Maigret and the Minister

by Georges Simenon

  ‘I had thought of that,’ admitted Point. ‘And that’s what frightens me! If he’s the one who has the report, it will be in a secure place and I’d be surprised if we found it. But if we don’t make it public, or if we don’t have evidence that a particular person has destroyed it, I will be disgraced, because people will accuse me of having hushed it up.’

  Maigret saw Madame Point look away to hide a tear running down her cheek. Point saw it too, and lost his composure for a moment, whereas Anne-Marie exclaimed:

  ‘Mother!’

  Madame Point shook her head as if to say it was nothing and hastily left the room.

  ‘You see!’ said her husband as if there were no need for any comment.

  Was Maigret wrong? Was he allowing himself to be affected by the dramatic atmosphere around him? He announced, as if sure of himself:

  ‘I can’t promise I’ll find the report, but I’ll lay hands on the man or woman who broke into your apartment to steal it. That is my job.’

  ‘Do you think you can?’

  ‘I am certain of it.’

  He was on his feet. Point murmured:

  ‘I’ll come down with you.’

  And, to his daughter:

  ‘Run and tell your mother what the inspector just said to me. It will make her feel better.’

  They retraced the route they had taken through the back corridors of the ministry and found themselves in Point’s office where, apart from Mademoiselle Blanche who was answering the telephone, a tall, thin individual with grey hair was sorting the post.

  ‘May I introduce Jacques Fleury, my principal private secretary? … Detective Chief Inspector Maigret …’

  Maigret had the feeling he had already seen the man somewhere, probably in a bar or restaurant. He looked dapper, dressed with an elegance that contrasted with the minister’s casualness. He was the quintessential type found in the cafés of the Champs-Élysées in the company of pretty women.

  His hand was dry, his handshake firm. From a distance, he appeared younger, more energetic than close up, when the bags under his eyes were visible, and a sort of droop of the lips, which he covered up by smiling nervously.

  ‘How many are there of them?’ Point asked, jerking his head towards the waiting room.

  ‘At least thirty. The correspondents from the foreign papers are here too. I don’t know how many photographers there are. They’re still arriving.’

  Maigret and the minister exchanged a look. Maigret seemed to be saying, with an encouraging wink:

  ‘Stand firm!’

  Point asked him:

  ‘Will you be leaving via the waiting room?’

  ‘Since you’re going to tell them that I’m in charge of the investigation, it’s not a problem. On the contrary.’

  He was aware of the suspicious gaze of Mademoiselle Blanche, whom he had not had time to charm. She still seemed unsure what to think of him. Perhaps, however, her boss’s serenity would make her think that Maigret’s involvement was a good thing.

  When Maigret walked through the waiting room, the photographers were the first to race over and he made me attempt to avoid them. Then the reporters fired questions at him.

  ‘Are you investigating the Calame Report?’

  He brushed them off with a smile.

  ‘In a few minutes, the minister will answer your questions himself.’

  ‘You don’t deny that you’re handling it?’

  ‘I’m not denying anything.’

  Some followed him down the marble stairs, hoping to extract a comment from him.

  ‘Ask the minister,’ he repeated.

  One inquired:

  ‘Do you think that Piquemal’s been murdered?’

  It was the first time this hypothesis had been stated openly.

  ‘You know my usual answer,’ he replied: ‘I don’t think anything.’

  A few moments later, after more snaps, he clambered into the Police Judiciaire car where Lapointe, in the driver’s seat, had spent his time reading the newspapers.

  ‘Where are we going? To headquarters?’

  ‘No. Boulevard Pasteur. What do the papers say?’

  ‘They concentrate mainly on Piquemal’s disappearance. One of them, I can’t remember which, went and interviewed Madame Calame, who’s still in the apartment where she lived with her husband, on Boulevard Raspail. Apparently, she’s a small, lively woman who doesn’t mince her words and doesn’t try to evade questions.

