why not, after all? The police force
isn't very generous. I don't know what kind of a pension they pay you.'

And
Maigret, still gentle and humble:

‘Three thousand, two hundred.'

He added, with disarming candour:

‘Of course, we have some
savings.'

This time, Ernest Malik was truly disconcerted.
This seemed all too easy. He had the feeling his former schoolmate was laughing at him. And yet
…

‘Listen—'

‘I'm all ears—'

‘I know what you're going to
think.'

‘I think so little!'

‘You're going to think that your
presence here bothers me, that I have something to hide. And supposing that were the
case?'

‘Yes, supposing that were the case?
It's none of my business, is it?'

‘Are you being sarcastic?'

‘Never.'

‘You'd be wasting your time with me,
you see. You probably think you're very clever. You have had a successful and
distinguished career chasing thieves and murderers. Well, Jules my friend, there are no thieves
or murderers here. Do you understand? Through the greatest of coincidences, you have landed in a
world you don't know and where you are likely to do a lot of damage. That's why
I'm telling you—'

‘How much?'

‘A hundred thousand.'

Maigret didn't bat an eyelid, then Malik
said, nodding hesitantly:

‘A hundred and fifty. I'll go up to
two hundred thousand.'

He
was on his feet now, jittery, tense, still fiddling with the paper knife, which suddenly snapped
between his fingers. A bead of blood formed on his index finger and Maigret commented:

‘You've hurt yourself.'

‘Be quiet. Or rather answer my question.
I'll write out a cheque for two hundred thousand francs. Not a cheque? No matter …
The car will take us to Paris later and I'll pick up the cash from my bank. Then
I'll drive you back to Meung.'

Maigret sighed.

‘What's your answer?'

‘Where is your son?'

This time, Malik could not contain his anger.

‘It's none of your business.
It's no one's business, do you hear? I'm not in your office at Quai des
Orfèvres and neither are you. I am asking you to leave because your presence here is
ill-timed, to say the least. People are talking. They're wondering—'

‘What exactly are they
wondering?'

‘One last time, I'm asking you
politely to leave. And if you do, I'm prepared to offer you a very generous reward. Is it
yes or is it no?'

‘It's no, of course.'

‘Very well. In that case, I'm going
to have to change my tune.'

‘Go ahead.'

‘I'm no angel and I never was.
Otherwise I wouldn't be where I am today. Now, through your pig-headedness, through your
stupidity, yes, stupidity, you're likely to
unleash a calamity that you don't even suspect. And
you're happy, aren't you? You think you're still in the Police Judiciaire
grilling some little cutthroat or some young delinquent who's strangled an old woman.

‘I haven't strangled anyone, you
should know that. I haven't robbed anyone either.'

‘In that case—'

‘Silence! You want to stay, so you'll
stay. You'll carry on poking your big nose in everywhere. Well, on your head be it.

‘You see, Maigret, I'm a lot stronger
than you are and I've proved it.

‘If I'd been made of the same stuff
as you, I'd have become a good little income-tax collector like my father.

‘Meddle in what doesn't concern you
if you must!

‘On your head be it.'

He had regained his outer calm and his lips were
again curled in a sneer.

Maigret, who had risen, was looking around for
his hat.

‘Where are you going?'

‘Outside.'

‘Aren't you having lunch with
us?'

‘I'd rather lunch
elsewhere.'

‘As you wish. And there again, you're
being petty. Petty and narrow-minded.'

‘Is that all?'

‘For now, yes.'

And, hat in hand, Maigret strode calmly over to
the door. He opened it and went out, without looking back. Outside, a shape darted off, and he
just had the time to
recognize Jean-Claude, the
eldest son, who must have been eavesdropping beneath the open window and had overheard the
entire conversation.

He walked around the house and, in the main
drive, passed two men whom he hadn't yet met.

One was short and stocky with a thick neck and
big, coarse hands: Monsieur Campois probably, for he matched the description Jeanne had given
him the previous evening. The other, who must have been his grandson, was a strapping boy with
an open face.

