The Yellow Dog

by Georges Simenon

  An elderly policeman was sitting inside the gate, reading a humour magazine. The courtyard, with green moss growing between its small paving stones, was still as serene as a cloister.

  ‘The sergeant?’

  ‘They’re all out – the lieutenant, the sergeant and most of the men – looking for that drifter.’

  ‘The doctor hasn’t budged?’

  The man smiled and looked at a barred prison window to the right. ‘No danger of that.’

  ‘Open the door for me, will you?’

  As soon as the bolts were drawn, Maigret exclaimed, in a bright, cordial voice: ‘Hello there, doctor! Slept well, I hope!’

  But all he saw was a pale, knife-sharp face emerging from the grey blanket on the bunk. The eyes were feverish, sunk deep into their sockets.

  ‘Well now, what’s the problem? Something wrong?’

  ‘Very wrong,’ mumbled Michoux, raising himself with a sigh. ‘My kidney …’

  ‘They’re giving you whatever you need, I hope?’

  ‘Yes … Good of you …’

  He had gone to bed fully dressed, which was apparent when he slid his legs from under the blanket. He sat up and wiped his hand over his forehead.

  Meanwhile, Maigret, bursting with health and vigour, straddled a chair and planted his elbows on its back.

  ‘Well now! I see you ordered yourself a nice bottle of Burgundy!’

  ‘My mother brought it yesterday … I would just as soon have skipped that visit. She must have got wind of something in Paris … She came back.’

  The dark circles under his eyes seemed to cover half of his unshaven hollow cheeks. The lack of a tie and his crumpled suit added to his aura of distress.

  He cleared his throat and spat conspicuously into his handkerchief, which he then examined like a man worried about tuberculosis and keeping an anxious watch on himself.

  ‘Is there anything new?’ he asked warily.

  ‘The police must have told you about last night.’

  ‘No! What hap … Who’s been …?’ He cowered against the wall as if afraid of being attacked.

  ‘Nothing serious. Someone was shot in the leg.’

  ‘Did they get the … whoever did it? … I can’t take any more, inspector! You have to admit it’s enough to drive a person crazy … Someone else from the Admiral café. Am I right? We’re the ones he’s after! And I’m racking my brain to work out why … Yes, why? Mostaguen! Le Pommeret! And the poison – that was meant for all of us together … You’ll see, they’ll get me, no matter what, even in here! … But why? Tell me!’

  He was no longer just pale. He was livid. It was painful to see such a picture of panic at its most pathetic and repellent.

  ‘I don’t even dare fall asleep … That window – look! There are bars, yes, but someone could shoot between them, at night. Suppose a guard fell asleep, or let his mind wander … I’m not made for this kind of life. Yesterday I drank that whole bottle, in hopes of getting to sleep, but I never closed an eye. I just felt sick. If they’d only kill that drifter, with his yellow dog … Did he turn up again, the dog? Is he still prowling around the café? … I don’t understand why nobody’s put a bullet into his hide. His and his master’s both!’

  ‘His master left Concarneau last night.’

  ‘Oh!’ The doctor seemed to have some trouble believing that. ‘Right after – after his latest attack?’

  ‘Before.’

  ‘But – that’s impossible! That would mean—’

  ‘Correct. That’s what I was telling the mayor, last night … Odd character, the mayor. Just between you and me, what do you think of him?’

  ‘Me? I don’t know … I …’

  ‘Well, he sold you the land for the development. You’re involved with him. You were friends, so to speak.’

  ‘We did some business together and we are neighbours, that’s all … out here in the country, you know …’

  Maigret noticed that the doctor’s voice was growing firmer, his gaze less distracted.

  ‘What was it you were telling him?’ Michoux asked.

  Maigret pulled his notebook from his pocket. ‘I was saying that the series of crimes – or murder attempts, if you like – couldn’t have been committed by any of the persons now known to us. I won’t go over the events one by one; I’ll just summarize: objectively, you understand, like a technician … Well, obviously you were in no position last night to fire at the customs guard, which could be enough to rule you out altogether. Le Pommeret couldn’t have shot him either, since they’re burying him tomorrow morning. Neither could Goyard; he’s just been found in Paris … And they couldn’t, any of them, have been the person behind the letterbox in the vacant house last Friday … Nor could Emma.’

