Maigret and the Wine Merchant Read online

  ‘And you didn’t notice anything? I don’t know where your husband found the money, but it couldn’t have been easy. You weren’t aware that he was a thief? A miserable little thief who had you believe that he’d been given a pay rise. If he’s stopped coming home, it’s because he’s gone under.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘A person can keep their head above water for one or two months, but the moment comes when they go under with no hope of coming up again.’

  ‘“Would you leave us, Anne-Marie? …”

  ‘I guessed what was going to happen. I was disgusted. I went down to the yard to get some air and, half an hour later, I saw her leave. She looked away as she walked past me, but I noticed that her lipstick was smeared over her cheek.’

  Maigret said nothing. He filled a pipe and lit it. After a while, he muttered:

  ‘May I ask you a question about something that is none of my business?’

  She watched him with a certain anxiety.

  ‘Knowing him as well as you did, why did you continue to have an intimate relationship with him?’

  At first she tried to laugh off the question.

  ‘Him or another man … I needed someone …’

  Then, more seriously:

  ‘With me, he was a different person. He felt no need to put on an act, to play the braggart. Quite the opposite, he allowed his vulnerability to show.

  ‘“That’s perhaps because you don’t count, you’re just a girl and you don’t try to take advantage of me …”

  ‘He was very afraid of dying. It’s almost as if he had a premonition of what was going to happen to him.

  ‘“One of those cowards is bound to turn against me, dammit!”

  ‘“Why do you do everything you can to make people hate you?”

  ‘“Because I’m incapable of making myself loved. So, people may as well hate me with a vengeance.”’

  She ended, less spiritedly:

  ‘There. I have never heard from Pigou. I don’t know what’s become of him. It didn’t even occur to me to mention him to you, thinking probably that it was already ancient history. Then yesterday, all of a sudden, at the cinema, that I remembered that slap …’

  A little later, Maigret went downstairs, knocked on the door of the book-keeper’s office and went in. Lapointe was there, in conversation with a lacklustre young man with dark, ill-fitting clothes.

  ‘Let me introduce Monsieur Jacques Riolle, chief.’

  ‘I’ve already met him.’

  ‘Of course. I’d forgotten.’

  Riolle remained on his feet, intimidated by Maigret. His office was the darkest and gloomiest in the building, and also the one where, for some strange reason, the smell of cheap wine was the strongest. On the shelves were rows of green binders, as in a provincial accounting firm. A huge old-fashioned safe stood between the two windows, and the furniture, which must have been bought second-hand, was covered in ink stains and even scratchings like school desks.

  Overawed, Riolle shuffled from one foot to the other, and Maigret felt as if he was seeing in front of him Gilbert Pigou in his early days.

  ‘Have you finished, Lapointe?’

  ‘I was waiting for you, chief.’

  They said goodbye to the young man and, a few moments later, they got into the little black car. Lapointe sighed:

  ‘I was wondering whether you’d ever come back down. It’s boring sitting there with a fellow who’s as dull and miserable as he is.

  ‘But he did end up confiding in me. He’s not a bookkeeper, but is taking evening classes and he hopes to obtain his diploma in two years’ time. He’s engaged to a girl from back home. He’s from Nevers. They can’t get married until he gets a rise, because he doesn’t earn enough to set up home—’

  ‘Does she still live in Nevers?’

  ‘Yes. She lives with her parents and works in a haberdashery. He goes to see her once a month.’

  Lapointe was driving automatically in the direction of Quai des Orfèvres when Maigret realized where they were heading.

  ‘We’re not going back to the office right away. First drive me to 57a, Rue Froidevaux.’

  They took Boulevard Saint-Michel and turned right towards Montparnasse cemetery.

  ‘Did young Riolle ever meet his predecessor?’

  ‘No. He replied to an advertisement. It was Chabut himself who interviewed him.’

