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Feinsteins had their private apartment in Boulevard des Batignolles.
    On Monday morning Maigret had to go to the Two-Penny Bar with magistrates from the prosecutor’s office and got caught up in endless discussions.
    By Monday evening, nothing! It was almost certain that Basso had slipped through the cordon and taken refuge in Paris or one of the surrounding towns, like Melun, Corbeil or Fontainebleau.
    On Tuesday morning came the forensic report: a bullet fired from a distance of about thirty centimetres. It wasimpossible to determine whether the shot had been fired by Feinstein himself or by Basso.
    Madame Feinstein identified the weapon as belonging to her. She was unaware that her husband had been carrying it in his pocket. Normally the revolver was kept – loaded – in the young woman’s bedroom.
    She was questioned at her flat in Boulevard des Batignolles. Unremarkable décor, few luxuries, very plain. And none too clean either – one maid to do everything.
    And Madame Feinstein wept! She wept and wept! It was more or less her only response, apart from the odd ‘If only I’d known!’
    She had been Basso’s mistress for a few months. She loved him!
    â€˜Had you had other lovers before him?’
    â€˜Monsieur!’
    Of course she’d had other lovers. Feinstein couldn’t have kept a live wire like her satisfied.
    â€˜How long have you been married?’
    â€˜Eight years.’
    â€˜Did your husband know about your affair?’
    â€˜Oh, no!’
    â€˜Didn’t he suspect a little?’
    â€˜Not at all.’
    â€˜Do you think he would have been capable of threatening Basso with the gun if he had found out something?’
    â€˜I don’t know … He was a strange man, very closed in on himself.’
    Obviously theirs was not a marriage based on greatintimacy. Feinstein occupied with running his business, Mado left to her shopping and her secret liaisons.
    And Maigret glumly pursued his investigation, proceeding by the book, questioning the concierge, the suppliers and the manager at Feinstein’s shop in Boulevard des Capucines.
    The case was depressing in its banality, though there was something about it that didn’t feel quite right.
    Feinstein had started off with a small haberdasher’s on Avenue de Clichy. Then, one year after he got married, he took over a larger concern on the Boulevards, with the help of a bank loan.
    From then on it was the age-old story of a small business overstretching itself: unpaid bills, bounced cheques, loans and beating the wolf from the door at the end of the month.
    Nothing shady, nothing improper, but nothing solid either.
    At home too they owed money to all the local tradesmen.
    In the dead man’s office behind his shop Maigret spent a good two hours going through his books. He found nothing unusual around the time of the crime Jean Lenoir had talked about the day before his execution.
    No large receipts, no out-of-the-ordinary expenses.
    Absolutely nothing, a complete blank. The investigation was grinding to a halt.
    The most annoying part of it was questioning Madame Basso at Morsang. The inspector was surprised by her attitude. Although clearly sad, she was hardly in despair.She showed a dignity of which Maigret would not have thought her
capable.
    â€˜My husband must have had a good reason to run away.’
    â€˜You don’t think he’s guilty?’
    â€˜No.’
    â€˜But he still ran away … Have you heard any word from him at all?’
    â€˜No.’
    â€˜How much money did he have on him?’
    â€˜Not more than ten francs!’
    The coal merchant’s affairs were the exact opposite of the haberdasher’s. The business never made less than 500,000 francs, even in a bad year. The offices and the yard were well organized. There were three barges moored at the
quayside. Marcel Basso had inherited the business from his father and had expanded it.
    Nor did