Maigret and the Man on the Boulevard

by Georges Simenon

  He must have been almost as old as Mademoiselle Léone’s mother, but he had no one to take care of him. In all probability, no one ever came to see him in his lodgings, the only merit of which was a view of the Seine and of the Palais de Justice and the flower market beyond.

  “How long ago did you last see Monsieur Louis?”

  Their conversation had lasted half an hour, partly because of the old man’s frequent bouts of coughing, and partly because he was so incredibly slow over eating his egg.

  And what, in the end, had Maigret learned from him? Nothing that Léone and the concierge in the Rue de Bondy had not already told him.

  The liquidation of the firm of Kaplan had been a tragedy for Saimbron as well. He had not even attempted to find another job. He had saved a little money. For years and years, he had believed that it was enough to keep him in his old age. But owing to successive devaluations of the franc he now literally had barely enough to stave off total starvation. That boiled egg was probably his only solid food for that day.

  “I’m one of the lucky ones. I have at least been able to call this place home for the last forty years!”

  He was a widower. He had no children, and no surviving relatives.

  When Louis Thouret had been to see him and asked him for a loan, he had lent him the money without hesitation.

  “He told me it was a matter of life and death, and I could tell that he was speaking the truth.”

  Mademoiselle Léone had also been only too glad to lend him money.

  “He paid me back a few months later.”

  But had he never wondered, during those months, whether he would ever see Monsieur Louis again? If he had not done so, how would Monsieur Saimbron have managed to pay for his daily boiled egg?

  “Did he come and see you often?”

  “Two or three times. The first time was when he came to return the money. He brought me a present, a meerschaum pipe.”

  He went to fetch it from the drawer of a whatnot. No doubt he had to be sparing with his tobacco as well.

  “How long is it since you saw him last?”

  “About three weeks. He was sitting on a bench in the Boulevard Bonne-Nouvelle.”

  Was it that the old bookkeeper was so much attached to the district where he had worked for so long that he returned to it from time to time by way of pilgrimage?

  “Did you speak to him?”

  “I sat down beside him. He offered to buy me a drink in a café nearby, but I declined. The sun was shining. We chatted, and watched the world go by.”

  “Was he wearing light brown shoes?”

  “I didn’t pay any attention to his shoes. I can’t tell you, I’m afraid.”

  “Did he say anything about his job?”

  Monsieur Saimbron shook his head. Like Mademoiselle Léone, he was reluctant to discuss it. Maigret could understand why. He was growing quite attached to Monsieur Louis, though he had never seen him, except as a corpse who had met his death with a wide-eyed stare of astonishment.

  “How did your meeting end?”

  “Someone was hovering around the bench. I had the impression that he was trying to attract my friend’s attention.”

  “A man?”

  “Yes. A middle-aged man.”

  “What was he like?”

  “The sort of person one often sees sitting on a bench in that particular district. In the end, he came and sat beside us, but he didn’t speak. I got up and left. When I looked back, the two of them were deep in conversation.”

  “Did they seem friendly?”

  “They certainly weren’t having an argument.”

  And that was that. Maigret had gone down the stairs, intending to return home for lunch, but in the end had decided to eat at his usual table in the Brasserie Dauphine.

  It was a gray day. There were no glittering flecks on the Seine. He drank another small glass of Calvados with his coffee, and returned to his office, where a mass of paper work awaited him. A little later, Coméliau, the examining magistrate on the case, rang through to him.

  “What do you think of this business of Thouret? The public prosecutor took it upon himself this morning to tell me that you were working on the case. It was the usual sort of thing, a mugging or a case of thieves falling out, I presume?”

  Maigret merely grunted, preferring not to commit himself one way or the other.

  “The family want to know when they can have the body. I didn’t want to say anything definite until I had consulted you. Have you finished with it yet?”

  “Has Doctor Paul completed his examination?”

  “He’s just rung me to let me know the result. I shall have his written report by tonight. The knife punctured the left ventricle, and death was virtually instantaneous.”

  “Any signs of a struggle?”

  “None.”

  “I see no reason why the family shouldn’t collect the body as soon as they like. There’s just one thing, though. I’d be glad if you’d arrange for the clothes to be sent on to the Forensic Laboratory.”

  “I’ll see to that. Keep me in the picture, won’t you?”

  Judge Coméliau was unusually affable. This was, no doubt, because the press had barely mentioned the matter, and because he himself had come to the conclusion that it was just an ordinary case of mugging. He was not interested. No one was interested.

  Maigret poked the fire in the stove, filled his pipe and, for the next hour or so, immersed himself in his paper work, scribbling notes in the margins of some documents, and signing others. Then he made a few unimportant telephone calls.

  “May I come in, chief?”

  It was Santoni, dressed up to the nines as usual. And, as usual, reeking of hair oil, a habit which frequently caused his colleagues to protest:

  “You smell like a tart!”

  Santoni was looking very pleased with himself.

  “I think I’m on to something.”

  Maigret, evincing no emotion, looked at him with wide, troubled eyes.

