My Friend Maigret (12 page)

It was Charlot.

“Did he come back this way?”

“A good half hour ago.”

 

The
Cormorant
was still no more than a white dot in the blue of the world, but the white dot, now, was clearly separated from the shore. Other boats were dotted about on the sea, some motionless, some progressing slowly, leaving a luminous wake behind them.

Maigret and Mr. Pyke went down to the harbor once more, followed along the jetty, as on the previous evening, mechanically watched a boy fishing for conger eels with a short line.

When they passed in front of the Dutchman's little boat, Maigret glanced inside and was somewhat surprised to see Charlot in conversation with de Greef.

Mr. Pyke was still following him, silently. Was he expecting something to happen? Was he trying to guess Maigret's thoughts?

They went to the end of the pier, retraced their steps, came once more past the
Fleur d'amour
, and Charlot was still in the same place.

Three times they covered the hundred yards of the pier, and the third time Charlot climbed onto the deck of the little yacht, turned around to say good-bye and stepped onto the plank which served as a gangway.

The two men were just near to him. They were going to pass one another. Maigret, after hesitating, stopped. It was the time when the bus from Giens should be arriving at Hyères. The people for the funeral would go and have a drink before heading for the morgue.

“I say, I was looking for you this morning.”

“As you can see, I didn't leave the island.”

“That's just what I wanted to talk to you about. I see no reason for keeping you here any longer. You told me, I think, that you had only come for two or three days and that, but for Marcellin's death, you would have left by now. The inspector thought it right to make you stay. I'll set you free again.”

“Thank you.”

“I only ask that you tell me where I can find you in case I need you.”

Charlot, who was smoking, studied the end of his cigarette for a moment as though reflecting.

“At the Arche!” he finally said.

“You aren't going away then?”

“Not for the moment.”

And, lifting his head again, he looked the chief inspector in the eye.

“Does that surprise you? One might think you were annoyed to see me stay. I suppose it's allowed?”

“I can't stop you. I admit I should be curious to know what made you change your mind.”

“I haven't got a particularly absorbing profession, have I? No office or factory or business premises, no employees or workers waiting for me. Don't you find it pleasant here?”

He made no attempt to conceal his irony. They could see the mayor, still in his long gray smock, coming down toward the harbor pushing his wheelbarrow. The page from the Grand Hôtel was there as well, and the porter with the uniform cap.

The
Cormorant
was now just midway in the crossing and would reach the disembarkation point in a quarter of an hour.

“You've had a long conversation with old Benoît?”

“When I saw you just now near the hut, I thought you would ask me that. You'll question Benoît in your turn. I can't stop you, but I can tell you in advance that he knows nothing. At any rate, that's what I gathered, for it's not easy to interpret his language. Perhaps, after all, you'll be luckier than I was.”

“You are trying to find out something?”

“Perhaps the same thing as you.”

It was a challenge almost, thrown out with good humor.

“What makes you think it could be of interest to you? Did Marcellin talk to you?”

“No more than to the others. He was always a little embarrassed in front of me. The half-and-halfs are never at their ease in front of the
caïds
.”

Presently the word
caïd
would have to be explained to Mr. Pyke, who was visibly setting it to one side in a compartment of his brain.

Maigret joined in the game, spoke also in an undertone, lightly, as though uttering words of no consequence.

“You know why Marcellin was killed, Charlot?”

“I know almost as much as you. And, indeed, I probably draw the same conclusions, but with different ends.”

He smiled, crinkling up his eyelids in the sun.

“Has Jojo talked to you?”

“To me? Haven't you been told that we hate one another like cat and dog?”

“Have you done something to her?”

“She didn't want me to. That's just what's kept us apart.”

“I wonder, Charlot, if you wouldn't do better to return to Pont du Las.”

“And I, with all due respect for your advice, prefer to remain.”

A dinghy was detaching itself from the
North Star
, and on it Moricourt's silhouette could be recognized as he sat at the oars. He was the only person aboard. Like the others, he was doubtless coming over for the arrival of the
Cormorant
, and would go up as far as the post office to collect his mail.

Charlot, following Maigret's gaze, seemed at the same time to be following his thoughts. As the chief inspector had turned toward the Dutchman's boat, he declared:

“He's a strange fellow, but I don't think it's him.”

“You mean Marcellin's murderer?”

“One can hide nothing from you. Mark you, the murderer doesn't interest me in himself. Only, except in the course of a fit, one doesn't kill someone without any reason, does one? Even and above all if that someone proclaims to whoever wants to hear that he's a friend of Chief Inspector Maigret.”

“You were at the Arche when Marcellin mentioned me?”

“Everyone was there. I mean, all the people you are busying yourself with. And Marcellin, especially after a few drinks, had a pretty piercing voice.”

“Do you know why he said that, on that particular evening?”

“There you are. As you may imagine that was the first question I asked myself when I learned that he was dead, I wondered who the poor fellow was speaking to. Do you understand?”

Maigret understood perfectly.

“Did you find a satisfactory reply?”

