Maigret's Mistake

by Georges Simenon

  Janvier went into Room 53, which had a view of the courtyard. The bed was of iron, the rug threadbare and discoloured, as was the tablecloth. On the wash-basin was a toothbrush, a tube of toothpaste, a comb, a shaving brush and a razor. In a corner, a big suitcase lay open, used only to put dirty washing in.

  Janvier found only one suit in the wardrobe, an old pair of trousers, a grey felt hat and a cap. As for Pierrot’s clothes, they consisted merely of three or four shirts, a few pairs of socks and pants. Another drawer was full of sheet music. It was on the bottom shelf of the bedside table that he finally spotted a pair of women’s slippers and, hanging behind the door, a salmon-pink crêpe de Chine dressing gown.

  By the time he went back downstairs, Janin had had time to chat with the manageress.

  ‘I have the addresses of two or three restaurants where he often has lunch.’

  It was only in the street that Janvier took note of them.

  ‘You’d do better to stay here,’ he said to Janin. ‘When the newspapers come out, he’ll find out what happened to his girlfriend, if he doesn’t already know. He might drop by the hotel.’

  ‘Do you think it’s him?’

  ‘The chief didn’t say.’

  Janvier headed first for an Italian restaurant on Boulevard Rochechouart, quiet, cosy and smelling of food cooked with herbs. Two waitresses in black and white bustled from table to table, but there was nobody answering to Pierrot’s description.

  ‘Have you seen Pierre Eyraud?’

  ‘The musician? No, he hasn’t been in. What day is it? Tuesday? I’d be surprised if he came, it isn’t his day.’

  The second restaurant on the list was a brasserie near the Barbès intersection, and here, too, nobody had seen Pierrot.

  There was one last hope, a restaurant frequented by drivers, its front painted yellow and the menu written on a slate hanging on the door. The owner was behind the counter, pouring wine. There was only one waitress, a tall, thin girl, and the owner’s wife could be glimpsed in the kitchen.

  Janvier approached the tin bar, ordered a beer. Everyone here probably knew each other, because they were watching him curiously.

  ‘I don’t have draught beer,’ the owner said. ‘How about a glass of Beaujolais?’

  Janvier nodded, waited a few moments, then asked:

  ‘Has Pierrot been in?’

  ‘The musician?’

  ‘That’s right. He arranged to meet me here at a quarter past twelve.’

  It was now 12.45.

  ‘If you’d come at a quarter past twelve, you’d have seen him.’

  They weren’t suspicious. He seemed very natural.

  ‘So he didn’t wait for me?’

  ‘To tell the truth, he didn’t even finish his lunch.’

  ‘Did someone come to get him?’

  ‘No. He left all of a sudden, saying he was in a hurry.’

  ‘What time was that?’

  ‘About fifteen minutes ago.’

  Janvier, looking around the tables, noticed that two of the customers were reading the afternoon paper over their lunch. One table, near the window, hadn’t been cleared. And next to a plate still containing veal stew, a newspaper lay open.

  ‘Was he sitting there?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Janvier had only 200 metres to walk in the rain to join Janin, who was keeping guard in Rue Briquet.

  ‘Has he been back?’

  ‘I haven’t seen anyone.’

  ‘He was in a little restaurant less than half an hour ago. A paper seller came in. Pierrot took one look at the front page and rushed out. I think I’d better call the chief.’

  On Maigret’s desk at Quai des Orfèvres there was a tray with two huge sandwiches and two glasses of beer. Maigret listened to Janvier’s report.

  ‘Try to find out the name of the dance hall where he works. The manageress of the hotel probably knows it. It must be somewhere in the area. I’d like Janin to carry on watching the hotel.’

  Maigret was right. The hotel’s manageress did know it. She, too, had the newspaper in her office but she hadn’t made any connection between the Louise Filon they were talking about and the Lulu she knew. All the newspaper had said in its first edition was:

  Louise Filon, unemployed, was found dead this morning by her cleaning lady in an apartment on Avenue Carnot. She was killed by a gunshot fired at close range, probably sometime last night. Robbery does not appear to have been the motive. Detective Chief Inspector Maigret has taken personal charge of the investigation, and we believe he is already following a lead.