  “First of all, it may interest you to know that Geber et Bachelier, the firm where the Thouret girl works, are debt collectors. Nothing very big. What they actually do is to take over hopeless defaulters for a small consideration, and then squeeze the money out of them. It isn’t so much a matter of office work as of house-to-house harassment. Mademoiselle Thouret is only in her office in the Rue de Rivoli in the mornings. Every afternoon, she’s out and about visiting the defaulters in their homes.”

  “I get it.”

  “They’re little people, mostly, because they are the ones most likely to be intimidated, and to pay up in the end. I didn’t see either of the partners. I waited outside until the staff came out at lunchtime. I took good care to avoid being seen by the young lady, and spoke to one of the other employees, a woman past her first youth, who, as it turned out, had no very warm feelings towards her colleague.”

  “And what did you find out?”

  “That our little Monique has a boyfriend.”

  “Do you know his name?”

  “All in good time, chief. They’ve known each other for about four months, and they meet every day for a set lunch at a restaurant in the Boulevard Sébastopol. He’s very young, only nineteen, and has a job as a salesman in a big bookshop in the Boulevard Saint-Michel.”

  Maigret was fiddling with the row of pipes strung out on his desk, then, although the one he was smoking was still alight, he started to fill another.

  “The kid’s name is Albert Jorisse. I thought I might as well take a look at him, so I went along to the restaurant. You never saw such a crowd! In the end, I managed to spot Monique sitting at a table, but she was on her own. I sat at a table on the opposite side of the room, and had a very nasty meal. The young lady seemed very much on edge, and never stopped glancing toward the door.”

  “Did he arrive eventually?”

  “No. She made her food last as long as she could. In a dump of that sort, the meals are served with the utmost speed, and dawdli
ng is frowned on. In the end, she had no choice but to get up and go, but she hung about outside, pacing up and down for nearly a quarter of an hour.”

  “What happened next?”

  “She was so concerned about the young man, that she didn’t notice me. Next she made for the Boulevard Saint-Michel. I followed her. You know that big corner bookshop, where they have trays of books outside on the pavement?”

  “Yes, I know the one you mean.”

  “Well, she went in there, and spoke to one of the salesmen, who referred her to the cashier. I could see that she was being very persistent, but to no avail. In the end, looking very crestfallen, she left.”

  “Didn’t you follow her?”

  “I thought I’d do better to concentrate on the young man, so I, in my turn, went into the bookshop, and asked the manager whether he knew anyone of the name of Albert Jorisse. He said yes, he worked in the shop, but only in the mornings. When I expressed surprise, he explained that it was common practice with them, as most of their employees were students, who were unable to work full time.”

  “Is Jorisse a student?”

  “Give me a chance! I wanted to know how long he’d been working there. The manager had to consult his records. He’s been with the firm for just over a year. At the beginning, he worked full time. Then, after he’d been there for about three months, he said he was going to work for a law degree, and henceforth could only come in in the mornings.”

  “Do you know his address?”

  “He lives with his parents in the Avenue de Châtillon, almost opposite the church of Montrouge. But that’s not all. Albert Jorisse didn’t turn up at the shop today. It’s not the first time, it happens two or three times a year, but, up to now, he’s always telephoned to let them know. Today, he didn’t.”

  “Was he there yesterday?”

  “Yes. I thought you’d be interested, so I took a taxi to the Avenue de Châtillon. His parents are thoroughly respectable people. They have a flat on the third floor. It’s spotlessly clean. His mother was busy ironing.”

  “Did you tell her you were a police officer?”

  “No. I said her son was a friend of mine, and I needed to see him urgently.”

  “Did she suggest you went to the bookshop?”

  “Exactly. She doesn’t know a thing. He left home this morning at a quarter past eight, as usual. She’s never heard a word about this law degree project. Her husband works for a wholesaler in fabrics in the Rue de la Victoire. They couldn’t afford to pay for a higher education for their son.”

  “What did you do next?”

  “I pretended I thought I was on the wrong tack, and that her son probably wasn’t the Jorisse I was looking for. I asked her whether she had a photograph of her son. She took me to see the one on the dresser in the dining room. She’s a good soul, and she doesn’t suspect a thing. All she ever thinks about is reheating her iron, and making sure she doesn’t scorch the linen. I stayed on for a while, talking sweet nothings…”

  Maigret made no comment, but listened with a marked lack of enthusiasm. It was plain to see that Santoni had not been working under him for long. Everything he said—and even his manner of saying it—was out of tune with the way Maigret’s mind, and indeed the minds of his closest associates, worked.

  “On the way out, taking care not to let her see what I was doing…”

  Maigret held out his hand.

  “Give it here.”

  As if he didn’t know that Santoni had pinched the photograph! It showed a thin youth with a nervous expression and very long hair, the sort whom women often find attractive, and who know it.

  “Is that all?”

  “We’ll have to wait and see whether he goes home tonight, won’t we?”

  Maigret sighed:

  “Yes, we’ll have to wait and see.”

  “Anything the matter?”

  “Of course not.”

  What was the use? Santoni would learn in time, as others had learned before him. It was always the same when one took on an inspector from some other branch of the Service.

