Maigret, Lognon and the Gangsters

by Georges Simenon

  ‘That’s all?’

  ‘He looked under the bed, like the others, and in the two cupboards. He went back to have another drink in the dining room and then he left with a mocking little wave.’

  ‘Did you notice if he was wearing gloves?’

  ‘Pigskin gloves, yes.’

  ‘And the other two?’

  ‘I think they had gloves on as well. At any rate, the one who threatened me with his gun did.’

  ‘Did you go to the window again?’

  ‘Yes. I saw him leave the building and join one of the two others, the short one, who was waiting for him on the corner of Rue Caulaincourt. I immediately called Rue de La Rochefoucauld station and asked to speak to Lognon. They told me that he hadn’t been seen that morning and that they weren’t expecting him. When I insisted, they told me that he hadn’t been into the office the night before, even though he was on duty.’

  ‘Did you tell them what had happened?’

  ‘No. I immediately thought of you, inspector. You see, I know Lognon better than anyone. He is the sort of person who’s obsessed with doing the right thing. So far he has never had the recognition he deserves, but he has often talked about you. I know you’re not like the others, you don’t envy him, you . . . I’m frightened, Monsieur Maigret. He must have gone after people stronger than him and by now, God knows where . . .’

  The telephone rang in the bedroom.

  Madame Lognon started.

  ‘May I?’

  Maigret heard her, suddenly tight-lipped, saying, ‘What? Is that you? Where were you? I rang your office, and they told me that you hadn’t set foot in there since yesterday. Detective Chief Inspector Maigret is here . . .’

  Maigret, who had followed her, stretched out a hand for the receiver.

  ‘Do you mind? . . . Hello, Lognon?’

  Lognon remained silent on the other end of the line, with a fixed stare, no doubt, his teeth clenched.

  ‘Tell me, Lognon, where are you at the moment?’

  ‘At the office.’

  ‘I’m in your apartment with your wife. I need to speak to you. I’ll drop by Rue de La Rochefoucauld, it’s on my way. Wait for me . . . What?’

  ‘I’d rather we didn’t meet here. I’ll explain . . .’ he heard Lognon stammer.

  ‘Be at Quai des Orfèvres in half an hour then.’

  He hung up the telephone and went and fetched his pipe and hat.

  ‘Do you think everything is all right?’

  He looked at her uncomprehendingly, so she went on:

  ‘He’s so reckless, so single-minded, that sometimes . . .’

  ‘Send him in.’

  Lognon was soaked and muddy, as if he had been roaming the streets all night, and he had such a bad cold that he had to have his handkerchief constantly in his hand. He tilted his head to one side, like someone expecting to be taken to task, and stayed standing in the middle of the room.

  ‘Sit down, Lognon. I’ve just come from your apartment.’

  ‘What did my wife tell you?’

  ‘Everything she knows, I suppose.’

  There followed a fairly long silence, which Lognon took advantage of to blow his nose, without daring to look Maigret in the face. Knowing how touchy he was, Maigret wasn’t sure exactly what approach to take.

  What Madame Lognon had said about her husband wasn’t so far off the mark. In his desire to do the right thing, that halfwit was always getting into scrapes, convinced that the whole world was against him, that he was the victim of a conspiracy to prevent him being promoted and finally assuming his rightful place in the Crime Squad at Quai des Orfèvres.

  What was most distressing was that he wasn’t stupid, he was genuinely conscientious and he was the most honest man on earth.

  ‘Is she in bed?’ he asked finally.

  ‘She was up when I got there.’

  ‘Is she angry with me?’

  ‘Look at me, Lognon. Relax. All I know is what your wife has told me, but I only have to take one look at you to know something’s wrong. I’m not your immediate superior, so whatever you’ve done is none of my concern. But perhaps, now your wife has spoken to me, you’d better fill me in. What do you think?’

  ‘I think I should, yes.’

  ‘In that case, please tell me everything. Do you understand? Not just a part, not almost everything.’

  ‘I understand.’

  ‘Good. You can smoke.’