They stared at him in bewilderment, as he made
his way calmly towards the gate, then they both turned around to look at him, stopping even to
watch him.

‘That's one thing out of the
way!' said Maigret to himself as he walked off along the towpath.

A boat was crossing the river, steered by an old
man in a yellowish linen suit, with a splendid red tie. It was Monsieur Groux, on his way to the
gathering. They would all be there, except him, for whose benefit this lunch had been arranged
in the first place.

What about Georges-Henry? Maigret began to move
faster. He wasn't hungry, but he was terribly thirsty. In any case, he swore to himself
again that, whatever happened, he would drink no more little tipples of Kummel with old
Jeanne.

When he walked into L'Ange, he did not see
the owner in her usual place by the grandfather clock. He poked his head around the half-open
kitchen door and Raymonde called out:

‘I thought you weren't having lunch
here?'

Then, raising her plump arms to the heavens:

‘I haven't cooked anything. Madame is
unwell and doesn't want to come downstairs.'

There wasn't even any beer in the
house.

It would have been hard to say how it happened:
the fact was that Maigret and Raymonde were now friends. Only an hour ago, she was sorely
tempted to ban him from entering her kitchen.

‘I have nothing to eat, I tell
you.'

What's more, she didn't like men. She
found them violent and they smelled unpleasant. Most of the men who came to L'Ange, even
the married ones, tried to grope her and it disgusted her.

She had wanted to become a nun. She was tall and
languid despite her apparent energy.

‘What are you after?' she asked
impatiently, seeing Maigret standing in front of the open larder.

‘A little leftover something-or-other.
Anything. It's so hot that I haven't got the energy to go and eat up at the
lock.'

‘Well, there aren't any leftovers
here! First of all, in theory, the place is closed. As a matter of fact, it's up for sale.
Has been for three years. And each time the sale is about to go through, the old lady wavers,
finds reasons to object and ends up saying no. She doesn't need to make her living from
it, does she!'

‘What about you, what are you going to
eat?'

‘Bread and cheese.'

‘Do you not think there'll be enough for the two of
us?'

He looked kind, with his slightly flushed face
and his round eyes. He had made himself at home in the kitchen and ignored Raymonde when she
said:

‘Get out of here, it hasn't been
cleaned yet. I'll lay you a place in the dining room.'

He had dug his heels in.

‘I'll go and see if there isn't
a tin of sardines left, but it'll be lucky if there is. There are no shops around here.
The butcher, the
charcuterie
and even the grocer from Corbeil come and deliver to the
big houses, the Maliks, the Campois. Before, they used to stop here and we were able to stock
up. But the old lady barely eats a thing nowadays and she thinks that others should do likewise.
Wait, let me go and see if there are any eggs in the hen house.'

There were three. Maigret insisted on making the
omelette, and she laughed as she watched him whisk the egg yolks and whites separately.

‘Why didn't you go and have lunch at
the Maliks', seeing as you're invited? I hear their cook used to be chef to the king
of Norway or Sweden, I don't remember which.'

‘I'd rather stay here and have a bite
to eat with you.'

‘In the kitchen! With no
tablecloth!'

Yet it was true. And Raymonde, unwittingly, was
providing him with invaluable help. He felt relaxed here. He had removed his jacket and rolled
up his shirt-sleeves. From time to time, he got up to pour boiling water over the coffee.

‘I wonder what keeps her here,'
Raymonde had said, among other things, talking about old Jeanne. ‘She's got
more money than she'll ever spend, no children
and no heirs, since she booted her nephews out a long time ago.'

It was insights like that which, added to
memories of the previous evening, to insignificant details, helped flesh out for Maigret a solid
picture of the inn owner's character.

She had once been beautiful, Raymonde also told
him. And it was true. You could tell, even though she was over fifty, despite her ill-kempt
look, her lank, greasy hair and her sallow complexion.

A woman who had been beautiful and was
intelligent, but who had suddenly let herself go, who drank, who lived a fiercely reclusive
existence, complaining and drinking to the point of taking to her bed for days on end.

