‘That woman in the cabin, the woman a man like the captain could not live without, the woman whose very name made him catch his breath.
‘And there was me writing reams and reams to my fiancée, who I wouldn’t be seeing again for three months, and I never felt obsessed, possessed like that! And when he said words like her flesh or her body I felt my cheeks go hot without knowing why.’
Maigret put the question slowly:
‘And no one, apart from the two of you, knew the truth about the death of Jean-Marie?’
‘No one!’
‘And was it the captain who, in the customary way, read out the prayers for the dead?’
‘At first light. The weather had got thick. We were steaming through icy grey mist.’
‘Didn’t the crew say anything?’
‘There were funny looks and some whispering. But Fallut was more authoritarian than ever, and his voice had acquired a new cutting edge. He would not tolerate any answering back. He got angry with anyone who looked at him in a way he didn’t like. He spied on the men, as if he was trying to detect any suspicions they might be getting.’
‘What about you?’
Le Clinche didn’t answer. He stretched out one arm for a glass of water on his bedside table and drank from it greedily.
‘So you began prowling round the cabin more often, didn’t you? You wanted to see this woman who had got so far under the captain’s skin? Did you start the following night?’
‘Yes. I ran into her, just for a moment. Then the next night … I’d noticed that the key to the wireless room was the same as the key of the cabin. It was the captain’s watch. I crept in, like a thief.’
‘You went to bed with her?’
The wireless operator’s face hardened.
‘I swear you won’t understand, you can’t! The whole atmosphere was nothing like anything that happens in the real world. The kid … the previous day’s ceremony … But whenever I thought about it, the same picture kept surfacing in my mind, the image of a woman unlike any other, a woman whose body, whose flesh could turn a man into something that he was not.’
‘She led you on?’
‘She was in bed, half-dressed …’
He turned bright scarlet. He looked away.
‘How long did you stay in the cabin?’
‘Maybe a couple of hours, I don’t remember. When I left with the blood still pounding in my ears, the captain was there, just outside the door. He didn’t say a word. He watched me walk past. I almost went down on my knees so I could say it wasn’t my fault and that I was sorry. But he remained stony-faced. I walked on. I returned to my post.
‘I was scared. After that, I always went around with my loaded revolver in my pocket because I was convinced he was going to kill me.
‘He never spoke to me again, except for ship’s business. And even then, most of the time he sent me his orders in writing.
‘I wish I could explain it better, but I can’t. Each day it got worse. I had a feeling that everybody knew about the terrible thing that happened.
‘The chief mechanic went sniffing around the cabin too. The captain stayed inside it for hours and hours.
‘The men started giving us inquisitive, anxious looks. They guessed that something was going on. How many times did I hear talk of the evil eye?
‘But there was only one thing I wanted …’
‘Of course there was,’ grunted Maigret.
There was a silence. Le Clinche stared at the inspector with eyes full of resentment.
‘We ran into bad weather, ten days on the trot. I was seasick. But I kept thinking about her. She was … fragrant! She … I can’t explain. It was like a pain. That’s it! A desire capable of inflicting pain, of making me weep tears of rage! Especially when I saw the captain go into his cabin. Because now, I could imagine … You see, she’d called me her big boy! In a special voice, sort of breathy. I kept saying those two words over and over to torture myself. I stopped writing to Marie. I built impossible dreams: I’d run away with that woman the moment we got back to Fécamp.’
‘What about the captain?’
‘He got even more stony-faced and brusque. Maybe there was a touch of madness about him after all, I don’t know. He gave orders that we were to fish at some location or other, and all the old hands claimed no one had ever seen a fish in those waters. He refused to have his orders questioned. He was afraid of me. Did he know I had a gun? He had one too. Whenever we met, he kept his hand near his pocket. I kept trying to see Adèle again. But he was always around, with bags under his eyes and his lips drawn back. And the stink of cod. The men who were salting the fish down in the hold … There was one accident after another.
‘And the chief mechanic was also on the prowl. It got so that none of us spoke freely any more. We were like three lunatics. There were nights when I believe I could have killed somebody to get to her. Can you understand that? Nights when I tore my handkerchief to shreds with my teeth while I repeated over and over, in the same voice that she had used:
‘“My big boy! That’s my big fool!”
‘How long it seemed! Each night was followed by a new day! And then more days! And with nothing but grey water around us, freezing fogs, fish-scales and cod guts everywhere!
‘A taste of pickling brine in the back of the throat that made your stomach heave …
‘Just that once! I believe that if I could have gone to her one more time I’d have been cured! But it was impossible. He was there. He was always there, more hollow-eyed all the time.
‘The constant pitching and tossing, with nothing as far as the eye could see. And then we saw cliffs!
‘Can you grasp the fact that it had been like that for three months? Well, instead of being cured, I was even sicker. It’s only now that I’m beginning to realize that it was a sickness.
‘I hated the captain who was always in my way. I detested that man who was already old and kept a woman like Adèle under lock and key.
‘I was afraid of returning to port. I was afraid of losing her for ever.
