Maigret Loses his Temper by Georges Simenon

Author:Georges Simenon
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Published: 2011-03-17T15:13:24+00:00

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5

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Anyone would have thought that Maigret was playing at being a night-club proprietor and that, in spite of the difference in weight and build, he was doing his best to imitate Émile Boulay. Without hurrying, he strolled through the few streets that constituted the former steward’s world and, as the hours went by, these changed in appearance.

First there were the neon signs, which became more numerous, and then there were the uniformed doormen who appeared outside the doors. Not only did the sound of jazz filtering through the night club’s doors give a different vibration to the air, but also the passers-by were different and the night taxis began to spill out their passengers, while a new fauna moved back and forth between the light and shade.

Women called out to him. He walked along with his hands behind his back. Had Monsieur Émile walked with his hands behind his back? In any case, he hadn’t smoked like the Chief Superintendent. He had sucked peppermints.

Maigret walked down Rue Notre-Dame-de-Lorette as far as the Saint-Trop’. He had known the night club under another name, at a time when most of its clients had been ladies in dinner jackets.

Had Montmartre changed so much? The rhythm of the orchestras was no longer the same. There was more neon lighting, but the people looked like those he had known before; some of them had simply changed their jobs, like the doorman at the Saint-Trop’, who greeted the Chief Superintendent familiarly.

He was a colossus with a white beard, a Russian refugee who for years, in another night club in the district, had sung old ballads of his country, in a fine bass voice, accompanying himself on a balalaika. “Do you remember last Tuesday evening?”

“I remember all the evenings God has allowed me to live, ” replied the former general grandiloquently.

“Did your employer come here that evening?”

“About half past nine, with a pretty young lady.”

“You mean Ada? He didn’t come back alone later on?”

“No, I swear by Saint George that he didn’t. ” Why by Saint George? Maigret went in, glancing at the bar, and at the tables around which the first customers were sitting bathed in an orange light. The staff must have been told that he was there, for waiters, musicians, and hostesses watched him with curiosity mingled with a certain anxiety.

Had Boulay been in the habit of staying longer? Maigret left again, nodded to Mickey outside the Lotus and to the cloakroom girl inside, and asked her for a token for the telephone.

In the glass booth he dialed the Rue La Bruyère number once more, but in vain.

Then he went into the Train Bleu, which was decorated to look like a Pullman carriage. The orchestra was playing so loud that he beat a retreat, plunged into the quiet and darkness of the other part of Rue Victor-Masse, and came to the Square d’Anvers, where only two cafés were open.

One, the Chope d’Anvers, looked like an old-fashioned brasserie in the provinces.

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