A Man's Head by Georges Simenon

Author:Georges Simenon
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Penguin Group US
Published: 2014-07-03T04:00:00+00:00

8. A Man in the House

When Maigret emerged from the taxi outside the Henderson villa at Saint-Cloud, it was just after three in the afternoon. On the way back from Nandy it had struck him that he had forgotten to return to Mrs Henderson’s American heirs the key which he had been given in the previous July to enable him to carry out his inquiries.

He went back now with no particular object in mind, with half a hope that chance might lead him to something he had overlooked, or even more, with the idea that the atmosphere might give him inspiration.

The main building, which was surrounded by a garden too small to be called grounds, was enormous, but without style, and ornamented with a turret in appalling taste.

All the shutters were closed. The paths were covered with dead leaves.

The gate in the railings swung open. Maigret felt slightly uneasy in these surroundings, which were so forbidding that they put him in mind more of a cemetery than a home.

He climbed heavily up the four front steps, which were flanked by pretentious plaster figures each topped with a branched electric lamp, opened the main door and was obliged to wait a moment until his eyes got used to the gloom.

There was a disturbing feel to the place, for it was both luxurious and run down. The ground floor had not been in use for four years, that is, since the death of Mr Henderson.

But most of the furniture and furnishings were just as they had been. When Maigret entered the drawing room, for example, the crystal chandelier tinkled softly, and the boards of the wooden floor creaked as he walked over them.

Out of curiosity, he tried the light switch. Ten out of twelve lamps came on. The bulbs were so thickly encrusted with dust that their light was dimmed.

In one corner were valuable carpets which had been rolled up. The armchairs had been pushed to the far end of the room, and assorted travelling trunks had ended up there in no particular order. One was empty. Another still contained some of the dead man’s clothes, with mothballs sprinkled over them. Yet he had been deceased for more than four years! The house had been accustomed to stylish living. In this very room there had been receptions which had been reported in the press.

In full view on the enormous mantelpiece was a half-opened box of Havanas.

It was probably at this spot that the visitor had the clearest impression of just how overwhelming the house was.

Mrs Henderson was almost seventy when she had been widowed.

She had been too fatigued to make the effort to organize a new life for herself.

She had settled for shutting herself away in her rooms and had left the rest to go to seed.

They had probably been happy together; at any rate they had made a brilliant couple and had cut a figure in most of the world’s capitals.

And all that had been left of it was an old

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