‘By the finish, I was as scared of him as of the devil himself! Yes, as if he were some kind of evil genie who was keeping the woman all to himself!
‘As we got in, there were a few navigation errors. Then the men jumped ashore, relieved to be back, and headed straight for the bars. But I knew the captain was only waiting for the cover of night to get Adèle off the boat.
‘I went back to my room over Léon’s bar. There were old letters, photos of my fiancée and the like, and I don’t know why but I got into a vile temper and I burned the whole lot.
‘Then I went back out. I wanted her! I’ll say it again: I wanted her! Hadn’t she told me that when we got back Fallut would marry her?
‘I bumped into a man …’
He let himself slump back on to his pillow, and on his tortured features appeared an expression of agonized torment.
‘Because you know …’ he gasped.
‘Yes. Jean-Marie’s father. The trawler was berthed. Only the captain and Adèle were still on board. He was about to bring her out. And then …’
‘Please, no more!’
‘And then you told the man who had come to look at the boat on which his boy had died that his son had been murdered. True? And you followed him. You were hiding behind a truck when he went up to the captain …’
‘Stop!’
‘The murder happened there, while you watched.’
‘Please stop!’
‘No! You were there when it happened. Then you went on board and let the woman out.’
‘I didn’t want her any more!’
From outside came a long blast of a hooter. Le Clinche’s lips trembled as he stammered:
‘The Océan …’
‘That’s right. She sails at high tide.’
Neither of them spoke. They could hear all the sounds made in the hospital, down to the muffled swish of a patient’s trolley being wheeled to the operating theatre.
‘I didn’t want her any more!’ the wireless operator repeated wildly.
‘But it was too late!’
There was another silence. Then Le Clinche’s voice came again:
‘And yet … now … I want so much to …’
He did not dare pronounce the word that stuck to his tongue.
‘Live?’
Then he went on:
‘Don’t you understand? I was mad. I don’t understand it myself. It all happened elsewhere, in another world … Then we got back here, and I realized what had been happening. Listen. There was that dark cabin and men prowling round, and nothing else existed. I felt as if that was my whole life! I longed to hear those words again, my big boy! I couldn’t even begin to say how it all happened. I opened the door. She slipped out. There was a man in tan-coloured shoes waiting for her, and they started hugging each other on the side of the quay.
‘And I woke up – it’s the only word for it. And ever since all I’ve wanted is not to die. Marie Léonnec came with you to see me. Adèle came too, with that other man.’
‘What do you want me to say?’
‘It’s too late now, isn’t it? I was let out of jail. I went on board and got my revolver. Marie was waiting for me by the boat. She didn’t know …
‘And that same afternoon, that woman was there, talking. And the man in the tan-coloured shoes …
‘Who could possibly make sense of it all? I pulled the trigger. It took me an age to bring myself to do it, on account of Marie Léonnec, who was there!
‘And now …’
He sobbed. Then he literally screamed:
‘All the same, I’ve got to die! And I don’t want to die! I’m afraid of dying! I … I …’
His body was racked by such spasms that Maigret called a nurse, who quietly and unfussily subdued him with an economical ease born of long professional experience.
The trawler gave a second harrowing summons on its hooter, and the women hurried down to line the jetty.
11. The Océan Sails
Maigret reached the quay just as the new captain was about to give the order to cast off the hawsers. He caught sight of the chief mechanic, who was saying goodbye to his wife. He went up to him and took him to one side.
‘Something I need to know. It was you, wasn’t it, who found the captain’s will and dropped it into the police station letterbox?’
The man looked worried and hesitated.
‘You’ve nothing to worry about. You suspected Le Clinche. You thought that it was a way of saving his neck. Even though you both had had your eye on the same woman.’
The hooter, peremptory now, barked at the latecomers, and hugging couples on the quayside peeled away from each other.
‘Don’t bring all that up again, do you mind? Is it true that he’s going to die?’
‘Unless we can save him. Where was the will?’
‘Among the captain’s papers.’
‘What exactly were you looking for?’
‘I was hoping to find a photo,’ the man said, lowering his eyes. ‘Look, let me go, I’ve got to …’
The hawser fell into the water. The gangway was being raised. The chief mechanic jumped on to the deck, gave his wife a last wave and cast a final look at Maigret.
Then the trawler headed slowly towards the harbour entrance. A sailor lifted the ship’s boy, who was barely fifteen, on to his shoulders. The boy had got hold of the man’s pipe and was proudly clenching it between his teeth.
On the land, women were weeping.
By walking quickly, they could follow the vessel, which did not pick up speed until it was clear of the jetties. Some voices were shouting out reminders:
‘If you come across the Atlantique, don’t forget to tell Dugodet that his wife …’
The sky was still low and threatening. The wind pressed down on the water, ruckling its surface and raising small white-crested waves, which made an angry washing sound.
A Parisian in whites was taking photos of the departing trawler. He had two little girls in white dresses in tow. They were laughing.
Maigret collided with a woman, almost knocking her over. She clutched his arm and asked:
‘Well? Is he better?’
