Maigret and the Killer Page 8

  ‘His country house was nearly burgled last night. Don’t you listen to the radio?’

  ‘Only on the beach, when it’s playing music.’

  She helped him put the cassettes in the suitcase, then added the notebook that served as a catalogue.

  ‘Don’t you have any more questions to ask me? You can always come and question me, and I promise to answer you as frankly as I have done so far.’

  She was visibly excited to be helping the police.

  ‘I won’t walk you back to the door, because I’m not dressed to walk past the mortuary room. People would see it as a lack of respect. Why do we suddenly have to respect someone when they’re dead, when you were dismissive of them when they were alive?’

  Maigret left, a little encumbered by his suitcase, particularly when he passed in front of the concierge. He was lucky enough to see a woman getting out of a taxi and paying the driver, so he didn’t have to wait to find one.

  ‘Quai des Orfèvres.’

  He wondered who to entrust with the recordings of Antoine Batille. He needed someone with a good knowledge of the places where the recordings were made, and who was familiar with the people who frequented them.

  Eventually he went to the end of the corridor to find his colleague in the Vice Squad.

  Since he was holding his suitcase, his colleague asked him ironically:

  ‘Have you come to say goodbye before moving house?’

  ‘I have some recordings here, most of them taken on the edge of Paris, in dance halls, cafés and bistros.’

  ‘Am I supposed to be interested in that?’

  ‘Maybe not, but I am, and it may have something to do with an ongoing case.’

  ‘The one in Rue Popincourt?’

  ‘Between ourselves, yes. I’d rather no one knew. One of your men must know these places, and perhaps the recordings will mean something to him.’

  ‘I understand. Spotting a dangerous individual, for example. Somebody who, for fear of being compromised …’

  ‘That’s it exactly.’

  ‘Old Mangeot. He’s been in the job for almost forty years. He knows the fauna of those places better than anybody.’

  He wasn’t a stranger to Maigret.

  ‘Has he got any free time?’

  ‘I’ll see to it that he does.’

  ‘Does he know how to use those contraptions? I’ll go and get the tape recorder from my office.’

  When he came back, a sad man with soft features and dull eyes was standing in the office of the head of the Vice Squad.

  He was one of the low-wage-earners in the Police Judiciaire, one of the men who, for want of a certain basic training, remain at the bottom of the heap for their whole lives. By dint of walking around Paris, they acquire the posture of butlers and café waiters who stand up all day. They almost assume the same dull colour as the impoverished areas that they patrol.

  ‘I know these machines,’ he said immediately. ‘Are there a lot of cassettes?’

  ‘About fifty. Maybe a few more.’

  ‘At half an hour per cassette. Is it urgent?’

  ‘Quite urgent.’

  ‘I’ll give him an office where he won’t be disturbed,’ the head of the Vice Squad broke in.

  They explained in detail to Mangeot what was expected of him; he nodded to show that he had understood and went off with the suitcase while Maigret’s colleague said in an undertone:

  ‘Don’t worry. He looks soft in the head. He definitely has no illusions, but he’s still one of my most precious collaborators. A kind of hunting dog. We let him sniff a trail, and off he goes, head down.’

  Maigret went back to his office, and he hadn’t been there for ten minutes before the examining magistrate called him.

  ‘I’ve tried to get through to you several times. First of all, congratulations on last night’s haul.’

  ‘Rue des Saussaies did all that.’

  ‘I went to see the prosecutor, who is delighted. They’re bringing me the four young men at three o’clock this afternoon. I’d like you to be in my office, because you know the case better than I do. When we’ve dealt with the burglaries, if you think it’s useful you can bring them down to your office. I know you have a special way of carrying out your interrogations.’

  ‘Thank you. I’ll be in your office at three o’clock.’

  He opened the door to the inspectors’ office.

  ‘Are you free for lunch, Janvier?’

  ‘Yes, chief. I’ll finish my report and …’

  There were always reports, there was always paperwork.