  ‘And assured himself that he was a lesser being!’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘That, with the exception of Louceck, he surrounded himself with weak, spineless people he could despise. In short, that man despised everyone, men and women, those who worked for him and the friends who visited his home. I am convinced that he slept with all those women to have the feeling of dominating them, tainting them in some way.’

  ‘We’re here, chief.’

  ‘It might be best if you don’t come up with me. I’m going to see Madame Pigou and, if there are two of us, it might look too official and frighten her. Wait for me in that little bar.’

  He pushed open the door of the concierge’s lodge.

  ‘Madame Pigou, please?’

  ‘Fourth floor on the left.’

  ‘Is she at home?’

  ‘I haven’t seen her go out, she must be there.’

  There was no lift so he had to walk up the four flights of stairs, stopping from time to time to catch his breath. The building was clean and well maintained, the staircase not too dark. On the first floor, he could hear the radio. On the second, a little boy aged four or five was sitting on a step playing with a toy car.

  On the fourth floor, he knocked at the door, because he couldn’t see a bell. He waited a good while and knocked again, annoyed at the idea that he might have to come back.

  He pressed his ear to the door but heard no sound coming from inside. Even so, he knocked for a third time, quite hard, making the door shudder on its hinges, and, this time, footsteps could be heard, or rather a sliding sound as if the person inside was wearing slippers.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Madame Pigou, please.’

  ‘Just a minute.’

  It was more than a minute before the door finally opened. A young woman stared at him curiously, clutching a dressing gown over her chest.

  ‘What are you selling?’

  ‘I’m not selling anything. I simply want to talk to you. I am Detective Chief Inspector Maigret of the Police Judiciaire.’

  She hesitated, and finally let him in.

  ‘Come in. I wasn’t feeling well and was having a little nap.’

  On entering the sitting room, she went over and closed the door to the bedroom where Maigret caught a glimpse of the unmade bed.

  ‘Have a seat,’ she said, indicating a chair.

  The window overlooked the cemetery and the tall trees lining the paths. The ‘rustic-style’ furniture, as the catalogues described it, came from a department store on Boulevard Barbès.

  There was a record player on a pedestal table and LPs scattered over the nearby divan, suggesting that Liliane was in the habit of lounging there and playing music. There was an ashtray full of cigarette butts.

  ‘Is it about my husband?’

  ‘Yes and no. Have you heard from him?’

  ‘Still nothing. I went to his office and they told me he hasn’t set foot there for six months.’

  ‘How long is it since he left you?’

  ‘Two months. It was the end of September, the day he was supposed to bring me his pay.’

  She was perched on the arm of a chair and each time her dressing gown fell open, her candy-pink nightdress was visible. It didn’t bother her. This must be what she usually wore around the house.

  ‘How long have you been married?’

  ‘Eight years. He happened to come into the shop where I was working to buy a tie. It took him ages to choose. He seemed overwhelmed. When I left that evening, he followed me. For four or five days, he walked behind me before pl
ucking up the courage to speak to me.’

  ‘Was he already living in this apartment?’

  ‘No. He lived in furnished lodgings in the Latin Quarter. He hadn’t even known me for three weeks when he asked me to marry him. I wasn’t too keen. He was a nice boy, but he was no great shakes.’

  ‘You weren’t in love with him?’

  She looked at him as she blew out her cigarette smoke.

  ‘Is there any such thing? I don’t really believe in it, you know.’

  ‘One question, Madame Pigou. Does your husband have a slight limp?’

  ‘Since he was knocked down by a car and broke his kneecap, he tends to throw out his left leg when he walks fast.’

  ‘How long ago did he have this accident?’

  ‘Before he met me.’

  ‘How long have you known him?’

  ‘Eight years. We were sort of engaged for a month, then the rest of the time we’ve been married.’

  ‘Did you carry on working?’

  ‘For three years. It couldn’t go on like that. In the morning I had to make breakfast and tidy up the place. At midday we’d meet in a restaurant for lunch, and in the evening I had to do the shopping, cook dinner and do the housework. It wasn’t a life.’

