Maigret in New York (17 page)

Maigret's voice had turned contemptuous and it
was almost with complicity that he glanced at Little John, listening with his forehead in one
hand, while MacGill toyed nervously with his gold cigarette case.

‘You have no idea how it happened? One never does
in such cases. One has a drink, or two, yes … It had been years since you'd had any
whisky? Obviously. And you were enjoying talking about New York … Hello! … Tell me,
is it sunny, where you are?'

It
was ridiculous, but he had been wanting to ask that question from the very beginning of the
conversation. As if he needed to see this person in his setting, his own atmosphere.

‘Yes, I understand. Spring comes earlier in
France than it does here. You talked a lot about New York and your early life here, didn't you?
J and J … How I learned that isn't important.

‘And you asked him if he knew a certain Little
John … You were very drunk … Yes, perfectly, I know he was the one making you drink.
Drunks don't like to drink alone.

‘You told him that Little John … Oh, but
yes, Monsieur Daumale … Really, please … What? You don't see how I could force you
to answer? Let's say, for example, that tomorrow or the next day a police inspector calls on you
armed with a summons in due form to provide evidence in court …

‘Pull yourself together, will you? You've caused
a great deal of harm. Without meaning to, it's possible, but you have caused harm all the
same.'

His raised his voice, furious, motioning to
MacGill to pour him a beer.

‘Don't tell me you don't remember. As for Parson,
unfortunately, he remembered everything you said. Jessie … What? … The building on
169th Street … Speaking of which, I have bad news for you. Angelino is dead. He was
murdered, and in the end you are the one responsible for his death.

‘Stop whimpering, will you?

‘That's right, sit down if your legs feel wobbly.
I've got
time. The telephone service has been
notified not to cut us off. As for who will be paying for the call, we'll see about that later.
Don't worry, it won't be you …

‘What? That's right: say anything you want, I'm
listening. Just remember that I'm already well informed and it's useless for you to lie.

‘You are a miserable wretch, Monsieur
Daumale.

‘An honest man, I know, you've already said that
…'

Three silent men in a dimly lit hotel room.
Parson had collapsed once more into his armchair and remained there, eyes half closed, mouth
half open, while Little John kept his forehead cradled in his slender white hand and MacGill
poured himself a glass of whisky. The white patches of the two shirtfronts, the cuffs, the black
of the tailcoat and dinner jacket, and that single voice resounding through the room, now heavy
and scornful, now shaking with anger.

‘Talk … You loved her, of course. It was
hopeless … Naturally! … I tell you that I do understand and even, if you need to
know, that I believe you … Your best friend … Given your life for him.'

What disdain dripped from his words!

‘All weaklings say that and it doesn't stop them
from lashing out. I know. I know. You didn't turn on him. You simply took advantage of the
situation, didn't you? … No, she wasn't the one … Do me a favour, don't insult her
on top of everything. She was a little girl and you were a man.

‘Yes … Maura's father was at death's door.
I know that. And he left … The two of you came back to 169th Street. She was very unhappy,
I can imagine … That he wouldn't
come back?
… Who told her that? … Not a chance! You're the one who put that idea into her head.
It shows even in your photo from those days. That's right, I have it … You don't any more?
Well, I'll send you a copy of it.

‘Poverty? Didn't leave any money? How could he
have left you any when he had no more than you did?

‘Understandable. You couldn't do your duo number
alone. But you could play the clarinet in cafés, cinemas, in the streets if you had to.

‘You made some money that way? Good for you.

‘Too bad you made something else, too. Love, I
mean.

‘Only, you knew perfectly well there was another
love involved, two other loves, Jessie's and your friend's.

‘And afterwards? Cut it short, Monsieur Daumale.
Now you're writing pulp fiction.

‘More than ten months, I know … It wasn't
his fault if his father, whom they'd thought was near death, was lingering on. Or that he had
difficulties later settling the estate.

‘And during this time, you had replaced him.

‘And when the child was born, you were so afraid
– because John was saying he would soon return – that you handed him over to Child Welfare.

‘What are you swearing to? … What? …
You want to go and check the corridor again? … Be my guest. And drink a glass of water
while you're at it, because I think you need it.'