It was Adèle, who hadn’t powdered her nose since at least that morning, and the skin of her face was shiny.
‘Where’s Buzier?’ asked the inspector.
‘He said he’d rather go back to Le Havre. He doesn’t want any trouble. Anyway, I said I was finishing with him. But what about that boy, Le Clinche?’
‘Don’t know.’
‘Go on, you can tell me!’
Absolutely not. He turned and left her standing there. He’d picked out a group on the jetty: Marie Léonnec, her father and Madame Maigret. All three were facing in the direction of the trawler which for a moment drew level with them. Marie Léonnec was saying fervently:
‘That’s his boat!’
Maigret slowly walked towards them, in a surly mood. His wife was the first to spot him among the crowd which had gathered to see the trawler set off for the Grand Banks.
‘Did he pull through?’
Monsieur Léonnec, looking anxious, turned his misshapen nose in his direction.
‘Ah! I’m so glad to see you. Where are you with your inquiries, inspector?’
‘Nowhere.’
‘Meaning?’
‘Nothing … I don’t know.’
Marie opened her eyes wide.
‘But Pierre?’
‘The operation was a success. It seems he’ll be all right.’
‘He’s innocent, isn’t he? Oh please! Tell my father he didn’t do it!’
She put her whole heart into the words. Contemplating her, he saw how she would be in ten years’ time, with the same look as her father, a somewhat overbearing manner ideally suited to dealing with customers in the shop.
‘He didn’t kill the captain.’
Turning to his wife:
‘I’ve just had a telegram calling me back to Paris.’
‘So soon? I’d promised to go swimming tomorrow with …’
She caught his eye and understood.
‘If you’ll excuse us.’
‘We’ll walk back to the hotel with you.’
Maigret saw Jean-Marie’s father, dead drunk, still brandishing his fist at the trawler, and looked away.
‘Don’t put yourselves out, please.’
‘Tell me,’ said Monsieur Léonnec, ‘do you think I could arrange for him to be transferred to Quimper? People are bound to talk.’
Marie looked pleadingly at him. She was very pale. She said in a faltering voice:
‘After all, he is innocent,’
‘I don’t know. You are better placed …’
‘But at least you must allow me to offer you something? A bottle of champagne?’
‘No thanks.’
‘Just a glass of something? Benedictine, for example, since we’re in the town where …’
‘A beer, then.’
Upstairs, Madame Maigret was shutting their cases.
‘So you share my opinion, then. He’s a fine boy who …’
She still had that little-girl look about her! The look that pleaded with him to say yes!
‘I think he’ll make a good husband.’
‘And be a good hand at business!’ said her father, going one better. ‘Because I won’t have him sailing the high seas for months on end. When a man’s married, he has a responsibility to …’
‘Goes without saying.’
‘Especially since I have no son. Surely you can understand that!’
‘Of course.’
Maigret was keeping an eye on the stairs. Eventually, his wife appeared.
‘The luggage is all ready. They say there’s not a train until …’
‘Doesn’t matter. We’ll hire a car.’
It was a getaway!
‘If ever you have occasion to be in Quimper …’
‘Yes, ye
s …’
And the way the girl looked at him! She seemed to have understood that things were not all as straightforward as they seemed, but her eyes pleaded with Maigret not to say any more.
She wanted her fiancé.
The inspector shook hands all round, paid the bill and finished his beer.
‘Thank you so much Detective Chief Inspector Maigret.’
‘There really is no need.’
The car which had been hired by phone arrived.
*
so unless you have come up with something which I have missed, I shall sign off with a recommendation that the case be closed.
This was a passage from a letter sent by Chief Inspector Grenier, of the Le Havre Police, to Maigret, who replied by telegraph:
Agreed.
Six months later, he was sent a card through the post, which said:
Madame Le Clinche has great pleasure in announcing the wedding of her son, Pierre, and Mademoiselle Marie Léonnec, which …
And shortly afterwards, when in connection with another inquiry he was looking round a certain kind of establishment in Rue Pasquier, he thought he recognized a young woman who looked quickly away.
Adèle!
And that was all. Or not quite. Five years later, Maigret was on a short visit to Quimper. He saw the proprietor of a chandler’s shop, standing in his doorway. He was still a young man, very tall with the beginnings of a paunch.
He walked with a slight limp. He called to a toddler of three, who was playing with his top on the pavement.
‘Come in now, Pierrot. Your mother will be cross!’
The man, too preoccupied with his offspring, did not recognize Maigret, who in any case quickened his step, looked away and pulled a wry face.
• • •
For a complete list of this author’s books click here or visit www.penguin.com/simenonchecklist
1. Cell 11, High Surveillance
When a bell somewhere rang twice, the prisoner was sitting on his bunk with his two large hands clasped about his folded knees.
For the space of perhaps a minute he did not move, as if suspended in time; then with a sudden release of breath, he stretched his arms and legs and stood up in his cell, a huge man, ungainly, his head too big, his arms too long and his chest hollow.
The Grand Banks Café Page 12