  ‘What about the drifter with the yellow dog?’

  ‘I considered him. Not only is he probably not the one who poisoned Le Pommeret, but last night he was a long way from where the shooting occurred … That’s why I told the mayor that it might be some unknown person, some mysterious X, who committed all these crimes. Unless …’

  ‘Unless?’

  ‘Unless it’s not one person. Instead of some sort of unilateral offensive, suppose there’s actually a battle going on between two groups, or between two individuals.’

  ‘But what happens to me then, inspector? If there are unknown enemies prowling around, I …’ And his face went dull again. He put his head in his hands. ‘When I think how sick I am, and how the doctors tell me I need absolute calm! … Oh, there’s no need for any bullet or poison to do me in. You’ll see – my kidney will take care of that.’

  ‘What do you think of the mayor?’

  ‘I don’t know! I don’t know anything about him! … He comes from a very rich family. When he was young, he lived the high life in Paris, had his own racing stable. And then he settled down. He had managed to save some of his money and came to live here, in the house built by his grandfather, who used to be mayor of Concarneau himself … He sold me the land he didn’t need. I think he’d like to be appointed to the departmental council, and then move on to the Senate.’

  The doctor had stood up, and anyone would have sworn he had lost fifteen pounds in the last few days. It would have been no surprise, moreover, to see him burst into nervous tears.

  ‘What do you think is going on? … What about Goyard, turning up in Paris when everyone thinks … What could he have been doing there? And why?’

  ‘We’ll soon find out, because he’s about to arrive in Concarneau. In fact, he should be here by now.’

  ‘Is he under arrest?’

  ‘He was asked to come along with two gentlemen. That’s not the same thing.’

  ‘What did he say?’

  ‘Nothing. But then, no one asked him anything.’

  The doctor suddenly looked the inspector square in the face. A quick flush rose to his cheeks.

  ‘What does that mean? … I get the impression that something crazy is going on. You come in here and chat about the mayor, about Goyard … and meanwhile I’m sure – you hear me? – I’m convinced, more and more, that I’m about to be killed! In spite of those bars. Never mind that big idiot policeman on duty out in the courtyard! … And I don’t want to die! I don’t! Just give me a revolver to defend myself. Or else lock up the people who are after me, the ones who killed Le Pommeret, who put poison in the bottle …’

  He was breathing heavily.

  ‘I’m no hero! Facing death isn’t my job. I’m just a man. A sick man! And I’ve got enough to do just fighting this disease … You talk and you talk, but what exactly are you doing?’

  In a rage, he knocked his forehead against the wall. ‘This whole thing looks like a conspiracy to me … unless people are trying to drive me crazy! That’s it – they want to commit me! … Who knows? Maybe it’s my mother. She’s probably had enough of me.
Because I’ve always hung on to my share of my father’s legacy. But I won’t let them get away with this!’

  Maigret had not moved. He sat there quietly – his elbows on the back of the chair, his pipe in his teeth – in the middle of the white cell with one wall drenched in sunlight.

  The doctor moved back and forth, his agitation close to delirium.

  Then suddenly there was the sound of a cheerful voice, a touch ironic, imitating a child’s. ‘Coocoo!’

  Ernest Michoux jumped and looked into all four corners of the cell before he turned to stare hard at Maigret. The inspector had taken his pipe from his mouth and was looking at Michoux with a wide grin.

  It was as if a switch had been flipped. Michoux stopped short, went limp. His substance seemed to fade to a ghostly mist.

  ‘Was that you?’ he asked.

  The voice might have come from anywhere, like a ventriloquist’s, springing from the ceiling or out of a china vase.

  Maigret’s eyes were still laughing as he rose and, in a tone entirely at odds with his expression, said: ‘Pull yourself together, doctor! I hear footsteps in the courtyard. In a few moments, I expect the murderer to be right here within these four walls.’

