The Shadow Puppet

by Georges Simenon; Translated by Ros Schwartz

  ‘I suppose—’

  ‘Goodbye, Colonel. Kindly pay my respects to Madame Couchet.’

  In the street, he couldn’t help muttering, ‘Good old Couchet!’

  Coldly, just like that, in complete seriousness, he had put his three women in his will! Including his first wife, now Madame Martin, who was constantly appearing in front of him with her contemptuous gaze, like a living reproof! Including courageous little Nine, who did everything she could to entertain him.

  On the other hand, he had forgotten that he had a son!

  For a good few minutes, Maigret wondered whom to tell first. Madame Martin, who would probably leap out of her bed at the news of a fortune? Or Nine?

  ‘But they haven’t got their hands on the cash yet.’

  This business could go on for years! The family would contest the will. Madame Martin, in any case, wouldn’t allow them to push her around.

  ‘Even so, the colonel has been honest. He could have burned the will and no one would ever have known.’

  And a light-hearted Maigret crossed the Europe district on foot. A wan sun gave out a little warmth and there was joy in the air.

  ‘Good old Couchet!’

  He entered the lift of Hôtel Pigalle without announcing himself and a few moments later he was knocking at Nine’s door. He heard footsteps inside the room. The door opened a fraction, just enough for a hand to poke through. The hand remained dangling in the air.

  A woman’s hand, already wrinkled. Since Maigret didn’t respond, the hand grew impatient and the face of an elderly Englishwoman appeared. She launched into an unintelligible tirade.

  Or rather, Maigret guessed that the Englishwoman was expecting her post, which explained the outstretched hand. What was clear was that Nine no longer occupied her room and that she probably didn’t live in the hotel any more.

  ‘Too expensive for her,’ he thought.

  And he paused uncertainly outside the neighbouring door. A valet decided him, asking him suspiciously, ‘Can I help you?’

  ‘Monsieur Couchet—’

  ‘Is he not answering?’

  ‘I haven’t knocked yet.’

  And Maigret was still smiling. He was in a buoyant mood. That morning, he suddenly felt as if he were playing a part in a farce. Life itself was a farce! Couchet’s death was a farce, especially his will!

  ‘… C’min!’

  The bolt slid back. The first thing Maigret did was to march over and draw the curtains and open the window.

  Céline had not even woken up. Roger rubbed his eyes and yawned, ‘Oh! It’s you.’

  There was an improvement: the room didn’t reek of ether. The clothes were in a heap on the floor.

  ‘… What d’you want?’

  Roger sat up in bed, picked up the glass of water from his bedside table and drained it in one go.

  ‘The will has been found!’ announced Maigret covering up a naked thigh belonging to Céline, who was lying curled up.

  ‘So what?’

  Roger showed no excitement. Barely a vague curiosity.

  ‘So what? It’s a strange will! It will certainly cause much ink to flow and earn the lawyers a lot of money. Can you imagine, your father has left his entire fortune to his three women!’

  The young man struggled to understand.

  ‘His three …?’

  ‘Yes! His current lawful wife. Then your mother! And lastly his girlfriend Nine, who was living in the room next door till yesterday! He has instructed the lawyer to ensure they each receive an equal share.’

  Roger didn’t bat an eyelid. He appeared to be thinking. But not to be thinking about something that concerned him personally.

  ‘That’s priceless!’ he said at length in a serious tone that belied his words.

  ‘That’s exactly what I said to the colonel.’

  ‘What colonel?’

  ‘An uncle of Madame Couchet’s. He’s playing the head of the family.’

  ‘I bet he’s not happy!’

  ‘Too right!’

  The young man thrust his legs out of the bed and grabbed a pair of trousers draped over the back of a chair.

  ‘You don’t seem particularly bothered by this news.’

  ‘Oh me, you know …’

  He buttoned up his trousers, looked for a comb and closed the window, which was letting in the cold air.

  ‘Don’t you need money?’

  Maigret was suddenly solemn. His gaze became probing, questioning.