“Not so far. If I had found one, I should have returned to Pont du Las by the next boat.”

“I didn't know you liked playing amateur detectives.”

“You're joking, inspector.”

The latter still persisted, with an air of utter indifference, in trying to make the other say something he was refusing to say.

It was a strange sort of game, in the sun on the jetty, with Mr. Pyke playing the part of umpire and remaining strictly neutral.

“So you definitely start from the idea that Marcellin was not killed without good reason?”

“As you say.”

“You suppose the murderer was trying to appropriate something which Marcellin had in his possession.”

“Neither you nor I suppose anything of the sort, or else your reputation is damned overrated.”

“Someone wanted to shut his mouth?”

“You're getting very warm, inspector.”

“He had made a discovery which could endanger someone?”

“Why are you so anxious to know what I think when all the time you know as much about it as I do?”

“Including the ‘big money'?”

“Including the ‘big money.'”

After which, lighting a fresh cigar, Charlot threw out:

“Big money has always interested me; do you catch on now?”

“That's why you visited the Dutchman this morning?”

“He's flat broke.”

“Which means it's not him?”

“I don't say that. All I say is that Marcellin couldn't have hoped to get money out of him.”

“You're forgetting the girl.”

“Anna?”

“Her father is very rich.”

That made Charlot think, but he finally shrugged his shoulders. The
Cormorant
was passing by the first rocky promontory and entering the harbor.

“Will you excuse me? I'm probably meeting someone.”

And Charlot touched his cap ironically, and headed for the jetty.

While Maigret was stuffing his pipe, Mr. Pyke declared:

“I think he's a highly intelligent fellow.”

“It's pretty hard to succeed in his job without being.”

The page boy from the Grand Hôtel was taking the luggage of a young married couple. The mayor, who had gone aboard, was examining the labels on the packages. Charlot was helping a young woman ashore, and was taking her toward the Arche. So he really was waiting for someone. He must have telephoned the day before.

As a matter of fact, where had Inspector Lechat telephoned Maigret from, two days before, to tell him about it all? If it was from the Arche, where the wall telephone was just beside the bar, everyone had overheard him. He must remember to ask him.

The dentist was there again, in the same clothes as in the morning, unshaven, perhaps unwashed, an old straw hat on his head. He was watching the
Cormorant
, and that was enough for him. He seemed happy to be alive.

Were Maigret and Mr. Pyke to follow the general movement, stroll up to the Arche, make for the bar, and drink the white wine which would be served up without their being asked what they wanted?

The chief inspector studied his companion from the corner of his eye, and on his side Mr. Pyke, though impassive, seemed to be studying him.

Why not follow the others, after all? Marcellin's burial was in progress at Hyères. Behind the bier Ginette was taking the place of the family and she would be mopping her brow with her handkerchief, screwed tightly into a ball. There was a heavy heat in the air over there, in the avenues lined with motionless palms.

“Do you like the island white wine, Monsieur Pyke?”

“I should be very happy to drink a glass.”

The postman was crossing the bare expanse of the square pushing a barrow piled with the mailbags. Lifting his head, Maigret saw the windows of the Arche wide open and, in one of the frames on the first floor, Charlot leaning on the window sill. Behind him in the gilded half-light, a young woman was in the act of removing her dress, which she was slipping over her head.

“He talked a lot and I wonder if he was hoping to get more out of me.”

That would emerge later. People like Charlot cannot easily resist adopting an advantageous position. Just as Maigret and Mr. Pyke were sitting down on the terrace they saw Monsieur Émile, more of a little white mouse than ever, advancing onto the square with short steps, a panama hat on his head, and heading diagonally for the post office—situated to the left of the church, at the top. The door was open. Four or five people were waiting, while the postmistress sorted the mail.

It was Saturday, Jojo was giving the red tiles of the dining room a good wash; her feet were bare, and rivulets of dirty water were draining onto the terrace.

Paul brought not two glasses of white wine, but a whole bottle.

“Do you know the woman who went up to Charlot's room?”

“That's his girlfriend.”

“Is she in service?”

“I don't think so. She's some sort of a dancer or singer in a Marseilles nightclub. It's the third or fourth time she's been here.”

“He telephoned her?”

“Yesterday afternoon, while you were in your room.”

“Do you know what he said?”

“He simply asked her to come and spend the weekend. She accepted at once.”

“Were Charlot and Marcellin friends?”

“I don't remember having seen them together; I mean just the two of them.”

“I would like you to try to remember exactly. When, that evening, Marcellin mentioned me…”

“I know what you mean. Your inspector put the same question to me.”

“I suppose at the start of the evening the customers were at different tables, like yesterday evening?”

“Yes. It always starts off like that.”

“Do you know what happened next?”

“Someone put on the gramophone, I don't recall who. The Dutchman and his girlfriend began to dance. It comes back to me because I noticed that she let herself go limp in his arms like a rag doll.”

“Did other people dance too?”

“Mrs. Wilcox and Monsieur Philippe. He's a very good dancer.”

“Where was Marcellin at that moment?”

“I seem to picture him at the bar.”