My Friend Maigret (17 page)

“Is this an interrogation?” she asked. “But…tell me, chief inspector…I presume you don't suspect us, Philippe and me, of having killed this man?”

Maigret was silent for a moment, examining his pipe with deliberation.

“I suspect nobody
a priori
, Mrs. Wilcox. However, this is certainly an interrogation and you have the right not to reply.”

“Why shouldn't I reply? We came back straightaway. Even though we shipped water in the dinghy and had to cling to the ladder to climb on board.”

“Philippe didn't go out again?”

There was a hesitation in her eyes. The presence of her fellow countryman made her feel uncomfortable.

“We went straight to bed and he couldn't have left the boat without my hearing.”

Philippe chose this moment to make his appearance, in white flannels, his hair smoothed down, a freshly lit cigarette at his lips. He wanted to appear bold. He addressed himself directly to Maigret.

“You have some questions to put to me, inspector?”

The latter pretended not to notice him.

“Do you often buy paintings, madame?”

“Fairly often. It's one of my hobbies. Without having exactly what you might call a picture gallery, I have some pretty good ones.”

“At Fiesole?”

“At Fiesole, yes.”

“Italian masters?”

“I don't rise to that. I'm more modest and content myself with fairly modern works.”

“Cézannes or Renoirs, for example?”

“I've a charming little Renoir.”

“Degas, Manet, Monet?”

“A Degas drawing, a dancer.”

“Van Gogh?”

Maigret was not looking at her, but stared straight at Philippe, who appeared to swallow hard and whose gaze became completely rigid.

“I've just bought a van Gogh.”

“How long ago?”

“A few days. What day did we go to Hyères to send it off, Philippe?”

“I don't remember exactly,” the latter replied in a colorless voice.

Maigret prompted them.

“Wasn't it the day before or two days before Marcellin's death?”

“Two days before,” she said. “I remember it now.”

“Did you find the picture here?”

She didn't stop to think, and a moment later she bit her lip.

“It was Philippe,” she said, “who through a friend…”

She understood, by the silence of the three men, looked at them in turn, then cried:

“What is it, Philippe?”

She had risen with a start, was advancing toward the chief inspector.

“You don't mean?…Explain to me! Speak! Why don't you say something? Philippe? What's…?”

The latter still didn't stir.

“Excuse me, madame, but I must take your secretary away.”

“Are you arresting him? But I tell you he was here, he didn't leave me all night, that…”

She looked at the door of the cabin which served as a bedroom and one could feel that she was on the point of throwing open the door, showing the double bed and shouting:

“How could he have gone without my knowing?”

Maigret and Mr. Pyke had risen as well.

“Will you come with me, Monsieur de Moricourt?”

“Have you a warrant?”

“I shall ask for one from the examining magistrate if you insist, but I don't think that will be the case.”

“Are you arresting me?”

“Not yet.”

“Where are you taking me?”

“Somewhere where we can have a quiet conversation. Don't you think it would be better that way?”

“Tell me, Philippe…” Mrs. Wilcox began.

Without realizing she began to speak to him in English. Philippe wasn't listening to her, or looking at her, or thinking about her anymore. As he climbed onto the deck, she was not even given a look of farewell.

“This won't get you very far,” he said to Maigret.

“That's very possible.”

“Perhaps you're going to handcuff me?”

 

It was still Sunday and the
Cormorant
, moored to the jetty, was disgorging its passengers in their bright-colored clothes. Already some tourists, perched on rocks, were busy fishing.

Mr. Pyke left the cabin last, and when he took his place in the dinghy, he was very red. Lechat, surprised to see another passenger, didn't know what to say.

Maigret, seated at the stern, allowed his left hand to trail in the water, as he used to do when he was small and his father took him in a boat on the pond.

The bells were still sending their circles of sound into the air.

They stopped outside the grocer's to ask the mayor for the key. He was busy serving customers and he shouted something to his wife, who was small and pale, with a bun at the nape of her neck. She searched for a long while. During all this time Philippe remained waiting, between Maigret and Mr. Pyke, his face set obstinately in a sulky expression, and it resembled more than ever a school scene, with the punished schoolboy and the heavy, implacable headmaster.

One would never have believed that so many people could have come off the
Cormorant
. True, other boats had made the crossing that morning. Until the trippers had had time to stream off to the beaches, the square looked like an invasion.

Anna could be seen, in the semiobscurity of the cooperative, with her net bag, wearing her sunsuit, while de Greef was sitting with Charlot on the terrace of the Arche.

These two had seen Philippe passing by between the detectives. They had followed them with their eyes. They were free themselves, with a table in front of them and a bottle of cool wine on the table.

Maigret had said a few words in an undertone to Lechat who had stayed behind.

The mayor's wife finally brought the key and a few minutes later Maigret was pushing open the door of the town hall, and immediately opened the window on account of the dust and mustiness.

“Sit down, Moricourt.”

“Is that an order?”

“Precisely.”

