Maigret and the Old Lady

by Georges Simenon

  ‘I hope not.’

  He’d had enough now of this strained conversation. Arlette’s insistence annoyed him. She seemed to derive too much satisfaction from analysing and denigrating herself.

  ‘Mother isn’t in bed yet.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘The little light you can see is the sitting-room lamp.’

  ‘What time is your train tomorrow?’

  ‘I’d like to get the eight o’clock one. Unless you want me to stay here. In that case I’ll telephone Julien and tell him that Mother needs me.’

  ‘Does he know you hate your mother?’

  ‘I don’t hate her. I just don’t love her, that’s all. Can I take the eight o’clock train?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I shan’t see you again before I leave?’

  ‘I don’t know yet.’

  ‘Perhaps you’d like to go and check that Mother’s still alive and well before I go?’

  ‘Perhaps.’

  They had just descended a steep slope, a sort of embankment, and they came out on to the road, fifty metres from the gate of La Bicoque.

  ‘Are you coming in?’

  ‘No.’

  They couldn’t see the windows and could only just make out the light through the thick curtain of shrubs.

  ‘Good night, Monsieur Maigret!’

  ‘Good night!’

  She was loath to take her leave of him.

  ‘Are you still angry with me?’

  ‘I don’t know. Go to bed!’

  And, thrusting his hands in his pockets, he strode off in the direction of the town.

  His mind was in turmoil and, now that he’d left her, dozens of questions which he hadn’t thought to ask came into his head. He regretted having given her permission to go back to Paris the next morning and was about to retrace his steps and order her to stay.

  Perhaps it was a mistake to leave the two women alone together overnight? Might not that afternoon’s scene be repeated more heatedly and turn dangerously violent?

  He would be delighted to see Valentine again and talk to her, sitting in her tiny living room surrounded by harmless knick-knacks.

  At nine o’clock he would meet the blustering Charles Besson, who would deafen him with his loud talk.

  Étretat was a ghost town, and the casino was already in darkness for want of customers. At a street corner there was only one bar with its light on, a café rather, which probably stayed open in the winter for the locals.

  Maigret paused on the pavement outside, because he was thirsty. In the yellowish light inside, he glimpsed the now familiar form of Théo Besson, still looking very much the Englishman in his tweed suit.

  He was holding a glass and talking to someone standing beside him, a fairly young man in a black suit, the sort farmers wear on Sundays, with a white shirt and a dark tie, a boy with a very ruddy face and a weather-beaten neck.

  Maigret turned the handle and went up to the bar without looking at them and ordered a beer.

  Now he could see both of them in the mirror behind the bottles, and he thought he caught Théo giving his companion a look signalling to him to be quiet.

  There was a heavy silence in the bar where they were only four people, including the owner, plus a black cat curled up on a chair in front of the stove.

  ‘We’ve got fog again,’ said the owner, at length. ‘It’s the time of year. It’s still sunny during the daytime, though.’

  The young man turned round to stare at Maigret, who was emptying his pipe by banging it against his heel and crushing the hot ashes in the sawdust. There was an arrogance in his eyes, and he reminded Maigret of those village cockerels who, having had a few drinks at a wedding or a funeral, strut around looking for a fight.

  ‘Aren’t you the man who came from Paris this morning?’ asked the owner, for the sake of talking.

  Maigret simply nodded, and the young braggart stared at him all the more intently.

  This went on for a few minutes, during which Théo Besson merely gazed morosely at the bottles in front of him. He had the complexion, the eyes, especially the rings under his eyes, of those who drink a lot, regularly, from the moment they wake up. He also had an indifferent look and a rather limp manner.

  ‘Same again!’ he ordered.

  The owner glanced at the young man, who nodded his assent. So they were together.

  Théo downed his glass in one. The other man did likewise and, when the elder Besson had tossed a few notes on to the bar, they both left, not without the young man turning round a couple of times to look at Maigret.

  ‘Who is he?’

  ‘Don’t you know him? That’s Monsieur Théo, Valentine’s stepson.’