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘You don’t know whether you need money?’

  Roger darted Maigret a shifty look and Maigret felt ill at ease.

  ‘I don’t give a —!’

  ‘It’s not as if you are earning a good living.’

  ‘I don’t earn a bean!’

  He yawned and looked mournfully at his reflection in the mirror. Maigret noticed that Céline had woken up. She didn’t move. She must have overheard some of the conversation, for she was watching the two men with curiosity.

  She too needed the glass of water! And the atmosphere in that untidy room, with its stale smell, those two listless beings, was the quintessence of a dispirited world.

  ‘Do you have any savings?’

  Roger was beginning to tire of this conversation. He looked around for his jacket, took out a slim wallet embossed with his initials and threw it to Maigret.

  ‘Have a look!’

  Two 100-franc notes, a few smaller ones, a driving licence and an old cloakroom ticket.

  ‘What do you intend to do if you are deprived of your inheritance?’

  ‘I don’t want any inheritance!’

  ‘You won’t contest the will?’

  ‘No!’

  That was strange. Maigret, who had been staring at the carpet, looked up.

  ‘Three hundred and sixty thousand francs are enough for you?’

  Then the young man’s attitude changed. He walked over to the inspector, stopped within inches of him, at the point where their shoulders were touching. And, his fists clenched, he snarled, ‘Say that again!’

  At that moment, there was something thuggish about him, A coarse air, the scent of the café brawl.

  ‘I’m asking you if Couchet’s 360,000 francs are—’

  He just managed to grab Roger’s arm in mid-air. Otherwise he would have received one of the biggest punches of his life!

  ‘Calm down!’

  But Roger was calm! He wasn’t struggling! He was pale. He stared fixedly. He was waiting until the inspector was prepared to release him.

  Was it to strike again? Meanwhile, Céline had jumped out of bed, despite being half-naked. Maigret could sense she was about to open the door to call for help.

  Everything happened peacefully. Maigret only held on to Roger’s wrist for a few seconds, and when he gave him back his freedom of movement, the young man did not move.

  There was a long silence. It was as if each one of them was afraid to break it, the way, in a fight, each opponent is reluctant to deliver the first punch.

  Finally it was Roger who spoke.

  ‘You’ve got to be kidding!’

  He picked up a mauve dressing gown from the floor and threw it over to his companion.

  ‘Do you want to tell me what you plan to do, once you’ve spent your 200 francs?’

  ‘What have I done until now?’

  ‘There’s just one little difference: your father’s dead and you can no longer sponge off him.’

  Roger shrugged as if to say that Maigret had got the wrong end of the stick.

  There was an indefinable atmosphere, not exactly of drama, but something else – a poignancy perhaps, a bohemian atmosphere but devoid of poetry. Perhaps it was the sight of the wallet and the two 100-franc notes? Or was it the anxious woman, who had just realized that tomorrow would not be like the previous days, that she’d have to find a new source of support?

  But no! It was Roger himself who was frightening. Because his behaviour and ac
tions were out of character, contradicting what Maigret knew of his past.

  His calmness … and it wasn’t an act! He was truly calm, calm like someone who—

  ‘Give me your gun!’ suddenly commanded the chief inspector.

  The young man pulled it out of his trouser pocket and proffered it with the ghost of a smile.

  ‘Promise me you’ll—’

  He stopped in mid-sentence when he saw the woman about to scream in terror. She couldn’t grasp what was going on, but she knew it was something very bad.

  Irony, in Roger’s eyes.

  Maigret almost ran out of the room. Having nothing further to say, no gesture to make, he beat a retreat, banging into the door frame on his way out and stifling a curse.

  Back in the street, his cheery mood of that morning had dissipated. He no longer found life a joke. He looked up at the couple’s window. It was closed. You couldn’t see a thing.

  He was uneasy, as one is when nothing makes sense any more.

  Roger had given him two or three looks … He couldn’t have explained it, but they were not the looks he was expecting. They were looks that were somehow at odds with the rest.