  ‘What about you, Lapointe?’

  ‘You know I’m always free.’

  Because that meant that all three of them were going to go for lunch in the Brasserie Dauphine.

  ‘We’ll meet at twelve thirty.’

  Maigret didn’t forget to call his wife, and she asked him as usual:

  ‘Do you think you’ll be back for dinner? A shame about lunch. I had snails.’

  As if by chance, every time he didn’t come back for a meal it was something of which he was particularly fond.

  But perhaps they had snails at the Brasserie Dauphine as well …

  At three o’clock, when Maigret stepped into the long corridor with the offices of the examining magistrates on either side, the flashes of the photographers went off as a dozen journalists came charging towards him.

  ‘Are you coming to interrogate the gangsters?’

  He tried to dodge them without giving an answer either way.

  ‘Why are you here, and not Detective Chief Inspector Grosjean?’

  ‘Goodness, I have no idea. Ask the examining magistrate.’

  ‘You’re the one in charge of the Rue Popincourt case, aren’t you?’

  He had no reason to deny it.

  ‘Might there by any chance be a connection between the two cases?’

  ‘Gentlemen, I have no statement to make for now.’

  ‘You won’t answer no?’

  ‘You would be wrong to draw any conclusions.’

  ‘You were in Jouy-en-Josas last night, isn’t that right?’

  ‘I won’t deny it.’

  ‘In what capacity?’

  ‘My colleague Grosjean will be able to give you a more authoritative answer than I can.’

  ‘Was it your men who discovered the trail of the thieves in Paris?’

  The four men arrested the previous night were sitting on two benches on either side of the magistrate’s door, handcuffs around their wrists, surrounded by gendarmes, and they were not unamused by the scene.

  A short but bulky lawyer appeared from the far end of the corridor, his gown flapping like wings. Noticing the inspector, he walked towards him and shook his hand.

  ‘How are things, Maigret?’

  A flash. The handshake had been photographed, as if the whole scene had been prepared in advance.

  ‘So what brings you here?’

  Monsieur Huet asked that question in front of the journalists, and not by chance. He was skilful and quick-witted and was in the habit of defending high-level members of the underworld. Very cultured, a lover of music and theatre, he attended every dress rehearsal and major concert.

  ‘What’s keeping us from going in?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Maigret replied, not without irony.

  And the little man with the broad shoulders knocked at the magistrate’s door, opened it and gestured to Maigret to come in with him.

  ‘Hello, my dear judge. I hope you’re not too disappointed to see me here? My clients …’

  The magistrate shook the lawyer’s hand, and Maigret’s.

  ‘Take a seat, gentlemen. I will bring in the accused. I imagine that you aren’t afraid of them, and that I can leave the gendarmes outside.’

  He had the handcuffs removed. The rather cramped office was full. The clerk stood at one end of the table that served as a desk. An extra chair had to be brought from a storeroom. The four men stood on either s
ide of their lawyer, and Maigret had sat down slightly apart from the others, in the background.

  ‘First of all, as you know, I must identify the accused. You are each to respond when your name is called out. Julien Mila …’

  ‘Here.’

  ‘Your surname, first names, current address, place and date of birth, profession …’

  ‘Milat with a t?’ asked the clerk, who was writing.

  ‘With an a, nothing more.’

  It went on for quite a long time. Demarle, the man with the scar and the biceps of a fairground wrestler, was born in Quimper. He had been a sailor, and for now he was registered unemployed.

  ‘Your address?’

  ‘Here and there. I always find a friend to put me up.’

  ‘In other words, you’re homeless?’

  ‘With what we got on unemployment benefit, you know …’

  The fourth man, the lookout, was a poor, sickly-looking man who claimed to be an errand-boy and lived in Rue du Mont-Cenis, in Montmartre.

  ‘How long have you been part of the gang?’

  ‘Excuse me, your honour,’ Huet cut in. ‘First of all, we have to establish that there is indeed a gang.’