It was the first time in his life that he was
conducting an interrogation five thousand kilometres away, knowing almost nothing of the man he
was questioning.

Perspiration was beading on his brow. He had already had two
bottles of beer.

‘Hello? … It wasn't you, I know. Will you
stop telling me that it isn't your fault! You had taken his place, and he came back. And instead
of telling him the truth, instead of keeping the woman you claimed to have loved, you handed her
back to him, which was cowardly and vile.

‘Oh yes, Joseph.

‘You were a dirty little coward. A lousy, gutless
cheat.

‘And you didn't dare tell him a child had been
born. What are you saying?

‘That he wouldn't have believed the child was
his? Wait while I repeat your words:
John wouldn't have believed the child was his.

‘So, you, you knew that it wasn't yours …
What? Otherwise, you wouldn't have left it with Child Welfare? And you can stand there and tell
me that? … I forbid you to hang up, you hear? I can have you behind bars by this evening.
Right!

‘Maybe you became an honest man or something that
looks on the outside like an honest man but back then you were a nasty piece of work.

‘And all three of you continued to live on the
same floor.

‘John took back the place you'd taken while he
was gone.

‘Speak louder. I don't want to lose a word
… John wasn't the same any more? What do you mean? … He was tense, worried,
suspicious? Admit it – he had good reason to be! … And Jessie wanted to tell him
everything? Good Lord, that would have been better for her, isn't that so?

‘Well no, obviously, you couldn't have known beforehand. You kept her from telling him.

‘And John was wondering what it was that seemed
wrong all around him … What? She used to cry at the drop of a hat? I like that. You've got
a way with words.
She used to cry at the drop of a hat.

‘How did he find out?'

Little John made as if to speak, but the
inspector signalled him to be silent.

‘Let him talk! … No, I wasn't speaking to
you. You'll find out soon enough … He found a bill from the midwife? … That's true,
it is hard to think of everything … He didn't believe it was his?

‘Put yourself in his place … Especially
handed over to Child Welfare.

‘Where were you during this scene? … Well,
yes, since you heard everything. Behind the connecting door, yes. Because there was a door
between the two rooms! And for … for how long, in fact? … Three weeks … for
three weeks after his return, you slept in that room, next to the one where John and Jessie,
Jessie who had been yours for months …

‘Finish up quickly, can you? … I'm sure
you're not a pretty sight right now, Monsieur Daumale … I'm not sorry any more to be
questioning you over the phone, because I think if I were there I'd find it hard to keep from
punching you in the face.

‘Be quiet! Just answer my questions. You were
behind the door.

‘Yes … Yes … Yes … Go on
…'

He
was staring at the tablecloth in front of him, no longer repeating what he heard. So tightly
were his jaws clenched that his pipe stem finally snapped.

‘And after that? Get on with it, dammit! …
What? … And you didn't intervene sooner? … Liable to do anything, yes! … Put
yourself in his place – or, rather, no, you couldn't … On the stairs … Angelino was
delivering a suit … Saw everything … Yes.

‘Well, no: you're lying again. You did not try to
enter the room, you tried to get away. Only, since the door was open … That's right. He
saw you.

‘I'm not surprised that it was too late!

‘This time, I have no trouble believing you. I'm
sure you didn't tell Parson that. Because you could have been accused of complicity, couldn't
you! And remember, you still can be … No, there is no statute of limitations, you're wrong
… I can just see the wicker trunk. And the rest … Thanks, I don't need to know any
more. As I told you at the beginning, Parson is here … He's drunk, yes, as usual.

‘Little John is here, too. You don't want to talk
to him? I can't force you to, naturally.

‘Or to MacGill, whom you so nicely sent off to
Child Welfare? … Absolutely, he's here in my room as well.

‘That's all. The smell of the coffee prepared by
Madame Daumale must be wafting up to you. You'll be able to hang up, heave a great sigh of
relief and go downstairs to breakfast with your family.

‘I bet I know how you'll explain this telephone
call. An American impresario who has heard of your talents as an orchestra conductor and who
…

‘Adieu, Joseph Daumale. May I never run into you, you bastard!'

And Maigret hung up, then sat still for a long
time, as if drained of all energy.

