‘Are you familiar with some of these nightclubs?’
‘Two or three. I found matchbooks with the names on …’
‘For example?’
‘Le Chat Botté … La Belle Hélène … Hold on … Le Cric-Crac …’
‘You were never tempted to see them for yourself?’
‘I’m not curious …’
‘Evidently …’
She poured herself a drink and her lips quivered again; her gaze had become cloudy, absent. Maigret had the impression that she would suddenly become aware of his presence and ask him what he was doing there.
‘In other words, you’re thinking he’s been murdered.’
‘What about you?’
‘Why not taken ill?’
‘He has an iron constitution.’
‘An accident …’
‘I’d have read about it in the newspapers …’
‘Have you telephoned the hospitals?’
‘Yesterday.’
And so, despite appearances, she had all her wits about her. On the marble mantelpiece, there was a photograph in a silver frame. Maigret stood up to inspect it more closely. It was Madame Sabin-Levesque, much younger, unmarried most probably, in a studied pose. In those days she was very pretty, with a gamine look.
‘That was me, yes … I’ve changed, haven’t I?’
‘Was this photo taken before or after your marriage?’
‘A few weeks after. Gérard insisted I had my portrait taken by a famous photographer in Boulevard Haussmann …’
‘So he was in love?’
‘I don’t know. He seemed to be.’
‘Did things deteriorate suddenly?’
‘No. The first time he ran off for twenty-four hours and I didn’t say anything. He told me he’d been to visit a client in another town … Then he began to disappear when he felt like it. He stopped informing me. He’d go out after dinner, and I never had any idea when he’d be back …’
‘What was he like when he was with those who knew him well?’
‘They’ll all say that he was a happy-go-lucky fellow, who got along with everyone and who was always ready to help people. Some would say there was something childlike about him …’
‘What about you?’
‘I have nothing to complain about. Apparently I misjudged things, or he was wrong about me …’
‘Meaning?’
‘That he thought I was different from what I am …’
‘What did you do before you met him?’
‘I was a legal secretary to Maître Bernard d’Argens, Rue de Rivoli … The two men knew each other … Gérard came to my boss’s office several times and one day he asked me out.’
‘Were you born in Paris?’
‘No. In Quimper …’
‘Why do you think he’s been killed?’
‘Because it’s the only explanation.’
‘Is your mother still alive?’
‘Yes. My father – his name was Louis Frassier – is dead. He was an accountant. My mother was born Countess Outchevka …’
‘Do you send her money?’
‘Of course. Money has never meant anything to Gérard. He would give me anything I wanted without asking any questions …’
She drained her glass and raised a handkerchief to her lips.
‘May I have your permission to see the rest of the apartment?’
‘I’ll show you around.’
She rose from the chaise longue and walked towards the door, treading gingerly.
2.
The place gave the impression of great wealth, evoking the prominent, austere families of the nineteenth century. The apartment occupied the entire floor and Madame Sabin-Levesque, still unsteady on her feet, began by showing Maigret the part that was hers.
Beyond the boudoir, there was a very spacious bedroom, the walls of which were also covered in blue silk, which appeared to be her favourite colour. The bed was unmade but she wasn’t bothered by this intrusion into her privacy. The furniture was white. There was a bottle of brandy on the chest of drawers.
‘What is your first name?’ asked Maigret.
‘Nathalie. Probably a nod to my Russian background …’
The bathroom floor and walls were tiled in blue-grey marble, and, like the bedroom, it was untidy.
Then came a room lined with cupboards, followed by what could be called a small sitting room, a second boudoir.
‘This is where I take my meals when I don’t eat in the dining room.’
She had the detached air of a museum guide.
‘Now, we’re entering the servants’ quarters.’
A vast room, first of all, with display cabinets full of silverware, then a small dining room painted white, and lastly the kitchen with an old-fashioned stove and copper pans. An old woman was bustling about.
‘Marie Jalon, who was already here in my father-in-law’s day.’
‘When did he die?’
‘Ten years ago.’
‘So you lived here with him?’
‘For five years …’
‘Did the pair of you get along well?’
‘He had no interest in me whatsoever. At that time, I used to eat in the dining room and I can count on one hand the number of times he spoke to me.’
‘What kind of relationship did he have with his son?’
‘Gérard would go downstairs at nine o’clock. He had an office to himself. I don’t know what he did there, exactly.’
‘Was he already in the habit of disappearing?’
‘For two or three days, yes.’
‘And his father didn’t say anything?’
‘He pretended not to notice …’
Maigret was discovering a whole world, an outmoded, inward-looking world.
Perhaps, in the late nineteenth or early twentieth century, there had been receptions and balls in the two drawing rooms. Because there were two and the second one was almost as vast as the first.