  ‘I was just about to ask you a question. Which of these men do you represent?’

  ‘All four of them.’

  ‘Don’t you think that during the preliminary hearing a conflict might arise between them as the result of a divergence of interests?’

  ‘I severely doubt it, and if it did happen, I would call on my colleagues. Do you agree, gentlemen?’

  All four of them nodded.

  ‘Since we’re still asking the preliminary questions, I was about to ask questions about ethical matters,’ Huet continued with an ominous smile. ‘You should be aware that since this morning this case has aroused a great deal of interest in the press. I’ve received quite a large number of phone calls, in the course of which I have collected information that has left me surprised, if not indeed shocked.’

  He leaned back and lit a cigarette. The magistrate, faced with this prince of the bar, couldn’t help feeling nervous.

  ‘I’m listening.’

  ‘The arrest, in fact, was not carried out in the usual style of apprehensions of this kind. Three radio cars, including a van full of plainclothes inspectors, arrived on the scene at more or less the same time as my clients, as if the police were aware of what was going to happen. And yet taking his place at the head of this procession was Detective Chief Inspector Maigret here, and two of his colleagues. Is that correct, Detective Chief Inspector?’

  ‘It is correct.’

  ‘I see that my informant was not mistaken.’

  Someone from Rue des Saussaies, probably, perhaps a clerk or a typist?

  ‘I thought, I have always thought, that the territory of Quai des Orfèvres was limited to Paris. Let us say greater Paris, of which Jouy-en-Josas is not a part.’

  He had got what he wanted. He had taken control of operations, and the magistrate no longer knew how to reduce him to silence.

  ‘Might it not be because the information about – shall we say this attempted burglary – came from the Police Judiciaire? You aren’t answering, Maigret?’

  ‘I have nothing to say.’

  ‘Weren’t you there?’

  ‘I’m not here to be questioned.’

  ‘However, I am going to ask you another more important question. Is it not the case that, while investigating a different case, also recent, you happened by chance upon this one?’

  Maigret remained silent.

  ‘Please, Monsieur Huet,’ the magistrate cut in.

  ‘Just one moment. Some inspectors from the Police Judiciaire have been identified to me as having mounted a stakeout, over the past two days, opposite Émile Branchu’s shop. Detective Chief Inspector Maigret in person has been seen twice in a café in Bastille where my clients happened to meet the day before yesterday, and he questioned the waiters and tried to weasel out information from the manager. Is that correct? Forgive me, your honour, but I would like to put this case in its true perspective, which is perhaps not the one that you know.’

  ‘Have you finished, Monsieur Huet?’

  ‘For now.’

  ‘Can I question the first of the accused? Julien Mila, please tell me who alerted you to Philippe Lherbier’s villa, and who talked to you about the valuable paintings it contains.’

  ‘I advise my client not to answer.’

  ‘I’m not answering.’

  ‘You are suspected of participating in the twenty-one burglaries of villas and chateaus which have taken place over the last two years in the same circumstances.’

  ‘I have nothing to say.’

  ‘All the more,’ the lawyer cut in, ‘in that you have no evidence.’

  ‘I repeat my first question, extending it to the other cases. Who alerted you to these villas and chateaus? Who, then, probably the same person, took charge of the sale of the stolen paintings and artworks?’

  ‘I don’t know anything about any of that.’

  The magistrate, with a sigh, turned his attention to the framer, and Mimile proved no more talkative. As to Demarle the sailor, he was enjoying himself playing the clown.

  The only one with a different attitude was the lookout, the one who was called Gouvion and who was of no fixed abode.

  ‘I don’t know what I’m doing here. I don’t know these gentlemen. I found myself in the area in search of a place to kip that wasn’t too cold.’

  ‘Is that also your point of view, Monsieur Huet?’

  ‘I agree with him completely, and I should point out that this man has no criminal record.’

  ‘Does nobody have anything to add?’

