The Shadow Puppet

by Georges Simenon; Translated by Ros Schwartz

  ‘Bring my breakfast!’

  And, to Maigret, ‘What a business! You’re not too mad at me for scrounging off you last night? It’s stupid! I’ll have to sell my jewellery.’

  ‘Have you got a lot?’

  She gestured towards the dressing table, where a few rings, a bracelet and a watch lay in a promotional ashtray. Their combined value was around five thousand francs.

  There was a knock at the door of the next room and Nine pricked up her ears, gave a vague smile as the knocking began again, more insistent this time.

  ‘Who is that?’ asked Maigret.

  ‘My neighbours? I don’t know! But if anyone manages to wake them up at this hour—’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Nothing! They’re never up before four o’clock in the afternoon. That’s when they wake up!’

  ‘Do they take drugs?’

  Her eyelashes fluttered a yes, but she hastened to add, ‘You’re not going to use what I tell you, are you?’

  The door eventually opened. As did Nine’s, and a chamber-maid brought in the tray with the coffee and croissants.

  ‘May I?’

  There were dark circles under her eyes and her nightdress revealed scrawny shoulders and small, not very firm breasts like those of a stunted child. As she dunked pieces of croissant in her café au lait, she continued to listen out, as if despite everything she did take an interest in what was going on next door.

  ‘Will I be mixed up in all this?’ she asked nevertheless. ‘It would be awkward if they wrote about me in the newspapers! Especially for Madame Couchet.’

  And, as someone was knocking on her door with urgent little taps, she shouted, ‘Come in!’

  A woman in her early thirties, who had slipped a fur coat over her nightdress and was barefoot, entered. She almost retreated on catching sight of Maigret’s broad back, then she plucked up her courage and stammered, ‘I didn’t know you had company!’

  Maigret shuddered at the sound of the languid voice that seemed to be struggling out of a furred mouth. He looked at the woman who was closing the door behind her and saw a face drained of colour, with puffy eyelids. A glance at Nine confirmed his guess. She was the drug addict from next door.

  ‘What’s happened?’

  ‘Nothing! Roger has a visitor, so I took the liberty—’

  She sat down on the end of the bed, dazed, and sighed as Nine had done, ‘What time is it?’

  ‘Nine o’clock!’ said Maigret. ‘Hmm, someone’s been at the cocaine!’

  ‘It’s not cocaine, it’s ether. Roger says it’s better and that—’

  She was cold. She got up to go and huddle by the radiator, gazing out of the window.

  ‘It’s going to rain again.’

  The whole scene was gloomy, depressing. The comb on the dressing table was full of broken hairs. Nine’s stockings lay on the floor.

  ‘I’m in the way, aren’t I? But apparently it’s important. It’s about Roger’s father, who’s just died.’

  Maigret watched Nine and saw her suddenly knit her brow like someone who has just had an idea. At the same time, the woman who had just spoken raised her hand to her chin, thought for a moment and muttered, ‘Oh my goodness!’

  And the inspector asked, ‘Do you know Roger’s father?’

  ‘I’ve never seen him. But … Hold on! Nine, nothing happened to your friend, did it?’

  Nine and the inspector exchanged a glance.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I don’t know. It’s all a bit muddled. I’ve just remembered that Roger once told me that his father was a visitor here. It amused him, but he preferred not to bump into him and one time, when he heard someone coming up the stairs he rushed back into the room. I seem to recall that the person in question came in here.’

  Nine stopped eating. The tray on her knees hindered her and her face betrayed her anxiety.

  ‘His son?’ she said slowly, staring at the dull glass rectangle of the window.

  ‘Oh my goodness!’ exclaimed the other woman. ‘Then it’s your friend who’s dead! They say he was murdered.’

  ‘Is Roger’s surname Couchet?’ asked Maigret.

  ‘He’s Roger Couchet, yes!’

  Disconcerted, all three fell silent.

  ‘What does he do?’ continued the inspector after a long pause, during which a murmur of voices in the next room could be heard.

