‘Is he your father?’ the inspector asked the girl in the nightdress.
She didn’t seem to understand. Too many things were going on at the same time. The landlord of the bar stepped in and said:
‘Gassin was already pretty drunk. He must have slipped off the gangplank.’
‘And the other man?’
The doctor was undressing the other man.
‘Émile Ducrau, the one who owns tugs and quarries. He lives over there.’
He motioned to the tall house. The venetian blinds on the first floor were still leaking thin streams of light and the windows on the second still showed pink.
‘On the second floor?’
Bystanders explained hesitantly:
‘First,’ said one.
Another added mysteriously:
‘On the second too. I mean, he’s got somebody on the second floor.’
‘You mean he’s been playing house with somebody else?’
High above them the window of the pink room shut, and the blind came down.
‘Anyone told the family?’
‘No. We were waiting to know what was happening.’
‘Go and put some stockings on,’ one boatman said to his wife. ‘And fetch me my cap.’
And so, from time to time figures were observed moving from one boat to the next. Through hatches and portholes oil-lamps could be seen, and even framed photographs were visible hanging on pine walls.
The doctor said in the inspector’s ear:
‘You’d better call the chief. This man was knifed before being thrown into the water.’
‘Is he dead?’
It was as if the drowned man had been waiting for just that question to open his eyes and, with a gasp, cough up water. He was seeing everything at an angle because he was lying on his back, so that his horizon was the star-studded sky. From where he was, the people round him rose giant-like into the heavens, legs resembling interminable columns. He said nothing. Perhaps he was not yet thinking anything. He looked with eyes that were slow and flinty, but gradually they relaxed and became less fixed.
His gasp must have been audible, for everyone started forward at the same instant, and suddenly the policemen imposed the usual, official order on proceedings, that is that they formed into a line, held back the crowd and let through only those who needed to be there.
The man on the ground saw the space around him empty and then a lot of police uniforms and silver-braided police headgear. He continued dribbling greyish water, which ran over his chin down on to his chest, while his arms were being continuously pumped. They were his arms. He watched their movements out of curiosity and frowned when someone at the back of the crowd said:
‘Is he dead?’
Old Gassin got to his feet, without relaxing his hold on the bottle. He took three faltering steps, parked himself between the rescued man’s legs and spoke to him. His speech so thick and his tongue so clotted that no one understood a single word.
But Ducrau saw him. He did not take his eyes off him. He was thinking. He seemed to be racking his memory …
‘Move further back!’ the doctor said crossly and he pushed Gassin so roughly that the drunk went sprawling on the ground, broke his bottle and stayed where he was, moaning and fuming, as he tried to fend off his daughter, who was bending over him.
Another car stopped on the quay above and a new group formed around the police chief.
‘Is he fit to be questioned?’
‘No harm trying.’
‘You think he’ll pull round?’
It was the man, Émile Ducrau, himself who replied, with a smile. It was a peculiar smile, still not fully formed, more a grimace, but everyone had a clear sense that it was an answer to the question.
Somewhat uncertainly the police chief acknowledged him by removing his hat.
‘I’m glad to see that you’re feeling better.’
It was awkward speaking down from a height to a man whose face was turned up to the sky above while the rescue team were still working on him.
‘Were you attacked? Was it far from here? Do you know where exactly you were stabbed and then thrown into the water?’
Water was still coming out of his mouth, in weak spurts. Émile Ducrau was in no hurry to reply or even to try to speak. He turned his head a little because just then the girl in white passed through his field of vision, and his eyes followed her until she reached the gangway.
She had gone, with the help of a neighbour, to make coffee for her father, who resisted whenever anyone suggested he should go home to bed.
‘Do you remember what happened?’
And since he was still not responding, the police chief took the doctor to one side and asked:
‘Do you think he understands?’
‘I’d say so.’
‘But …’
They had their backs to the prone man when they were stupefied to hear him say:
‘… you’re hurting me!’