Everywhere the walls were covered in wood panelling that had become dark in colour.
Everywhere too were paintings from another era, portraits of men with side whiskers, their necks encased in high collars.
It was as if life had come to a standstill.
‘Now, we’re entering my husband’s side …’
A study, with leather-bound books up to the ceiling. A walnut stepladder to reach the top shelves. On the desk, in a corner by the window, lay a blotter and brown leather accessories. Perfectly tidy. There was no indication that a person lived there.
‘Is this where he sits in the evenings?’
‘When he’s at home.’
‘I see he has a television.’
‘So do I, but I never watch it.’
‘Do you ever spend the evening in this room?’
‘I did in the early days of our marriage.’
She was struggling to find her words, letting them drop as if they were of no importance. The corners of her mouth were turned down, giving her face a bitter expression.
‘His bedroom …’
Maigret had had the time to verify that the desk drawers were locked. What could be in them?
There were very high ceilings throughout the apartment, with very tall windows too, their crimson velvet curtains making the rooms gloomy.
The bedroom walls were covered not in wood panelling but in fauve leather. The bed was a double bed. There were armchairs with slightly sagging seats.
‘Did you sleep here?’
‘Sometimes, during the first three months …’
Was that hatred in her voice, written on her face?
She carried on with the guided tour, still as if in a museum.
‘His bathroom …’
His toothbrus
h, razor, hairbrush and comb were all still there.
‘He never took anything with him?’
‘Not as far as I know.’
A dressing room, as in Nathalie’s side of the apartment, then a gym.
‘Did he use it?’
‘Rarely. He’d grown plumper; not exactly fat, but bloated …’
She pushed open a door.
‘The library …’
Thousands of books, from all periods, but with very few recent works.
‘Did he read a lot?’
‘I didn’t come to see what he did in the evenings. This staircase leads directly down to the office, because we’ve passed over the arch. Do you still need me?’
‘I shall probably need to see you again. If so, I’ll telephone you.’
She was going to go back to her bottle.
‘I presume you’ll pay a visit to the office now?’
‘Yes, I would like to question Monsieur Lecureur. I apologize for inconveniencing you …’
She walked off, arousing in Maigret a mixture of pity and annoyance. He took the stairs, filling a pipe at last, because he had refrained from smoking in the apartment.
He found himself in a large room where half a dozen typists were tapping away feverishly. They looked up and stared at him in surprise.
‘Monsieur Lecureur, please.’
On the shelves were hundreds of green files of the sort found in civil service departments and most lawyers’ offices. A short, dark-haired woman invited him to follow her across a room where there was just a long table and a massive, ancient safe.
‘This way …’
Another room, where a middle-aged man sat on his own, poring over what must have been the general ledger. He shot Maigret an indifferent glance as he went through to the next room where five employees were working.
‘Is Monsieur Lecureur alone?’
‘Yes, I think so.’
‘Would you telephone him and ask if he is free to see Detective Chief Inspector Maigret?’
They stood waiting for a moment, then a padded door opened.
‘Do come in … I am glad to see you …’
Lecureur was younger than Maigret had imagined when told that he had worked with Sabin-Levesque’s late father. He couldn’t have been fifty. He had dark hair, with a little moustache, and his suit was a deep grey, almost black.
‘Please have a seat.’
Wood panelling again. The firm’s founder must have had a great fondness for dark wood.
‘I assume Madame Sabin-Levesque alerted you?’
The Empire-style furniture here was mahogany.
‘I presume you’re the person who stands in for your boss when he disappears?’
‘That is my job as chief clerk. But there are documents I am not authorized to sign and that creates a problem for me.’
He was a calm man, with that particular quality of those who have to rub shoulders with high society. He wasn’t servile, but there was a touch of deference in his attitude.
‘When he took off for a few days, did he inform you?’
‘No. It was unplanned. Of course, I know nothing of his private life … I have to make do with suppositions … He would often go out in the evenings, almost every evening, as a matter of fact—’
‘One moment. Was he actively involved in the firm’s work?’
‘He spent most of his days in his office and he received most of the clients in person … He didn’t appear to be very busy and yet he had more to do than me … Especially when it came to wealth management and the sale and purchase of estates and chateaux … He was exceptionally good at his job and I’d have been incapable of taking his place …’
‘Is his office next to yours?’
Lecureur went and opened a door.
‘This is it … The furniture, as you can see, is of the same style, but there are three additional chairs.’
Perfectly tidy. No dust. The lawyer’s office overlooked Boulevard Saint-Germain and you could hear the drone of traffic.
The two men sat down again.