  ‘What about the young man?’

  ‘One of the brothers of young Rose, who died when she drank the poison intended for her mistress, poor girl.’

  ‘The eldest brother?’

  ‘Henri, yes. He’s a herring fisherman in Fécamp.’

  ‘Did they come in here together?’

  ‘I think so, yes. Wait a sec. When they arrived there were several people at the bar. In any case, if they didn’t come in at the same time, it was close.’

  ‘Do you happen to know what they were talking about?’

  ‘No. In the first place it was noisy, with several conversations going on at the same time. Then I went downstairs to tap a new barrel.’

  ‘Have you seen them together before?’

  ‘I don’t think so. I’m not sure. But I’ve seen Monsieur Théo with the young lady.’

  ‘Which young lady?’

  ‘Young Rose.’

  ‘Did you see them in the street?’

  ‘I saw them here, in my bar, at least twice.’

  ‘Was he chasing her?’

  ‘It depends what you mean by chasing. They didn’t kiss and he didn’t touch her, if that’s what you mean. But they were chatting away and laughing, and I could see he was trying to get her drunk. That wasn’t difficult with young Rose, she’d start giggling after one glass of wine and was sozzled after the second.’

  ‘How long ago was that?’

  ‘Just a moment. The last time was around a week ago. I know! It was Wednesday, because it was the day my wife went to Le Havre, and she goes there every Wednesday.’

  ‘When was the first time?’

  ‘Maybe a week or two before that.’

  ‘Is Monsieur Théo a good customer?’

  ‘He’s not a particular customer of mine. He’s the customer of anywhere serving drinks. He has nothing to do all day, so he wanders around. Only he can’t see an open café or bar without popping inside. He’s never noisy; he never picks a fight with anyone. Sometimes, at night, he lisps and finds it difficult to get certain words out, but that’s all.’

  Suddenly, the owner looked as if he regretted being so forthcoming.

  ‘I hope you don’t suspect him of trying to poison his stepmother? If there’s one person I’d trust, it’s him. Besides, people who drink the way he does are never dangerous. The worst are those who get drunk occasionally and don’t know what they’re doing any more.’

  ‘Have you seen Rose’s brother often?’

  ‘Rarely. People from Yport don’t like coming to Étretat. They’re a special breed. They prefer to go to Fécamp, which is close by, and where they feel more at home. A little Calvados, to help the beer down? It’s my round.’

  ‘No. Another beer.’

  The beer was not good, and it lay on Maigret’s stomach for a long time. He kept waking suddenly and had nightmares, which he couldn’t even remember, but which left him with a feeling of despondency. When he finally got up, the mournful wail of the foghorn could be heard, and the tide must have been high because the hotel shuddered each time a wave pounded the shore.

  5. The Opinions of a Good Man

  The fog had almost entirely dispersed, but a haze still hung over the calm sea that swelled gently with a slow breathing motion and rainbows shone in the fine mi
st.

  The town’s houses began to turn golden in the fresh sunlight, and the air was cool, a delicious coolness that tingled through every pore. The vegetable stalls smelled good, bottles of milk stood on the doorsteps and it was the hour when the bakeries were filled with warm, crisp bread.

  Once again, the scene conjured up a childhood memory, an image of an idyllic world, an imaginary world. Étretat looked pure and innocent with its houses that were too small, too picturesque, too freshly painted to be the scene of a tragedy, and the cliffs emerged from the mist exactly as they did on the postcards displayed by the door of the general store; the butcher, the baker and the greengrocer could have been characters in a children’s storybook.

  Was it just Maigret? Or did other people feel the same nostalgia without admitting it? He so wished the world could be the one he had known as a child. In his mind, he said: ‘Like a picture postcard.’

  It wasn’t only the streets and the buildings, but also the people – the father, the mother, the well-behaved children, the kindly white-haired grandparents, and so on.