  ‘Pardon?’

  ‘What is his profession?’

  The young woman snapped, ‘You’re from the police, aren’t you?’

  She was flustered. She might hold it against Nine for having lured her into a trap.

  ‘The inspector’s very kind!’ said Nine, poking one leg out of the bed and leaning forward to pick up her stockings.

  ‘I should have guessed! So then you already knew, before I came in.’

  ‘I hadn’t heard anything about Roger!’ said Maigret. ‘Now, I’ll need you to give me some information about him.’

  ‘I don’t know anything. We’ve been together for barely three weeks.’

  ‘What about before?’

  ‘He was with a tall redhead who claimed to be a manicurist.’

  ‘Does he work?’

  The word ‘work’ created further discomfiture.

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘In other words, he does nothing. Is he wealthy? Does he live extravagantly?’

  ‘No! We nearly always have a six-franc set menu.’

  ‘Does he often talk about his father?’

  ‘I told you, he only mentioned him once.’

  ‘Could you describe his visitor? Have you met him before?’

  ‘No! He’s a man … how can I say? To start with I thought he was a bailiff, that he’d come because Roger was in debt.’

  ‘Is he well-dressed?’

  ‘Hold on. I saw a bowler hat, a beige overcoat, gloves—’

  Between the two rooms there was a communicating door concealed behind a curtain and probably locked. Maigret could have pressed his ear to it and overheard everything, but he was loath to do so in front of the two women.

  Nine got dressed, contenting herself with wiping her face with a moistened towel by way of a wash. She was on edge. Her movements were jerky. It was clear that she was out of her depth and now she was expecting all sorts of trouble; she didn’t have the strength to react or even to grasp the situation.

  The other woman was calmer, perhaps because she was still under the influence of ether, perhaps because she had more experience of this sort of thing.

  ‘What is your name?’

  ‘Céline.’

  ‘Do you have a profession?’

  ‘I was a hairdresser doing home visits.’

  ‘And on the vice squad’s books?’

  She shook her head, without showing annoyance. A murmur of voices could still be heard coming from next door.

  Nine, who had slipped on a dress, gazed around the room and suddenly burst into tears, exclaiming, ‘Oh God! Oh God!’

  ‘It’s a funny business!’ said Céline slowly. ‘And, if it really is a murder, they’re going to keep pestering us.’

  ‘Where were you last night at around eight p.m.?’

  She cast her mind back.

  ‘Hold on … Eight o’clock … Well, I was at the Cyrano.’

  ‘Was Roger with you?’

  ‘No. We can’t be together all the time. I met him at midnight, at the tobacconist’s in Rue Fontaine.’

  ‘Did he tell you where he’d been?’

  ‘I didn’t ask.’

  Through the window, Maigret could see Place Pigalle, its tiny garden, the nightclub signs. Suddenly, he straightened up and marched towards the door.

  ‘Wait here for me, both of you!’

  And he went out, knocked at the neighbouring door and turned the handle.

  A man in pyjamas was sitting in the only armchair in the room, which reeked of ether despite the open window. Another man was pacing up and down, gesticulating
. It was Monsieur Martin, whom Maigret had met twice the previous evening, in the courtyard at Place des Vosges.

  ‘Ah, so you found your glove!’

  Maigret was looking at the two hands of the official from the Registry Office, who turned so pale that the inspector thought for a moment that he was about to faint. His lips quivered. He attempted to speak but failed.

  ‘I … I—’

  The young man had not shaved. He had a pasty complexion, red-rimmed eyes and soft lips that were a sign of his spinelessness. He gulped water out of the tooth mug.

  ‘Get a grip on yourself, Monsieur Martin! I hadn’t expected to meet you here, especially at this hour when your office must have opened some time ago.’

  Maigret studied him from head to toe. He had to make an effort not to take pity on him, such was the poor man’s visible confusion.

  From his shoes to his tie and his detachable white collar, Monsieur Martin was like a caricature of the archetypal civil servant. A dignified, neat and orderly official with a waxed moustache, not a speck of dust on his clothes, who no doubt deemed it shameful to go out without gloves.

