In some streets, the fog was thicker than in others, and the cars drove slowly, with a halo around their headlights.
‘I’ve driven you before, haven’t I?’
‘That’s entirely possible.’
‘That’s funny, I can’t put a name to your face. I know you’re well known. An actor?’
‘No.’
‘You’ve never been in films?’
‘No.’
‘And I haven’t seen you on television?’
Luckily they reached Rue Fontaine.
‘Try to find a place to park and wait for me.’
‘Will you be long?’
‘A few minutes.’
‘Then that’s fine. Because people will be coming out of the theatres and …’
Maigret opened the door to the bistro and found Lourtie leaning on the bar. He ordered a cognac, because they’d been talking a lot about cognac the day before, then took the photographs out of his pocket and slipped them into Lourtie’s hand.
‘Go and look at them in the toilet, it’ll be safer.’
A few minutes later, Lourtie returned and handed the photographs back to the inspector.
‘He’s the one on top of the bundle. I’ve drawn a cross on the back.’
‘There’s no possible doubt?’
‘None. Just that he’s three or four years younger in the photograph. He’s still a handsome fellow.’
‘Go back down there.’
‘The stripping’s about to start. We had to order champagne. It’s the only thing they serve.’
‘Go on. And if something happens, particularly if the framer leaves town, don’t hesitate to call me.’
In the taxi he looked at the photograph marked with a cross. He was the handsomest man in the packet. There was something stubborn and sarcastic about his face. A hard man, the kind you come across in gangs from Corsica or Marseille.
Maigret had a troubled night’s sleep. He reached headquarters before nine o’clock and sent Janvier up to Records.
‘Any luck? I didn’t dare to hope so. The instruction was quite vague.’
Janvier came down a quarter of an hour later with a file.
Mila, Julien Joseph François, born in Marseille, barman. Single. Height …
After this came the various measurements of the man called Mila whose last known address was a boarding house in Rue Notre-Dame-de-Lorette.
Sentenced four years earlier to two years in prison for involvement in an armed robbery. It happened at the entrance to a factory in Puteaux. The attacker had released the spring of his briefcase, from which thick smoke had emerged. A constable at the crossroads had noticed. A chase. The robbers’ car had crashed into a streetlamp.
Mila had got off lightly, first of all because he had claimed to be only a decoy, and then because the criminals had used toy guns.
Maigret sighed. He knew professionals very well but he had never been very interested in them. For him it was routine, a kind of game with its own rules, and sometimes its ruses and tricks.
Was it likely that a man who had used a toy gun in a hold-up would have attacked a young man twice, just because he had recorded scraps of a compromising conversation? Or that once the young man had been killed, the murderer hadn’t taken the trouble to take his tape recorder or make it unusable?
‘Hello. Put me through to Poiret, the examining magistrate, please … Hello, yes … Thank you … Monsieur Poiret? Maigret speaking. I have some information here that raises a number of questions and I’d like to pass it to you … Half an hour? Thank you. I’ll be at your office in half an hour.’
All of a sudden it was sunny. It was as if spring had turned up as arranged on 21 March. Maigret, with the photograph of Mila in his pocket, went to the commissioner’s office for the briefing, as he did every morning.
It was a day of comings and goings, of phone calls, of setting things up. The little gang, of which so far they knew only Mila and the framer, plus a third person as yet unidentified, was apparently planning a burglary in a country house near Paris.
However, once it was beyond the boundaries of Paris, the Police Judiciaire of Quai des Orfèvres became powerless. This was the domain of Sûreté Nationale in Rue des Saussaies and, with the agreement of the examining magistrate, Maigret called his counterpart there.
This was Detective Chief Inspector Grosjean, a veteran who was more or less the same age as Maigret and who, like him, always had a pipe in his mouth. He was originally from Cantal, and still had the delightful accent.
They met a little later in the huge buildings in Rue des Saussaies that the people from the Police Judiciaire liked to call ‘the factory’.
After an hour’s work, Grosjean got to his feet, grumbling:
‘I’ll still have to pretend to report this to my boss.’
By the time Maigret got back to his office, everything had been organized. Not necessarily as he would have liked, but the way Sûreté Nationale usually worked.
‘So?’ asked Janvier, who had stayed in contact with the men carrying out the stakeout in Rue du Faubourg-Saint-Antoine.
‘What a circus!’
‘Lucas and Marette are at Rue du Faubourg-Saint-Antoine. Émile came for an aperitif at the bar where they were based, without paying them any attention. Then he went for lunch in the same restaurant as the previous night.
‘No comings and goings. Two or three customers who look like real customers. There’s a little studio that communicates with the shop, and that’s where he does his tinkering.’
At about four o’clock, Maigret had to go back up to see the magistrate to keep him up to date on the plan of action they had undertaken. When he came back down, he was handed a form on which only a name had been written, leaving blank the space reserved for the purpose of the visit: Monique Batille.
How had her first name turned from Monique to Minou? He headed towards the waiting room and saw a tall, thin girl wearing dark trousers and a trenchcoat over a see-through blouse.
‘You’re Detective Chief Inspector Maigret, isn’t that right?’
