Maigret and the Man on the Boulevard Read Online Free PDF Page B

Since Kaplan’s closed down, and the hairdresser vacated the first floor premises, things haven’t been any too lively here.”
    â€œDid you and he talk about that?”
    â€œYes. We chatted about all sorts of things, such as the number of tenants who had moved out, one after another, the lawsuits, the architects who came in from time to time studying the plans for their wretched cinema, while the walls slowly crumbled in ruins about us.”
    She did not sound bitter. All the same, he was sure that she would hang on long after everyone else had left.
    â€œHow did it happen?” she asked in her turn. “Did he suffer much?”
    Neither Madame Thouret nor Monique had thought to put this question to him.
    â€œThe doctor says not. Apparently he died instantly.”
    â€œWhere did it happen?”
    â€œNot very far from here, in an alleyway off the Boulevard Saint-Martin.”
    â€œNear the jeweler’s, do you mean?”
    â€œYes. Someone must have been following him in the dusk. At any rate, he was found with a knife in his back.”
    Maigret had telephoned the Forensic Laboratory the previous night from his home, and again this morning. The knife was a very ordinary mass-produced article, to be found on the shelves of almost any ironmonger’s. It was new, and there were no fingerprints on it.
    â€œPoor Monsieur Louis! He did so enjoy life!”
    â€œYou mean he was always cheerful?”
    â€œIt’s hard to explain. He certainly wasn’t an unhappy man. He always had a smile and a kind word for everyone. He was very considerate, and modest with it.”
    â€œWas he interested in women?”
    â€œNever! And yet there were plenty of opportunities here. Apart from Monsieur Max and the old bookkeeper, he was the only man around, and women who take jobs as packers aren’t exactly strait laced as a rule.”
    â€œDid he drink?”
    â€œJust a glass of wine, like everyone else. Occasionally, he would have a liqueur with his coffee.”
    â€œWhere did he go for lunch?”
    â€œHe hardly ever went out. He nearly always brought sandwiches wrapped in oilcloth. I can see him now. He ate standing up, with his packet of sandwiches open on the table. Afterwards he would go out into the courtyard and smoke his pipe, before returning to the stockroom. Very occasionally he would go out, announcing to me that he was having lunch with his daughter. This was toward the end of his time here. His daughter was quite grown-up by then, and had an office job in the Rue de Rivoli.
    â€œâ€˜Why not bring her back here, Monsieur Louis? I would so love to meet her.’
    â€œâ€˜I will one day…’ he promised.
    â€œBut he never did. I’ve often wondered why.”
    â€œHave you lost touch with Mademoiselle Léone?”
    â€œNo, indeed. In fact, I have her address. She lives with her mother. She doesn’t work in an office any more. She’s opened a little shop in the Rue de Clignancourt in Montmartre. She may be able to tell you more than I can. He used to go and see her too. On one occasion, when we were talking about her, he told me that she was selling layettes and all sorts of other things for babies. It seems odd, somehow.”
    â€œWhat’s odd about it?”
    â€œThat she, of all people, should be selling things for babies.”
    People were beginning to come into the lodge to collect their mail. They looked at Maigret uneasily, assuming, no doubt, that he, like others before him, had come to evict them.
    â€œThanks for your help. I’ll be back before very long, I daresay.”
    â€œHave you any idea who might have done it?”
    â€œNone,” he frankly admitted.
    â€œWas his wallet stolen?”
    â€œNo, nor his watch.”
    â€œWell, then, he must have been mistaken for someone else.”
    The Rue de Clignancourt was right on the other side of town. Maigret went into a little bar, and made