  “The reason I didn’t follow the girl was that I know where to find her. Every evening at about half-past five, or a quarter to six at the latest, she calls in at the office to hand over the money she has collected, and write her report. Do you want me to go there?”

  Maigret hesitated on the brink of telling him to drop the whole thing. But he thought better of it. It would have been unfair. After all, the inspector had done his best.

  “Just check that she does go back to the office, as usual, and then make sure she goes off to catch her train.”

  “Maybe her boyfriend will be waiting for her there?”

  “Maybe. What time does he usually get home in the evening?”

  “They have dinner at seven. He’s always in by then, even if he has to go out again later.”

  “They’re not on the telephone, I suppose?”

  “No.”

  “What about the concierge?”

  “I don’t think she is either. It’s not the sort of place where you’d expect to find telephones. But I’ll check.”

  He consulted the street directory.

  “You’d better go back there some time after seven, and see what you can find out from the concierge. Leave the photograph with me.”

  Santoni had taken the photograph, there was no going back on it, Maigret thought. So he might as well keep it. It could come in useful.

  “Will you be staying here in your office?”

  “I don’t know where I shall be, but keep in touch with our people here.”

  “What shall I do between now and then? I’ve got nearly two hours to kill before setting out for the Rue de Rivoli.”

  “Go down and have a word with the Licensed Premises chaps. They may have a registration form in the name of Louis Thouret.”

  “You mean you think he took a room somewhere in town?”

  “Where do you suppose he left his brown shoes and colorful tie when he went home?”

  “That’s a thought.”

  It was now fully two hours since Monsieur Louis’s photograph had appeared in the afternoon editions of the newspapers. It was only a small photograph, tucked away in a corner, and the caption read:

  Louis Thouret, murdered yesterday afternoon in a cul-de-sac off the Boulevard Saint-Martin. The police are on the track of the killer.

  It wasn’t true, but that was what the papers invariably said. It was odd, come to think of it, that the chief superintendent had not yet received a single telephone call. If the truth were told, it was chiefly on this account that he had decided to return to the office and, while he was about it, clear his in-tray.

  Almost always, in a case of this sort, there were people who believed, rightly or wrongly, that they recognized the victim. Or they claimed to have seen an unsavory looking character lurking near the scene of the crime. More often than not such claims were unfounded. All the same, every now and again, one or more of these people would lead him to the truth.

  For the past three years, Monsieur Louis, as he was known to his former colleagues and to the concierge in the Rue de Bondy, had left Juvisy at the same time every morning. Morning and evening, he never missed his usual trains. He continued to take his lunch with him, wrapped in a square of oilcloth, as he had always done.

  But how had he spent his time, after he had got off the train at the Gare de Lyon? That was still a mystery.

  Except, that is, for the first few months, when, in all probability, he had spent every moment desperately looking for another job. Like so many others, he must have joined the queues outside the offices of one of the newspapers, waiting to pounce on the Situations Vacant columns. Maybe he had even tried his hand at selling vacuum cleaners from door to door?

  Apparently he had not succeeded, since he had been driven to borrow money from Mademoiselle Léone and the old bookkeeper.

  After that, for several months, he had disappeared from view. By this time, h
e had not only somehow had to lay his hands on a sum of money equivalent to his salary at Kaplan’s, but also to pay back the two loans.

  During all that time, he had returned home every evening, just as if nothing had happened, and looking every inch the family breadwinner.

  His wife had suspected nothing. Nor had his daughter, nor his sisters-in-law, nor his two brothers-in-law, who both worked on the railways.

  And then, one day, he had turned up at the Rue de Clignancourt to pay his debt to Mademoiselle Léone, armed with a present for her, and sweets for her aged mother.

  Not to mention the fact that he had taken to wearing light brown shoes!

  Had those brown shoes of his anything to do with the keen interest that Maigret was beginning to take in the fellow? He would certainly never admit it, even to himself. He too had longed at one time to own a pair of goose-dung shoes. They had been all the rage then, like those very short fawn raincoats, known at that time as bum-freezers.

  Once, early on in his married life, he had made up his mind to buy a pair of light brown shoes, and had felt himself blushing as he went into the shop. Come to think of it, the shop was in the Boulevard Saint-Martin, just opposite the Théâtre de l’Ambigu. He had not dared to put them on at first. Then, when he had finally plucked up the courage to open the parcel in the presence of his wife, she had looked at him, and then laughed in rather an odd way.

  “You surely don’t intend to wear those things?”

  He never had worn them. It was she who had taken them back to the shop, on the pretext that they pinched his feet.

  Louis Thouret had also bought a pair of light brown shoes, and that, in Maigret’s view, was symbolic.

  It was above all, Maigret was convinced, a symbol of liberation. Whenever he wore those shoes, he must have thought of himself as a free man, which meant that, until the moment when he changed back into his black shoes, his wife, sisters-in-law, and brothers-in-law had no hold on him.

  The shoes meant something else as well. On the day when Maigret had bought his pair, he had just been informed by the superintendent of the Saint-Georges District, whose subordinate he was at the time, that he was to have a rise in salary of ten francs a month. And, in those days, ten francs really were ten francs.