  Right now, he didn’t know what to do with his hands, and his gaze searched the corners of the untidy room as if he hoped to find inspiration there.

  ‘May I ask you a question, Monsieur Martin? How long have you known Roger Couchet?’

  It was no longer fear, it was sheer terror.

  ‘Me?’

  ‘Yes, you!’

  ‘Since … since my marriage!’

  He said this as if it were self-evident.

  ‘I don’t understand!’

  ‘Roger is my stepson, my wife’s son.’

  ‘And Raymond Couchet was his father?’

  ‘Well yes … As—’

  He grew more assured.

  ‘My wife was Couchet’s first wife. She has a son, Roger. After she got divorced, I married her.’

  This had the effect of a gust of wind sweeping an overcast sky. The building in Place des Vosges was transformed by it. The nature of the events changed. Some points became clearer. Others, on the contrary, became muddier, more worrying.

  To such an extent that Maigret no longer dared speak. He needed to muster his thoughts. He looked from one man to the other with mounting concern.

  That very night, the concierge had asked him, looking up at all the windows that could be seen from the courtyard, ‘Do you think it’s one of the residents?’

  And her eyes finally came to rest on the archway. She hoped that the murderer had come in that way, that it was someone from outside.

  Well it wasn’t! The drama was indeed an internal affair! Maigret couldn’t have said why, but he was convinced of it.

  What drama? He hadn’t the faintest idea!

  Only he had a hunch that there were invisible threads linking points far apart in space, stretching from Place des Vosges to this hotel in Rue Pigalle, from the Martins’ apartment to Couchet’s laboratory, from Nine’s room to that of the couple in an ether-induced stupor.

  Perhaps the most disturbing thing was seeing Monsieur Martin tossed like a hapless spinning-top into this maze. He always wore gloves. His putty-coloured overcoat alone was an orderly, dignified statement. And his anxious look sought to alight somewhere without success.

  ‘I came to tell Roger …’ he stammered.

  ‘Yes.’

  Maigret looked him in the eyes, calmly, deeply, and almost expected to see Monsieur Martin shrink with fear.

  ‘My wife told me that it would be best if we were the ones to …’

  ‘I understand.’

  ‘Roger is very—’

  ‘Very sensitive.’ Maigret took the words out of his mouth. ‘An anxious boy.’

  The young man, who was on his third glass of water, glared at him venomously. He must have been twenty-five, but his features were already careworn, his eyelids withered.

  And yet he was still attractive, with a dark complexion and looks capable of seducing some women; everything about him was tinged with romanticism, even his weary, slightly nauseated air.

  ‘Tell me, Roger Couchet, did you see your father often?’

  ‘Sometimes.’

  ‘Where?’

  And Maigret’s eyes bored into him.

  ‘At his office, or at a restaurant.’

  ‘When did you see him for the last time?’

  ‘I don’t know, a few weeks ago.’

  ‘And did you ask him for money?’

  ‘As always!’

  ‘In other words, you were sponging off him?’

  ‘He was wealthy enough to—’

  ‘Just a moment! Where were you at around eight p.m. last night?’

  There was no hesitation.

  ‘At the Select,’ he said with an ironic smile that meant, Don’t you think I can’t see where this is leading!

  ‘What were you doing at the Select?’

  ‘I was waiting for my father.’

  ‘So, you needed money! And you knew that he’d be coming to the Select?’

  ‘He was there nearly every evening with his mistress. And anyway, that afternoon I overheard her talking on the telephone. You can hear everything through these walls.’

  ‘When you realized that your father wasn’t coming, did it occur to you to go to his office in Place des Vosges?’

  ‘No.’

  Maigret picked up a photograph of the young man from the mantelpiece. It was surrounded by portraits of different women. He put it in his pocket, mumbling, ‘May I?’

  ‘If you wish.’

  ‘You don’t think—?’ began Monsieur Martin.