  He retraced his steps, because he had forgotten to ask at the hotel for Nine’s new address.

  ‘Don’t know!’ said the porter. ‘She paid for her room and left carrying her suitcase! Didn’t need a taxi. She must have gone to the cheapest hotel around here.’

  ‘Look, if … if anything were to happen here … Yes … something unexpected … would you kindly inform me personally at police headquarters? Detective Chief Inspector Maigret.’

  He was annoyed at himself for having said that. What could happen? Even so he recalled the two 100-franc notes in Roger’s wallet and Céline’s look of fear.

  A quarter of an hour later, he entered the Moulin Bleu via the stage door. The auditorium was empty, dark, the seats and the sides of the boxes covered in glossy green silk fabric.

  On the stage, six women, shivering despite their coats, were repeatedly rehearsing the same step – ‘a ridiculously easy step’ – while a short, pudgy man bellowed a tune at the top of his lungs.

  ‘One! … Two! … Tra la la la … No! … Tra la la la … Three! … Three, for heaven’s sake!’

  Nine was the second woman in the line. She recognized Maigret, who was standing by a column. The man had spotted him too, but he wasn’t bothered.

  ‘One! … Two! … Tra la la—’

  It went on for fifteen minutes. It was colder in here than outside and Maigret’s feet were frozen. At last the squat man wiped his forehead and cursed his dancers by way of a farewell.

  ‘Come to see me?’ he yelled at Maigret from a distance.

  ‘No! … I’ve come to see—’

  Nine walked over, embarrassed, wondering whether she should hold out her hand to the inspector.

  ‘I have some important news for you—’

  ‘Not here … We’re not allowed to have visitors at the theatre … Except in the evenings, because they have to pay.’

  They sat at a pedestal table in a little bar next door.

  ‘They’ve found Couchet’s will. He left his fortune to three women.’

  She looked at him in amazement, without suspecting the truth.

  ‘First of all, his first wife, even though she’s remarried, then his second wife … And then you.’

  She continued to stare at Maigret, who saw her pupils dilate and then mist over.

  And finally she buried her face in her hands to cry.

  8. The Home Nurse

  ‘He had heart disease. He knew it.’

  Nine sipped her ruby-coloured aperitif.

  ‘That’s why he took things easy. He said he’d worked enough, that it was time for him to enjoy life.’

  ‘Did he sometimes talk about death?’

  ‘Often! But not … not that kind of death! He was thinking of his heart disease.’

  They were in one of those little bars where all the customers are regulars. The owner watched Maigret covertly as if he were a bourgeois meeting his mistress. At the counter, the men were talking about the afternoon’s racing.

  ‘Was he sad?’

  ‘It’s hard to explain! Because he wasn’t like other men. For example, when we were at the theatre, or somewhere else, he’d be enjoying himself. Then, for no reason, he’d say with a deep laugh, “Life’s a bitch, isn’t it, Ninette!”’

  ‘Did he take care of his son?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Did he talk about him?’

  ‘Almost never! Only when he came to scrounge.’

  ‘And what did he say?’

  ‘He’d sigh, “What a stupid idiot!”’

  Maigret had already intuited that, for one reason or another, Couchet had little affection for his son. It even seemed as if he was disgusted by the young man. Disgusted to the point of not trying to come to his rescue!

  For he had never lectured him. And he gave him money to get rid of him, or out of pity.

  ‘Waiter! How much do I owe you?’

  ‘Four francs sixty!’

  Nine left the bar with him and they stood on the pavement of Rue Fontaine for a moment.

  ‘Where are you living now?’

  ‘Rue Lepic, the first hotel on the left. I haven’t even looked at the name yet. It’s fairly clean.’

  ‘When you’re rich you’ll be able—’

  She gave him a watery smile.

  ‘You know very well I’ll never be rich! I’m not the sort for all that.’

  The strangest thing was that Maigret had that very impression. Nine didn’t look like someone who would be rich one day. He couldn’t have said why.

  ‘I’ll accompany you to Place Pigalle, where I’m going to get my tram.’