All eyes turned to him. He was showing signs of impatience. It seemed that trying to speak was a great effort to him. Moving one arm painfully, he added:
‘Wanna go home.’
What his hand was trying to do was to point at the house on six floors, a little way off behind him. The police chief looked rather put out and hesitated.
‘Sorry to insist, but it’s my job. Did you see your attackers? Did you recognize them? Maybe they haven’t gone very far.’
Their eyes met. Émile Ducrau’s gaze was steady. Yet he did not answer.
‘There’s going to have to be an investigation, and the prosecutor’s office is bound to ask me if …’
What happened next was unexpected. The shapeless bulk, which had looked so limp as it lay on the light-coloured stones of the unloading wharf, roused itself briefly and pushed away everything that cramped its movements.
‘… go home!’ Ducrau said again in a fury.
There was a feeling that if they went on opposing his wishes he might turn very nasty and even summon up enough strength to stand up and set about those crowding round him.
‘Go easy!’ exclaimed the doctor. ‘You’ll make the wound bleed.’
But the man with the bull’s neck didn’t care, he had suddenly had enough of lying flat on his back in the middle of a lot of gawping people.
‘Take him home,’ sighed the police chief with a gesture of resignation.
The stretcher from Lock No. 1 had been brought. Ducrau didn’t want to be carried on a stretcher. He growled a refusal. They had to carry him by his arms, legs and shoulders. While he was being helped away, he looked angrily at the bystanders, and the bystanders made way because they were afraid of him.
The procession crossed the street. The police chief called a halt.
‘Hold it there. I must go up and warn his wife.’
He rang the bell while the men who were carrying him waited under the green gaslight which marked the stop for trams and buses.
Meanwhile, a number of boatmen were having a very hard time carrying old Gassin across the gangplank of the Golden Fleece. He was dead drunk. He had also cut his hand on a shard of glass from the bottle.
2.
When, two days later, Detective Chief Inspector Maigret stepped off the number 13 tram opposite the two bars, it was ten in the morning and, standing on the kerb with the sun shining directly into his eyes and his ears filled with noise, there he remained for some time, scowling, while lorries white with cement dust thundered past between him and the canal.
He had not been present when the public prosecutor’s people visited the crime scene, and his knowledge of the area, as of the case itself, was theoretical. On the small map which had been drawn for him, it looked simple: canal to the right, with the lock and Gassin’s boat moored on the unloading wharf; to the left, the two bars, the tall house and, at the far end, the dance hall.
Perhaps that was how it really was: flat, a scene with no perspective, no depth, no life. But not quite: the barges, for e
xample. There were fifty in the reach above the lock, some lying next to the quay, others tucked snugly against them and still more manoeuvring slowly in the sunshine. And then there was the road, full of endless movement, led by heavy lorries, which created noise wherever they went.
The soul of the townscape, however, was elsewhere, or at least its heart was, for its beating made the air itself pulsate. This heart was a tall misshapen structure which stood by the water’s edge, a tower of metal girders which by night would be no more than a patch of grey but by day spat out noise through its steel plates, iron girders and pulleys as it crushed stone which clattered down on to screens and then was conveyed away, through the din, to be deposited on smoking heaps of dust.
On the top of the tower could be made out a blue enamel plate: Émile Ducrau Enterprises.
Washing was drying on clothes lines slung above the barges. A fair-haired young woman was throwing a bucket of water over the deck of the Golden Fleece.
Another number 13 tram clanked by, then another, and Maigret, who was basking in the warmth, his skin damp and sensual as it never is except in the rays of the first April sunshine, set off dutifully towards the tall house. He could not see anyone behind the glass windows of the concierge’s lodge. There was a stair carpet, dark-red and worn. The stairs were varnished and the walls painted to look like marble. The landing, with its three dark doors and the bright gleam of one highly polished brass door knob, smelled of dust, mediocrity and respectability. A shaft of sunlight slanted across an inner court and, sidling through a gable window, gilded the stairwell.
