The Night at the Crossroads by Georges Simenon

Author:Georges Simenon
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Penguin Group US
Published: 2014-09-21T16:00:00+00:00

7. The Two Wounds

Carl Andersen was carried up to his bedroom. An inspector followed, bringing the lamp from the drawing room. The wounded man neither moved nor groaned. Only after he had been laid on his bed did Maigret lean over him and see that his eyes were half open.

Andersen recognized him, seemed somewhat comforted and reached for the inspector’s hand, murmuring, ‘Else?’

She was standing in the doorway in an attitude of anxious waiting, looking bleakly into the bedroom.

It was a striking tableau. Carl had lost his black monocle, and next to the healthy but blood-shot, half-closed eye, the glass one still stared vacantly.

The glow of the oil lamp made everything seem mysterious. The police could be heard searching the grounds and raking the gravelled paths.

As for Else, when Maigret told her firmly to go over to her brother, she went rigid and hardly dared advance towards him at all.

‘I think he’s badly wounded,’ whispered Lucas.

She must have heard. She looked at him but hesitated to go any closer to her brother, who gazed at her intently, struggling to sit up in bed.

In a sudden storm of tears, she turned and ran to her own room, where she threw herself, weeping, on to the divan.

Maigret motioned to the sergeant to keep an eye on her and attended to the wounded man, removing Andersen’s jacket and waistcoat with the ease of someone familiar with this sort of incident.

‘Don’t be afraid … We’ve sent for a doctor. Else is in her room.’

Andersen was silent, like someone crushed by some mysterious misgiving. He looked around him as if he were anxious to resolve an enigma or discover a solemn secret.

‘Later on I will question you, but—’

Examining the man’s bare torso, the inspector frowned.

‘You’ve been shot twice … This wound in your back is far from fresh …’

And it was a terrible injury: ten square centimetres of skin had been torn away. The flesh was literally cut up, burned, swollen, encrusted with scabs of dried blood. This wound had stopped bleeding, which showed that it was a few hours old, whereas the latest bullet had fractured the left shoulder blade. As Maigret was cleaning the wound, the deformed bullet spilled out of it.

He picked it up. The bullet was not from a revolver, but from a rifle, like the one that had killed Madame Goldberg.

‘Where is Else?’ murmured the wounded man, who was bearing his pain without grimacing.

‘In her room. Don’t move … Did you see who just shot you?’

‘No.’

‘And the other shooter? Where was that?’

Andersen frowned, opened his mouth to speak, but gave up, exhausted. With a faint motion of his left arm he tried to explain that he could not talk any more.

‘Well, doctor?’

It was irritating trying to function in the semi-darkness. There were only two oil lamps in the house, one currently in the wounded man’s bedroom, the other in Else’s.

Downstairs, one candle burned, without lighting even a quarter of the drawing room.

‘Unless there are unexpected complications, he’ll pull through. The first wound is the more serious one.

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