No one else had moved. The inspector rose
heavily, picked up the bowl of his broken pipe and set it on the table. It just happened to be
the pipe he'd bought on his second day in New York. He went to fetch another pipe from the
pocket of his overcoat, filled it, lit it and poured himself a drink, not beer any more, which
now seemed too bland, but a big glass of straight whisky.

‘And that's that!' he sighed at last.

Little John still hadn't moved, and it was
Maigret who poured him a drink and placed it within his reach.

Only after Maura had sipped from his glass and
sat up a little straighter did the inspector speak again, in his normal voice, which suddenly
sounded strange.

‘Perhaps we'd best first finish up with that
one,' he said, pointing at Parson, who was mopping his brow in the depth of his armchair.

Another weakling, another coward, but of the
worst kind, the aggressive kind. Yet in fact, didn't Maigret prefer even that to the prudent and
bourgeois cowardice of a Daumale?

Parson's story was easy to reconstruct. He knew,
from the Donkey Bar or elsewhere, some gangsters who could use the information he'd chanced upon
during his trip to Europe.

‘How much did you get?' Maigret asked him
wearily.

‘What's that to you? You'd be only too happy to know I'd been swindled.'

‘A few hundred dollars?'

‘Barely.'

Then the inspector pulled his cheque from his
pocket, the cheque for two thousand dollars that MacGill had given him from Little John. He took
a pen from the table, endorsed the check over to Parson.

‘This will be enough for you to disappear while
there's still time. I needed to have you on hand in case Daumale had refused to talk, or in case
I had been mistaken. You shouldn't have mentioned your trip to France, you see. I would have
found out anyway, in the end, perhaps much later, because I was aware that you knew MacGill and
that you also frequented those people who killed Angelino. You'll note that I'm not even asking
you for their names.'

‘Jos knows them just as well as I do.'

‘True enough. That's none of my affair. What I am
trying to spare you, I don't know why, perhaps out of pity, is having you appear before a
jury.'

‘I'd shoot myself first!'

‘Why?'

‘Because of a certain person.'

It sounded like sentimental slop, and yet Maigret
would have bet that Parson meant his mother.

‘I don't think it would be safe for you to leave
the hotel now. Your friends certainly think that you've turned snitch, and in your crowd that's
not good. I'll call downstairs to get you a room near mine.'

‘I'm not afraid.'

‘I'd rather nothing happened to you tonight.'

Parson shrugged, swigged some whisky straight
from the bottle.

‘Don't worry about me.'

He took the cheque and staggered towards the
door, where he turned around.

‘So long, Jos!'

And then his attempt at a parting shot: ‘Bye-bye,
Mister Maygrette …'

Presentiment? The inspector almost called him
back to make him stay the night at the hotel, locking him in a room if necessary. He did not.
But he could not keep from going over to the window, where he pulled aside the curtain in a
gesture typical not of him, but of Little John.

A few minutes later came some muffled
detonations: an unmistakeable burst of machine-gun fire.

And Maigret, walking back towards MacGill and
Little John, heaved a sigh.

‘I don't think it's any use going down. They've
put paid to him!'

They stayed for another hour in the room, which
gradually filled, as at the office at Quai des Orfèvres, with the smoke of pipes and
cigarettes.

‘I apologize,' Little John began by saying, ‘for
the way my son and I tried to brush you off.'

He was tired, too, but now seemed to experience a
great release, an infinite, almost physical relief.

For the first time since Maigret had met him,
gone was the tension of a man coiled up within himself, striving painfully to keep from striking
out.

‘For six months now I've been holding my own
against them, or, rather, giving ground only bit by bit. There are four, two are Sicilian.'

‘That aspect of the case does not concern me,'
Maigret observed.

‘I know. Yesterday, when you came to the hotel, I
almost spoke to you, and Jos stopped me.'

His face hardened, his eyes became more inhuman
than ever, but now Maigret knew what suffering gave them that dreadful coldness.

‘Can you imagine,' said Little John in a low
voice, ‘what it's like to have a son whose mother you have killed, and still to love her?'

MacGill had gone quietly to sit in the corner armchair, the one
Parson had used, as far from the two men as possible.

