The Yellow Dog (5 page)

And he headed back to the centre of town.

It was idiotic! He'd never known anything like it. It made him think of a storm in a film: you're seeing a cheerful street scene, a clear sky. Then an image of a cloud slides over the scene, it blocks the sun. A violent wind sweeps
through; dim light, banging shutters, whirling dust, some fat drops splash, and suddenly the street is lashed by rain, under a dramatic sky.

Concarneau was changing before his eyes. The piece in the
Brest Beacon
was only the beginning: for some time now, word of mouth had far outstripped the written version.

And besides, it was Sunday. The townspeople had time on their hands. You could see them deciding, for their walk, to go and take a look at Jean Servières' car, where two policemen had been posted. The idlers hung around for an hour or so, as
the better-informed among them explained the situation.

When Maigret got back to the Admiral Hotel, the proprietor, in his chef's toque, clutched nervously at his sleeve. ‘I've got to talk to you, inspector … This is becoming impossible.'

‘Just give me some lunch.'

‘But—'

Maigret, in a temper, sat down in a corner and ordered. ‘Bring me a beer! … Have you seen my officer?'

‘He went out. I think he was called over to the mayor's house … Someone just telephoned again from Paris. A newspaper has reserved two rooms, for a reporter and a photographer.'

‘Where's the doctor?'

‘He's upstairs. He told us not to let anyone up.'

‘And Monsieur Le Pommeret?'

‘He's just left.'

The yellow dog was gone. Several young fellows, flowers in their buttonholes, hair slicked down with pomade, were seated around the tables, but they were not drinking the lemonades they had ordered. They had come to watch and they were visibly
proud of themselves for their boldness.

‘Come here, Emma.'

There was an instinctive rapport between the waitress and the inspector. She approached readily and let him draw her into the corner.

‘You're sure the doctor never went out last night?'

‘I swear I didn't sleep in his room.'

‘So he might have gone out?'

‘I don't think so. He's afraid … I told you he made me lock the door to the quay this morning.'

‘How come that yellow dog knows you?'

‘I don't know. I've never seen him before … He comes, he goes … I wonder who feeds him.'

‘Has he been gone long?'

‘I wasn't paying attention.'

Leroy came back in a nervous state. ‘You know, sir, the mayor is furious … And he's a very influential man! He told me he's a cousin of the minister of justice. He claims all we're doing is churning things up and
throwing the town into a panic … He wants us to arrest someone, anyone, to calm people down. I promised him I'd talk to you about it. He kept telling me our careers – yours and mine, that is – are on the line.'

Maigret scraped serenely at the bowl of his pipe.

‘What are you going to do?' asked Leroy.

‘Nothing at all.'

‘But—'

‘You're young, Leroy! … Did you pick up any worthwhile evidence at the doctor's house?'

‘I've sent everything to the laboratory – the glasses, the cans, the knife. I even made a plaster cast of the footprints, the man's and the dog's. That was hard, because the plaster they've got here is very poor
quality … Do you have any ideas?'

By way of answer, Maigret pulled a notebook from his pocket. The officer, more baffled than ever, read:

Ernest Michoux
(known as Doctor): Son of small manufacturer in Seine-et-Oise who served as deputy for that department for one term and then went bankrupt. Father dead. Mother a schemer. Tried, with son, to establish property development
at Juan-les-Pins. Complete failure. Started again at Concarneau. Set up a company, trading on dead husband's name. Invested no capital herself. Now trying to get town and department to underwrite development costs.

Ernest Michoux was married, then divorced. His former wife married a notary in Lille.

Degenerate type. Has difficulty paying bills.

Leroy looked at his chief as if to say, ‘Meaning?' Maigret showed him the next entry:

Yves Le Pommeret
: Prominent family. Brother Arthur runs biggest canning plant in Concarneau. Minor gentry. Yves the playboy of the family. Never worked. Long ago ran
through most of his money in
Paris. Came back to live in Concarneau when he was down to 20,000 francs a year. Manages to come across as gentry even if he does polish his own shoes. Many affairs with working girls. A few scandals hushed up. Hunts at all the big estates in the neighbourhood. Big shot. Through connections
got himself named vice-consul for Denmark. Pulling strings now for Légion d'Honneur. Sometimes borrows from brother to pay his debts.

Jean Servières
(pseudonym for Jean Goyard): Born in Morbihan. Long-time journalist in Paris, manager of small theatres, etc. Came into small inheritance and settled in Concarneau. Married former usherette who'd been his mistress
for fifteen years. Middle-class household. Occasional flings in Brest and Nantes. Lives off small investments more than off newspaper work, but very proud of latter. Decorated by Academy.

‘I don't understand,' stammered Leroy.

‘Of course not. Give me your notes.'

‘But … who told you I …'

‘Let's see them.'

The inspector's notebook was a cheap little graph-paper pad with an oilcloth cover. Leroy's was a loose-leaf daybook in a steel binder.

His manner paternal, Maigret read:

1.
Matter of Mostaguen
: The bullet that hit the wine dealer was certainly intended for someone else. As there was no way to foresee that anyone would stop randomly at that doorway, the real target must have been expected there, but
never came, or came too late.

Unless the purpose was to terrorize the population.
The perpetrator knows Concarneau intimately. (Neglected to analyse cigarette ashes found in hallway.)

2.
Matter of poisoned Pernod
: In wintertime, the Admiral café is empty almost all day. Anyone who knew this could enter and put poison in the bottles. In two bottles. Thus it was aimed specifically at the drinkers of Pernod and
calvados. (Note, however, that the doctor spotted, in time and easily, the grains of white powder floating in the liquid.)