‘I gather his absences usually lasted only two or three days …’
‘More recently, they sometimes lasted a week.’
‘Did your boss remain in contact with you?’
‘He would nearly always telephone me to find out whether there was any new matter he needed to attend to …’
‘Do you know where he called from?’
‘No.’
‘As far as you know, did he have a bachelor pad in Paris?’
‘It’s a possibility that occurred to me. He never had much cash on him and he paid for almost everything by cheque … The stubs went through my hands before being passed on to the accounts department—’
He stopped, frowning.
‘I’m not sure I’m authorized to discuss these things. I’m bound by professional confidentiality.’
‘Not if he’s been murdered, for example …’
‘Do you seriously believe he has?’
‘His wife seems to think so.’
He shrugged as if to suggest that what she said was of little consequence.
‘I confess that I thought of that too. It’s the first time he’s been away for so long and hasn’t telephoned me. A week ago, he had a meeting here with one of our most important clients, one of the biggest, if not the biggest landowner in France.
‘He knew this … Despite his absent-minded air and his frivolous appearance, he never forgot anything and he tended to be meticulous in his work …’
‘What did you do?’
‘I postponed the appointment with the excuse that he was in hospital.’
‘Why, given your suspicions, did you not inform the police?’
‘It was up to his wife to do so, not me …’
‘I understand she never comes down to the office.’
‘That is correct … In the past, she came down once or twice, but she didn’t stay long …’
‘Was she made to feel uncomfortable?’
‘She wasn’t welcomed with open arms. Not even by her husband.’
‘Why not?’
He fell silent again, even more embarrassed than before.
‘I’m sorry, inspector, but you are putting me in an awkward position. My employer’s relationship with his wife is none of my business …’
‘What if a murder has been committed?’
‘That would change everything, of course … Here we love Monsieur Gérard … That’s what I call him, because I knew him when he’d just graduated … All the staff appreciate him … No one takes the liberty of judging his private life …’
‘I believe one can’t say the same for his wife.’
‘It’s a little as if she were an outsider. I’m not saying she’s mad. But all the same she’s a thorn in the flesh.’
‘Because she drinks?’
‘There’s that too.’
‘Was your boss unhappy with her?’
‘He’s never complained. He’s gradually made a separate life for himself …’
‘Earlier you mentioned cheque stubs that went through your hands. I assume he made payments to the women with whom he spent several days …’
‘I suppose so too, but I don’t have any evidence … Those cheques weren’t made out to a named person but to the bearer … There were some for five thousand francs and others for twenty thousand …’
‘Were there any for the same amount every month?’
‘No. That’s why I don’t think he had a bachelor pad.’
They looked at each other now in silence.
‘Some members of staff,’ sighed the chief clerk, at last, ‘saw him going into nightclubs … And then there would nearly always be an absence of a few days …’
‘Yo
u think something bad has happened to him, don’t you?’
‘I fear so. What about you, inspector?’
‘From the little I know so far, I do too … Did women sometimes telephone him at his office? I presume all calls go through the switchboard …’
‘I’ve questioned the switchboard operator, of course … There’s no trace of any calls of that nature …’
‘Which suggests that, when he disappeared, he didn’t give his real name …’
‘There’s one detail I think I should mention … Two weeks ago I was already beginning to get worried … I telephoned Madame Sabin-Levesque to tell her and I advised her to contact the police …’
‘What did she reply?’
‘That there wasn’t any reason to worry yet and that she would act when the time was right …’
‘She didn’t ask you up to the apartment or come down to discuss the matter with you?’
‘No.’
‘I don’t have any other questions for you at present. If there’s any news, please call me at the Police Judiciaire. Just one thing, though. Do the servants upstairs share the feelings of the office staff concerning Madame Sabin-Levesque?’
‘Yes. Especially the cook, Marie Jalon, who’s worked for the family for forty years and who knew Monsieur Gérard when he was a child. She hates her with a passion.’
‘What about the others?’
‘They put up with her, that’s all. Except the maid, Claire Marelle, who’s devoted to her and undresses her before putting her to bed when she finds her employer lying in a stupor on the floor …’
‘Thank you.’
‘Are you going to open an investigation?’
‘With not much to build on. I’ll keep you posted.’
Maigret left and went into a café close to the Solférino Métro station. He didn’t order a brandy, the thought of which he found repugnant, but a large, chilled beer.
‘Do you have a telephone token?’
He shut himself up in the booth and looked for the number of the lawyer Nathalie claimed to have worked for before her marriage, Maître Bernard d’Argens. He wasn’t listed in the telephone directory.
Maigret drank his beer and took a taxi, giving the address in Rue de Rivoli.
Maigret and Monsieur Charles Page 3