‘I won't tell you about what happened back then.
I'm not trying to excuse myself. I want none of that. You understand? I am not Joseph Daumale.
He's the one I should have killed. Still, it's important that you know …'

‘I know.'

‘That I loved, that I still love the way I
believe no man has loved. Faced with the collapse of everything, I … No, it's no use.'

And Maigret repeated gravely, ‘It's no use.'

‘I believe I've paid more dearly than man's
justice would ever have cost me. A short while ago you stopped Daumale from going all the way to
the end. I think, inspector, that you trust what I say?'

And Maigret nodded, twice.

‘I wanted to disappear with her. Then I decided
to accuse myself … He's the one who prevented me, he was afraid of getting mixed up in an
ugly scandal.'

‘I understand.'

‘He's the one who fetched the wicker trunk from
his room. He said we ought to throw it in the river. I couldn't do it. There's one thing you
could not possibly have guessed. Angelino had come over. He had seen. He knew. He could tell the
police. Joseph insisted that we had to leave immediately. Well, for two days …'

‘Yes. You kept her.'

‘And Angelino didn't talk. And Joseph was half
mad
with fury. And I was in such a state that I
could endure his presence and gave him the last of my money to do what needed to be done.

‘He bought a second-hand truck. We pretended to
move out and loaded everything we owned …

‘We drove fifty miles out into the countryside,
and I was the one, in a wood near the river …'

MacGill's voice, pleading: ‘Father, be quiet
…'

‘That's all. I say that I have paid, paid in
every possible way. Even through doubt. And that was the most dreadful. Because for months, I
continued to doubt, to tell myself that maybe the child wasn't mine, that Jessie might have lied
to me.

‘I entrusted him to an honest woman I knew and I
didn't want to see him … Even later, I felt I had no right to see him … You haven't
the right to see the son of the …

‘Could I have told you all that when Jean brought
you over to New York?

‘He is my son too.

‘But he is not Jessie's son.

‘I admit, inspector, and Jos knows this, that
after a few years I hoped to again become a man like any other instead of a kind of
automaton.

‘I married … Without love … As if
taking medicine … I had a child … And I was never able to live with the mother.
She's still alive … She is the one who asked for a divorce. She's somewhere down in South
America, where she has made a new life for herself.

‘You know that Jos disappeared when he was around
twenty … He was in Montreal, involved with a milieu
rather like – on a lesser scale – the one where you found
Parson.

‘Old Mrs MacGill died … I lost track of Jos
and never suspected that he was living so close by, at Broadway, among those people you know
about.

‘My other son, Jean, as he admitted to me, has
shown you the letters I sent him, and you must have been surprised …

‘You understand, it was because all I could think
of was the other one, Jessie's son …

‘I forced myself to love Jean … I did this
with a kind of rage … Whatever the cost, I wanted to give him an affection that, deep
inside, I felt for another …

‘And one day, about six months ago, I saw this
boy appear.'

What infinite tenderness when he said the word
boy
, when he gestured towards Jos MacGill!

‘He had just learned the truth from Parson and
his friends. I remember his first words when we found ourselves face to face: “Sir, you are my
father …”'

And at that moment, MacGill begged him, ‘Papa, be
quiet!'

‘I am being quiet. I am saying only what is
necessary … Since then, we live together, we are working together to save what can be
saved, and that explains the transfers of funds Monsieur d'Hoquélus mentioned to you …
Because I felt that sooner or later catastrophe was inevitable. Our enemies, who had been Jos's
friends, were entirely without scruples and, when you arrived, it was one of them, Bill, who put
on quite an act to deceive you.

‘You thought that Bill took orders from us, when we were following his … But you could not
be persuaded to leave.

‘They killed Angelino because of you, because
they felt you were on the right track and they did not want to be done out of their biggest haul
…

‘I'm worth three million dollars, inspector. In
six months, I've given up half a million, but they want it all.

‘Go explain that to the FBI.'

Why was Maigret thinking at that very moment of
his melancholy clown? It was Dexter, much more than Maura, who suddenly took on a symbolic aura,
Dexter and, strangely enough, Parson, who had just got himself shot down in the street right
after he had finally, and almost honestly, come into two thousand dollars.