‘She'll never make up her mind to
leave Orsenne.'

Well! By the time all the characters had taken on
the same human roundness, when he could ‘feel' them the way he could feel the owner
of L'Ange, the mystery would be very close to being solved.

There was Bernadette Amorelle, whom he was close
to understanding.

‘Old Monsieur Amorelle, who died,
wasn't at all like his sons-in-law. More like Monsieur Campois. I don't know if you
see what I mean. He was tough, but fair. He would go down to the lock to chat with his bargemen
and he wasn't too proud to sit and have a drink with them.'

In other words, they were the first generation
who'd done well for themselves, with their big, unpretentious houses.

Then the next generation, the two daughters who
had
married the Malik brothers, the modern
residence, the pontoon, the luxury cars.

‘Tell me, Raymonde, did you know Monita
well?'

‘Of course I did. I knew her when she was a
little girl, because I've been at L'Ange for seven years and, seven years ago,
she'd just turned ten. A right tomboy … She was always giving her governess the slip
and they'd go hunting all over the place for her. Sometimes all the servants would be sent
along the towpath calling Monita. She had usually run off with her cousin
Georges-Henry.'

Maigret had never set eyes on him either. He had
heard people describe him.

‘He wasn't all dressed up to the
nines like his brother! Nearly always in shorts, and rather grubby shorts at that, with his bare
legs and tousled hair. He was terrified of his father!'

‘Were Monita and Georges-Henry in
love?'

‘I don't know whether Monita was in
love. A woman hides her feelings better. But he definitely was.'

It was peaceful in this kitchen where only a
single slanting ray of sunshine filtered in. Maigret smoked his pipe, his elbows on the polished
heavy timber table, and sipped his coffee.

‘Have you seen him since his cousin's
death?'

‘I saw him at the funeral. He was very
pale, red-eyed. Right in the middle of the service, he started sobbing. At the cemetery, when
people were filing past the open grave, he suddenly began grabbing the flowers by the handful
and throwing them on to the coffin.'

‘And since?'

‘I think they're keeping him locked up inside the
house.'

She stared at Maigret inquisitively. She had
heard that he was a famous policeman, that during his career he had arrested hundreds of
criminals and solved the most complicated cases. And this man was here in her kitchen, dressed
casually, smoking his pipe and talking to her informally, asking her mundane questions.

What could he be hoping for? She felt something
akin to pity for him. He was probably getting old, because they'd retired him.

‘Now, I must wash my dishes, then
I've got to mop the floor.'

He didn't leave and his face was still as
placid, as if devoid of thought.

‘In short,' he muttered suddenly,
‘Monita is dead and Georges-Henry has gone.'

She looked up abruptly.

‘Are you sure he has gone?'

And he rose, his attitude now hardened,
displaying a sudden determination.

‘Listen to me for a moment, Raymonde. Hold
on. Give me a pencil and a piece of paper.'

She tore a page from a grease-stained notebook in
which she kept her accounts. She did not understand what he was leading up to.

‘Yesterday … Let's see …
We were on the cheese. So it was around nine o'clock in the evening … Georges-Henry
jumped out of his bedroom window and ran off.'

‘In which direction?'

‘Off to the right. If he had gone down to
the Seine, I
would have seen him running across the
garden. If he had gone to the left, I would also have seen him because the dining room has
windows on both sides. Hold on … His father ran after him. Ernest Malik stayed away for
twelve minutes. It's true that during those twelve minutes he took the time to change his
trousers and run a comb through his hair. To do that, he must have gone up to his bedroom. At
least three or four minutes. Now, you know the area well, think carefully before you reply.
Which way could Georges-Henry have gone if he had intended to leave Orsenne?'

‘To the right is his grandmother and his
uncle's house,' she said, looking at the rough sketch he was drawing as she spoke.
‘There's no wall between the two gardens but a hedge that has a couple of gaps in
it.'

‘And then?'

‘From the neighbouring garden he would have
been able to reach the little path that goes to the station.'

‘You can't turn off the path before
the station?'