Maigret rang twice or three times. After the second ring he heard sounds from inside, but five minutes went by before the door opened.
‘Does Monsieur Ducrau live here?’
‘He does. Come in.’
The maid was red-cheeked, too flustered and Maigret smiled as he looked at her, though he could not have said why exactly. She was plump and inviting, especially when seen from behind, for her features, which were coarse and of a hard, irregular cast, were a disappointment.
‘Who shall I say is calling?’
‘Police Judiciaire.’
She headed for a door but had to stoop to pull up one stocking. She took another couple of steps and then, judging that she was hidden by the door, she refastened her suspender and pulled her girdle down while Maigret’s smile grew broader. Whispering came from the next room. The girl returned.
‘Please come this way.’
The smile on Maigret’s face was not entirely down to the sun. It rose to his lips from deep down, and he stood there beaming. Already in the hallway, virtually as soon as he set foot on the doormat, he had sensed what was going on and by the time he spoke he was absolutely sure:
‘Monsieur Ducrau?’
His eyes were laughing; his lips instinctively formed into an amused curl, and from that moment the truth was tacitly admitted by the two men. Ducrau looked at the maid, at his visitor and then at his red plush armchair. Then he tidied his thick mop of hair, which did not need tidying, and smiled back, a smile of gratification which was slightly awkward but pleased all the same.
Sunshine streamed through three windows. One of them was wide open and let in so much noise from the street and the racketing crushing mill that when Maigret tried to speak he could hardly hear the sound of his own voice.
Émile Ducrau had resumed his seat in his armchair with a sigh of relief. It was obvious that despite appearance he was not yet back to full strength. A dew of perspiration remained on his forehead after his gambol with the maid, and his breathing was rapid. Even so, the evening before, the prosecutor’s investigators had been amazed to see sitting up in an armchair a man they had fully expected to find prostrate in his bed.
He was wearing slippers and a nightshirt with red embroidery on the collar under his old jacket, and the same shabby anything-goes attitude was visible in every detail of his living room, with its unremarkable furniture which was thirty or forty years old, in the black and gold frames containing photographs of tugs, and the roll-top desk which stood in one corner.
‘Are you the one who’s in charge of the investigation?’
His smile steadily faded. Ducrau grew serious again, his gaze inquisitive and a hint of aggression already in his voice.
‘I suppose you’ve already got your own theory about what happened? No? That’s good, though I’m surprised to hear that coming from a policeman!’
He had not set out to be disagreeable. It was just the way he was. From time to time, he scowled, probably because the wound in his back was giving him pain.
‘You must have something to drink. Mathilde! … Mathilde! … For God’s sake, Mathilde!’
In the end the girl came, her hands covered with soap suds.
‘Pour two glasses of white wine! The good stuff!’
He filled the chair with his bulk. That and the fact that his feet were resting on an embroidered cushion made his legs look shorter.
‘Well, then, what have they been telling you?’
He had the habit, when speaking, of darting little glances out of the window, towards the lock. Suddenly he growled:
‘Ach! They’ve let themselves be overtaken by one of Poliet & Chausson’s cement boats!’
Maigret saw a loaded barge, its hull painted yellow, slowly nosing its way into the chamber of the lock. Behind it, another barge, marked with a blue triangle, was hove to on the canal and some people, three or four of them, were waving their arms and clearly shouting insults at each other.
‘All boats showing a blue triangle belong to me,’ Ducrau explained, pointing the maid, who had just come in, to a chair, saying:
‘Put the bottle and the glasses down there. We don’t stand on ceremony, here, inspector … Now what was I saying? Ah yes! I’m curious to know what people are making of this business.’
Beneath his bluff good humour lay an undercurrent of malevolence, and the longer he looked at Maigret the more apparent this malevolence became, perhaps because physically the inspector was as burly and powerful as he was, only on a bigger scale, and because in the apartment his calmness suggested a large, immovable object.
