The Two-Penny Bar

by Georges Simenon

  For that is where he had gone after he had left James. He was in good humour. With his pipe in his mouth and his hands in his pockets he chatted and joked with the firm’s employees, who, in the absence of instructions to the contrary, had carried on with business as usual. The barges were loaded and unloaded every day as normal.

  The offices weren’t especially up-to-date. But they weren’t old-fashioned either. A quick look around was enough to get a sense of how the place was run.

  The boss didn’t have his own office, but had a desk in the corner, next to the window. The chief accountant sat opposite him, and his secretary was at a desk nearby.

  Obviously, this wasn’t a hierarchical place. People seemed free to chat, and many of them worked with a pipe or a cigarette in their mouth.

  ‘An address book?’ the accountant responded to the inspector’s request. ‘Yes, of course we have one, but it only contains the addresses of our customers in alphabetical order. If you wish to see it …’

  Maigret had a quick look at the letter U, but, as he had expected, the name of Ulrich wasn’t there.

  ‘Are you sure Monsieur Basso doesn’t have a private address book? … Hold on, who was working here when his son was born?’

  ‘I was,’ the secretary replied, a little reluctantly, for she was a thirty-five-year-old who wanted to pass herself off as twenty-five.

  ‘Good. Monsieur Basso must have sent out announcements.’

  ‘He did. I took care of that.’

  ‘Then he must have given you a list of his friends’ names.’

  ‘Yes, that’s right, he gave me a little notebook! I filed it away with his personal items.’

  ‘Where is the file?’

  She hesitated, looked to her colleagues for guidance. The chief accountant shrugged as if to say: ‘I don’t see that we have any choice.’

  ‘It’s up at the house,’ she said. ‘Would you care to follow me?’

  They walked across the yard. On the ground floor of the house, there was a simply furnished study that looked as if it was never used. In fact, it was known as the library.

  The library of a family for whom reading came well down the list of distractions. A family library, used as the dumping-ground for a whole host of disparate objects.

  For example, on the lower shelves were the prizes Basso had won at school. Then some bound volumes of Magazine des Familles dating back fifty years.

  Some books for young girls that Madame Basso must have brought with her when she got married. Then a number of serious novels bought on the strength of favourable newspaper reviews.

  Finally some brand-new picture books belonging to the child and some toys stored on the remaining empty shelves.

  The secretary opened the drawers of the desk, and Maigret noticed a fat yellow envelope that was sealed.

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘Monsieur’s letters to madame when they were engaged.’

  ‘Have you found the notebook?’

  She discovered it at the bottom of a drawer that contained a dozen or so old pipes. It looked at least fifteen years old. It was in Basso’s hand, though his writing had changed over time, and the ink had faded.

  It was like the lines of seaweed on a beach, showing which tide had washed them up by how dried out they were.

  The addresses were fifteen years old, addresses of friends now no doubt forgotten. A few had been crossed out, perhaps because of some falling out, or because the person in question had died.

  There were a number of addresses of women, such as:

  Lola, Bar des Églantiers, 18, Rue Montaigne.

  But Lola had been erased from Basso’s life by a blue pencil.

  ‘Have you found what you’re looking for?’ the secretary asked.

  He had indeed! A name the coal merchant was ashamed of, for he hadn’t written it out in full:

  Ul. 13 bis, Rue des Blancs-Manteaux.

  The ink and the handwriting suggested this was an old entry. It was one of those addresses with a blue line through it, though it was still legible underneath.

  ‘Can you tell me approximately when these words were written?’

  The secretary bent over to take a closer look.

  ‘It was when Monsieur Basso was a young man, and his father was still alive.’

  ‘How can you tell?’

  ‘Because it is written in the same ink as the woman’s address on the other page. He once told me he had a fling with her in his younger days.’

  Maigret closed the notebook and slipped it into his pocket, despite the disapproving look he received from the secretary.

  ‘Do you think he will come back?’ she asked, after a slight hesitation.

  The inspector gave a non-committal shrug.

  When he got back to the Quai des Orfèvres, Jean, the office clerk, ran up to meet him.

  ‘We’ve been looking for you for the last two hours. They’ve found the Bassos.’

  ‘Ah!’

  He gave a mighty sigh, which almost sounded like a sigh of regret.

  ‘Has Lucas phoned?’

  ‘He calls in every three or four hours. Your man is still at the Salvation Army hostel. They wanted to turf him out after they had fed him, but he offered to sweep up around the place.’

  ‘Is Janvier here?’

  ‘I believe he’s just got back.’

  Maigret went to Janvier’s office.

  ‘I’ve got just the sort of awkward job you like, my friend. I want you to track down a certain Lola, who gave her postal address as the Bar des Églantiers, Rue Montaigne, about ten to fifteen years ago.’

  ‘And since then?’

  ‘Who knows? She could have died in hospital. She could have married an English lord … Get cracking.’

  On the train journey to La Ferté-Allais he examined the address book, smiling every now and again at certain entries that seemed so evocative of how it felt to be young, free and single.

  A police lieutenant was waiting for him at the station. He drove the inspector to old Mathilde’s house, where they found Piquart gravely standing guard in the small front garden.

