Maigret, Lognon and the Gangsters

by Georges Simenon

  Maigret did but he would have had difficulty finding an exact equivalent in French: someone not very crisp or clean, badly dressed.

  ‘Good. That’s his nickname, and he lives up to it.’

  ‘What’s he doing in France?’

  A silence on the other end of the line.

  ‘What are the other two doing here?’

  MacDonald said something in a low voice, as if he was asking advice from someone standing near him, then answered finally, ‘If Charlie Cinaglia and Cicero met Sloppy Joe in Paris, there’s every likelihood the body your inspector saw being thrown out of a car was Sloppy Joe.’

  ‘That’s crystal clear, obviously,’ Maigret said mockingly.

  ‘I’m sorry, Jules, but it’s more or less all I know myself.’

  Maigret called Le Havre, then Cherbourg, and got through to the official in charge of arrivals at each port. They checked their passenger lists without finding anyone by the name of Mascarelli. Maigret gave them as full a description as he could and they promised to question their inspectors.

  Janvier appeared.

  ‘Torrence is asking for you on the telephone, chief.’

  ‘Where is he?’

  ‘Around Grande-Armée, checking addresses.’

  It didn’t make any sense for him to come back to Quai des Orfèvres between visits. He would ring with the results from a bar, then be given another address.

  ‘Hello? Is that you, chief? I’m calling from the apartment of a woman who I’d rather not let out of my sight. I think you’d better come over and have a word with her. She’s hard work.’

  Maigret vaguely heard a woman’s voice, then Torrence’s, no longer talking into the telephone, ‘If you don’t keep quiet, you’ll get a slap in the face. Are you there, chief? I’m at 28A, Rue Brunel. It’s the fourth floor, on the left. The woman’s name is Adrienne Laur. It might be a good idea to see if the name’s in Records.’

  Maigret put Lapointe on it, then, donning his heavy overcoat and gathering up a couple of pipes from his desk, headed for the stairs. He was lucky enough to find one of the police cars in the courtyard.

  ‘Rue Brunel.’

  Still the same neighbourhood, not far from Avenue Wagram, barely 200 metres from Rue des Acacias and 300 from where the car had been stolen the previous evening. The apartment building was comfortable, bourgeois. There was a lift, carpets on the stairs. When he got to the fourth floor, a door opened, and the hefty figure of Torrence appeared, looking relieved.

  ‘Maybe you’ll get something out of her, chief. I give up.’

  A woman with brown hair and a fullish figure was standing in the middle of the living room, wearing nothing but a dressing gown that opened every time she moved.

  ‘Two now!’ she said sarcastically. ‘How many of you are after me?’

  Maigret had politely taken off his hat and put it on an armchair. As it was very hot, he also took off his overcoat, murmuring:

  ‘Do you mind?’

  ‘I mind the whole thing, as you may have noticed.’

  She was a beautiful woman, really, in her thirties, with the slightly hoarse voice of people whose nights are busier than their days. The room smelled of perfume. The bedroom door was open, revealing an unmade bed. There was a pillow on a sofa in the living room, and another on the floor in a corner, where a couple of rugs had been piled on top of one another.

  Torrence, who had followed Maigret’s gaze, said:

  ‘Get it, chief?’

  She obviously hadn’t been the only person sleeping in the apartment the previous night.

  ‘When I rang the bell, she took a long time answering. She says she was asleep. She could have been. She must have been sleeping completely naked because she hasn’t got a stitch on under her dressing gown.’

  ‘Is that any of your business?’

  ‘I asked her if she knew an American called Bill Larner and I saw she was hesitating, playing for time, pretending to rack her brains. She put up a fight, but I went in and glanced in the bedroom. Have a look for yourself. On the chest of drawers to the left.’

  There was a photograph in a red leather frame, probably taken at Deauville, of a couple in swimming costumes: Adrienne Laur and Bill Larner.

  ‘You see why I rang you? That’s not all. Have a look in the wastepaper basket. I counted eight cigar butts. They are those big Havanas that each last a good hour. I suppose when I rang she saw the full ashtrays and quickly emptied them in the wastepaper bin.’