  They walked slowly, Maigret huge, burly, and Nine petite next to his broad back.

  ‘If you knew how lost I feel being on my own! Luckily there’s the theatre, with two rehearsals a day until the show opens.’

  She had to take two steps to each of Maigret’s strides, and was almost running. At the corner of Rue Pigalle, she stopped abruptly, while the inspector frowned and muttered under his breath, ‘The fool!’

  But they couldn’t see anything. Opposite Hôtel Pigalle, around forty people were gathered. A police officer stood in the doorway trying to move them on.

  That was all, but there was that particular atmosphere, that silence that you only encounter in the street when a tragedy occurs.

  ‘What’s going on?’ stammered Nine. ‘In my hotel!’

  ‘No! It’s nothing! Go back to your room—’

  ‘But … something—’

  ‘Go!’ he snapped.

  And she obeyed, scared, while Maigret elbowed his way through the crowd. He charged like a ram. Women shouted abuse at him. The police sergeant recognized him and asked him to step inside the hotel.

  The district detective chief inspector was already there, talking to the porter, who cried out, pointing at Maigret, ‘It’s him! I recognize him—’

  The two inspectors shook hands. From the little lounge that opened off the lobby, sobs, groans and indistinct murmurs could be heard.

  ‘How did he do it?’ asked Maigret.

  ‘The girl who lives with him states that he was standing by the window, very calm. She got dressed, and he watched her, whistling. He only paused to tell her she had lovely thighs, but that her calves were too thin. Then he started whistling again, and suddenly everything went quiet. She felt a terrible emptiness … He was no longer there! He couldn’t have left via the door.’

  ‘Got it! Did he injure anyone as he landed on the pavement?’

  ‘No one. Killed outright. Spine broken in two places.’

  ‘Here’s the ambulance,’ announced the sergeant coming over to them.

  And the district detective chief inspector explained to Maigret, ‘There’s nothing more to be done. Do you know whether he has any family who need to be informed? When you arriv
ed, the porter was just telling me that the young man had had a visitor this morning … a tall, well-built man. He was giving me a description of this man when you turned up. It was you! Should I write a report anyway, or will you deal with everything?’

  ‘Write a report.’

  ‘What about the family?’

  ‘I’ll deal with them.’

  He opened the door to the lounge, saw a shape lying on the floor, completely covered with a blanket from one of the beds.

  Céline, crumpled in an armchair, was now making a regular wailing noise, while a plump woman – the owner or the manager – was trying to comfort her.

  ‘It’s not as if he killed himself for you, is it? It’s not your fault, you never refused him anything.’

  Maigret did not lift up the blanket, did not even make Céline aware of his presence.

  A few moments later, the body was carried out to the ambulance, which set off in the direction of the mortuary.

  Then, gradually, the crowd in Rue Pigalle dispersed. The last stragglers didn’t even know whether there had been a fire, a suicide or the arrest of a pickpocket.

  He was whistling … and suddenly everything went quiet.

  Slowly, slowly Maigret climbed the staircase of the Place des Vosges and, as he reached the second floor, he scowled.

  Old Mathilde’s door was ajar. She was probably lurking behind it, spying. But he shrugged and pulled the bell cord by the Martins’ front door.

  He had his pipe in his mouth. For a second he considered putting it in his pocket, then, once again, he shrugged.

  The sound of bottles clinking. A vague murmur. Two male voices coming closer and at last the door opened.

  ‘Very good, doctor … Yes, doctor … Thank you, doctor.’

  A crushed Monsieur Martin, who had not yet had time to get dressed and whom Maigret found in the same sorry get-up as that morning.

  ‘It’s you?’

  The doctor headed for the staircase while Monsieur Martin showed the inspector in, glancing furtively in the direction of the bedroom.

  ‘Is she worse?’

  ‘We don’t know … The doctor won’t say … He’ll be back this evening.’

  He picked up a prescription that was lying on top of the wireless, and stared at it with vacant eyes.

  ‘I don’t even have anyone to send to the pharmacy!’