‘No … Or perhaps he took a boat
across the river.'

‘Is there a way out from the bottom of the
garden?'

‘Only with a ladder. Both the Amorelles and
the Maliks have a wall that's too high to climb over. The railway line runs past the end
of both gardens.'

‘Another question. When I came back an hour
later, there was a boat on the water. I heard someone casting a fishing net.'

‘That's Alphonse, the
lock-keeper's son.'

‘Thank you, Raymonde. If you don't
mind, we'll have dinner together.'

‘But there's nothing to
eat.'

‘There's a grocer's next to the lock. I'll
buy the necessaries.'

He was pleased with himself. He had the sense of
having set foot on dry land again, and Raymonde watched him lumber off in the direction of the
lock. The weir was around five hundred metres away. There were no boats in the lock, and the
lock-keeper was sitting on his blue-stone doorstep whittling a piece of wood for one of his
kids, while in the gloomy kitchen a woman came and went, a baby in her arms.

‘Tell me …' ventured
Maigret.

The man had jumped to his feet and touched his
cap.

‘You've come about the young lady,
haven't you?'

The local people already knew who he was.
Everyone was aware of his presence.

‘Well, yes and no … I don't
suppose you know anything about her?'

‘Except that I was the one who found her.
Over there, on the third section of the weir. It was a terrible shock, because we knew her well.
She often used to come through the lock in her canoe on the way down to Corbeil.'

‘Was your son out on the water last
night?'

The man looked uncomfortable.

‘Don't worry, I'm not
interested in poachers. I spotted him at around ten o'clock, but I'd like to know
whether he was already out an hour earlier.'

‘He'll tell you himself. You'll
find him in his workshop, a hundred metres further down. He's the boat builder.'

A wooden shed where two men were busy finishing
off a flat-bottomed fishing boat.

‘I was on the water with Albert, yes … He's my
apprentice. First of all we put out the creels, then when we came back—'

‘If someone had crossed the river by boat
between the Maliks' house and the lock at around nine o'clock, would you have seen
them?'

‘Definitely. First of all, it wasn't
dark yet. Then, even if we hadn't seen him, we'd have heard him. When you fish the
way we do, you keep your ears pricked and …'

In the little grocer's shop where the
bargemen stocked up, Maigret bought some tinned food, eggs, cheese and sausage.

‘I can tell that you're at
L'Ange!' commented the shopkeeper. ‘There's never anything to eat there.
They'd do better to close down for good.'

Maigret walked up to the station. It was merely a
halt with a crossing-keeper's cottage.

‘No, monsieur, nobody came by around that
time last night, or up to ten thirty. I was sitting on a chair in front of the house with my
wife. Monsieur Georges-Henry? Definitely not him. We know him well and besides, he would have
stopped for a chat, because he knows us too and he's not stuck-up.'

But Maigret persisted. He peered over the hedges,
chatted to good people out gardening, nearly all of them retired.

‘Monsieur Georges-Henry? No, we
haven't seen him. Has something happened to him too?'

A big car drove past. It was Ernest
Malik's, but it wasn't him at the wheel, it was his brother Charles, heading in the
direction of Paris.

It
was seven o'clock by the time Maigret got back to L'Ange. Raymonde burst out
laughing as he emptied his pockets, which were bulging with provisions.

‘With all that, we'll be able to have
a bite to eat,' she said.

‘Is Madame Jeanne still in bed? Has no one
been to see her?'

Raymonde hesitated for a moment.

‘Monsieur Malik came earlier. When I told
him that you'd gone to the lock, he went upstairs. The two of them were up there
whispering for a quarter of an hour, but I couldn't hear what they were saying.'

‘Does he often come and see
Jeanne?'

‘He drops in occasionally. You don't
have any news of Georges-Henry?'

Maigret went into the garden to smoke a pipe
until dinner was ready. Bernadette Amorelle seemed to have been speaking the truth when she told
him that she hadn't seen her grandson. True, that proved nothing. Maigret was close to
believing that they were all lying, every single one of them.