  ‘I don’t smoke.’

  It was true. Maigret had forgotten. He didn’t smoke because of Madame Lognon, whom the smell of tobacco made nauseous.

  ‘What do you know about these gangsters?’

  ‘I think they really are gangsters,’ Lognon said emphatically.

  ‘American?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘How did you come into contact with them?’

  ‘I don’t really know myself. After what I’ve been through, I might as well tell you everything, even if it means losing my job.’

  He stared fixedly at the desk, his lower lip quivering.

  ‘It would have happened sooner or later anyway.’

  ‘What would have?’

  ‘You know very well. They keep me on because they’ve got no choice, they haven’t caught me out yet, but they’ve been watching me for years . . .’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Everyone.’

  ‘For goodness sake, Lognon!’

  ‘Yes, inspector.’

  ‘Will you stop playing the victim?’

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘Stop hunching your shoulders and looking off in the other direction. Good! Now, talk to me like a man.’

  Lognon wasn’t crying, but his cold was making his eyes water, and it was irritating seeing him constantly bringing his handkerchief to his face.

  ‘I’m listening.’

  ‘It was on Monday night.’

  ‘Were you on duty?’

  ‘Yes. It was about one in the morning. I was on a stakeout.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘Near the church of Notre-Dame-de-Lorette, right by the railings, on the corner of Rue Fléchier.’

  ‘So you weren’t in your sector?’

  ‘Just on the edge. Rue Fléchier is in the third district, but I was watching the little bar at the corner of Rue des Martyrs, which is in my patch. I’d had a tip-off that a guy sometimes went there at night to sell cocaine. Rue Fléchier is dark, almost always empty at that time. I was standing right by the railings round the church. Suddenly a car turned the corner of Rue de Châteaudun, slowed down and pulled up for a moment less than ten metres away from me. The people inside didn’t suspect I was there. The door opened, and a body was thrown on the pavement; then the car set off again towards Rue Saint-Lazare.’

  ‘Did you get its number?’

  ‘Yes. I rushed over to the body first. I’d almost swear the man was dead, but I am not completely sure. I felt his chest in the dark, and my hand came away sticky with warm blood.’

  Frowning, Maigret muttered:

  ‘I didn’t see anything about this in the report.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘This happened on Rue Fléchier, so on the pavement in the third district.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘How is it that . . .’

  ‘I am going to tell you. I know I was wrong. Maybe you won’t believe me.’

  ‘What happened to the body?’

  ‘Exactly. I’m getting to that. There wasn’t a policeman anywhere. The little bar was open, less than a hundred metres away. I went there to telephone.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘The station in the third district.’

  ‘Did you?’

  ‘I stopped at the bar to ask for a token. I automatically glanced at the street and saw a second car leaving Rue Fléchier, speeding off down Rue Notre-Dame-de-Lorette. It had stopped near where I’d left the body. I ran out of the bar to try to see the number, but the car was already too far away.’

  ‘A taxi?’


  ‘I don’t think so. It all happened so fast. I had a hunch and ran towards the church. The body wasn’t there, by the railings.’

  ‘Didn’t you raise the alarm?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Didn’t it occur to you that by putting out the number of the first car the police would have a chance of catching it?’

  ‘I thought that. But it seemed to me that the men involved weren’t stupid enough to drive around in the same car for very long.’

  ‘You didn’t file a report?’

  Maigret had, of course, understood. Poor Lognon had been waiting for the big case that would put him in the limelight for years. Bad luck really did seem to follow him around. His sector had one of the heaviest crime rates, but every time a crime was committed either he wasn’t on duty or the Crime Squad would take over the investigation.

  ‘I know it was wrong of me. I realized almost immediately but, because I hadn’t given the alarm, it was already too late.’

  ‘Did you find the car?’

  ‘I went to the Préfecture in the morning, checked the lists and found out the car was from a garage in Porte Maillot. It’s a place that hires out cars without a driver by the day or the month.’

  ‘Had the car been returned?’