  He looked at the narrow divan covered in records and magazines, the ashtray with cigarette butts. That must be her favourite place, and perhaps that was where she’d been sleeping when he’d had to knock on the door so insistently.

  Did she have lovers? He would have sworn she did, out of idleness, out of a sort of romanticism.

  She wore a sulky expression that seemed to be her natural state.

  ‘You didn’t suspect anything until your husband disappeared?’

  ‘No. I don’t know if he went to work somewhere else, but he always left home at the same time every day and came back at the same time too.’

  ‘And he gave you the same amount at the end of each month?’

  ‘Yes. I gave him forty francs a month for his cigarettes and minor expenses.’

  ‘Weren’t you worried when he didn’t come home?’

  ‘Not really. I don’t worry easily. I telephoned his office. A man answered. I asked to speak to my husband.

  ‘“He’s not here,” he said.

  ‘“Do you know when he’ll be back?”

  ‘“I have no idea. I haven’t seen him for ages …”

  ‘He hung up. That was when I started to feel a little concerned and I went to the police station to ask if they’d heard of him, whether he’d been the victim of an accident, for example.’

  She couldn’t have been very persistent.

  ‘Do you know where he is?’ she asked.

  ‘No. I’ve come to ask you that question. Have you absolutely no idea where he could be hiding?’

  ‘Not at his father’s. He’s lived in Rue d’Alésia for over fifty years. Gilbert was born in that apartment. He’s been in the neighbourhood almost for ever. His mother’s dead. His father’s retired. He was a bank clerk in a branch of the Crédit Lyonnais.’

  ‘Did the two men get along well?’

  ‘Until he married me. I don’t think his father could stand me. Gilbert, of course, took my side, so these past few years they haven’t been on speaking terms.’

  ‘Have you informed his father of his disappearance?’

  ‘What’s the point? They only saw each other once a year anyway, on New Year’s Day. We’d go there together and we were allowed a glass of port and a cracker. The apartment felt like a bachelor pad.’

  ‘How do you explain the fact that your husband continued to bring you his pay for three months even though he’d lost his job?’

  ‘He was probably working somewhere else.’

  ‘Did you have any savings?’

  ‘Debts, rather! The refrigerator hasn’t been entirely paid for yet and I just managed to cancel the order for the dishwasher that was due to be delivered in September.’

  ‘Did he own anything of value?’

  ‘Definitely not. Even the rings he gave me are junk. You haven’t told me yet why you’re interested in him.’

  ‘His boss sacked him at the end of June, after discovering that for three years he’d been dipping rather nimbly into the till.’

  ‘Did he have a mistress?’

  ‘No. He only took very small sums. Fifty francs a month, initially.’

  ‘So that was his pay rise, then?’

  ‘Exactly. You kept on at him to talk to Monsieur Chabut and, since he didn’t have the nerve to do so – which wouldn’t have got him anywhere, by the way – he began falsifying the accounts. He increased the amount from fifty francs to a hundred. Then, last Christmas—’

  ‘The five-hundred-franc bonus!’

  She shrugged.

  ‘What an idiot! Now look where that’s got him! I hope for his sake that he found another job.’

  ‘I doubt it.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because I’ve spotted him in the street at different times of day, during office and shop opening hours.’

  ‘Has he done something? Do you have a reason to be looking for him?’

  ‘Oscar Chabut was killed last Wednesday by a man who was waiting for him outside a brothel in Rue Fortuny. Did your husband own a gun?’

  ‘A little black automatic that a friend gave him when he was still doing his military service.’

  ‘Is it still here?’

  She got up and shuffled into the bedroom where she could be heard opening and closing drawers.

  ‘I can’t see it. He probably took it with him. As far as I know, he’s never used it and I wonder whether he even had any cartridges. I don’t recall seeing any.’

  She lit another cigarette and sat down in the armchair this time.

  ‘Do you really think he’d have been capable of killing his boss?’

  ‘Chabut treated him cruelly and he once slapped his face.’

