A Crime in Holland (5 page)

He addressed Oosting:

‘Excuse me. Do you understand French?'

The Baes did not budge, appearing to be thinking. A lanky seaman standing alongside him explained in English and Dutch:

‘
Frenchman!
Frans
politie
.'

The next minute was perhaps one of the strangest in Maigret's career.

The man he had spoken to, turning briefly towards his boat, seemed to hesitate.

It was clear that he wanted to ask the inspector to come aboard with him. One could see a small oak-panelled cabin, with its swinging lamp, a compass.

The other men waited. He opened his mouth.

Then suddenly he shrugged his shoulders, as if deciding: ‘No, that's ridiculous!'

But that wasn't what he said. In a hoarse voice issuing from his throat, he uttered: ‘No understand.
Hollands
 … 
English
 …'

They could still see Any's dark silhouette, with her crepe mourning veil, crossing the bridge over the canal before taking the towpath along the Amsterdiep.

The Baes intercepted Maigret's glance at his new cap, but did not flinch. Rather, the shadow of a smile crossed his lips.

At that moment, the inspector would have given good money to be able to have a chat with this man in his own language, even for five minutes. His goodwill was such that he stammered out a few sentences in English, but his accent was so strong that nobody understood.

‘No understand. Nobody understand!' repeated the man who had spoken.

So they resumed their conversation, while Maigret walked away with the vague feeling that he had been very close to the heart of the enigma and that now, for want of mutual comprehension, he was getting further away from it.

He turned round a few minutes later. The Quayside Rats were still chatting as the sun set, and its last rays cast a rosier glow over the heavy-jowled face of the Baes, still turned in Maigret's direction.

Until then, Maigret had in some sense been circling round the drama, saving until last the visit, always a painful one, to the house of mourning.

He rang the doorbell. It was just after six. He hadn't realized that this was the time when Dutch people eat their evening meal, and when a young housemaid opened the door, he could see in the dining room the two women sitting at the table.

They both stood up in a simultaneous movement with the slightly stiff air of well-brought-up schoolgirls.

They were dressed in black. The table was laid with teacups, wafer-thin slices of bread and cold meats. Despite the gathering dusk, the lamp was not lit but a gas-fired stove, its flames visible through its mica panes, was struggling against the dark.

It was Any who immediately thought to switch on the electric light, while the maid closed the curtains.

‘Please forgive me,' said Maigret. ‘I'm so sorry to disturb you at supper time.'
Madame Popinga vaguely gestured towards an armchair and looked around her distractedly, while her sister retreated as far as possible into the room.

A similar atmosphere to the farm. Some modern furniture, but very conservatively modern. Muted colours combining in an elegant but gloomy harmony.

‘You've come to …'

Madame Popinga's lower lip trembled, and she had to put her handkerchief to her mouth to stifle a sob that had suddenly broken out. Any didn't move.

‘Forgive me. I'll come back …'

Madame Popinga shook her head. She was struggling to regain her composure. She must have been a good few years older than her sister. A tall woman, much more feminine. Regular features, a hint of broken veins in the cheeks, the odd grey hair.

And a modest dignity in every gesture. Maigret recalled that she was the daughter of a headmaster, spoke several languages and was well educated. But that didn't affect her timidity, the timidity of a respectable woman in a small town, liable to take fright at the slightest thing.

He also remembered that she belonged to the most austere of Protestant sects, and that she presided over all the Delfzijl charities and hosted the women's literary circles.

She regained her self-control. She looked at her sister as if asking for help.

‘I'm sorry! But it's just so unbelievable, isn't it? Conrad! A man everyone loved.'

Her gaze fell on the wireless loudspeaker, standing in a corner, and she almost burst into tears.

‘That was his only distraction,' she stammered. ‘And his little boat on the Amsterdiep, on summer evenings. He worked so hard. Who could have done this?'

And as Maigret said nothing, she added, turning a little pink, in the tone she might have used if someone had argued with her:

‘I'm not accusing anyone. I don't know. I just can't believe it, do you understand? The police thought of Professor Duclos, because he came out holding the revolver. But I don't know what happened. It's too horrible! Someone killed Conrad. But why? Why him? It wasn't even a burglary. So …'

‘And you told the police what you saw from the window?'

She blushed deeper. Standing upright, one hand leaning on the dinner-table, she said:

‘I didn't know if I should … I don't think Beetje did anything. It was just that by chance I saw. They told me the smallest little detail might help their enquiries. I asked the minister for advice. He told me to speak up. Beetje's a perfectly nice girl. Really, I don't see who … Somebody who should be in a lunatic asylum!'

She had no need to search for the right words. Her French was perfect, pronounced with a very slight accent.

‘Any told me you've come from Paris. Because of Conrad! Are we to believe that?'

She had calmed down. Her sister, still standing in a corner of the room hadn't stirred, and Maigret could only partly see her, by way of a mirror.

‘You'll need to look over the house, I assume?'

She was resigned to it. But she sighed:

‘Could you go with … Any?'

A black dress moved in front of the inspector. He followed it up a staircase fitted with brand-new carpeting. The Popinga home, no more than ten years old, was built like a doll's house, with lightweight materials, hollow bricks and pine boards. But the paint which had been
applied to all the woodwork gave it a fresh and bright look.