  Pierrot worked at the Grelot, a dance hall in Rue Charbonnière, near the corner of Boulevard de La Chapelle. It was still in the area, although in the less savoury part of it. From Boulevard de La Chapelle onwards Janvier encountered Arabs wandering in the rain looking as if they had nothing to do. There were other men apart from the Arabs, and women, too, waiting for clients in the doorways of hotels in broad daylight, in spite of the regulations.

  The front of the Grelot was painted mauve, and by night the light was probably also mauve. At this hour, there was nobody inside except the owner, busy having lunch with a middle-aged woman who might have been his wife. He watched as Janvier, who had closed the door behind him, advanced towards him. Janvier realized that the man had guessed his profession from the first glance.

  ‘What do you want? The bar doesn’t open till five.’

  Janvier showed his badge, and the owner didn’t flinch. He was short and broad, with the nose and ears of a former boxer. Above the dance-floor, there was a kind of balcony, to which the musicians gained access by a ladder.

  ‘I’m listening.’

  ‘Is Pierrot here?’

  The other man looked around him at the empty room and merely replied:

  ‘Can you see him?’

  ‘Has he been in today?’

  ‘He starts work at seven in the evening. Sometimes he drops by about four or five to play belote.’

  ‘Did he work yesterday?’

  Janvier realized that something was up, because the man and the woman looked at each other.

  ‘What has he done?’ the owner asked cautiously.

  ‘Maybe nothing. I just want to ask him a few questions.’

  ‘Why?’

  Janvier went for broke.

  ‘Because Lulu is dead.’

  ‘What? What are you talking about?’

  He was genuinely surprised. True, there was no newspaper in sight.

  ‘Since when?’

  ‘Since last night.’

  ‘What happened to her?’

  ‘Do you know her?’

  ‘She used to be a regular. She was here almost every night. I’m talking about two years ago.’

  ‘And now?’

  ‘She came from time to time, had a drink, listened to the music.’

  ‘What time did Pierrot slip out last night?’

  ‘Who told you he slipped out?’

  ‘The concierge on Avenue Carnot, who knows him well, saw him enter the building and come out a quarter of an hour later.’

  The owner was silent for a good moment, thinking about how best to react. He, too, was at the mercy of the police. ‘Tell me first what happened to Lulu.’

  ‘She was murdered.’

  ‘Not by Pierrot!’ he retorted with conviction.

  ‘I didn’t say it was by Pierrot.’

  ‘So what do you want with him?’

  ‘I need some information. You claim he was working here last night?’

  ‘I’m not claiming anything. It’s the truth. At seven o’clock, he was up there playing the saxophone.’

  With his eyes, he indicated the balcony.

  ‘But he slipped out about nine?’

  ‘He had a phone call. It was twenty past nine.’

  ‘Was it from Lulu?’

  ‘I have no idea. It’s quite likely.’

  ‘I know,’ the woman said. ‘I was near the phone.’

  The phon
e was not in a booth, but in a recess in the wall near the door to the toilets.

  ‘He said to her, “I’ll be right there.” Then he turned to me. “Mélanie, I have to go over there.” I asked him, “Is something wrong?” And he said, “It looks that way.” Then he went up to talk to the other musicians and rushed out.’

  ‘What time did he get back?’

  This time, the man answered.

  ‘Just before eleven.’

  ‘Did he seem agitated?’

  ‘I didn’t notice anything. He apologized for his absence and went back to his place. He played until one in the morning. Then, as usual after closing, he had a drink with us. If he’d known that Lulu was dead, he wouldn’t have had the guts. He was crazy about her. He always has been. I told him a hundred times, “You’re wrong, Pierrot! You have to take women for what they are, and—” ’

  ‘Thanks very much!’ his companion interrupted him curtly.