  ‘I had some friends over yesterday evening.’

  ‘How many friends?’

  ‘That’s none of your business.’

  ‘Bill Larner?’

  ‘That’s none of your business either. Besides, that photo was taken a year ago, and we’ve split up since.’

  There was a bottle of brandy and a glass on a chest of drawers. She poured herself a drink without offering them one, then lit a fresh cigarette and fluffed up her hair at the back.

  ‘Am I going to be allowed to go back to bed?’

  ‘Listen, my girl . . .’

  ‘I’m not your girl.’

  ‘You’d be better off answering me nicely.’

  ‘Oh, really!’

  ‘You thought you were doing the right thing. Larner asked you to put him up, along with his two friends. He probably didn’t tell you why.’

  ‘You’ve got a lovely voice, sweetie.’

  Torrence’s look seemed to say: ‘You see what she’s like?’

  Maigret patiently asked, ‘Are you French, Adrienne?’

  ‘She’s Belgian,’ Torrence put in. ‘I found her identity card in her bag. She was born in Antwerp and has lived in France for five years.’

  ‘In other words we can take away your resident’s card. I suppose you work in cabarets?’

  ‘She’s one of the Folies-Bergère nudes.’

  Torrence was still doing all the talking.

  ‘So? Just because I’m a nude dancer you have the right to barge into my place as if it’s a stable, do you? You, fatso,’ she pointed at Torrence, ‘if I hadn’t snatched your hat off your head, you wouldn’t even have bothered to take it off. But every time my dressing gown opens, I know where you’re looking.’

  ‘Listen, Adrienne, I don’t know what Larner has said, but he probably hasn’t told you the truth about his friends. Do you speak English?’

  ‘Enough for what I need it for.’

  ‘The two men who slept here are wanted for murder. Do you understand? That means that, because you put them up, you could be prosecuted for aiding and abetting. Do you know how much you’ll get for that?’

  He had hit a raw nerve. She had stopped pacing about, was looking at him anxiously.

  ‘Five to ten years.’

  ‘I haven’t done anything.’

  ‘I’m sure you haven’t, and that’s why I said you’re making a mistake. It’s fine helping friends as long as you don’t have to pay too high a price.’

  ‘You’re trying to get me to talk.’

  ‘The shorter of the two men with Bill is called Charlie.’

  She didn’t deny it.

  ‘The other is Tony Cicero.’

  ‘I don’t know them. I know Bill’s never killed anyone.’

  ‘I know that too. In fact I’m convinced that Bill wasn’t helping them of his own free will.’

  ‘Are you serious?’

  She looked at the bottle, poured herself another half a glass, almost offered one to Maigret, then shrugged.

  ‘I’ve known Larner for years,’ he said.

  ‘He’s only been in France for a couple.’

  ‘But his details have been on our files for fifteen. As someone put it this morning, he’s a gentleman.’

  She was staring at him, frowning, in two minds as to whether he was setting a trap for her.

  ‘Charlie and Cicero have been hiding in your apartment for at least two days, probably three. Do you have a refrigerator?’

  Torrence cut in again.


  ‘I thought of that. I found one in the kitchen. It’s full. Two cold chickens, half a ham, practically a whole salami . . .’

  ‘Yesterday evening,’ Maigret went on, ‘someone gave them a message by telephone, and all three of them left in a hurry.’

  She sat down in an armchair and, with unexpected modesty, arranged her dressing gown over her legs and thighs.

  ‘They came back in the night. I am sure they’d been drinking. From what I know of Bill Larner, he must have been drinking heavily because he had just witnessed a scene that would have put him on edge.’

  Torrence was pacing up and down the apartment, so she shouted:

  ‘Can’t you just stay still?’

  Then she turned to Maigret:

  ‘What else?’

  ‘I don’t know what time this morning they got another message. Not before eleven o’clock, at any rate. They were probably asleep, Bill in your bed, the other two in this room. They hurriedly got dressed. Did they tell you where they were going?’

