‘Once again, I don’t think anything. It’s a plausible hypothesis.’
‘So Batille was followed by one of them until he was in quite a deserted place and … Did the murderer take the tape recorder?’
‘No.’
‘How do you explain that?’
‘I don’t explain it.’
‘The passers-by that you mentioned … I assume they are the Pagliatis … You see, we know more than you might think … So did the Pagliatis, by rushing over, prevent the man from …’
‘No. He had only delivered four blows. After leaving the scene he retraced his steps to deliver another three. So he could have pulled the tape recorder off the victim’s neck.’
‘So you haven’t got anywhere?’
‘I’m going to question those gentlemen.’
‘Together?’
‘One by one.’
‘Who are you starting with?’
‘Yvon Demarle, the sailor.’
‘When will you have finished?’
‘I don’t know. You could leave one of your colleagues here.’
‘And go for a beer! Good idea! Thanks, detective chief inspector.’
Maigret would also have liked to go for a beer. He went to his office and called in Lapointe, who knew how to do shorthand.
‘Have a seat there. Take notes.’
Then, to Janvier:
‘Will you go and fetch the man called Demarle?’
The ex-sailor turned up with his hands clasped in front of him.
‘Take off the cuffs. And you, Demarle, take a seat.’
‘What are you going to do to me? Give me the third degree? I should tell you straight out that I’m tough, and you’re not going to get anything out of me.’
‘Have you finished?’
‘I wonder why, up there, I was allowed a lawyer while here I’m on my own.’
‘Monsieur Huet will explain that when he sees you again. Among the objects taken from you was a Swedish knife …’
‘And that’s why you’ve brought me in? It’s been hanging about in my pocket for twenty years. It was a present from my brother, when I was still a fisherman in Quimper, before I started on the liners.’
‘When did you last use it?’
‘I use it every day to cut meat, the way you do in the country. It may not be elegant but …’
‘On Tuesday evening, you were with two companions at the Café des Amis on Place de la Bastille.’
‘That’s what you say. You know, I can’t remember what I did yesterday. They say I’m a bit absent-minded.’
‘There was Mila, the framer and you. You spoke in more or less covert terms about the burglary, and among other things you were given the task of finding a car. Where did you steal it?’
‘What?’
‘The car.’
‘What car?’
‘I don’t suppose you know where Rue Popincourt is either?’
‘I’m not from Paris.’
‘None of the three of you noticed a young man at the next table turning on a tape recorder?’
‘A what?’
‘You didn’t follow that young man?’
‘Why? Please don’t think that’s my kind of thing.’
‘Your accomplices didn’t tell you to gain possession of the cassette?’
‘Right! It’s a cassette now. Is that all?’
‘That’s all.’
And, to Janvier:
‘Take him to the first free office. Same thing …’
Janvier was going to repeat the questions, more or less word for word. When he had finished, a third inspector would take over.
As it happened, Maigret didn’t think much would come of it, but it was still the most efficient method. It could go on for hours. One such interrogation had lasted thirty-two hours before the man in question, who had come in as a witness, confessed to his crime. And yet, three or four times during the interrogation the police had been on the point of letting him go, he was so good at acting innocent.
‘Go and get Mila for me,’ he said to Lourtie in the inspectors’ office.
The barman knew he was handsome, more intelligent, more alert than his accomplices. It was almost as if he enjoyed playing his part.
‘Hang on! The chatterbox isn’t here?’
He pretended to look around for his lawyer.
‘Do you think it’s normal practice to question me in his absence?’
‘That’s my business.’
‘I’d just have to say that I wouldn’t want the whole procedure to be declared irregular because of a detail.’
‘What was your first conviction for?’
‘I can’t remember. Besides, you can find that out from Records upstairs. So even though I’ve never dealt with you personally, I have been a client here in the past.’
‘When did you notice that your conversation was being recorded?’
‘What conversation are you talking about, and what recording?’
Maigret was patient enough to take his questions to their conclusion, even though he knew it was pointless. And Lourtie would repeat them tirelessly, as Janvier was now doing with the sailor.
Then came the framer’s turn. At first sight he seemed shy, but he was just as cool-headed as the others.
‘Have you been burgling unoccupied villas for a long time?’
‘I’m sorry?’
‘I’m asking you if …’
Maigret was hot, and his back was sticky with sweat. The four men had agreed on a deal. Each one would play his part and avoid being caught off guard by more or less unexpected questions.
The sailor-tramp stuck to his explanation. First of all, he wasn’t at the meeting in Place de la Bastille. Then, on Tuesday night, he was looking for a ‘crib’, as he put it.
‘In an unoccupied house?’
‘As long as the door’s open. In the house, or in the garage …’
At six in the evening, the four men were taken back in a police van to Rue des Saussaies, where they would spend the night.
‘Is that you, Grosjean? Thanks for lending them to me … I didn’t get anything out of them, no. They’re not choir-boys.’