The bathroom door was the first to be opened. There was a wooden lid over the bath, transforming it into an ironing board. Maigret leaned out of the window, and saw the bicycle shed, the well-kept kitchen garden, and across the fields the town of Delfzijl, few of whose houses had two storeys, and none three.

Any was waiting at the door.

‘I hear you're carrying out your own investigation,' Maigret said.

She shuddered, but didn't answer, and hurried to open the door of Professor Duclos's room.

A brass bedstead. A pitch-pine wardrobe. Lino on the floor.

‘And this is whose bedroom?'

She had to make an effort to speak French.

‘Of me … When I am here.'

‘And you've often stayed here?'

‘Yes … I …'

She was really very shy. The words stuck in her throat. Her eyes looked around for help.

‘So since the professor was a guest here, you slept in your brother-in-law's study?'

She nodded yes and opened the door. A table laden with books, including new publications on gyroscopic compasses and on radio communication with ships. Some sextants. On the walls, photos of Conrad Popinga in the Far East and Africa in his uniform as first lieutenant or captain.

There was a display of Malayan weapons. Japanese enamels. On trestles lay some precision tools and a ship's compass in pieces, which Popinga must have been repairing.

A divan covered with a blue bedspread.

‘And your sister's room?'

‘Here, next door.'

The study communicated both with the professor's room and the Popingas' bedroom, which was furnished more stylishly. An alabaster lamp over the bed. A rather fine Persian carpet. Wooden colonial furniture.

‘And you were in the study,' said Maigret thoughtfully.

A nod, yes.

‘So you couldn't come out without going either through the professor's room or your sister's?'

Another nod.

‘And the professor was in his room. And your sister in hers.'

She opened her eyes wide, her jaw dropped as if she'd had a terrible shock.

‘And, you think …?'

Maigret muttered as he paced through the three rooms:

‘I don't think anything. I'm searching. I'm eliminating possibilities! And up to now, you are the only one who can logically be eliminated, unless we assume some complicity between you and either Duclos or Madame Popinga.'

‘You … you …'

But he was carrying on talking to himself.

‘Duclos might have fired the shot either from his room or the bathroom, that's clear. Madame Popinga could have gone into the bathroom. But the professor, who went in
there immediately after hearing the shot, didn't see her. On the contrary, he saw her coming out of her room only a few seconds later.'

Perhaps she was now emerging a little from her shell. The student was taking over from the timid girl, as if inspired by this technical hypothesis.

‘Maybe, someone shot from downstairs?' she said, her gaze now more focused and her thin body alert. ‘The doctor says …'

‘True, but that doesn't alter the fact that the revolver that killed your brother-in-law was certainly the one Duclos was holding. Unless the murderer threw the gun upstairs through the window.'

‘Why not?'

‘Obviously. Why not?'

And he went down the stairs, which seemed too narrow for him, the steps creaking under his bulk.

He found Madame Popinga standing in the dining room, apparently on the spot where he had left her. Any followed him in.

‘Did Cornelius come here often?'

‘Almost every day. He only had lessons three times a week, Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. But he came on the other days. His parents are in the East Indies. A month ago, he was told that his mother had died. She was dead and buried by the time he got the letter. So …'

‘What about Beetje Liewens?'

There was a slightly awkward silence. Madame Popinga looked at Any. Any looked down.

‘She used to come …'

‘Often?'

‘Yes.'

‘Did you invite her?'

His questions were getting brusquer, more pointed. Maigret had the feeling he was making progress, if not in discovering the truth, at least in his penetration of the life in this house.

‘No … yes.'

‘She's a different kind of person from you and Mademoiselle Any, shall we say?'

‘She's, well, she's very young, isn't she? Her father is a friend of Conrad's. She used to bring us apples, raspberries, cream …'

‘And she wasn't in love with Cornelius?'

‘No!'

That sounded definite.

‘You didn't like her much?'

‘Why wouldn't I? She came here, she laughed. She chattered all day long. Like a bird, you understand?'

‘Do you know Oosting?'

‘Yes.'

‘Did he have any dealings with your husband?'

‘Last year Oosting put a new engine into his boat. So he consulted Conrad. My husband drew up some plans for him. They went hunting for
zeehonden
– what do you call them in French? – seals, out on the sandbanks.'

And then suddenly:

‘Oh, you think … The cap perhaps? It's impossible! Oosting!'

And she wailed, in distress once again:

‘No, not Oosting. No! Nobody … Nobody could have killed Conrad. You didn't know him. He was … he …'

She turned her head aside, because she was weeping. Maigret preferred to leave. No one shook his hand and he simply bowed, muttering his apologies.

Outside, he was surprised by the damp coolness rising from the canal. And on the other bank, not far from the boatyard, he saw the Baes, talking to a student wearing the uniform of the Naval College.

They were both standing in the gathering dusk. Oosting seemed to be speaking insistently. The young man was looking down and only the pale oval of his face could be made out.

Maigret realized that this must be Cornelius. He was sure of it when he glimpsed a black armband on the blue woollen sleeve.

He wasn't strictly speaking tailing them. At no time did Maigret have the feeling he was spying on anyone. He had been coming out of the Popinga house. He had walked a few steps. He had seen two men on the other side of the canal and had quite simply stopped to observe them. He wasn't hiding. He was there in full view on the bank, pipe in mouth and hands in pockets.

But perhaps it was precisely because he wasn't hiding, and because nevertheless the other men had not seen him as they carried on their intense conversation, that there was something poignant about that moment.