  ‘You’re trying to get me into trouble.’

  ‘The opposite. I’m trying to get you out of it!’

  ‘Are you the Maigret who’s in the papers the whole time?’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because they say you’re on the level. But I don’t like this tub of lard.’

  ‘What did they say to you when they left?’

  ‘Nothing. Not even thank you.’

  ‘How did Bill seem?’

  ‘I haven’t admitted Bill was here.’

  ‘You must have heard what they were saying when they were getting ready to leave.’

  ‘They were talking English.’

  ‘I thought you knew English?’

  ‘Not that kind.’

  ‘Last night, when he was alone with you in your bedroom, Bill talked to you about his friends.’

  ‘How do you know that?’

  ‘Didn’t he tell you he was trying to get rid of them?’

  ‘He said that he’d take them to the country as soon as he could.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Did he often go to the country?’

  ‘Hardly ever.’

  ‘Did you ever go there together?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Were you his mistress?’

  ‘On and off.’

  ‘Have you been to his apartment in the Hôtel Wagram?’

  ‘Once. I found him there with a girl. He threw me out. Then three days later he came to see me as if nothing had happened.’

  ‘Does he fish?’

  She laughed.

  ‘You mean with a rod? No! That’s not his style.’

  ‘Does he play golf?’

  ‘Yes, he does that.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘I don’t know. I’ve never gone with him.’

  ‘Did he used to go for a few days?’

  ‘He’d leave in the morning and come back in the evening.’

  That didn’t fit. He had to find a place where Larner had a habit of staying overnight.

  ‘Apart from the two men who slept here, did he ever introduce you to any of his friends?’

  ‘Not really.’

  ‘What sort of friends did he have?’

  ‘Mainly people from the racing world, jockeys, trainers.’

  Torrence and Maigret exchanged a glance. They sensed they were getting warmer.

  ‘Did he bet on the races a lot?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘For high stakes?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Did he win?’

  ‘Almost always. He got tips.’

  ‘From jockeys and trainers?’

  ‘That’s what I understood.’

  ‘Did he ever talk to you about Maisons-Laffitte?’

  ‘He telephoned me once from there.’

  ‘At night?’

  ‘At the end of the show.’

  ‘To ask you to go and meet him?’

  ‘The opposite. To tell me he couldn’t see me.’

  ‘Did he have to spend the night there?’

  ‘I suppose.’

  ‘At an inn?’

  ‘He didn’t say.’

  ‘Thank you, Adrienne. I’m sorry to have disturbed you.’

  She seemed surprised that he wasn’t taking her with him and found it hard to believe that they hadn’t been laying a trap for her.

  ‘Which of them did the killing?’ she asked when Maigret’s hand was already on the doorknob.

  ‘Charlie. Does that surprise you?’

  ‘No. But I like the other one even less. He’s as cold as a crocodile.’

  She didn’t respond to Torrence’s wave but smiled vaguely at Maigret, who gave an almost formal bow.

  On the way downstairs, Maigret said to his colleague:

  ‘We’ll have to get her telephone tapped. Not that anything will come of it. These guys are on their guard.’

  Then, remembering Pozzo’s and Luigi’s insistent warnings about the killers, he added:

  ‘You’d better keep an eye on her. She’s not a bad girl, and it would be a pity if anything happened to her.’

  Pozzo’s restaurant was just around the corner, with Lucas still on duty nearby. Maigret had the car drive down Rue des Acacias.

  ‘Nothing to report?’

  ‘One of the guys you described to me, one of the ones playing poker dice, went in a quarter of an hour ago.’

  They were directly opposite the restaurant. Maigret allowed himself the pleasure of calmly getting out of the car, pushing open the door and touching the brim of his hat.

  ‘Hello, Pozzo.’

  Then, turning to the customer sitting at the bar, he said:

  ‘Identity card, please.’

  The guy looked like a nightclub musician or gigolo. He hesitated, seemingly looking to Pozzo for guidance, but Pozzo was looking the other way.