‘You can say that again! We’re all right with Tuesday’s burglaries because they were caught red-handed. But as for the previous burglaries, if we don’t find any evidence or witnesses …’
‘When the papers get involved, witnesses will turn up, you’ll see.’
‘Do you still think that the crime in Rue Popincourt was committed by one of the four?’
‘To tell you the truth, no.’
‘Do you have any suspicions?’
‘No.’
‘So what are you planning to do?’
‘Wait.’
And it was true. In their final edition the newspapers were already publishing the account of what had happened in the examining magistrates’ corridor, and then the statements that Maigret had given at the Police Judiciaire.
Is this the Rue Popincourt murderer?
And below this question was the photograph of Yvon Demarle, handcuffs on his wrists, near Examining Magistrate Poiret’s door.
Maigret looked for the telephone number of the apartment on Quai d’Anjou and dialled it.
‘Hello, who’s speaking?’
‘Monsieur Batille’s valet.’
‘Is Monsieur Batille there?’
‘He’s not back yet. I think he had an appointment with his doctor.’
‘This is Detective Chief Inspector Maigret. When is the funeral?’
‘At ten o’clock tomorrow.’
‘Thank you.’
Phew! Maigret’s day was over, and he called his wife to say that he would be home for dinner.
‘After which we’ll go to the cinema,’ he added.
To take his mind off things.
5.
Just by chance, Maigret was joined by young Lapointe. They were both standing in the crowd, on the embankment side, not opposite the dead boy’s house but the ho
use next door, because there were so many onlookers that they hadn’t been able to find a better vantage point.
There were cars, including many chauffeur-driven limousines, all along the embankments, from Pont Louis-Philippe to Pont Sully, and others were parked on the other side of the island, on Quai de Béthune and Quai d’Orléans.
It was a cool morning, chilly, one might have said, very bright, very cheerful, pastel-coloured.
They saw the cars stopping in front of the big, black-draped gate, and people going inside and upstairs, where they would bow in front of the coffin before reappearing and waiting outside for the convoy to form.
A red-haired photographer, bare-headed, walked back and forth, pointing his lens at the rows of onlookers. He was not universally well received, and some people had no qualms about expressing their feelings to him.
Nonetheless, he carried on imperturbably with his work. The public, particularly the ones who complained, would probably have been surprised to learn that he didn’t belong to a newspaper, an agency or a magazine, but that he was there on Maigret’s orders.
Maigret had gone to the laboratory at the Police Judiciaire early that morning and, with Moers, had chosen Van Hamme, the best and, most importantly, the most resourceful of the available photographers.
‘I would like photographs of all the onlookers, first of all opposite the dead boy’s house, then opposite the church, when the coffin is brought there, then when it comes out, and finally at the cemetery.
‘Once the photographs have been developed, study them under the magnifying glass. It’s possible that one person or several people will appear in all three places. They’re the ones who interest me. Make enlargements, without the people around them.’
In spite of himself, Maigret looked around for a light-coloured raincoat with a belt and a dark hat. There was little chance of the murderer still wearing the same clothes, because the morning papers had given a description of them. The two cases, the one in Rue Popincourt and the burglary, were by now definitely seen as closely connected.
There was much talk of the role of the Police Judiciaire and the previous day’s interrogations, and the photographs of the four arrested men had been published.
In one of the papers, below the portrait of Demarle the sailor, in a raincoat and a brown hat, it said:
Is this the murderer?
The crowd was a mixture. First of all, near the house, there were those who had gone to pay their last respects to the dead boy, and who were waiting to take their place in the cortège. Along the pavement it was particularly the residents of the island, and the concierges and shopkeepers of Rue Saint-Louis-en-l’Ile.
‘Such a nice boy! … And so shy! … When he came into the shop, he always raised his hat …’
‘If only he had cut his hair a bit shorter … His parents should have told him … Elegant people like that … It made him look like a bad sort …’
Maigret and Lapointe exchanged a glance from time to time, and an absurd idea came into the former’s mind. How eagerly Antoine Batille would have slipped around this crowd with his microphone if he had been alive! Although if he had been alive, there would have been no crowd.
The hearse appeared and pulled up at the kerb, followed by three more cars. Were they going to drive to the church of Saint-Louis-en-l’Ile, which was two hundred metres away?
The people from the funeral director’s first of all took down the wreaths and bouquets. It wasn’t only the hearse that was covered with them; flowers were also piled up in the three cars.
Among the people waiting there was a third category: standing in small groups, the staff of Mylène Perfumes. Many of the girls and young women were pretty, dressed with an elegance which, in the morning sun, had a somewhat aggressive quality.
There was a movement in the crowd, like a current passing from one end of the rows to the other, and the coffin appeared, carried by six men. Once it had been slid into the hearse, the family appeared. At its head, Gérard Batille was flanked by his wife and daughter. His features were very drawn, his complexion muddy. He didn’t look at anyone but seemed surprised to discover so many flowers.
It was as if he wasn’t fully present, as if he barely realized what was happening around him. Madame Batille showed greater composure, although she sometimes dabbed her eyes through the thin black veil that covered her face.