She seemed to look him up and down to check that he was worthy of his reputation.
‘If you would be so kind as to follow me.’
Without a hint of awkwardness she went into that office where so many fates had been played out. Seemingly oblivious, she remained casual and took a pack of Gitanes out of her pocket.
‘Is it OK to smoke?’
A chuckle.
‘I forgot that you smoke your pipe all day!’
She walked to the window.
‘It’s like where we live. You can see the Seine. Don’t you think it gets boring?’
What did she want, moveable scenery?
At last she slumped into the armchair while Maigret went on standing by his desk.
‘You must be wondering why I’ve come here. Don’t worry: I’m not here out of simple curiosity. I must confess that while I associate with all kinds of celebrities, I’ve never met a policeman before.’
There was no point in trying to interrupt her. Was it a mask she wore to conceal a deep shyness?
‘Yesterday, I expected you to come and question my parents again, and question me and then the servants, what do I know. Isn’t that what usually happens? This morning I decided I’d come and see you in the afternoon. I’ve been thinking a lot …’
She spotted the faint smile on Maigret’s lips and guessed what was on his mind.
‘I do think sometimes, believe me. I don’t just say the first thing that comes into my head. My brother’s body was found in Rue Popincourt. It’s not an awful street, is it?’
‘What would you call an awful street?’
‘A street where thugs meet up in bars and plan their evil deeds, I don’t know …’
‘No. It’s just a street where ordinary people live.’
‘I thought so. Well, my brother went and did his recordings in other places, really dangerous places. Once I insisted that he take me along, and he said:
‘“Out of the question, little girl. You wouldn’t be safe in the places I go to. I’m not safe there either.”
‘I asked him:
‘“You mean there are criminals there?”
‘“Definitely. Do you know how many bodies are fished out of the Canal Saint-Martin alone every year?”
‘I don’t think he was trying to scare me, or get rid of me. I insisted. I tried again several times, but he never wanted to take me along on what he called his expeditions.’
Maigret looked at her, surprised that she was nonetheless a sweet girl beneath her studied, sophisticated exterior. And fundamentally her brother seemed, like her, to have been nothing but a big child.
On the pretext of carrying out psychological research, documenting humanity, in a sense he was trying to frighten himself.
‘Did he keep the recordings?’
‘There are dozens of cassettes in his room, carefully numbered to match a catalogue that he regularly updated.’
‘Has anyone touched them since … since he died?’
‘No.’
‘Is the body at your home?’
‘The little drawing room, the one that we call Mother’s drawing room, has been turned into a chapel of rest. The other drawing room is too big. There are also black curtains over the door of the building. It’s all very gloomy. That sort of thing shouldn’t exist these days, don’t you think?’
‘What else do you want to tell me?’
‘Nothing. That he took risks. That he met all kinds of people. I don’t know if he talked to them, or if he had contacts in those circles.’
‘Did he ever carry a weapon?’
‘It’s funny that you should ask me that.’
‘Why?’
‘He persuaded our father to give him one of his revolvers. He kept it in his room. And not long ago he said to me:
‘“I’m so happy that I’ve just turned twenty-one. I’m going to apply for a firearms licence. Given the nature of the kind of research I’m carrying out …”’
This gave the scene in Rue Popincourt a new sense of drama, while at the same time making it seem almost unreal. A big kid. He was convinced that he was studying humans in their natural habitat, in bars and restaurants, he recorded scraps of conversation. He carefully labelled his findings when he filled in his catalogue.
‘I’ll need to listen to those recordings. Have you ever heard them?’
‘He never let anyone hear them. Only one day I thought I heard a woman sobbing in his room. I went to see. He was on his own, listening to his tapes. Is there anything else you want to ask me?’
‘Not right now. I’ll probably call in at your apartment tomorrow during the day. I suppose a lot of people are passing through?’
‘It doesn’t stop all day. Well, there we are. I hoped I could be useful to you.’
‘You may be even more useful than you think. Thank you for coming.’
He walked her to the door and held out his hand. She was very happy.
‘Good evening, Monsieur Maigret. Don’t forget that you promised I’d be able to listen to the recordings with you.’
He hadn’t promised anything at all, but he preferred not to argue.
What had he been doing when he found her visitor form in his office? He had just come down from the examining magistrate’s office.
‘A circus,’ he thought grumpily.
And he remained grumpy all evening and for much of the night. Because it really was a circus, the kind they know how to organize in Rue des Saussaies.
At 7.30, Lucas phoned to say that the framer had lowered his shutters and attached the panel to the glass door. A little later he went to his usual restaurant for dinner. Then he went for a walk as if to get some fresh air, all the way to Bastille, where he bought several magazines from the kiosk, and then went home.
‘What should we do?’
‘Wait.’
Maigret and Janvier went for dinner at the Brasserie Dauphine. There was hardly anyone there. The two little rooms were particularly full at midday and around the evening aperitif.
Maigret called his wife to say hello.
‘I have no idea what time I’ll be back. It will probably be late. Unless somebody messes up. I’m not in charge of operations.’
He was only in charge of them in Paris, and that was why, at nine o’clock, the car in which he was sitting, with Janvier at the wheel and fat Lourtie in the back seat, pulled up just outside the framer’s shop, or not far away.
