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come …’
    â€˜Often?’
    â€˜Yes.’
    â€˜Did you invite her?’
    His questions were getting brusquer, more pointed. Maigret had the feeling he was making progress, if not in discovering the truth, at least in his penetration of the life in this house.
    â€˜No … yes.’
    â€˜She’s a different kind of person from you and Mademoiselle Any, shall we say?’
    â€˜She’s, well, she’s very young, isn’t she? Her father is a friend of Conrad’s. She used to bring us apples, raspberries, cream …’
    â€˜And she wasn’t in love with Cornelius?’
    â€˜No!’
    That sounded definite.
    â€˜You didn’t like her much?’
    â€˜Why wouldn’t I? She came here, she laughed. She chattered all day long. Like a bird, you understand?’
    â€˜Do you know Oosting?’
    â€˜Yes.’
    â€˜Did he have any dealings with your husband?’
    â€˜Last year Oosting put a new engine into his boat. So he consulted Conrad. My husband drew up some plans for him. They went hunting for
zeehonden
– what do you call them in French? – seals, out on the sandbanks.’
    And then suddenly:
    â€˜Oh, you think … The cap perhaps? It’s impossible! Oosting!’
    And she wailed, in distress once again:
    â€˜No, not Oosting. No! Nobody … Nobody could have killed Conrad. You didn’t know him. He was … he …’
    She turned her head aside, because she was weeping. Maigret preferred to leave. No one shook his hand and he simply bowed, muttering his apologies.
    Outside, he was surprised by the damp coolness rising from the canal. And on the other bank, not far from the boatyard, he saw the Baes, talking to a student wearing the uniform of the Naval College.
    They were both standing in the gathering dusk. Oosting seemed to be speaking insistently. The young man was looking down and only the pale oval of his face could be made out.
    Maigret realized that this must be Cornelius. He was sure of it when he glimpsed a black armband on the blue woollen sleeve.

4. Logs on the Amsterdiep
    He wasn’t strictly speaking tailing them. At no time did Maigret have the feeling he was spying on anyone. He had been coming out of the Popinga house. He had walked a few steps. He had seen two men on the other side of the canal and had quite simply stopped to observe them. He wasn’t hiding. He was there in full view on the bank, pipe in mouth and hands in pockets.
    But perhaps it was precisely because he wasn’t hiding, and because nevertheless the other men had not seen him as they carried on their intense conversation, that there was something poignant about that moment.
    The bank on which the two men were standing was otherwise deserted. A shed loomed up in the centre of a dry dock where two boats were propped on stays, and a few dinghies lay rotting, hauled up out of the water.
    On the canal itself, the floating tree trunks allowed only a metre or two of the liquid surface to be seen, giving the scene a slightly exotic feel.
    It was evening now. In the semi-darkness, however, the air was still limpid, allowing the colours to retain all their clarity.
    The tranquillity was surprisingly intense, so that the croaking of a frog in a distant marsh was startling.
    The Baes was doing the talking. He did not raise his
voice. But he appeared to be enunciating each syllable clearly, wanting to be understood, or obeyed. Head lowered, the young man in his cadet uniform was listening. He was wearing white gloves, showing as the only bright spots in the failing light.
    Suddenly there came an ear-splitting sound. A donkey had started to bray in a field somewhere behind Maigret. It was enough to break the charmed silence. Oosting, looking across in the direction of the animal, which was now beseeching the heavens, noticed Maigret, and let his gaze wander over him, but without showing any reaction.
    He said