3.
Matter of yellow dog
: He knows the Admiral café. He has a master. But who? Seems to be at least five years old.

4.
Matter of Servières
: Determine by handwriting analysis who sent article to
Brest Beacon
.

Maigret smiled, handed the book back to his companion and remarked: ‘Very good, my boy.'

Then, with an irritable glance at the gawkers' silhouettes beyond the green windows, he added, ‘Let's go and eat!'

A little later, when they were in the dining room, along with the travelling salesman who had arrived that morning, Emma informed them that Dr Michoux was feeling worse and had asked for a light meal to be sent to his room.

That afternoon the Admiral café was like a cage in the zoo, what with sightseers filing past its small dim windows in their Sunday best. They then headed towards the far end of the harbour to the next attraction – Servières' car, still
guarded by two policemen.

The mayor phoned three times from his sumptuous house at White Sands. ‘Have you made an arrest?'

Maigret barely bothered to answer.

The young crowd, those from eighteen to twenty-five, invaded the café. Noisy groups took over tables and
ordered drinks, which they never touched. They weren't in the café more than five minutes
before their jokes petered out, their laughter died down, and awkwardness gave way to bluffing. And one by one they left.

The difference in the town was more apparent when it came time to light the street lamps. It was four o'clock. Ordinarily at that hour the streets would still be busy. That evening, they were deserted, and deathly silent. It was as if the
strollers had passed the word. In less than a quarter of an hour the streets had emptied, and when footsteps sounded, they were the hurried ones of someone anxious to get to the shelter of home.

Emma leaned on her elbows at the till. The proprietor went back and forth between the kitchen and the café, where Maigret stubbornly refused to listen to his lamentations.

Ernest Michoux came downstairs at about 4.30, still in slippers. Stubble covered his cheeks. His cream silk scarf was stained with sweat.

‘Ah, you're here, inspector!' The fact seemed to comfort him. ‘And your officer?'

‘I sent him off to look around town.'

‘The dog?'

‘Hasn't been seen since this morning.'

The floor was grey, the marble of the tables a harsh white veined with blue. Through the windows, the glowing Old Town clock was dimly visible, now showing ten minutes to five.

‘We still don't know who wrote that article?'

The newspaper lay on the table. By this point only one headline stood out:

WHOSE TURN NEXT?

The telephone jangled. Emma answered. ‘No … Nothing … I don't know anything.'

‘Who was it?' Maigret asked.

‘Another Paris paper. They said their reporters are arriving by car.'

She had hardly finished the sentence when the phone rang again.

‘It's for you, inspector.'

The doctor, pale as a ghost, kept his eyes on Maigret.

‘Hello! Who's there?'

‘It's Leroy … I'm over in the Old Town, near the channel inlet. There's been a shooting here … A shoemaker saw the yellow dog from his window and—'

‘Dead?'

‘Wounded! Badly. In the hindquarters. The animal can barely drag himself along. People don't dare go near him … I'm calling from a café. The dog is in the middle of the street – I can see him through the window.
He's howling … What should I do?' And despite his effort to keep calm, the officer's voice was tense, as if the wounded yellow dog were some supernatural creature. ‘There are people at every window … What should I do, inspector? Finish him
off?'

His colour leaden, the doctor stood behind Maigret, asking fearfully, ‘What is it? … What's he saying?'

And the inspector saw Emma leaning on the counter, her expression blank.

Maigret crossed the drawbridge, passed through the Old Town ramparts and turned down a crooked, poorly lit street. What the people of Concarneau call ‘the closed town' – the old section still surrounded by its walls – is one of the most
densely populated parts.

As the inspector advanced, however, he entered a zone of ever more ambiguous silence, the silence of a crowd hypnotized by a spectacle and trembling with fear or impatience. Here and there, a few isolated voices, those of adolescents determined to
sound bold, could be heard.

One last bend in the street and he reached the scene: a narrow lane, with someone at every window, the rooms behind them lit with oil lamps; a glimpse of beds; in the street a mob blocking the way, and, beyond, a large open space, from which came
the sound of hoarse breathing.

Maigret pushed through the spectators, mostly youngsters, who were startled by his arrival. Two of them were pelting the dog with stones. Their companions tried to stop them. They heard – or rather, sensed – the warning.

One of the boys flushed to the ears when Maigret shoved him to the left and strode towards the wounded animal. The silence then took on a different character. It was clear that a few moments earlier an unwholesome frenzy had been driving the crowd,
except for one old woman, who cried from her window:

‘It's shameful! You should haul them all in, inspector. The whole bunch of them were torturing that poor creature … And I know perfectly well why. They're afraid of
him!'

The shoemaker-gunman withdrew sheepishly into his shop. Maigret leaned down to stroke the dog's head; the animal gave him a look that was more puzzled than grateful. Leroy came out of the café from which he had telephoned. The crowd began
reluctantly to move away.

‘Someone get a wheelbarrow.'

Windows were closing one after another, but inquisitive shadows hovered behind the curtains. The dog was filthy, his dense coat matted with blood. His belly was muddy, his nose dry and burning. Now that someone was showing kindness, he took heart
and stopped trying to creep along the ground through the dozens of large stones that lay around him.

‘Where should we take him, inspector?'

‘To the hotel … Easy there … Put some straw under him.'

The procession could have looked ridiculous. Instead, by some eerie effect of the anguish that had grown steadily stronger since morning, it was stirring. With an old man pushing it, the wheelbarrow bounced over the cobblestones of the twisting
street and on to the drawbridge. No one dared follow it. The yellow dog panted hard, an occasional spasm stiffening his four legs.