Maigret and the Man on the Boulevard by Georges Simenon Page B

care not to let her see what I was doing…”
    Maigret held out his hand.
    â€œGive it here.”
    As if he didn’t know that Santoni had pinched the photograph! It showed a thin youth with a nervous expression and very long hair, the sort whom women often find attractive, and who know it.
    â€œIs that all?”
    â€œWe’ll have to wait and see whether he goes home tonight, won’t we?”
    Maigret sighed:
    â€œYes, we’ll have to wait and see.”
    â€œAnything the matter?”
    â€œOf course not.”
    What was the use? Santoni would learn in time, as others had learned before him. It was always the same when one took on an inspector from some other branch of the Service.
    â€œThe reason I didn’t follow the girl was that I know where to find her. Every evening at about half-past five, or a quarter to six at the latest, she calls in at the office to hand over the money she has collected, and write her report. Do you want me to go there?”
    Maigret hesitated on the brink of telling him to drop the whole thing. But he thought better of it. It would have been unfair. After all, the inspector had done his best.
    â€œJust check that she does go back to the office, as usual, and then make sure she goes off to catch her train.”
    â€œMaybe her boyfriend will be waiting for her there?”
    â€œMaybe. What time does he usually get home in the evening?”
    â€œThey have dinner at seven. He’s always in by then, even if he has to go out again later.”
    â€œThey’re not on the telephone, I suppose?”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œWhat about the concierge?”
    â€œI don’t think she is either. It’s not the sort of place where you’d expect to find telephones. But I’ll check.”
    He consulted the street directory.
    â€œYou’d better go back there some time after seven, and see what you can find out from the concierge. Leave the photograph with me.”
    Santoni had taken the photograph, there was no going back on it, Maigret thought. So he might as well keep it. It could come in useful.
    â€œWill you be staying here in your office?”
    â€œI don’t know where I shall be, but keep in touch with our people here.”
    â€œWhat shall I do between now and then? I’ve got nearly two hours to kill before setting out for the Rue de Rivoli.”
    â€œGo down and have a word with the Licensed Premises chaps. They may have a registration form in the name of Louis Thouret.”
    â€œYou mean you think he took a room somewhere in town?”
    â€œWhere do you suppose he left his brown shoes and colorful tie when he went home?”
    â€œThat’s a thought.”
    It was now fully two hours since Monsieur Louis’s photograph had appeared in the afternoon editions of the newspapers. It was only a small photograph, tucked away in a corner, and the caption read:
    Louis Thouret, murdered yesterday afternoon in a cul-de-sac off the Boulevard Saint-Martin. The police are on the track of the killer .
    It wasn’t true, but that was what the papers invariably said. It was odd, come to think of it, that the chief superintendent had not yet received a single telephone call. If the truth were told, it was chiefly on this account that he had decided to return to the office and, while he was about it, clear his in-tray.
    Almost always, in a case of this sort, there were people who believed, rightly or wrongly, that they recognized the victim. Or they claimed to have seen an unsavory looking character lurking near the scene of the crime. More often than not such claims were unfounded. All the same, every now and again, one or more of these people would lead him to the truth.
    For the past three years, Monsieur Louis, as he was known to his former colleagues and to the concierge in the Rue de Bondy, had left Juvisy at the same time every morning. Morning and evening, he never missed his usual trains. He continued to