  ‘She hasn’t read the report but clearly remembers that around five years ago her husband went to spend several weeks in Haute-Savoie. On his return, he was very busy and often worked late into the night.

  ‘ “He had never received so many phone calls,” she said. “Lots of people came to see him, whom we didn’t know from Adam or Eve. He was preoccupied, anxious. When I asked him what was worrying him, he told me that it was his work and his responsibilities. He would often talk about responsibilities around that time. I had the sense that something was eating him up. I knew he was ill. A year earlier the doctor had told me that he was suffering from cancer. I remember that one day he sighed: ‘My God! It’s so hard for a man to know where his duty lies!’ ” ’

  They drove down Rue de Vaugirard, where a bus forced them to go slowly.

  ‘There’s an entire column,’ added Lapointe.

  ‘What has she done with her husband’s papers?’

  ‘She’s left everything as it was in his office, which she cleans regularly as she did when he was alive.’

  ‘Has she received any visits recently?’

  ‘Two,’ replied Lapointe darting an admiring look at his chief.

  ‘Piquemal?’

  ‘Yes. That was the first visit, about a week ago.’

  ‘Did she know him?’

  ‘Fairly well. When Calame was alive, he often used to come to ask for his advice. She thinks he did something to do with mathematics. He explained that he wanted to retrieve one of his papers, which he had left with the professor.’

  ‘Did he find it?’

  ‘He had a briefcase with him. She showed him into the study, where he stayed alone for around an hour. When he left, she asked him the question and he replied that no, unfortunately his papers must have been mislaid. She didn’t look inside his briefcase. She wasn’t suspicious. It was only two days later—’

  ‘Who was the second visitor?’

  ‘A man in his forties, who claimed to be a former student of Calame’s and asked if she had kept his papers. He also talked about projects they had worked on together.’

  ‘Did she allow him into the study?’

  ‘No. She found the coincidence strange to say the least and told him that all her husband’s papers had remained at the École des Ponts et Chaussées.’

  ‘Did she describe the second visitor?’

  ‘The paper doesn’t say. If she did, the reporter is keeping the information to himself and is probably pursuing his own little investigation.’

  ‘Park alongside the kerb. It’s here.’

  During the day, the boulevard was as quiet as at night, with the same reassuring air of middle-class respectability.

  ‘Shall I wait for you?’

  ‘You’re coming with me. We might have some work to do.’

  The glazed door of the lodge was on the left of the entrance. The concierge was a tired-looking elderly woman with a somewhat regal manner.

  ‘What is it?’ she asked the two men without getting up from her armchair, while a ginger cat jumped off her lap and came and rubbed itself against Maigret’s legs.

  He gave his name and took care to remove his hat and to speak in a deferential tone.

  ‘Monsieur Point has put me in charge of an investigation into a theft from his apartment two days ago.’

  ‘A theft? Here? And he didn’t tell me?’

  ‘He’ll confirm it when he sees you and, if you have any doubts, you can simply telephone him.’

  ‘There’s no need. Since you’re a chi
ef inspector, I have to believe you, don’t I? How could that have happened? This is a quiet building. The police have never had to set foot here in all my thirty-five years as concierge.’

  ‘I’d like you to think back to last Tuesday, especially the morning.’

  ‘Tuesday … Wait … That was the day before yesterday …’

  ‘Yes. The previous evening, the minister came to his apartment.’

  ‘Did he tell you that?’

  ‘Not only did he tell me, but I met him there. You let me in just after ten p.m.’

  ‘I think I remember, yes.’

  ‘He must have left shortly after I did.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Did you open the door to anyone else that night?’

  ‘Certainly not. It’s rare for residents to come home after midnight. They are quiet people. If that had happened, I’d have remembered.’

  ‘What time do you unlock the door in the morning?’

  ‘At half past six, sometimes seven.’

  ‘Do you then stay in your lodge?’

  The concierge’s quarters consisted of only one room, with a gas oven, a round table, a sink and, behind a curtain, a bed with a dark-red cover.

