The Saint-Fiacre Affair by Georges Simenon; Translated by Shaun Whiteside Page A

to ask his advice, and
     the Russian girl replied that he had gone for a walk.
    She was lying down, fully clothed,
     smoking cigarettes with a cardboard filter.
    Then the maid ushered the people in with
     a shrug of indifference.
    That was the signal. There were hurried
     confabs at the end of Vespers.
    â€˜No, they are! Old Martin and
     young Bonnet have been already!’
    Everyone went, in procession. The
     chateau was dimly lit. The villagers walked along the corridor, and silhouettes
     stood out at each window in turn. They held their children by the hand, shaking them
     to stop them making any noise.
    The stairs. The first-floor corridor.
     And at last the bedroom, which the people entered for the first time.
    The only person there was the
     countess’s maid, who
witnessed the
     invasion with horror. People crossed themselves with a spring of boxwood dipped in
     holy water. The more audacious of them murmured beneath their breath: ‘She
     looks as if she’s sleeping!’
    And others, in an echo:
    â€˜She didn’t suffer
      …’
    Then footsteps rang out on the uneven
     parquet floor. The stairs creaked. People were heard saying:
    â€˜Shh! … Hold on tightly to the
     banister …’
    The cook, in her kitchen in the
     basement, saw only the legs of the people passing.
    Maurice de Saint-Fiacre came back just
     as the house was being invaded. He looked wide-eyed at the villagers. The visitors
     wondered whether they were supposed to talk to him or not. But he just nodded to
     them and went into Marie Vassiliev’s room, where they heard English being
     spoken.
    Maigret was in the church. The
     sacristan, snuffer in hand, was walking from candle to candle. The priest was taking
     off his sacerdotal garments in the sacristy.
    On each side, the confessionals with
     their little green curtains designed to shield the penitents from view. Maigret
     remembered when his face didn’t come up high enough to be hidden by the
     curtain.
    Behind him the bell-ringer, who
     hadn’t seen him, was closing the main door and drawing the bolts.
    Then all of a sudden the inspector
     crossed the nave and stepped into the sacristy, where the priest was startled to see
     him appear.
    â€˜I’m sorry, Father! Before I
     do anything else I’d like to ask you a question …’
    In front of him, the priest’s regular
     features were serious, but it seemed to Maigret that his eyes blazed with fever.
    â€˜This morning, a disturbing event
     took place. The countess’s missal, which was on her prie-dieu, suddenly
     disappeared and was found hidden under the altar boy’s surplice, in this very
     room …’
    Silence. The sound of the
     sacristan’s footsteps on the church carpet. The louder footsteps of the
     bell-ringer leaving by a side door.
    â€˜Only four people could have … I
     must ask you to excuse me … The altar boy, the sacristan, the bell-ringer and
      …’
    â€˜Me!’
    His voice was calm. The priest’s
     face was lit only on one side by the flickering flame of a candle. From a censer, a
     thin thread of white smoke rose in spirals towards the ceiling.
    â€˜Was it …?’
    â€˜I was the one who took the missal
     and put it here, while waiting for …’
    The box of communion wafers, the cruets,
     the two-note bell were in their place, as they had been when little Maigret was an
     altar boy.
    â€˜Did you know what the missal
     contained?’
    â€˜No.’
    â€˜In that case …’
    â€˜I must ask you not to question me
     further, Monsieur Maigret. It’s the secret of the confessional …’
    An involuntary association of ideas. The
     inspector remembered the catechism, in the dining room at the presbytery. And the
     edifying image that had formed in his
mind
     when the old priest had told the story of a medieval priest who had had his tongue