  ‘I know him. I mean, I’ve met him. That doesn’t surprise me. He’s a horrible brute.’

  ‘Did he not tell you what had happened?’

  ‘No. He only told me that he was glad to be rid of my husband and that I was well shot of him too.’

  ‘Did he give you money?’

  ‘Why are you asking me that?’

  ‘Because that would be typical of him. I can imagine what must have happened.’

  ‘Then you really have a vivid imagination.’

  ‘No, but I know how he behaved with women.’

  ‘Do you mean he treated them all in the same way?’

  ‘Yes. Did he ask to see you again?’

  ‘He took my phone number.’

  ‘But he never called you?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You haven’t answered my question about money.’

  ‘He gave me a one-thousand-franc note.’

  ‘And how have you managed since?’

  ‘I get by as best I can. I answer classified ads, but so far with no luck.’

  Maigret stood up, his body stiff, his forehead beaded with sweat.

  ‘Thank you for talking to me.’

  ‘Tell me, since you say you’ve seen him several times, you are going to be able to find him, aren’t you?’

  ‘As long as he crosses my path again and doesn’t melt into the crowd as he’s done until now.’

  ‘How does he look?’

  ‘Tired and like someone who hasn’t slept in a bed. Does he have any friends in Paris?’

  ‘I’ve never met any. We only used to socialize with one of my friends, Nadine, who lives with a musician. They’d sometimes come and spend the evening here. We’d buy a couple of bottles of wine and he’d play us his electric guitar.’

  She must have slept with the musician too, and probably plenty of others.

  ‘Goodbye, madame.’

  ‘Goodbye, inspector. If you get any news, please inform me. He’s still my husband. If he really has killed someone, I’d rather know. I assume that’s sufficient grounds
for divorce?’

  ‘I think it is.’

  Maigret wrote down the address of Pigou’s father, in Rue d’Alésia, and met up with Lapointe in the little bar, where he was reading the afternoon paper.

  ‘Well, chief?’

  ‘A little bitch. I’ve rarely seen so many unsavoury characters in the course of a single investigation. Waiter, a rum!’

  ‘Does she know anything that could give us a lead?’

  ‘No. She’s never paid him any attention. She gave up working as soon as she could and, as far as one can tell, she spends her days sprawled on a divan, playing records, chain-smoking and reading magazines. She must know about the sex lives of all the stars. When her husband disappeared, she was barely worried, and when I told her that he might have killed a man, she asked if that was sufficient grounds for divorce.’

  ‘What do we do now?’

  ‘Drop me off at Rue d’Alésia. I’d like to have a brief conversation with the father.’

  ‘Her father?’

  ‘No, his. He’s a former Crédit Lyonnais clerk, now retired. He fell out with his son when the latter got married.’

  The apartment in Rue d’Alésia was a little more opulent-looking and, to Maigret’s great relief, there was a lift. When he rang the bell, the door opened immediately.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Monsieur Pigou?’

  ‘That’s me. How can I help you?’

  ‘May I come in?’

  ‘You’re not selling encyclopaedias? Last week four of them came knocking at my door.’

  ‘Detective Chief Inspector Maigret, from the Police Judiciaire.’

  The apartment smelled of floor polish and there wasn’t a speck of dust. Every object was in its place.

  ‘Do sit down.’

  They were in a small sitting room which looked as though it wasn’t used often, and Pigou went over to draw back the curtains, which were half closed.

  ‘I hope you’re not bringing me bad news?’

  ‘Nothing has happened to your son, as far as I know. I’d simply like to ask when you last saw him.’

  ‘That’s easy. On the 1st of January.’

  And he gave a slightly bitter smile.

  ‘I had the misfortune of warning him against that girl he’d set his heart on marrying. I could see as soon as I met her that she wasn’t right for him. He got on his high horse and accused me of being a selfish old man and I don’t know what else. Before, he used to come and visit me once a week. He stopped coming and I only saw him at New Year. Since then, every year on the first of January, he has come to see me with his wife, as if fulfilling an obligation.’