  ‘It’s not the same thing.’

  ‘Wasn’t Lulu in love with him?’

  ‘Of course she was.’

  ‘Did she have someone else?’

  ‘A saxophone player couldn’t have afforded an apartment in the Étoile area.’

  ‘Do you know who it was?’

  ‘She never told me, and nor did Pierrot. All I know is that her life changed after her operation.’

  ‘What operation?’

  ‘Two years ago, she was very ill. She was still living around here at the time.’

  ‘Was she on the game?’

  The man shrugged. ‘What else can a girl do around here?’

  ‘Carry on.’

  ‘She was taken to hospital, and when Pierrot came back from visiting her, he said there was no hope. It was something in her head, I don’t know what. Then, after two days, she was moved to another hospital, on the Left Bank. She had some kind of operation and recovered in a few weeks. Only, she didn’t come back here, except to visit.’

  ‘Did she immediately move to Avenue Carnot?’

  ‘Do you remember?’ the owner asked his wife.

  ‘Yes, I do. First, she had an apartment in Rue La Fayette.’

  When Janvier returned to Quai des Orfèvres, at about three, he knew no more than that. Maigret was still in his office, in his shirt-sleeves because the room was overheated, and the air was blue with pipe smoke.

  ‘Sit down. Tell me.’

  Janvier recounted what he had done and what he had learned.

  ‘I’ve asked for a watch to be kept on the railway stations,’ Maigret said when he had finished. ‘So far, Pierrot hasn’t tried to take a train.’

  He showed him a police record sheet containing both a full-face photograph and a profile photograph of a man who didn’t look thirty, but a lot younger.

  ‘Is that him?’

  ‘Yes. At the age of twenty, he was arrested for the first time for aggravated assault during a fight in a bar in Avenue de Flandre. A year and a half later he was suspected of being an accessory in a theft committed by a girl he lived with, but it was never proved. At the age of twenty-four he was arrested one last time for vagrancy. He wasn’t working at that time, just living off the immoral earnings of a girl named Ernestine. Since then, nothing. I’ve had his description circulated to the whole force. Is Janin still watching the hotel?’

  ‘Yes. I thought it was wise.’

  ‘You did the right thing. I don’t think he’ll be coming back any time soon, but we can’t take the risk. Only, I need Janin. I’ll send young Lapointe to replace him. You see, I’d be surprised if Pierrot tried to leave Paris. He’s spent all his life in a neighbourhood he knows like the back of his hand, where it’s easy for him to disappear. Janin knows his way around that neighbourhood better than we do. Call Lapointe.’

  Lapointe listened to his instructions and rushed out with as much zeal as if the whole investigation depended on him.

  ‘I also have the file on Louise Filon. Between the ages of fifteen and twenty-four she was picked up more than a hundred times in raids, taken to the cells, examined, put under observation and, most of the time, released after a few days. That’s all,’ Maigret sighed, knocking his pipe on his heel to empty it. ‘Or rather, it isn’t absolutely all, but the rest is vaguer.’

  He might have been talking to himself, putting his thoughts in order, but Janvier was nevertheless flattered to be made party to them.

  ‘Somewhere, there’s a man who set Lulu up in that apartment on Avenue Carnot. It immediately struck me as odd this morning, a girl like her living in a building like that. You see what I mean?’

  ‘Yes.’

  It wasn’t the kind of building where kept women usually lived. It wasn’t even the kind of area. That building on Avenue Carnot oozed comfort and respectability, and it was surprising that the owner or manager should have agreed to let an apartment to a prostitute.

  ‘My first thought was that the reason her lover set her up there was to have her close at hand. Now apparently, if the concierge isn’t lying, Lulu didn’t have any other visitors apart from Pierrot. She didn’t go out regularly either, and she sometimes stayed at home for a whole week.’

  ‘I’m starting to understand.’

  ‘To understand what?’

  Janvier turned red.

  ‘I don’t know,’ he said.

