The Flemish House (15 page)

As she said that her eyes moistened, but
it was so brief that Maigret thought he might have been mistaken.

‘And you?'

The fact that this question constantly
came back proved that they were both afraid of broaching the main topic.

‘How did you lure Germaine
Piedboeuf into your room? Wait! Don't tell me straight away … She came of her
own accord that evening, to ask about Joseph and claim the child's money …
Your mother let her in … You came into the shop as well … Did you know that you were
going to kill her?'

‘Yes!'

No more emotion, panic. A clear
voice.

‘For how long?'

‘About a month.'

And Maigret sat down on the edge of the
bed, the girls' bed, Anna and Maria's bed, ran his hand over his
forehead
as he looked at the wallpaper that served as a backdrop
to his adversary.

Now she looked as if she was proud of
what she had done. She claimed all responsibility for it. She was proclaiming her
premeditation.

‘You love your brother as much as
that?'

He knew. And it wasn't just Anna.
Was it because old Peeters had ceased to be part of the family a long time ago? The
three women, at any rate, his mother and his two sisters, held the young man in the
same adoration, which almost assumed a certain ambiguity in Anna's case.

He wasn't handsome. He was thin.
His features were irregular. His lanky build, his big nose, his eyes with their
weary pupils emanated boredom.

He was still a god! And it was as a god
that Marguerite loved him!

It was like a case of collective
suggestion, and it was easy to imagine the two sisters, the mother and the cousin,
spending whole afternoons talking about him …

‘I didn't want him to kill
himself!'

Suddenly, Maigret almost got angry. He
leaped to his feet and paced back and forth in the room.

‘He said that?'

‘If he had had to marry Germaine,
he would have killed himself on the evening of their wedding …'

He didn't laugh, but he gave a
terrible shrug. He remembered Joseph's confidences the other evening! Joseph,
who didn't even know who he loved any more! Joseph, who was almost as afraid
of Marguerite as he was of Germaine Piedboeuf!

Only, to flatter his sisters, to keep
their admiration, he assumed the attitudes of a romantic hero.

‘His life was broken …'

Good heavens! It all sat very well with
‘Solveig's Song'!

And they had all bought into it! They
had been drugged by music, poetry and confidences.

But what a fine fellow he was, the
handsome betrothed, with his ill-cut jackets and short-sighted eyes!

‘Did you talk about your plan to
anyone?'

‘No one!'

‘Not even him?'

‘Especially not him!'

‘And you had had the hammer in
your room for a month? Wait! I'm starting to understand!'

He was also starting to breathe
violently, because he was being drawn in by both the tragedy and the meanness of the
whole affair.

He barely dared to look again at Anna,
who didn't move.

‘It was important that you
weren't caught, isn't that right? Because then Joseph wouldn't
have dared to marry Marguerite! You thought of every possible weapon! A revolver
would have made too much noise! Since Germaine never ate here, you couldn't
use poison … If your hands had been strong enough, you would probably have strangled
her …'

‘I thought about it.'

‘Shut up, for God's sake! You
went and took the hammer from some building site or other, because you aren't
stupid enough to take a tool that belonged to the house … On what pretext did you
persuade Germaine to follow you?'

And she recited indifferently:

‘She had been crying, in the shop
… She was a woman who cried all the time … My mother had given her her monthly
payment of fifty francs … I went outside with her … I promised I would give her the
rest …'

‘And you both walked around the
house, in the night … You came back in by the back door and you went up to the first
floor …'

He looked at the door, and muttered in
what was supposed to be a firm voice:

‘You opened the door … You let
your companion in ahead of you … The hammer was ready …'

‘No!'

‘What do you mean, no?'

‘I didn't hit her straight
away … Perhaps I wouldn't have had the courage to hit her … I don't know
… Except that the girl said, looking at the bed: “Is this where my brother
comes to see you! You're lucky, you know how to avoid having
children!”'

Just a stupid, sordid, mundane
detail.

‘How many blows?'

‘Two … She fell straight away … I
pushed her under the bed …'

‘And, at the bottom, you found
your mother, your sister Maria and Marguerite, who had just arrived …'

‘My mother was in the kitchen with
my father, grinding the coffee for the following morning …'

‘Now, Anna!' Madame
Peeters' voice called again. ‘The inspector wants to leave …'

And Maigret, leaning over the banister,
called out:

‘Let him wait!'

He locked the door.

‘Did you tell your sister and
Marguerite?'

‘No! But I knew that Joseph would
come. I couldn't do what I had to do on my own. And I didn't want people
to see my brother in the house. I told Maria to go and wait on the quay so that he
didn't show his face, and that he was to leave his motorbike as far away as
possible …'

‘Was Maria surprised?'

‘She was scared. She didn't
understand. But she felt that she had to obey … Marguerite was at the piano … I
asked her to play and sing … Because I knew we would be making some noise up there
…'

‘And you were the one who came up
with the idea of the water-tank on the roof!'

He lit his pipe, which he had filled
mechanically.

‘Joseph came and joined you in
your room. What did he say when he saw …?'

‘Nothing! He didn't
understand! He looked at me in horror. He was barely able to help me …'

‘To hoist the body through the
skylight and drag it along the cornice to the galvanized tank!'

Big drops of sweat ran down the face of
the inspector, who muttered to himself:

‘Unbelievable!'

She pretended not to hear.

‘If I hadn't killed that
woman, Joseph would have died …'

‘When did you tell the truth to
Maria?'

‘Never! She didn't dare to
ask me … When she found out that Germaine had disappeared, she suspected something …
She's been ill since then …'

‘And Marguerite?'