  ‘No. It had been rented two days earlier for an unspecified amount of time. I saw the customer card: someone called Bill Larner, an American citizen, resident at the Hôtel Wagram, Avenue Wagram.’

  ‘Did you find Larner there?’

  ‘He had left the hotel around four in the morning.’

  ‘You mean he was in his room until then?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘So he wasn’t in the car?’

  ‘Definitely not. The night porter saw him come in around midnight. Larner got a telephone call at three thirty and left almost immediately.’

  ‘With his luggage?’

  ‘No. On his way out he said he was going to pick up a friend at the train station and that he would be back for breakfast.’

  ‘Of course he hasn’t come back.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘What about the car?’

  ‘It was found the next morning near Gare du Nord.’

  Lognon blew his nose again, then looked at Maigret contritely.

  ‘It was wrong of me, I’ll say it again. Today’s Thursday, and I have been trying since Tuesday morning to put it right. I haven’t gone home.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘My wife must have told you that they came on Tuesday not long after I left. It’s a clue, isn’t it?’

  Maigret listened.

  ‘In my opinion, it means that, after throwing the body on the pavement, they saw me in the shadows. They thought that I must have taken down the number – I mean the number of the first car, of course, because there were two. They dumped it as soon as they could. Then they telephoned Bill Larner, knowing we would probably pick up his trail from the customer card at the garage.’

  Maigret was doodling on his blotter as he listened.

  ‘And then?’

  ‘I don’t know. I’m just speculating. They must have combed through the newspapers and not found any mention of the business.’

  ‘Do you have an idea how they found you?’

  ‘I can only think of one explanation, which would prove they’re very good, these people, professionals. That is that they were waiting near the garage, saw me arrive to make inquiries, then followed me. I went home for lunch and when I left they broke into the apartment.’

  ‘Where they hoped to find the body?’

  ‘Do you think so too?’

  ‘I don’t know . . . Why haven’t you been back home since?’

  ‘Because I assume they’re watching the house.’

  ‘Afraid, Lognon?’

  Lognon’s cheeks turned as red as his bulbous nose.

  ‘I thought people would think that. But it’s not true. I just wanted to be free to move around. I took a room in a little hotel on Place Clichy and kept in touch with my wife by telephone. Since then I’ve been working day and night. I’ve visited over a hundred hotels, in the Quartier des Ternes first, then around Avenue de Wagram, then over by Opéra. My wife described the two men who came to the apartment. I went to the immigration bureau at the Préfecture. At the same time, I have been doing all my usual work.’

  ‘So, in a nutshell, you hoped to conduct this investigation by yourself?’

  ‘At first, yes. I thought I was up to it. Now they’ll do whatever they want with me.’

  Poor Lognon! There were moments when, for all his forty-seven years and unprepossessing appearance, he seemed like a sulky kid, a kid at an awkward age giving the grown-ups aggressive, shifty looks.

  ‘Your wife received a second visit this morning and, as she couldn’t reach you, she called me.’

  Lognon gave Maigret a despondent look, as if to say that he had reached a point where nothing mattered to him any more.

  ‘It wasn’t one of the two men from Tuesday, but a tall man with blond, almost red hair . . .’

  ‘Bill Larner,’ muttered Lognon. ‘That’s how he was described to me.’

  ‘He met up with one of the other two downstairs. He pocketed a photo of you, and probably some papers too.’

  ‘I suppose I’m going to be up before the disciplinary board?’

  ‘There’ll be time to discuss that afterwards.’

  ‘After what?’

  ‘After the investigation.’

  Lognon frowned, grim-faced, his eyes disbelieving.

  ‘The first thing to do now is to find these characters, don’t you think?’

  ‘You mean me too?’

  Maigret didn’t reply, and Lognon blew his nose for at least three minutes.

  When he left the office, anyone would have sworn he had been crying.

  2.

  In which, although disreputable characters are involved, Inspector Lognon is intent on showing he has good manners

  It was almost five o’clock when Maigret’s call went through. The lights had been switched on long before, and the floors were wet and muddy from the day’s visitors. Did tobacco really taste different in weather like that or was it Maigret’s turn to come down with a cold?