  It was the mayor the guard brought in first. But there were sounds of others in the courtyard.

  10. The Pretty Emma

  ‘You asked me to come, inspector?’

  Before Maigret had time to answer, he saw two officers enter the courtyard with Jean Goyard between them; out in the street, an excited crowd had gathered around the gate.

  The journalist looked smaller, plumper, between his two bodyguards. He had pulled his soft hat down over his eyes and, probably worried about photographers, held a handkerchief over the lower part of his face.

  ‘This way!’ Maigret told the policemen. ‘You might get us some chairs, since I hear a female voice.’

  ‘Where is he?’ a shrill voice demanded. ‘I want to see him immediately! And I’ll have you demoted, young fellow – you hear me? I’ll have you demoted …’

  It was Madame Michoux, in a mauve dress and wearing her jewels, powder and rouge, and seething with anger.

  ‘Ah! You’re here, dear friend,’ she simpered, addressing the mayor. ‘Can you imagine such a thing? This little man arrives at my house before I’m even dressed – my maid is away – and I tell him, through the door, that I cannot receive him. He insists, he demands, he waits while I get ready, claiming he has an order to bring me here. It’s simply outrageous! When I think that my husband was a deputy, practically prime minister, and that this … this lout – yes, lout …’

  She was too indignant to register what was going on around her. Suddenly, she saw Goyard, averting his face, and her son sitting on the edge of his bunk with his head in his hands.

  A car drove into the sunny courtyard at that point. Police uniforms gleamed. And a clamour rose from the crowd.

  A guard had closed the gate, to keep the throng from forcing its way into the courtyard. For the first person to be pulled out of the car, literally, was none other than the drifter. Not only did he have handcuffs on his wrists, but his ankles were shackled with sturdy rope and he had to be dragged in like a sack.

  Behind him came Emma, her limbs free but her movements dazed, as though she were in a dream.

  ‘Untie his legs!’ Maigret commanded.

  The police were full of themselves, still elated at having captured him. It couldn’t have been easy, to judge by their dishevelled uniforms and, especially, by the prisoner’s face, which was smeared with the blood still running from his split lip.

  Madame Michoux gave a frightened cry and recoiled against the wall. The man let himself be freed without a word, lifted his head and gazed slowly around.

  ‘Easy there, eh, Léon?’ growled Maigret.

  The man started and looked around again, to see who had spoken.

  ‘Someone give him a chair and a handkerchief.’

  Maigret noticed that Goyard had sidled to the farthest reach of the cell, behind Madame Michoux, and that the doctor was trembling and looking at no one. The police lieutenant was wondering uncomfortably what his role should be in this unusual assembly.

  ‘Please close the door. Will everyone kindly be seated … Lieutenant, can your sergeant take down the proceedings? … Very good! He can sit at that little table. I’ll ask you to have a seat too, Monsieur le Maire.’

  The crowd outside was no longer shouting, but it was unmistakably present – a sense of tightly packed humanity, an intense air of expectancy out in the street.

  Maigret stuffed his pipe as he paced the cell. Turning to Leroy, he said: ‘Before we start, I’d like you to telephone the seamen’s association at Quimper to ask what happened four or five years ago – maybe six – to a boat called the Pretty Emma.’

  As Leroy headed for the door, the mayor coughed and indicated that he had something to say.

  ‘I can tell you about that, inspector. Everyone knows the story around here.’

  ‘Go on.’

  The vagrant tensed in his corner like an attack dog. Emma, sitting on the very edge of her chair, never took her eyes off him. By chance she had ended up beside Madame Michoux, whose perfume, a sugary scent of violet, had begun to permeate the air.

  ‘I never saw the boat,’ the mayor said casually, his tone perhaps slightly forced. ‘It belonged to a fellow named Le Glen, or Le Glérec, who was said to be an excellent seaman but hot-headed. Like all the coasters in this area, the Pretty Emma mainly carried early vegetables to England … One fine day she apparently sailed on a longer voyage. There was no news for two months. Eventually, we heard that the Pretty Emma had been searched when it had arrived at a small port near New York. Its crew was sent to prison, and the cargo – cocaine – was seized. The boat, too, of course … That was at the time when most freighters, especially those that carried salt to Newfoundland, were involved in smuggling liquor.’