  ‘We’ve made sure that there is no way of escape at the back,’ the lieutenant explained. ‘It’s just so small inside that my officer has to stand out the front. Do you want me to come in with you?’

  ‘Perhaps it would be better if you stayed out here.’

  Maigret knocked at the door, which opened immediately. It was late. It was still light outside, but the window was so narrow that inside the house he could see little more than moving shadows.

  Basso was straddling a chair in the pose of a man who had been waiting for a long time. He got to his feet. His wife and child must have been in the adjoining room.

  ‘Could we have some light?’ Maigret asked the old woman.

  ‘I’ll have to see if there’s any oil in the lamp,’ she replied tartly.

  It turned out that there was. The glass was replaced with a clink, the wick began first to smoke, then to burn with a yellow flame that gradually filled the corners of the room with light. It was quite hot inside the house. A smell of the countryside, of poverty.

  ‘Do sit down,’ Maigret told Basso. ‘If you wouldn’t mind leaving us alone, madame.’

  ‘What about my soup?’

  ‘Off you go. I’ll keep an eye on it.’

  She went away grumbling to herself and shut the door behind her. In the adjoining room she could be heard speaking in a low voice.

  ‘Are there just the two rooms?’ the inspector asked.

  ‘Yes. The room at the back is the bedroom.’

  ‘Is that where the three of you have been sleeping?’

  ‘The two women and my son. I’ve been sleeping in here on a straw bale.’

  There were bits of s
traw still lodged in the cracks between the uneven floor tiles. Basso was calm, but it was the sort of calm that follows on from several days of fever. It was as if he were somehow relieved to be arrested. Indeed, the first thing he said was:

  ‘I was going to turn myself in.’

  He was probably expecting Maigret to be surprised by this, but the latter showed no reaction. The inspector didn’t even say a word. He merely looked at Basso from head to toe.

  ‘Isn’t that one of James’s suits?’

  It was a grey suit, too tight. Basso had broad shoulders and was as sturdily built as Maigret. Nothing can diminish a man in the prime of his life as much as a set of ill-fitting clothes.

  ‘Obviously you know already …’

  ‘I know lots of things besides … But do you think we should take this soup off the stove?’

  The pan was belching out steam, and the lid was rattling under the pressure. Maigret removed the pan from the heat, and his face was momentarily lit up by the red flames.

  ‘You knew old Mathilde before?’

  ‘I wanted to talk to you about her. I don’t want her to get into trouble because of me. She used to be my parents’ servant. She’s known me since I was a boy. When I came here looking for a place to hide, she couldn’t turn me away.’

  ‘Of course not. It’s just a shame she made the mistake of buying twenty-two francs’ worth of ham at one go.’

  Basso had lost a lot of weight. He hadn’t shaved for four or five days. In all, he looked a bit of a mess.

  ‘I also trust that my wife has nothing to answer for …’ he sighed.

  He stood up, looking stiff and awkward, like someone trying to find the right way to broach a weighty topic.

  ‘I was wrong to run away, to stay in hiding for so long. But maybe that shows that I am not a real criminal. Do you understand? I lost my head. I saw my life in ruins because of this stupid affair. I thought I would go abroad, have my wife and child come out to join me and try to start a new life.’

  ‘And you got James to bring your wife here, to withdraw 300,000 francs from the bank and to bring you a change of clothes.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Only, you realized that you were being pursued.’

  ‘Old Mathilde told me there were policemen at every crossroads.’

  There was still some noise coming from next door. The child must have been moving about. Madame Basso was probably listening at the door because every now and again they heard her say ‘Shush!’ to the child.

  ‘Today I came to the only possible conclusion: I had to give myself up. But fate decreed otherwise, and the policeman turned up …’

  ‘Did you kill Feinstein?’

  Basso looked Maigret straight in the eye.

  ‘I did,’ he said quietly. ‘It would be mad to deny it, wouldn’t it? But I swear on my son’s life that I will tell you the whole truth.’

  ‘Just a moment.’

  Maigret now got to his feet. And they stood there, both more or less the same build, under the low ceiling, in a room that was too small for them.

  ‘Did you love Mado?’

  Basso’s lip curled in bitterness.

  ‘You’re a man, you should understand. I’ve known her for six or seven years, maybe more. I’d never given her a second glance before. Then one day, about a year ago, I don’t know what happened. It was a party, like the one you came to. We were drinking, dancing … I ended up kissing her … then we slipped off to the bottom of the garden.’

  ‘And then?’

  He gave a tired shrug.

  ‘She took it all seriously. She swore she’d always been in love with me, that she couldn’t live without me. I’m no saint. I admit that I started it. But I didn’t want to get that involved, I didn’t want to jeopardize my marriage.’

  ‘So you’ve been seeing Madame Feinstein in Paris two or three times a week for the last year …’

  ‘And she’s been phoning me every day! I’ve pleaded with her to be more careful, but it’s no use. She’s always come up with some ridiculous excuse. I was sure we’d be discovered any day. You can’t imagine what that was like … If only she wasn’t so sincere. But no! I think she really did love me.’