Minou, the sister, whom Maigret was seeing in black for the first time, seemed taller and thinner, and she was the only one who paid attention to what was going on around her.
Other photographers, these ones press cameramen, took some photographs. Aunts, uncles and more or less distant relatives followed, and also, in all likelihood, the senior staff of the perfume and beauty products company.
The hearse moved off, the cars full of flowers, and the family took their place behind it, then the friends, students, teachers, and finally the local shopkeepers.
Some of the onlookers headed towards Pont Marie or Pont Sully to go back to their jobs, but others set off towards the church.
Maigret and Lapointe were among them. They followed the procession along the pavement and, on Rue Saint-Louis-en-l’Ile, they found another crowd that hadn’t been at Quai d’Anjou. The church was already more than half full. From the street they could hear the deep murmur of a pipe organ, and the coffin was carried to the bier, which was only partly covered by flowers.
A lot of people had stayed outside. The doors hadn’t been closed again, and the absolution was already underway when the sun and the cool air entered the church.
‘Pater Noster …’
The priest, who was very old, walked around the bier waving his sprinkler and then swung the censer.
‘Et ne nos inducas in tentationem …’
‘Amen.’
Outside, Van Hamme was still working.
‘Which cemetery?’ Lapointe asked under his breath, leaning over Maigret’s shoulder.
‘Montparnasse. The Batilles have a family vault there.’
‘Are we going?’
‘I don’t think so.’
Luckily a lot of police officers had come to control the traffic. The immediate family took their seats in a car at the front. The more distant relations followed, then came Batille’s colleagues and friends who ran to find their cars and tried to edge their way in.
Van Hamme had taken the precaution of getting a lift in a little black police car that was waiting at a strategic point and picked him up at the last moment.
The crowd gradually dispersed. Some groups were still conversing on the pavements.
‘We can go back,’ Maigret sighed.
They crossed the pedestrian bridge behind Notre Dame and stopped in a bar on the corner of Boulevard du Palais.
‘What will you have?’
‘A white wine. A Vouvray.’
Because the word Vouvray was written in chalk on the mirrors.
‘Me too. Two Vouvrays.’
It was nearly midday when Van Hamme stepped into Maigret’s office with some photographs.
‘I haven’t finished, but there was something I wanted to show you straight away. Three of us have been studying the photographs with a strong magnifying glass. I was immediately struck by this.’
The first photograph, on Quai d’Anjou, showed only part of the body and the face, because a woman was pushing from the side, trying to slip into the front row.
The man was incontestably wearing a lightweight beige raincoat and a dark hat. He was quite young, about thirty. His face was ordinary, and he seemed to be frowning as if displeased by something around him.
‘Here’s a slightly better photograph.’
The same face, enlarged. The mouth was quite thick, almost sulky, and the expression was that of a shy person.
‘This is still Quai d’Anjou. We’ll see if he’s in the photographs taken in front of the church that we’re developing right now. I brought these down to you because of the raincoat.’
‘Weren’t there
any other raincoats?’
‘Several, but only three with belts, one middle-aged man with a beard, and a man in his forties without a hat, smoking a pipe.’
‘Bring down anything else you find after lunch.’
Basically, the raincoat didn’t mean very much. If Batille’s murderer had read the morning papers, he knew that they had published his description. Why, then, wear the same outfit as he had in the evening in Rue Popincourt? Because it was the only one he had? Out of defiance?
Maigret had lunch at the Brasserie Dauphine again, just with Lapointe this time, because Janvier and Lucas weren’t in the building.
At 2.30, Maigret received a phone call that relaxed him. It was as if a large part of his worries evaporated all at once.
‘Hello, Detective Chief Inspector Maigret? I’m putting you through to Monsieur Frémiet, our senior editor. Please stay on the line.’
‘Hello … Maigret?’
The two men had known each other for a long time. Frémiet was the editor of one of the biggest morning newspapers.
‘I’m just asking if your investigation is making any progress. I’m taking the liberty of calling you because we’ve just received quite a curious message. And it came by express telegram, which is quite rare for an anonymous communication …’
‘I’m listening …’
‘You know that we published the photograph of the members of the Jouy-en-Josas gang this morning. Below the picture of the sailor my editor insisted on printing the words “Is this the murderer?”’
‘I saw.’
‘This cutting that has just reached us has just one word written in green ink, in large letters: “No!”’
Maigret’s face brightened.
‘If you’ll forgive me, I’m going to send one of my men to fetch the message. Do you know which post office it was sent from?’
‘Rue du Faubourg-Montmartre. May I ask you, inspector, not to mention this to any other journalists. I can’t publish this document until tomorrow morning. It’s already been photographed, and the print will be ready shortly. Unless you ask us to keep it secret …?’
‘No. On the contrary. I’d even like you to comment on it. One moment. The best thing would be to suggest that it’s a joke, stressing that the real murderer wouldn’t risk compromising himself like that.’
Maigret and the Killer Page 9