  There had been an entire period, for example, in his early days in the police, when Le Vésinet had seemed to him to be the most peaceful place in the world. It was just outside Paris, but before 1914 there were hardly any motor cars. The wealthy bourgeois still had their country homes in Le Vésinet – big, comfortable brick houses surrounded by well-maintained gardens with fountains, swings and large silver-painted spheres. The menservants wore yellow-striped waistcoats and the maids white caps and lace-trimmed aprons.

  Seemingly happy, virtuous families lived in them, families for whom all was peace and joy, and he had been secretly disappointed when an unsavoury business had broken out in one such house with its raked paths – the sordid murder of a stepmother for financial gain.

  Now, of course, he knew. He spent his life, in a way, seeing the other side of the coin, but he still had a childlike hankering for a world ‘like in the picture postcards’.

  The little station was pretty, a watercolour painting by a talented student, with a rose-coloured puff of smoke above its chimney. He saw the toy train, the man who punched the tickets – as a child he had dreamed one day of punching railway tickets – and he saw Arlette arrive, as slim and elegant as the previous day in her Parisian outfit, carrying a crocodile holdall.

  Earlier he had almost gone to meet her on the dusty path that must be fragrant with the smell of the hedgerows and tall wild flowers, but he was afraid it would look as if he were hurrying to an assignation. Descending the path with tiny steps in her high heels, she must look very much the ‘young mistress of the chateau’.

  Why is the reality always so different? Or rather, why do we give children the illusion of a world that doesn’t exist and which all their lives they will compare with the harsh reality?

  She spotted him immediately, waiting for her on the platform by the newspaper kiosk, and she smiled wearily at him as she handed over her ticket to be punched. She seemed tired and slightly anxious.

  ‘I thought you’d be here,’ she said.

  ‘How did it go?’

  ‘It was difficult.’

  She looked to see where her compartment was, because there was no corridor on the train. There was only one first-class carriage, and she had it all to herself.

  ‘How about your mother?’

  ‘She’s alive. In any case, she was when I left.’

  They only had a few moments before the train left and, having put her bag down on the seat, she stood by the door.

  ‘Did you have another argument?’

  ‘We stayed up half the night. There’s something I have to say to you, Monsieur Maigret. It’s only a feeling, but it bothers me. Rose is dead, but my instinct tells me that it isn’t over, that there’s going to be another tragedy.’

  ‘Because of what your mother said to you?’

  ‘No. I don’t know why.’

  ‘Do you think she’s still in danger?’

  She did not reply. Her blue eyes gazed in the direction of the kiosk.

  ‘The inspector’s over there, waiting for you,’ she said, as if the spell was broken.

  And she stepped on to the train as the stationmaster raised his whistle to his lips and the engine began to belch out steam.

  And so the inspector was. He had arrived earlier than anticipated, and, finding that Maigret wasn’t at his hotel, had come to the station searching for him. It was slightly embarrassing. Now why was that?

  The train slowly pulled out of the station, then stopped with a great shudder after a few metres while Maigret was shaking hands with Castaing.

  ‘Any news?’

  ‘Nothing special,’ replied Castaing. ‘But I was worried, for no particular reason. I dreamed about the two women, the mother and the daughter, alone in that little house.’

  ‘Which one killed the other?’

  Now it was Castaing’s turn to feel awkward.

  ‘How do you know? In my dream it was the mother who killed the daughter. And guess what she used? A log from the fireplace!’

  ‘Charles Besson should be here at nine o’clock. His mother-in-law died. Has Lucas telephoned yet with some information?’

  ‘There isn’t much, but he’ll call back when he has more, and I left instructions at the station to contact us at your hotel when he does.’

  ‘Nothing on Théo?’

  ‘He’s had a spot of bother a few times over cheques that bounced. He’s always paid up before being taken to court. Most of his friends are wealthy. They like to party and be surrounded by people. He does the occasional business deal, mainly acting as go-between.’

  ‘No women?’

  ‘He doesn’t seem particularly interested in women. He sometimes has a girlfriend, never for long.’

  ‘Is that all?’

  The smell of coffee and eau de vie coming from a little café was so tempting that neither of them could resist going inside. They leaned on the bar over a large cup of coffee giving off a whiff of alcohol.