  ‘Except when I sweep the stairs.’

  ‘At what time?’

  ‘Not before nine o’clock. After that I deliver the post, which arrives at around half past eight.’

  ‘Because the lift shaft is glazed, I imagine that when you are on the stairs, you can see who is going up or down?’

  ‘Yes. I automatically look.’

  ‘That morning, did you see anyone go up to the fourth floor?’

  ‘Absolutely not.’

  ‘No one in the morning, or even in the early afternoon, asked you whether the minister was at home?’

  ‘There was just a phone call.’

  ‘To you?’

  ‘No. To the apartment.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘Because I was on the stairs between the fourth and fifth floors.’

  ‘What time was that?’

  ‘Ten o’clock maybe? Perhaps just before? With my legs, I can’t work fast any more. I heard the phone ringing inside the apartment. It went on for a long time. Then, fifteen minutes later, when I’d finished my cleaning and gone back downstairs, the phone rang again. I even muttered: “You can keep ringing!” ’

  ‘And then?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Did you go back inside your lodge?’

  ‘To freshen up.’

  ‘You didn’t leave the building?’

  ‘Only as I do every morning, for around fifteen or twenty minutes, to do my shopping. The grocer next door, the butcher just on the corner. From the grocer’s I can see who’s coming and going. I always keep an eye on the place.’

  ‘And from the butcher’s?’

  ‘I can’t see, but I don’t stay long. I live alone with my cat. I buy the same thing almost every day. At my age, you lose your appetite.’

  ‘You don’t know exactly what time you were at the butcher’s?’

  ‘Not exactly, no. There’s a big clock above the till, but I never look at it.’

  ‘When you got back home, you didn’t see anyone leave who you hadn’t seen going in?’

  ‘I don’t remember. No. I pay less attention to the people going out than to those going in, naturally, except for the residents, because I have to be able to say whether they’re at home or not. There are always deliveries, people from the gas company, vacuum-cleaner salesmen …’

  He knew he wouldn’t get any more out of her, but that if she recalled some detail later she would be sure to let him know.

  ‘My inspector and I are going to question your residents,’ said Maigret.

  ‘If you like. You’ll see that they are all decent people, except perhaps the little old lady on the third floor who …’

  The thought of carrying out this routine made Maigret feel dispirited.

  ‘We’ll come back and see you on our way out,’ he promised.

  And he made sure, on leaving, to stroke the cat’s head.

  ‘You take the apartments on the left,’ he instructed Lapointe. ‘I’ll deal with the ones on the right. Do you understand what I’m looking for?’

  He added light-heartedly:

  ‘To work, my friend!’

  6. Lunch at the Filet de Sole

  Before ringing the first doorbell, Maigret had second thoughts and turned to Lapointe, who was reaching for the button.

  ‘Aren’t you thirsty?’

  ‘No, chief.’

  ‘You start, then. I’ll be back in a minute.’

  He had just remembered a telephone call he needed to make. At a pinch, he could phone from the concierge’s lodge, except that he would rather not speak in front of a witness. And he wouldn’t mind a drink, a glass of white wine, for instance.

  He had to walk around a hundred metres before he found a tiny café where, apart from the owner, there wasn’t a soul.

  ‘A white wine,’ he ordered.

  He changed his mind.

  ‘No, a Pernod.’

  That was more in keeping with his mood and with the weather, and with the smell of this immaculate little bar where it seemed no one ever came.

  He waited until he had been served and had drunk half of his Pernod before walking over to the booth.

  Newspaper reports of crime investigations give the impression that the police follow a straight line and know where they are going from the outset. Events follow on from one another logically, like the entrances and exits of characters in a well-directed play.

  There is rarely any mention of the pointless comings and goings, the meticulous following-up of leads that turn out to be red herrings, or the random probing in different directions.

  There had not been a single investigation during which Maigret hadn’t floundered at some stage.