He pushed over to him one of the folding chairs used for the July 14 celebrations. Mr. Pyke appeared to have understood that on these occasions the chief inspector didn't like to see people standing, for he unfolded a chair in his turn and settled himself in a corner.

“I suppose you have nothing to say to me?”

“Am I under arrest?”

“Yes.”

“I didn't kill Marcellin.”

“What else?”

“Nothing. I shall say nothing more. You can question me to your heart's content and use all the vile methods you have at your command to make people speak, but I'll still say nothing.”

How like a vicious child! Perhaps because of the impressions of that morning, Maigret couldn't manage to take him seriously, to get it into his head that he was dealing with a man.

The chief inspector didn't sit down. He walked up and down aimlessly, touching a rolled-up flag or the bust of the Republic, stood for a moment in front of the window, and saw some little girls in white crossing the square in the care of two nuns with winged bonnets. He hadn't been so far out just now in being reminded of a first communion.

The islanders were wearing clean trousers that morning, made of cloth, of a blue that became deep and rich in the sunlight of the square, and the white of their shirts was dazzling. A game of boules was already starting. Monsieur Émile was making for the post office with his careful tread.

“I suppose you realize you're a little rat?”

Maigret, enormous beside Philippe, looked him up and down, and the young man instinctively raised his hands to protect his face.

“I said a little rat, a rat who's afraid, who's a coward. There are people who break into flats and take risks. Others only go for old ladies, pinch rare books from them to resell them, and when they are caught, start crying, begging forgiveness and talking about their poor mothers.”

Mr. Pyke appeared to be making himself as small and as motionless as possible so as in no way to obstruct his colleague. One couldn't even hear him breathing, but the sounds from the island came in through the open window and mingled oddly with the chief inspector's voice.

“Who first got the idea of the forged paintings?”

“I shall only reply in the presence of a lawyer.”

“So that your unfortunate mother will have to bleed herself white to pay for a well-known barrister for you! You'll have to have a well-known one, won't you? You're a repugnant creature, Moricourt!”

He stalked up and down, with his hands behind his back, more like a headmaster than ever.

“At my school we had a boy who was rather like you. Like you he was a drip. From time to time he needed a beating up, and when we gave him one, our teacher took care to turn his back or else to leave the playground. You had one yesterday evening and you didn't budge, you stayed there, pale and trembling in your place, beside the old woman who keeps you alive. It was I who asked Polyte to give you a hiding because I wanted to know your reactions, because I wasn't yet sure.”

“Are you intending to hit me again?”

He was trying to sneer, but one could tell that he was transfixed with fear.

“There are various species of rat, Moricourt, and unfortunately there are some that one somehow never manages to send to prison. I tell you straightaway that I shall do all in my power to get you there.”

Ten times he turned back toward the young man in his chair, and each time the latter made an instinctive gesture to protect his face.

“Admit that the idea of the pictures was yours. You'll end by confessing, even if I have to spend three days and three nights at it. I've met a tougher nut than you. He sneered too, when he arrived at the Quai des Orfèvres. He was well dressed like you. It was a long business. There were five or six of us taking it in turns. After thirty-six hours do you know what happened to him? Do you know how we discovered that he was giving in at last? By the smell! A smell as foul as himself! He had just relieved himself in his trousers.”

He looked at Moricourt's beautiful white trousers, then ordered him point-blank:

“Take off your tie.”

“Why?”

“Do you want me to do it myself? Good! Now, undo your shoes. Remove the laces. You'll see, in a few hours you'll begin to look a bit more guilty.”

“You haven't the right…”

“I'll take it! You wondered how to squeeze more money from the mad old woman you had attached yourself to. Your lawyer will probably plead that it's immoral to allow fortunes to remain in the hands of women like her and will claim that it's an irresistible temptation. That doesn't concern us for the moment. All that's a matter for the jury. Because she bought pictures and didn't know anything about them you told yourself that there was big money to be made, and you got together with de Greef. I wonder whether it wasn't you that made him come to Porquerolles.”

“De Greef is a little saint, isn't he?”

“Another kind of rat. How many forgeries did he make for your old woman?”

“I've told you I shall say nothing.”

“The van Gogh can't have been the first. Only it happens that somebody spotted that particular one, probably when it wasn't quite finished. Marcellin used to wander around almost anywhere. He used to climb on board de Greef's yacht as well as the
North Star
. I suppose he caught the Dutchman in the middle of signing a canvas with a name that wasn't his own. Then he saw the same canvas in Mrs. Wilcox's possession and he tumbled to it. It took him a bit of time to find out how the system was worked. He wasn't sure. He had never even heard of van Gogh and he telephoned a girlfriend to find out about him.”

Philippe was staring fixedly at the floor, a peevish look on his face.

“I don't say it was you who killed him.”

“I didn't kill him.”

“You're probably too much of a coward for that sort of a job. Marcellin told himself that as the two of you were getting fat off the old woman's bank balance there was no reason why he shouldn't be a third. He put it to you. You wouldn't play. Then, to dot all the i's, he began to talk about his friend Maigret. How much did Marcellin ask?”

