Friend of Madame Maigret Read Online Free PDF Page B

type.”
    Was this a discreet allusion to the days when she was at the mercy of the police in the Vice Squad?
    â€œHow’s Steuvels?”
    â€œAll right. He reads all day long. He’s confident.”
    â€œAnd you?”
    Was there really a hesitation?
    â€œSo am I.”
    Nonetheless she was obviously rather weary.
    â€œWhat books are you taking him now?”
    â€œHe’s in the middle of re-reading Marcel Proust all the way through.”
    â€œHave you read him too?”
    â€œYes.”
    Steuvels had, in fact, educated the wife he had picked up long ago off the pavement.
    â€œYou mustn’t think I’ve come to see you as an enemy. You know the situation as well as I do. I want to understand. At present, I don’t understand. What about you?”
    â€œI’m sure Frans hasn’t committed any crime.”
    â€œDo you love him?”
    â€œThat word doesn’t mean anything. I’d need another word, a special one, which doesn’t exist.”
    He had gone up to the workshop again, where the bookbinder’s tools were laid out on the long table facing the window. The presses were at the back, in semidarkness, and on the shelves books were waiting their turn among the work in progress.
    â€œHe had regular habits, didn’t he? I’d like you to tell me as accurately as possible how he would spend a typical day.”
    â€œSomebody else has asked me that already.”
    â€œWho?”
    â€œMaître Liotard.”
    â€œHas it occurred to you that Maître Liotard’s interests don’t necessarily coincide with your own? He was unknown three weeks ago and what he is after is to get as much publicity for his own name as possible. It doesn’t matter to him whether your husband is innocent or guilty.”
    â€œExcuse me. If he proves his innocence, that will be a terrific boost for him and his reputation will be made.”
    â€œAnd what if he obtains his release without having definitely proved his innocence? He’ll make a name as a clever fellow. He’ll be in great demand. They’ll say of your husband:
    â€œâ€˜Lucky for him Liotard got him off!’
    â€œIn other words, the guiltier Steuvels appears, the more credit Liotard will get. Do you realize that?”
    â€œFrans realizes it, certainly.”
    â€œDid he say so?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œDoesn’t he like Liotard? Why did he choose him?”
    â€œHe didn’t choose him. It was he who . . .”
    â€œOne moment. You’ve just said something important.”
    â€œI know.”
    â€œDid you do it on purpose?”
    â€œMaybe. I’m sick of all this fuss about us and I realize where it’s coming from. It doesn’t seem to me that I’m doing Frans any harm by saying what I’m saying.”
    â€œWhen Sergeant Lucas came to make his search on February 21 at about five o’clock he didn’t leave alone, but took your husband along with him.”
    â€œAnd you questioned him all night,” she said reproachfully.
    â€œThat’s my job. At that time Steuvels still had no lawyer because he didn’t know he was going to be charged. And since then he hasn’t been released. He came back here only for a very short time, accompanied by detectives. Yet when I told him to choose a lawyer he named Maître Liotard without any hesitation.”
    â€œI see what you mean.”
    â€œSo the lawyer saw Steuvels here before Sergeant Lucas did?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œTherefore it must have been in the afternoon of the twenty-first, between the visit of Lapointe and that of the sergeant?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œWere you present at the interview?”
    â€œNo, I was downstairs doing a thorough cleaning because I’d been away three days.”
    â€œYou don’t know what they said to each other? They hadn’t met before?”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œIt wasn’t your husband who