  That morning at the Police Judiciaire, he hadn’t had the time to debrief Lucas, Janvier and Torrence, whom he had sent off to pursue lines of inquiry that seemed unimportant now.

  ‘Police Judiciaire? Would you put me on to Lucas? If he’s not there, give me Janvier.’

  It was Lucas’ voice he heard on the other end of the line.

  ‘Is that you, chief?’

  ‘Yes. Firstly, I have an urgent job for you. You must get hold of a photograph of Piquemal, the fellow from the École des Ponts et Chaussées. No point looking in his hotel room. There aren’t any. I expect there’s a group photo at the École, the usual end-of-year class photo, which the Criminal Records people will be able to do something with.

  ‘Tell them to work as fast as they can. There’s still time for the photo to appear in the afternoon papers. And it should also be sent out to every police force. And leave no stone unturned, have someone take a quick look around the Forensic Institute.’

  ‘Understood, chief.’

  ‘Have you got any news?’

  ‘I found the woman called Marcelle. Her name is Marcelle Luquet.’

  Maigret had already mentally abandoned that avenue, but he didn’t want Lucas to think his efforts were all for nothing.

  ‘And?’

  ‘She works as a proof-reader at the Imprimerie du Croissant, where she’s on the night shift. That’s not where they print La Rumeur or Le Globe. She’s heard of Tabard, but she doesn’t know him personally. She’s never met Mascoulin.’

  ‘Did you talk to her?’

  ‘I bought her a coffee in Rue Montmartre. She’s a decent woman. She lived alone until she met Fleury and fell in love with him. She still is. She doesn’t hold a grudge against him for leaving her and if he asked her tomorrow, she’d go back to him without a word of reproach. She says he’s a big baby who needs help and affection. She claims that while he’s capable of minor cheating, like children, he’s incapable of serious wrongdoing.’

  ‘Is Janvier there with you?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Put him on.’

  Janvie
r had nothing to report. He had loitered opposite the apartment block in Rue Vaneau until Torrence came to relieve him, around midnight.

  ‘Blanche Lamotte came home, on foot, alone, at around eleven p.m. and went up to her apartment, where the light stayed on for about half an hour.’

  ‘There was no one from the Sûreté in the area?’

  ‘No one. I was able to count the people from the street coming home from the cinema or the theatre.’

  Torrence’s watch had been even quieter. During the entire night, he had only seen seven passers-by in Rue Vaneau.

  ‘The light went on at six a.m. I presume she gets up early to do her housework. She went out at ten past eight and headed in the direction of Boulevard Saint-Germain.’

  Maigret went back to the bar to finish his Pernod and since it was a light drink, he had another one while he filled his pipe.

  When he went back into the apartment building on Boulevard Pasteur, he could hear that Lapointe was on his third apartment and he patiently began to do his share.

  Questioning people can sometimes take a while. At that hour, the two men found only women busy with their housework. Their initial reflex was to shut the door in their faces because they thought Maigret and Lapointe were door-to-door salesmen or insurance brokers. When they heard the word ‘police’, they all recoiled.

  While they talked, their minds were elsewhere – on what they had on the stove, the baby playing on the floor or the electric vacuum cleaner which was still running. Some were embarrassed at being caught looking unkempt and they automatically tried to smooth their hair.

  ‘Try to think back to Tuesday morning …’

  ‘Tuesday, yes …’

  ‘Did you happen to open your door between ten o’clock and midday?’

  The first woman Maigret asked hadn’t been at home on Tuesday but at the hospital, where her sister had been undergoing surgery. The second, who was young and had a child balanced on her hip, kept muddling up Tuesday and Wednesday.

  ‘I was here, yes. I’m always here in the mornings. I do my shopping in the late afternoon, when my husband is back.’

  ‘Did you open your door?’

  With infinite patience, he had to gently bring her back to the atmosphere of that Tuesday morning. If they had asked the women outright: ‘Did you see a person who is not a resident going up to the fourth floor in the lift or on the stairs?’, they would have replied no, in good faith, without taking the trouble to think.