  ‘I don’t know either. I’m just speculating. The man’s slippers and dressing gown found in the wardrobe certainly don’t belong to the saxophone player. At the shirt maker’s in Rue de Rivoli they can’t say who bought the dressing gown. They have hundreds of customers and don’t keep records of names for cash purchases. As for the bootmaker, he’s an old eccentric who claims he doesn’t have time to look at his books today but promises he will one of these days. The fact remains that someone other than Pierrot was in the habit of going to see Louise Filon and was intimate enough with her to put on a dressing gown and slippers. If the concierge never saw him …’

  ‘He must live in the building?’

  ‘That’s the most logical explanation.’

  ‘Do you have a list of tenants?’

  ‘Lucas phoned it to me earlier.’

  Janvier was wondering why the chief had that grumpy air of his, as if there was something about this business he didn’t like.

  ‘What you told me about Lulu’s illness and operation might be a clue, and in that case …’

  He took time to light his pipe, bent over the list of names that was on his desk.

  ‘You know who lives just above her apartment? Professor Gouin, the surgeon, who happens to be the greatest brain specialist around.’

  Janvier’s reaction was:

  ‘Is he married?’

  ‘Of course he’s married, and his wife lives with him.’

  ‘What are you going to do?’

  ‘First of all, have a conversation with the concierge. Even if she didn’t lie to me this morning, she certainly didn’t tell me the whole truth. I might also pay a visit to Madame Brault, who may also know more than she’s telling.’

  ‘What shall I do?’

  ‘Stay here. When Janin phones, ask him to start looking for Pierrot locally. Make sure he has a photograph with him.’

  It was five o’clock, and already dark in the streets, by the time Maigret crossed the city in a police car. That morning, while his wife was looking through the window to see how people were dressed, he had had a curious thought. He had told himself that this day answered exactly to the image you have of a ‘working day’. Those two words had come into his head for no reason, the way you remember the chorus of a song. It was a day when you couldn’t imagine people being outside for their own pleasure, or even that they could find pleasure anywhere, a day when you were in a hurry, when you gritted your teeth and did what you had to do, trudging along in the rain, diving into Métro stations, into department stores, into offices, with nothing but dampness and greyness around you.

  That was how he, too, had worked; his office was overheated, and it was w
ithout any enthusiasm that he was once again on his way to Avenue Carnot, to a big stone building devoid of charm. Good old Lucas was still there, in the third-floor apartment, and from below Maigret caught a glimpse of him pulling the curtain aside and looking out gloomily into the street.

  The concierge was sitting at the round table in her lodge, busy mending sheets. With her glasses on, she looked older. It was hot here, too, and very calm, the only sounds the ticking of an old clock and the hissing of the gas stove in the kitchen.

  ‘Don’t get up. I’ve come to have a chat with you.’

  ‘Are you sure now she was murdered?’ she asked as he took off his coat and sat down opposite her in a familiar manner.

  ‘Unless someone took the gun off her after she died, which seems unlikely. The cleaning lady was only alone there for a few minutes, and I’m pretty sure she didn’t take anything away with her when she left. Obviously, I didn’t search her thoroughly. What are you thinking about, Madame Cornet?’

  ‘Me? Nothing in particular. That poor girl.’

  ‘Are you sure this morning you told me everything you know?’

  He saw her turn red and bow her head lower over her sewing. A moment passed before she said, ‘Why do you ask me that?’

  ‘Because I have the impression you know the man who set Louise Filon up in this building. Was it you who let the apartment?’

  ‘No, it was the manager.’

  ‘I’ll go and see him. He’ll probably know more about it. I also think I’ll go up to the fourth floor. There are some things I need to ask there.’

  This time, she looked up abruptly.

  ‘The fourth floor?’

  ‘That is Professor Gouin’s apartment, isn’t it? If I understand correctly, he and his wife occupy the whole floor.’

  ‘That’s right.’

  She had pulled herself together.

  ‘I can at least ask them if they heard anything last night,’ he went on. ‘Were they at home?’

  ‘Madame Gouin was.’