  Maigret wrote down his name and address in his notebook.

  Strangely he wasn’t Italian or American but Spanish, and, according to his papers, an opera singer by profession. He lived in a little hotel on Avenue des Ternes.

  ‘Thank you.’

  Maigret gave back the card, didn’t ask any questions and touched the brim of his hat once more. The Spaniard and Pozzo watched him leave in amazement.

  5.

  In which, while a certain Baron goes out on the prowl, Maigret makes the mistake of going to the cinema

  Snugly wrapped up in his overcoat in the back of the car, Maigret was watching the lights go past, thinking. As they crossed Place de la Concorde, he told the driver, ‘Make a detour via Rue des Capucines. I’ve got a telephone call to make.’

  He needed to call Quai des Orfèvres. It would only have taken five minutes to go straight there, but he quite liked the thought of revisiting the Manhattan in a different frame of mind to this morning, and, besides, having recovered his taste for whiskey without too much hardship, he wasn’t averse to having another.

  The place was full, with at least thirty faces lined up along the bar in a pall of cigarette smoke. Everyone, or almost everyone, was talking English, and a few customers were engrossed in American newspapers. Luigi and his two assistants were busy mixing drinks.

  ‘The same whiskey as this morning,’ Maigret said, and the bar owner was struck by his calm, cheerful demeanour.

  ‘Bourbon?’

  ‘You were the one who served me. I don’t know.’

  Luigi didn’t seem pleased to see him, and Maigret thought he saw him quickly scan the room, as if he wanted to check nobody was there whom Maigret shouldn’t see.

  ‘Tell me, Luigi . . .’

  ‘Just a moment . . .’

  He was pouring drinks left and right, busying himself unnecessarily as if he was trying to put off the policeman’s questions.

  ‘I was saying, Luigi, that there’s another of your countrymen I’d like to meet. Have you heard of someone called Mascarelli, also known as Sloppy Joe?’

  H
e had spoken in a normal voice while those around him were shouting to make themselves heard. But now at least ten people were looking at him curiously. He felt slightly like the man at a gathering of old ladies who has gone too far with a smutty joke.

  Luigi said flatly:

  ‘Don’t know him, don’t want to either.’

  Satisfied, Maigret headed to the phone booth.

  ‘Is that you, Janvier? Will you see if the Baron is still in the building? If he is, ask him to wait for me. If he isn’t, try to get hold of him on the telephone and ask him to come to headquarters as soon as possible. I need to see him urgently.’

  He threaded his way between the groups of people standing around, drinking. As he went to finish his whiskey, he caught sight of a face he had seen before. It was a tall, blond-haired fellow who looked as if he was straight out of an American film and who was following the inspector with his eyes.

  Luigi was too busy to say goodbye, and Maigret went back to his car. A quarter of an hour later, when he walked into his office, a man sitting in the only armchair leaped to his feet.

  It was the Baron, so called not because he had a title but because that was his surname. He didn’t belong to Maigret’s squad. For twenty-five years he had specialized in the racetracks, preferring to remain an inspector all his life rather than change jobs.

  ‘You sent for me, detective chief inspector?’

  ‘Sit down, my friend. One moment . . .’

  Maigret took off his overcoat, went next door to see if there were any messages for him and finally took a seat and filled his pipe.

  After years of going to the races, where he concentrated exclusively on the regulars in the enclosure, rather than the small fry in the public stands, the Baron had started to resemble the race-goers. Like them, he wore a pair of binoculars slung over his shoulder and, on Arc de Triomphe day, sported a pearl-grey bowler and matching spats. Some people claimed to have seen him in a monocle, which may have been true. It may also have been true, as was rumoured, that he had developed a passion for betting himself.

  ‘I’m going to explain the situation and you can tell me what you think.’

  In his career Maigret had worked in almost all the departments – Traffic, Railways, Department Stores, and even, to his extreme displeasure, the Vice Squad – but he had never had anything to do with the races.