  He heard the operator say in English, pronouncing his name as if it ended in at least three ts:

  ‘Police Judiciaire, Paris. Detective Chief Inspector Maigret calling.’

  Then straight afterwards he heard the boyish, ebullient, warm-hearted tones of J. J. MacDonald:

  ‘Hello, Jules!’

  Maigret had more or less got used to the American way of doing things by the end of his tour of the United States, but it still went against the grain, and he had to take a deep breath before replying:

  ‘Hello, Jimmy!’

  MacDonald was one of the chief right-hand men of J. Edgar Hoover, the head of the FBI in Washington. He had shown Maigret around most of the American cities. He was a tall fellow with light eyes, who generally had his tie in his pocket and his jacket on his arm.

  Over there everyone was on first-name terms after ten minutes.

  ‘How’s Paris?’

  ‘It’s raining.’

  ‘We’ve got glorious sunshine here.’

  ‘Listen, Jimmy, I need some information and I wouldn’t want to waste any taxpayers’ money. First, have you heard of someone called Bill Larner?’

  ‘Sweet Bill?’

  ‘I don’t know. All I’ve got is the name Bill Larner. Judging by his appearance, he’d be in his forties.’

  ‘It’s probably him. He left the country about two years ago and he spent a few months in Havana before sailing for Europe.’

  ‘Dangerous?’

  ‘Not a killer, if that’s what you mean, but one of the best conmen going. There’s no one like him at swindling an innocent out of fifty dollars by promising him a million. So, he’s in your part of the world, is he?’

  ‘He’s in Paris.’

  ‘Maybe French law will allow yo
u to nab him. We’ve never been able to pin enough on him and we’ve always had to let him go. Do you want me to get a copy of his file sent over?’

  ‘If you can. That’s not all though. I’m going to read you a list of names. Stop me if you know any.’

  Maigret had set Janvier to work. The Police Judiciaire had compiled a list of all the passengers who had landed at Le Havre and Cherbourg in the last few weeks, then the passport inspectors had given them enough information to eliminate a certain number of names.

  ‘Can you hear me all right?’

  ‘As if you were in the next office.’

  MacDonald stopped his French colleague when he was only on the tenth name.

  ‘Did you say Cinaglia?’

  ‘Charles Cinaglia.’

  ‘He’s over there too?’

  ‘He turned up two weeks ago.’

  ‘You’d be well advised to keep an eye on him. He’s been in prison five or six times. If he’d got what he deserved, he’d have been sent to the electric chair a long time ago. He’s a killer. Unfortunately we’ve only ever been able to get him on illegal possession of firearms, assault and battery, vagrancy, that sort of thing.’

  ‘What does he look like?’

  ‘Short, stocky, always immaculately dressed, diamond ring on his finger, stacked heels. Broken nose and cauliflower ears.’

  ‘He seems to have arrived at the same time as someone called Cicero, who had the cabin next to his.’

  ‘Lord! Tony Cicero worked with Charlie in St Louis. But he doesn’t get his hands dirty, as you’d say. He’s the brains.’

  ‘Have you got any information on them?’

  ‘Enough to start a library. I’ll send you the highlights. And some photos. They’ll go out on the evening plane.’

  The other names didn’t mean anything to MacDonald, and, after another exchange of ‘Jules’ and ‘Jimmy’, Maigret’s voice ceased reverberating around a sunlit office in Washington where it wasn’t yet lunchtime.

  Needing to discuss another case with the commissioner of the Police Judiciaire, Maigret left his office, papers in hand. As he crossed the waiting room he sensed a presence in a shadowy corner. He turned and was surprised to see Lognon in one of the chairs, who gave him a wan smile.

  It was almost six o’clock. The offices were starting to empty out, and the broad, still dusty corridor was deserted.

  Normally, if Lognon needed to talk to him, he would have telephoned or, if he was in the neighbourhood, got the office boy to say he was waiting. He could even have gone into the inspectors’ office because he was pretty much part of the team, even if he didn’t work at the Quai.