‘If she has suspicions, she
doesn't want to know … You understand?'

Did he understand! Madame Peeters
continued to come and go in the house without suspecting a thing and was furious
about the accusations of the people of Givet!

Old Peeters just went on smoking his
pipe in his wicker armchair, where he went to sleep two or three times a day …

Joseph appeared as rarely as possible
and went back to Nancy, leaving his sister with the task of defending herself.

And Maria was in torment, passing her
days at the Ursuline convent with the fear of learning, when she came home one
evening, that everything had been discovered.

‘Why did you take the body out of
the tank?'

‘It would have ended up smelling …
I waited for three days … On Saturday, when Joseph came back, we carried it to the
Meuse together …'

She too had big drops of sweat, but not
on her forehead: above her upper lip, exactly where the skin was downy.

‘When I saw that the inspector
suspected us and was furiously carrying out his investigation, I thought the
best way to get people to be quiet was to go to the police myself
… If they hadn't found the body …'

‘The case would have been
closed!' he muttered.

And he added, starting to walk
again:

‘Only there was the bargeman, who
had seen the body being dumped in the water and who had fished out the hammer and
the jacket …'

And was he any less cynical than
professional criminals? He didn't say anything to the police! Or rather he
lied! He let people believe that he knew more than he was willing to
admit!'

He went and told Gérard Piedboeuf that
he could get the Peeters put in jail and, in return for that evidence, he received
two thousand francs.

But he didn't give evidence. He
spoke to Anna. He told her the deal.

Either she gave him nothing, and he
would talk. Or she would give him a lot of money, and he would leave the area, thus
drawing suspicion to himself and turning it away from the Flemish house!

It was Marguerite who had paid! They had
to get a move on! Maigret had already found the hammer! Anna couldn't leave
the grocery without attracting attention! She gave the bargeman a message for her
cousin.

And her cousin hurried over a short time
later.

‘What's happening? Why did
you …?'

‘Sh! Joseph's coming …
You'll get married soon …'

And the diaphanous Marguerite
didn't dare ask anything more.

On Saturday evening there was a relaxed
atmosphere in
the house. The danger had been banished. The
bargeman was on the run! Now all that mattered was that he didn't get
caught!

‘And since you feared your sister
Maria's nerves,' Maigret growled, ‘you advised her to stay in
Namur, to say she was sick or give herself a sprain …'

He was suffocating. The sound of the
piano reached them again, but this time it was playing ‘Le Comte de
Luxembourg'!

Did Anna realize the monstrousness of
her action? She remained absolutely calm. She waited. Her face was still as limpid
as before.

‘They'll be getting worried
down there!' she said.

‘You're right! Let's
go down …'

But she didn't move. She remained
standing in the middle of the room, stopping her companion with a gesture.

‘What are you going to
do?'

‘I've told you three
times!' Maigret sighed wearily. ‘I'm going back to Paris this
evening.'

‘But … the …'

‘I'm not concerned with the
rest! I'm not on duty here. See Inspector Machère …'

‘Will you tell him?'

He didn't reply. He was already on
the landing. He was breathing the mild, sweet smell that spread throughout the whole
house, and the dominant hint of cinnamon brought back old memories.

There was a chink of light under the
dining-room door. The sound of music could be heard more clearly.

Maigret pushed the door and was surprised
to see Anna, whom he hadn't heard, coming in at the same time as he did.

‘What have you two been
plotting?' asked Dr Van de Weert, who had just lit an enormous cigar and was
sucking the end of it like a child sucking on a dummy.

‘Excuse us … Mademoiselle Anna was
asking me for information about a trip that I think she wants to take one of these
days …'

Marguerite had abruptly stopped
playing.

‘Is that true, Anna?'

‘Oh! Not straight away
…'

And Madame Peeters, who was knitting,
looked at them all with a hint of concern.

‘I have filled your glass,
inspector … I know your tastes now …'

Machère, frowning, studied his
colleague, trying to guess what had happened.

As for Joseph, he was in high spirits,
because he had drunk several glasses of genever in a row. His eyes were shining, his
hands agitated.

Maigret said, ‘Would you do me the
pleasure, Mademoiselle Marguerite? Play me “Solveig's Song” one
last time …'

And, turning to Joseph:

‘Why don't you turn the
pages for her?'

It was perversity, as when you prod a
diseased tooth with the tip of your tongue in order to provoke the pain.

From the place where he was standing,
with one elbow on the mantelpiece, his glass of Schiedam in his hand,
Maigret dominated the whole drawing room, Madame Peeters, leaning
over her table and haloed by the light of the lamp, Van de Weert, smoking,
stretching his little legs, Anna, still standing against the wall.

And at the piano Marguerite playing and
singing, Joseph turning the pages.

The top of the instrument was decorated
with a piece of embroidery and lots of photographs: Joseph, Maria and Anna, at all
ages …

But most of all it was Anna that
Maigret was studying. He didn't think he was beaten yet. He was hoping for
something, without knowing exactly what.

Genuine emotion, at least! Perhaps a
tremor of the lips? Perhaps some tears? Perhaps even a dash out of the room …

The first couplet passed with nothing of
the kind happening, and Machère murmured in Maigret's ear:

‘Are we staying long?'

‘A few minutes …'

During that brief exchange of words,
Anna looked at them over the table, as if to check that no danger was being prepared
for her.

And while the last chord was still
echoing, Madame Peeters murmured, her white head still bent over her work:

‘I've never wished any harm
to anyone, but I repeat that God knows what he has to do! Wouldn't it have
been miserable if these children …'

She was too emotional to finish. She
wiped away a tear on her cheek with the stocking she was busy knitting.