  ‘Thank you … Stay where you are, Léon. Answer me from there … And answer the questions I ask you exactly, and nothing more! You hear me? … First, where did they arrest you just now?’

  The vagrant, wiping at the blood on his chin, said in a hoarse voice, ‘At Rosporden … in a railway station, where we were waiting till dark to jump on to a train.’

  ‘How much money did you have?’

  It was the lieutenant who answered: ‘Eleven francs and a little change.’

  Maigret looked at Emma, whose cheeks were wet with tears, then at the brute, now silent and withdrawn. He sensed that the doctor, though quiet, was intensely agitated, and he signed to one of the policemen to station himself near Michoux, ready for any eventuality.

  The sergeant was still writing. His pen scratched on the paper with a metallic sound.

  ‘Tell us, exactly, the circumstances of this cocaine cargo, Le Glérec.’

  The man raised his eyes. His gaze locked on to the doctor and grew hard. His mouth bitter, his heavy fists clenched, he muttered, ‘The bank had lent me money to get my boat built …’

  ‘I know that. Go on.’

  ‘It was a bad year. The franc was rising. The English were buying less produce. I was worried about paying the interest … I wanted to get most of the loan paid off before I married Emma … Then this newspaperman looked me up. I knew him because he hung around the port a lot …’

  Astonishing everyone, Ernest Michoux dropped his hands from his face. It was pale, but infinitely calmer than anyone had expected. He drew a notebook and a pencil from his pocket and wrote a few words.

  ‘Did Jean Servières offer you a cocaine shipment?’

  ‘Not right away. He only talked about doing some business. He told me to meet him in a café in Brest. He was waiting there with two other men—’

  ‘Dr Michoux and Monsieur Le Pommeret?’

  ‘That’s right.’

 
Michoux jotted down some more notes, his expression disdainful. At one point he even gave a sardonic smile.

  ‘Which of the three actually gave you the job?’

  The doctor waited, his pencil poised.

  ‘None of them … That is, they just talked about the big money I could make for a month or two’s work … An American turned up an hour later. I never heard his name, and I saw him only twice. He obviously knew the sea, because he asked me the specifications of my boat, the number of men I’d need on board and how much time it would take to install an auxiliary engine … I figured what they had in mind was bootlegging liquor. Everyone was doing some of that, even officers on the liners … The next week, workmen came to install a semi-diesel engine on the Pretty Emma …’

  He spoke slowly, his gaze fixed. But the slow, spasmodic movements of his huge fingers were more eloquent than his face, and it was affecting to watch them.

  ‘They gave me an English chart that showed Atlantic wind patterns and routes for sailing vessels, because I’d never made the crossing … Being cautious, I took only two men with me, and I never told anyone about it but Emma. She was on the jetty the night we left … The three Frenchmen were there too, standing next to a car with its lights out … We’d taken on the cargo that afternoon. And at that moment, as we set out, I got scared … Not so much about the contraband. But I never had much schooling. As long as I can use the compass and the plumb line, I’m all right; I can do as well as anyone. But out there on the open ocean … An old sea captain had tried to teach me how to use the sextant to take bearings. And I bought logarithm tables and all that. But I was sure to get tangled up in the calculations … Still, if I made it, the boat would be paid for and I’d have about 20,000 francs left … There was a terrible wind that night. We lost sight of the car and the three men. Then Emma, her dark shape at the end of the jetty … Two months at sea …’

  Michoux was still taking notes, but he avoided looking at the man speaking.

  ‘I had landing instructions. Finally – God knows how – we got to the little port they’d told us about … But before we even threw out the anchors, we were surrounded – three police launches with machine guns and men carrying rifles. They jumped on deck, held us at gunpoint and shouted things in English. They hit us with the rifle butts till we put our hands up …