‘I was given the case file this morning,’ he said.
‘Have you read it?’
The front door opened, someone walked through the hall and came into the room. It was a woman of about fifty, thin, sad-looking, who was carrying a net shopping bag. She spoke apologetically:
‘I’m sorry, I didn’t know …’
Maigret was already on his feet.
‘Madame Ducrau, I assume? Very pleased to meet you.’
She gave an awkward nod and left the room backwards. She could be heard talking to the maid, and that same smile of Maigret’s came back, for he could now imagine the details of the morning’s goings-on more clearly than earlier.
‘My wife has never managed to get out of the habit of doing housework,’ muttered Ducrau. ‘She could pay ten servants if she wanted to but she still does all the shopping herself!’
‘You began as master of a tug, I believe?’
‘I started the way everybody starts, at the bottom! The tub was called the Eagle. I acquired her by marrying the owner’s daughter, who you’ve just met. As of now, the fleet of Eagles has reached number twenty-four. In this port alone, there are two who are going up as far as Dizy today, and I’ve been told there are five coming downstream. All the river pilots in both the bars down below work for me. I’ve already bought up eighteen barges, some store-boats, two dredgers …’
His eyes grew narrower and narrower until all they were seeing were Maigret’s eyes.
‘Is that what you wanted to know?’
Then, turning towards the door:
‘Keep quiet out there!’ he yelled to the two invisible women, whose voices could be heard no louder than a murmur.
‘Your very good health! They must have told you that I’m offering the police a reward of twenty thousand francs if they catch the man who attacke
d me, which is why, I imagine, they’ve sent me a top man. What are you looking at?’
‘Nothing special. The canal, the lock, the boats …’
Through the windows the bright, glowing landscape was positively bustling with life. Seen from above, the barges seemed more ponderous, as though they were bogged down in water that was too dense. Standing in his wherry, a boatman was putting a coat of grey bitumen paint on the hull of his boat which rose two metres out of the water. And there were dogs, chickens in a wire-netting coop, and the girl with fair hair was on deck, polishing the brasses. People came and went past the sluices, and the boats which had gone down through the lock appeared to hesitate before letting themselves be taken by the current of the Seine.
‘So in a word, all that is in a manner of speaking yours?’
‘No, not all. But all the people you see down there depend in some way or other on me, especially since I bought the chalk quarries, out in the sticks, in Champagne.’
All the furniture in the apartment looked like the furniture which is piled high in auction rooms to be sold off on Saturdays, when the hard-up come in search of a second-hand table or washstand. A smell of onions frying wafted in from the kitchen. It was accompanied by the sizzling sound of butter on the stove.
‘One question, if I may. The report states that you don’t remember anything that happened before the moment they pulled you from the water.’
Ducrau, wary-eyed, was clipping the end of a cigar.
‘At what time exactly did you stop remembering? Could you, for example, tell me what you did on the evening before last?’
‘My daughter and her husband came here to dinner. Her husband is an infantry captain based at Versailles. They come every Wednesday.’
‘You also have a son?’
‘Yes. He’s at the École de Chartes in Paris, but we don’t see a lot of him at home. I’ve given him his own room on the fifth floor.’
‘So you didn’t see him that evening?’
Ducrau did not reply at once. He did not take his eyes off Maigret and, as he puffed slowly on his cigar, he weighed each question he was asked and every word he spoke.
‘Listen, inspector. I’m going to say something important and I advise you not to forget it if you want us to get along together. No one ever gets the better of Mimile! That’s me, Mimile. It’s what they called me when I had my first tug, and to this day there are lock-keepers in the Haute-Marne who don’t know me as anything else. Do you understand me? I’m no more of a fool than you are. In this business, I’m the one who has paid! I’m the one who was knifed! I’m the one who brought you here!’
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