It was a black car, without any distinctive markings, but it was fitted with a radio transmitter and receiver. Another car, exactly the same and similarly equipped, was parked about fifty metres away. It contained Detective Chief Inspector Grosjean and three of his inspectors.
Finally, in a sidestreet, there was a police van from Rue des Saussaies, with about ten plainclothes policemen inside.
Lucas was on guard, he too in a car, not far from Mila’s furnished room in Rue Notre-Dame-de-Lorette.
He was the one who moved first.
‘Hello … 287? … Is that you, chief?’
‘This is Maigret.’
‘Lucas speaking. Mila has just left in a taxi. We’re passing through the centre of the city, and it seems we’re going to be heading along the left bank.’
At the same time, the door to the shop opened, and the framer, who was wearing a beige, lightweight overcoat, locked the door and strode off towards Place de la Bastille.
‘Hello … 215 …’ Maigret called. ‘Is that you, Grosjean? Do you read me? … Hello … 215 …’
‘215 here.’
‘We want to go slowly towards Bastille. He’s on foot.’
‘Over and out?’
‘Over and out.’
Maigret shrugged heavily.
‘To think that I’m playing a game of soldiers!’
At Place de la Bastille, Émile Branchu walked towards Boulevard Beaumarchais and opened the door of a parked black Citroën DS that immediately pulled away from the pavement.
Maigret couldn’t see the man who was driving, probably the third man from the Café des Amis, the one who had been drinking rum, and who had a scar on his face.
Grosjean followed at a certain distance. He called from time to time, and Maigret replied, trying not to seem too bad-tempered. The van also stayed in contact.
There wasn’t much traffic. The DS drove quickly, and the driver didn’t seem to notice that he was being followed. More importantly, he didn’t suspect that he was at the head of a little cortège.
At Porte de Châtillon, he stopped briefly, and a tall, dark-haired man standing by the pavement got into the car quite naturally.
Now all three of them were united. They too were organized with almost military precision. They speeded up, and Janvier was careful not to lose sight of them without making himself noticed.
They had taken the Versailles road and were passing through Petit Clamart almost without slowing down.
‘Where are you?’ Grosjean asked regularly. ‘You’re not losing sight of them?’
‘We’re leaving my territory,’ Maigret grumbled. ‘You’re in charge from now on.’
‘When we’ve reached our destination.’
They turned left towards Châtenay-Malabry, then to the right, towards Jouy-en-Josas. There were big clouds, some of them quite low, but much of the sky was clear, and the moon appeared from time to time.
The DS slowed down, turned left again, and shortly afterwards it could be heard braking.
‘Shall I stop here?’ Janvier asked. ‘I think they’re stopping. Yes. They’ve stopped.’
Lourtie got out of the car to go and see. When he came back, he announced:
‘They’ve found someone who was waiting for them. They’ve gone into a big garden or park, I’m not sure, where you can see the roof of a villa.’
Grosjean, lost in the countryside, wondered where they were, and Maigret informed him.
‘Where did you say you were?’<
br />
And Lourtie whispered:
‘Chemin des Acacias. I saw the sign.’
‘Chemin des Acacias …’
Lourtie had taken up position on the corner of the road where Mila and his companions had got out of the car. They had left the DS on the edge of the pavement. The lookout was still there, while the three others seemed to have entered the house.
The car from Rue des Saussaies pulled up behind Maigret’s and then, a few moments later, the impressive van crammed full of police officers.
‘Your turn now,’ Maigret sighed, stuffing his pipe.
‘Where are they?’
‘Probably in the villa whose gate you can see on the corner. The man on the pavement is their lookout.’
‘Are you not coming with me?’
‘I’m staying here.’
A few minutes later Grosjean’s car turned into the path on the left, so impetuously that the lookout, caught off guard, didn’t have time to give the alarm. Before he knew what was happening, two men were on top of him and putting him in handcuffs.
From the van, the policemen dashed into the villa’s garden and hurried to surround it, checking all the exit routes. It was a modern construction, very large, and the water that could be seen glittering behind the trees was the swimming pool.
All the windows were in darkness, the shutters closed. But then there was the sound of footsteps, and when, with Grosjean at their head, the men from Rue des Saussaies opened the door, they found in front of them three figures in rubber gloves who, alerted by suspicious sounds, were trying to flee.
They didn’t insist, they put their arms in the air, without a word, and, a few moments later, they too had handcuffs on their wrists.
‘Put them in the van. I’ll question them as soon as I’m back in my office.’
Maigret took a short walk to stretch his legs. From a distance he watched the men being pushed into the van, and saw Grosjean coming towards him.
‘Won’t you come with me to take a look inside?’
First of all, they noticed, to the right of the gate, a pink marble plaque bearing the words, in gold letters: ‘The Golden Crown’. A crown carved into the stone reminded Maigret of something. What? He couldn’t remember.
There was no corridor. They stepped straight into a vast hall, where hunting trophies and paintings alternated on white stone walls. One of them had been unhooked and rested face-down on a mahogany table.
Maigret and the Killer Page 6