  ‘It’s not so much my dream that worried me,’ Castaing went on in a hushed voice, ‘as a train of thought I had before going to sleep. I even shared it with my wife, because I think better aloud than in my head, and she agreed with me. It’s five years now since old Besson – Ferdinand – died, isn’t it?’

  ‘About that.’

  ‘And since then, as far as we know, the situation hasn’t changed. But it wasn’t until last Sunday that someone tried to poison Valentine. And mark you, they chose the only day when there were enough people in the house to divert suspicion.’

  ‘That makes sense. And then?’

  ‘It’s not Valentine who died, but poor Rose. So, if someone had a reason to do away with Valentine, the reason still exists. So, until we discover that reason—’

  ‘The threat is still there. Is that what you mean?’

  ‘Yes. Perhaps that threat is more serious than ever, precisely because you’re here. Valentine has no fortune. Therefore it wasn’t for her money that someone attempted to kill her. Might it be because she knows something that the killer wants to prevent her from revealing? In that case …’

  Maigret listened to Castaing’s reasoning seemingly unimpressed. He gazed out of the window at the delectable morning, the dewy moisture of the night making the sun’s rays shimmer.

  ‘Did Lucas say anything about Julien?’

  ‘The Sudres have a comfortable lifestyle, in an affordable rented four-bedroom apartment. They have a maid and a car, and they spend their weekends in the country.’

  ‘I knew that.’

  ‘Hervé Peyrot, the wine merchant, is wealthy. He has large premises on Quai de Bercy and fritters away most of his time with women – all sorts of women. He has three cars, including a Bugatti.’

  ‘Family beach’ Maigret had read somewhere in a brochure. And it was true. Mothers with children, husbands who came to join them on Saturday evening; elderly ladies and gentlemen with their bottle of mineral wat
er and box of pills on the table in the hotel dining room, who always sat in the same seats in the casino; the Seuret sisters’ patisserie, where people went to eat cakes and ice cream; the old fishermen, always the same, whom visitors photographed posing next to their boats pulled up on the pebble beach.

  Ferdinand Besson had been a respectable-looking elderly gentleman too, and Valentine was the most delightful old lady; Arlette, that morning, could have been a model for a picture postcard, her husband was a hardworking dentist, while Théo was the epitome of the gentleman whom people forgive for drinking a bit too much because he is always so quiet and so distinguished.

  Now Charles Besson was arriving with his wife and four children, including a baby only a few months old. And while waiting for his mourning clothes to be ready he had sewn a black crepe armband on to his sleeve, because his mother-in-law had died.

  He was a deputy, and was already on first-name terms with the minister. During his electoral campaign he must have gone around warmly shaking hands, kissing babies, having a drink with the fishermen and the farmers.

  He was also what is generally considered a fine figure of a man – that is how Maigret’s mother, for example, would have described him – tall with broad shoulders, slightly plump, paunchy, his eyes almost disingenuous and full lips beneath his moustache.

  ‘I hope I haven’t kept you waiting, detective chief inspector? Good morning, Castaing. Delighted to see you again.’

  His car had recently had a fresh coat of paint and looked brand new.

  ‘No bad news?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘My stepmother?’

  ‘Seems fine. Arlette has just left.’

  ‘Ah! Did she come back? That was nice of her. I was sure she’d be there to comfort her mother.’

  ‘Would you excuse us for a moment, Monsieur Besson?’

  And Maigret took Castaing aside, told him to go to Yport, and on to Fécamp if need be.

  ‘I apologize. I had to give him some instructions. I’m afraid I’m not too sure where we can go to talk. I doubt my room has been cleaned yet.’

  ‘I’ll gladly have a drink. After that, if you’re not afraid of some fresh air, we can sit on the terrace of the casino. I hope you’ll forgive me for not being here to welcome you. My wife is deeply distressed. Her sister has just arrived from Marseille, where she’s married to a ship-owner. There are only the two of them now. The Montets didn’t have a son and so I’m the one who’ll have to deal with all the complications.’