Ronald Dexter, in the inspector's eyes, embodied
all the bad luck, hardship and sorrow that can burden humanity. Dexter, who had also been paid a
small fortune, and who had come to leave the five hundred dollars on this table where the beer
and whisky bottles now stood near the sandwiches no one had touched.

‘You might perhaps go abroad?' suggested Maigret
halfheartedly.

‘No, inspector. Someone like Joseph would, but
not I. I've fought on alone for almost thirty years … Against my worst enemy: myself and
my suffering … I've wished a hundred times that the whole thing would crack wide open, you
understand? I have really, sincerely wished to make an accounting.'

‘What good would that do?'

And what Little John said truly expressed his deepest thought,
now that he had allowed himself to breathe again.

‘It would let me rest …'

‘Hello … Lieutenant Lewis?'

Maigret, alone in his room at five in the
morning, had called the lieutenant at his home.

‘Do you have some news?' he asked the inspector.
‘A crime was committed last night, not far from your hotel, in the middle of the street, and I
wonder …'

‘Parson?'

‘You know?'

‘It's so unimportant, in the end!'

‘What's that?'

‘It isn't important! He would have died anyway of
cirrhosis in two or three years and would have suffered a lot more.'

‘I don't understand.'

‘It doesn't matter. I'm calling you, lieutenant,
because I believe there's an English ship sailing for Europe tomorrow morning and I intend to be
on it.'

‘You know that we haven't found any death
certificate in that young woman's name?'

‘You aren't going to find any.'

‘What?'

‘Nothing … In short, there has been only
one murder committed – pardon me, two, as of tonight! Angelino and Parson. In France, we call
such things crimes of
le milieu
.'

‘What milieu is that?'

‘The underworld: where no one cares at all about human life.'

‘I don't follow you.'

‘No matter! I wanted to say goodbye to you,
lieutenant, because I am going home to my house in Meung-sur-Loire, where I shall always be glad
to welcome you if you ever visit our old country.'

‘You're giving up?'

‘Yes.'

‘Discouraged?'

‘No.'

‘Don't take this the wrong way …'

‘Of course not.'

‘But we'll get them.'

‘I am convinced of it.'

And it was true, moreover, for three days later,
at sea, Maigret heard on the radio that four dangerous crooks, two of them Sicilians, had been
arrested by the police for the murders of Angelino and Parson, and that their lawyer was
disputing the evidence.

As the ship was about to leave, there were a few
people on the pier who pretended not to know one another but were all looking in Maigret's
direction.

Little John, in a dark overcoat and blue
suit.

MacGill, nervously smoking cork-tipped
cigarettes.

A sad-faced person who tried to slip aboard and
whom the stewards treated with sovereign disdain: Ronald Dexter.

There was also a man with red hair who remained
on board until the last minute and who was treated by the police with great deference.

It
was Special Agent O'Brien, who also had questions to ask over a last drink at the ship's
bar.

‘So, you're giving up?'

He was wearing his most innocent expression, and
Maigret did his best to imitate that innocence when he replied.

‘As you say, O'Brien, I'm giving up.'

‘Just when …'

‘Just when certain people who have nothing
interesting to say could be made to talk, but when, in the Loire Valley, it is high time to
plant out melon seedlings under cloches … And I've become a gardener, you see.'

‘Satisfied?'

‘No.'

‘Disappointed?'

‘Not that either.'

‘Stumped?'

‘I don't know anything about that.'

At the moment, that still depended entirely on
the Sicilians. Once in custody, they would either talk or not, to protect themselves.

In the end they would judge it more prudent and,
perhaps, more profitable, not to talk.

And ten days later, Madame Maigret asked, ‘Now,
what exactly did you go to America for?'

‘Nothing at all.'

‘You didn't even bring yourself back a pipe the
way I told you to do in my letter …'

It was his turn to play Joseph and behave like a
coward.

‘Over there, you see, they're much too expensive
… and too flimsy …'

‘You could have at least brought me back something, a souvenir, I don't know …'

Because of which, he allowed himself to cable
Little John:

Please send phonograph.

This was all he had to show, along with a few
pennies and nickels, for his trip to New York.