  ‘And Feinstein?’

  Basso looked up suddenly.

  ‘Oh yes,’ he groaned. ‘That’s why I couldn’t bear the thought of having to defend myself in court. There are limits in these compromising situations. There’s only so much the public will swallow. Can you see me, Mado’s lover, standing up in court, accusing her husband of …’

  ‘… of blackmailing you.’

  ‘I don’t have any proof. He was and he wasn’t. He never explicitly said that he knew anything was going on. He never threatened me directly. You know what he was like – an inoffensive little man, wouldn’t hurt a fly. A weedy-looking chap, always smartly dressed, always polite – too polite. That hangdog smile of his … The first time he came to me with a problem concerning a protested bill and begged me to lend him some money. He offered me all sorts of assurances. I did as he asked. I would have done anyway, even without Mado.

  ‘However, this turned into something of a routine. I realized it was quite calculated. I tried to refuse. That’s when the blackmail began. He took me into his confidence. He said his wife was his only consolation. It was because of her that he had taken on expenses he couldn’t afford and had got himself into this bind, etcetera. And he’d rather kill himself than refuse her anything she wanted. And if he did, what would become of her?

  ‘Can you believe it? He always managed to show up just after I had left Mado. I was afraid he would be able to smell her perfume on my clothes. One time he picked a woman’s hair – one of hers – off the collar of my jacket.

  ‘He was never threatening. More whining, which is worse! At least you can defend yourself against threats. But what do you do with a man who cries? Yes, I’ve actually had him in my office in tears.

  ‘And the things he came out with: “You’re young, you’re strong, you’re good-looking, you’re rich … A man like you has no trouble finding someone to love him … But what about me? …” It made me sick. And yet I could never be absolutely certain that he knew.

  ‘That Sunday, he had already spoken to me before we played bridge and had asked me to lend him 15,000 francs. It was too much. I wouldn’t play ball. I’d had enough. So I just said no, straight out. And I said I wouldn’t see him again if he continued to harass me in this way.

  ‘So that’s how it all blew up, the whole stupid, sordid little mess. If you recall, he arranged it so that we sailed across the river at the same time. He dragged me behind the bar. Then, suddenly, he pulled a small revolver from his pocket and pointed it at his own head, saying, “This is what you’ve brought me to … I ask just one thing of you. Take care of Mado when I’m gone …”’

  Basso ran his hand across his brow, as if trying to wipe away this wretched memory.

  ‘It was just bad luck. I felt light-headed that day. Perhaps it was the sun. I went up to him to try to grab the gun.

  ‘“No, no!” he cried. “You’re too late. It’s you who have brought me to this!”’

  ‘Naturally, he had no intention of pulling the trigger,’ Maigret muttered.

  ‘I know. That’s why the whole thing is so tragic. I lost my head. I should have left well alone and nothing would have come of it. He’d have burst into tears again, or extricated himself some other way. But no! I was a naive fool. Like I was with Mado. Like I’ve always been.

  ‘I tried to grab the revolver off him. He retreated, but I went after him. I grabbed him by the wrist. Then it happened. The gun went off. Feinstein fell, without a word, without a sound. Dropped like a stone …

  ‘Not that a jury will believe me. Nor will the judges be any less hard on me. I’ll
be the man who killed his mistress’s husband and then accused the dead man of blackmail.’

  He was becoming quite animated.

  ‘I wanted to run away. And I did. I also wanted to tell my wife everything, ask her whether, in spite of everything, she still wanted me as her husband. I wandered round Paris, hoping to find James. He’s a friend, probably my only real friend in the Morsang crowd.

  ‘You know the rest. My wife knows too. I’d rather we’d got away abroad and avoided this trial, which will be very painful for all concerned. I have the 300,000 francs here. What with that and my head for business, I’d have been able to start afresh somewhere – in Italy, for example, or Egypt.

  ‘But … do you believe what I’ve just told you?’

  He faltered all of a sudden. But the doubt was merely momentary, so caught up was he in what he was saying.

  ‘I believe you didn’t mean to kill Feinstein,’ Maigret replied, slowly, articulating each word carefully.

  ‘You see! …’

  ‘Wait a minute. What I want to know is whether or not Feinstein had a stronger card to play than his wife’s infidelity. In short …’

  He paused while he took the little address book from his pocket and opened it at the letter U.

  ‘In short, I would like to know who killed a certain Monsieur Ulrich, a second-hand dealer of Rue des Blancs-Manteaux, six years ago, and subsequently threw his body into the Canal Saint-Martin.’

  He almost didn’t finish his sentence, so violent was the change in Basso’s demeanour. So violent, in fact, that he almost lost his balance and, in seeking to grab hold of something, placed his hand on the stove and then withdrew it with an oath.

  ‘My God!’

  He stared at Maigret, wide-eyed with horror. He recoiled until he bumped into his chair, and he collapsed into it, looking completely drained of strength.

  ‘My God!’

  The door burst open and Madame Basso rushed into the room screaming:

  ‘Marcel! … Marcel! … It can’t be true! … Tell me it’s not true!’