  ‘I don’t think anything at all. Which reminds me I’d like to ask you some questions. How were relations between your household and Roger?’

  ‘He didn’t come often.’

  ‘And when he did come?’

  ‘He only stayed for a few minutes.’

  ‘Is his mother aware of his lifestyle?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Don’t pretend to be stupid, Monsieur Martin. Does your wife know that her son lives in Montmartre and is a layabout?’

  And the civil servant looked at the floor, embarrassed.

  ‘I have often tried to persuade him to get a job,’ he sighed.

  This time, the young man started drumming impatiently on the table.

  ‘You can see that I’m still in my pyjamas and that—’

  ‘Would you tell me if you saw anyone you knew at the Select last night?’

  ‘I saw Nine!’

  ‘Did you say anything to her?’

  ‘What? I have never spoken to her.’

  ‘Where was she sitting?’

  ‘The second table to the right of the bar.’

  ‘Where did you find your glove, Monsieur Martin? If my memory serves me correctly, you were looking for it last night in the courtyard, near the dustbins.’

  Monsieur Martin gave a strained little laugh.

  ‘It was at home! Can you believe it, I had gone out with only one glove on and I hadn’t noticed.’

  ‘When you left Place des Vosges, where did you go?’

  ‘I went for a walk along the embankment. I had a very bad headache.’

  ‘Do you often go out for a walk at night without your wife?’

  ‘Sometimes.’

  This was agony for him. And he still didn’t know what to do with his gloved hands.

  ‘Are you going to your office now?’

  ‘No! I telephoned to ask for the day off. I can’t leave my wife in—’

  ‘Well, go back to her, then!’

  Maigret stayed put. The man was casting around for a dignified way of making his exit.

  ‘Goodbye, Roger,’ he gulped. ‘I … I think you should go and see your mother.’

  But Roger merely shrugged and gave Maigret an irritated look. Monsieur Martin’s footsteps could be heard fading on the stairs.

  The young man said nothing. His hand automatically picked up a bot
tle of ether from the bedside table and set it down further away.

  ‘You have nothing to say?’ the inspector asked slowly.

  ‘Nothing!’

  ‘Because, if you do want to make a statement, you’d better do so now rather than later.’

  ‘I won’t have anything to say to you later. No, actually I will! One thing I’ll tell you right now, is that you’re barking up the wrong tree.’

  ‘By the way, since you didn’t see your father last night, you must be short of money?’

  ‘Too true!’

  ‘Where are you going to find some?’

  ‘Oh please don’t worry about me. Do you mind?’

  And he ran some water into the basin and started washing.

  Maigret, to keep his countenance, took a few more steps and then left the room. He went next door, where the two women were waiting. Now it was Céline who was the most anxious. Nine was sitting in the wing chair slowly nibbling at a handkerchief and staring at the blank window with her big dreamy eyes.

  ‘Well?’ asked Roger’s mistress.

  ‘Nothing! You can go back to your room.’

  ‘Is it really his father who—?’

  And suddenly, she frowned.

  ‘So does that mean he’s going to inherit?’

  Looking pensive, she left.

  Outside on the pavement, Maigret asked Nine, ‘Where are you going?’

  A vague, dismissive wave, then, ‘I’m going to the Moulin Bleu to see if they’ll take me back.’

  He watched her with avuncular interest.

  ‘Were you fond of Couchet?’

  ‘I told you yesterday, he was a good man. And there aren’t many of those around, I can assure you! To think that some bastard—’

  There were a couple of tears, then nothing.

  ‘It’s here,’ she said pushing open a little door that was the stage entrance.

  Maigret was thirsty and went into a bar for a beer. He had to go to Place des Vosges. The sight of a telephone reminded him that he hadn’t yet dropped into Quai des Orfèvres and that there might be urgent post waiting on his desk.

  He called the office boy.

  ‘Is that you, Jean? Nothing for me? What? A lady who’s been waiting for an hour? In mourning? It’s not Madame Couchet? What? Madame Martin? I’m on my way.’