  ‘I would like to ask a question, at the risk of repeating myself. What is Detective Chief Inspector Maigret’s role in this? And what will happen when we leave this office?’

  ‘I am not obliged to reply.’

  ‘Does that mean that another interrogation will take place, not at the Palais de Justice, but in the offices of the Police Judiciaire, to which I have no access? In other words, that it will involve not burglary, but another case entirely?’

  ‘I apologize, Monsieur Huet, but I have nothing to tell you. You’ll probably want to ask your clients to sign the provisional statement, which will be typed up, by tomorrow, in four copies.’

  ‘You may sign them, gentlemen.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  And, rising to his feet, the examining magistrate walked towards the door, followed reluctantly by the lawyer.

  ‘I must express my reservations …’

  ‘I have noted them.’

  Then, to the gendarmes:

  ‘Please put the handcuffs back on the prisoners and take them to the Police Judiciaire. You can go through the communicating door. Would you stay for a moment, please, detective chief inspector?’

  Maigret sat down again.

  ‘What do you think?’

  ‘I think that right now Monsieur Huet is busy informing the press and blowing this case out of proportion so that from tomorrow, perhaps even in this evening’s final editions, it will be spread across two columns.’

  ‘Does that bother you?’

  ‘I wonder … Just now I would have said yes. My intention was to keep the two cases very separate from one another, and to make sure that the newspapers didn’t get them mixed up. Now …’

  He thought for a moment, weighing up the pros and cons.

  ‘Perhaps it’s better that way. By creating a stir, there is a chance that …’

  ‘Do you think one of those four men …?’

  ‘I can’t be certain of anything. Apparently a Swedish knife like the one used in Rue Popincourt was found in the sailor’s pocket. The man wore a light raincoat with a belt and a brown hat. In any case, probably this evening, I’ll put him in the presence of the Pagliatis, in the same street, in the same lighting, but it’s hardly conclusive. The old lady on the first floor will also
be called upon to identify him.’

  ‘What are you hoping for?’

  ‘I don’t know. The burglaries are a matter for Rue des Saussaies. What interests me are the seven knife blows that cost a young man his life.’

  When he came out of the magistrate’s office, the journalists had disappeared, but he found them all, or perhaps even more, it seemed to him, in the corridor of the Police Judiciaire. The four suspects were nowhere to be seen, because they had been taken to an office, where they were being kept under close watch.

  ‘What’s happening, detective chief inspector?’

  ‘Nothing out of the ordinary.’

  ‘Are you dealing with the Jouy-en-Josas case?’

  ‘You know very well that it has nothing to do with me.’

  ‘Why are these four men here rather than having been driven back to Rue des Saussaies?’

  ‘Well, let me tell you …’

  He suddenly took a decision. Huet was bound to have talked to them about a connection between the two cases. Rather than seeing more or less precise and tendentious information, wasn’t it better to tell the truth?

  ‘Antoine Batille, gentlemen, had a passion: recording what he called living documents. With a tape recorder around his neck, he went to public spaces, to cafés, bars, dances, restaurants, even the Métro, and placed himself discreetly with his tape recorder turned on.

  ‘On Tuesday evening, at about nine thirty, he was in a café on Place de la Bastille and, as usual, he had turned on his tape recorder. His neighbours were …’

  ‘The burglars?’

  ‘Three of them. The lookout wasn’t there. The recording isn’t of the first order. Still, we can understand that a meeting is being arranged for two days later, and that a certain villa that has already been watched …

  ‘Less than an hour later, in Rue Popincourt, the young man was attacked from behind and given seven stab wounds, one of which was fatal.’

  ‘Do you think it was one of those men?’

  ‘I don’t think anything, gentlemen. My job is not to think, but to find evidence or obtain confessions.’

  ‘Did anyone see the attacker?’

  ‘Two passers-by, a certain distance away, and a lady who lives opposite the place where the murder was committed.’

  ‘Do you think the burglars realized that their words had been recorded?’