“I shan't answer.”

“I've plenty of time. That night, Marcellin was killed.”

“I have an alibi.”

“Namely that at the time of his death you were in the grandmother's bed.”

One could smell, even from the small town-hall room, the apéritifs that were being served on the terrace at the Arche. De Greef must still be there. Probably Anna had joined him with her provisions. Lechat, at a neighboring table, was watching him, and if necessary would stop him going away.

As for Charlot, he had surely realized by now that, at all events, he was too late. He was another who had been hoping to have his cut!

“Are you intending to talk, Philippe?”

“No.”

“Note that I'm not trying to make you do so by telling stories. I'm not telling you that we've got proof, that de Greef has taken the bait. You'll talk in the end, because you're a coward, because you're poisonous. Give me your cigarettes.”

Maigret took the packet the young man handed to him and threw it out of the window.

“May I ask you to do me a service, Mr. Pyke? Will you go and ask Lechat, who is on the terrace at the Arche, to bring in the Dutchman? Without the girl. I'd also like Jojo to bring us a few bottles of beer.”

As though from scruple, he did not utter a word during his colleague's absence. He went on walking up and down, his hands behind his back, and the Sunday life continued on the other side of the window.

“Come in, de Greef. If you had a tie, I should tell you to take it off, and the same with your shoelaces.”

“Am I under arrest?”

Maigret contented himself with a nod.

“Sit down. Not too near your friend Philippe. Give me your cigarettes and throw away the one you've got stuck in your mouth.”

“Have you a warrant?”

“I'm going to send for one by telegraph, in your two names, so there'll be no more doubt on the subject.”

He sat down in the place the mayor must have occupied for marriages.

“One of you two killed Marcellin. To tell the truth it doesn't much matter which, since you're each as guilty as the other.”

Jojo came in, with a tray covered with bottles and glasses, then stood nonplussed in front of the two young men.

“Don't be afraid, Jojo. They're just two dirty little killers. Don't start talking about it outside immediately or we'll have the whole population at the window and the Sunday trippers into the bargain.”

Maigret was taking his time, looking at the two young men in turn. The Dutchman was much the calmer and there was no trace of bravado about him.

“Perhaps I'd do better to leave you to settle it between the two of you? When all's said and done, it concerns one of you. There is in fact one person who will probably have his head lopped off or else will spend the rest of his days in a penal settlement, while the other will get away with a few years in prison. Which?”

Already the “drip” was shifting in his chair and one might have thought he was going to put up his hand, as if at school.

“Unfortunately the law cannot take into account true responsibility. For my part I would happily put the two of you in the same bag, with this difference, however, that I should have a tiny scrap of sympathy for de Greef.”

Philippe was still shifting, ill at ease, visibly discontented.

“Admit, de Greef, that you didn't do it just for the money? You don't want to answer, either? As you wish. I bet that you've been amusing yourself painting forgeries for quite some time, just to prove you're no spare-time painter, no mere dauber. Have you sold a lot?

“Never mind! What a revenge on the people who don't understand you if you had one of your works, signed with a famous name, hanging in line at the Louvre, or an Amsterdam museum!

“We shall be seeing your latest works. We'll have them sent from Fiesole. At the trial the experts will argue over them. You're going to live through some great moments, de Greef!”

It was almost amusing to see Philippe's expression, at once disgusted and angry, during this little speech. The two of them looked more and more like schoolboys. Philippe was jealous of the words Maigret was addressing to his classmate and had to hold himself in so as not to protest.

“Admit, Monsieur de Greef, that you aren't really annoyed that it hasn't come off!”

Even down to the “Monsieur,” which wounded Moricourt to his very soul.

“When no one else knows but yourself, it's not much fun in the end. You don't love your life, Monsieur de Greef.”

“Nor yours, nor the one people wanted me to lead.”

“You don't love anything.”

“I don't love myself.”

“Nor do you love that little girl whom you only carried off out of defiance, to infuriate her parents. Since when have you been wanting to kill one of your fellow creatures? I don't say from necessity, to gain money or to suppress an embarrassing witness. I'm speaking of killing for the sake of killing, to see what it's like, what reactions one has. And even to hit the body afterwards with a hammer to prove that one has strong nerves.”

A thin smile twisted the Dutchman's lips, and Philippe was furtively watching him, without understanding.

“Would you like me to predict now what's going to happen? You've decided, both of you, to keep silent. You are convinced that there is no proof against you. There was no witness of Marcellin's death. Nobody on the island heard the shot, because of the mistral. The weapon hasn't been found; probably it's safe at the bottom of the sea. I haven't taken the trouble to make a search. Fingerprints won't tell us anything more. It will be a long inquiry. The magistrate will question you patiently, will find out about your antecedents, and the newspapers will talk a lot about you. They won't fail to splash the fact that you are both of good family.