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woman talked, first of all about Marius, her
deceased husband, and then about herself, a girl from a good family who had followed Marius and
missed out on marrying an officer who had since become a general.
    ‘He came here with his wife and children,
three years ago now, a few days before Marius died. He didn’t recognize me.’
    About Bernadette Amorelle:
    ‘They say she’s mad, but it isn’t true.
It’s just that she’s got a peculiar nature. Her husband was a great brute. It was he
who founded the big Seine quarries.’
    Madame Jeanne was no fool.
    ‘I know why you’ve come here, now
… Everyone knows … I think you’re wasting your time.’
    She was talking about the Maliks, Ernest and
Charles.
    ‘You haven’t seen Charles yet?
You’ll meet him … and his wife, the youngest of the Amorelle girls, Mademoiselle
Aimée as she used to be called. You’ll meet them. We are a tiny village, aren’t
we? Not even a hamlet. And yet strange things happen here. Yes, Mademoiselle Monita was found at
the weir.’
    No, she, Madame Jeanne, didn’t know
anything. Can one ever know what goes on inside a young girl’s head?
    She drank, Maigret drank, listened to her chatter
and refilled the glasses, feeling as if he had been bewitched, and saying from time to time:
    ‘I’m keeping you up.’
    ‘Oh you don’t need to worry about me.
I don’t sleep very much, with all my aches and pains! But if you’re tired
…’
    He stayed a while longer. And, when they each
went up separate staircases, he had heard a clatter as Madame Jeanne fell down the stairs.
    She couldn’t be up yet. He resolved to get
out of bed and to go into the bathroom, first to drink, to drink great gulps of cold water, then
to wash off his sweat smelling of alcohol, of Kummel. No! Never again would he touch a glass of
Kummel.
    Well
well! Someone had just arrived at the inn. He could hear the maid’s voice saying:
    ‘He’s still asleep, I tell you
…’
    He leaned out of the window and saw a maid in a
black dress and white apron talking to Raymonde.
    ‘Is it for me?’ he asked.
    And looking up, the maid said:
    ‘You can see perfectly well that he’s
not asleep!’
    She was holding a letter, an envelope with a
black border, and she stated:
    ‘I’m to wait for a reply.’
    Raymonde brought up the letter. He had put his
trousers on, and his braces dangled against his thighs. It was already hot. A fine haze rose
from the river.
Will you come and see me as soon as possible? It is best for you to follow my maid, who
will show you the way to my apartment, otherwise you will not be allowed up. I know you are
meeting them all at lunch time.
    Bernadette Amorelle
    He followed the maid, who was in her forties and
very ugly, with the same beady eyes as her mistress. She did not utter a word and her body
language seemed to be saying: ‘No point trying to get me to talk. I have my instructions
and I won’t let myself be pushed around.’
    They followed the wall, went through the gate and
walked up the drive leading to the vast Amorelle residence. Birds were singing in all the trees.
The gardener was pushing a wheelbarrow full of manure.
    The
house was less modern than that of Ernest Malik, less sumptuous, as if already dimmed by the
mists of time.
    ‘This way …’
    They did not enter through the big main door at
the top of the steps, but through a little door in the east wing. They climbed a staircase whose
walls were hung with nineteenth-century prints and had not yet reached the landing when a door
opened and Madame Amorelle appeared, as erect, as imperious as on the previous day.
    ‘You took your time,’ she
declared.
    ‘The gentleman wasn’t ready … I
had to wait while he got dressed.’
    ‘This way, inspector. I would have thought
that a man like you would be an early riser.’
    It was her bedroom, a vast room, with three
windows. The four-poster bed was already made. There were objects lying around on the furniture,
giving the impression