A Man's Head by Georges Simenon Page B

medicine overlap …’
    The unresponsiveness of Maigret, who did not even seem to be listening, was beginning to irk him. He raised his voice:
    â€˜Eh? So what do you say to that, inspector? Have you started admitting to yourself that you are all at sea? No? Not yet? Well allow me to point out that you were wrong, when you had a guilty man under lock and key, to let him go. Because not
only might you be unable to find another suspect to put in his place, he might also slip through your fingers …
    â€˜Just now I mentioned unreliable facts. Shall I give you a new piece of incriminating evidence? And at the same time would you also like me to provide you with the excuse you need to arrest me?’
    He drank his vodka down in one, leaned well back against the wall-bench and thrust one hand in an outside pocket of his jacket.
    When he withdrew it, it was full of 100-franc notes in bundles of ten each fastened with a pin. There were ten bundles.
    â€˜You will observe that the notes are brand new. In other words, notes whose origin is easily traceable … Why not try? Go on, have fun! Unless you’d rather go home to bed, a course of action which I strongly advise.’
    He stood up. Maigret remained seated and looked hard at Radek from head to foot as he produced a thick cloud of smoke from his pipe.
    Customers began arriving.
    â€˜Are you going to arrest me?’
    The inspector did not hurry to reply. He picked up the notes and examined them carefully before putting them in his pocket.
    Eventually he too got to his feet, but so slowly that the Czech’s face began to twitch. Maigret put one hand lightly on his shoulder.
    It was Maigret in his prime, a Maigret who was sure of himself, imperturbable.
    â€˜Listen, little man …’
    The words were in stark contrast with Radek’s tone and with the nervy figure he cut and the tetchy look in his eyes, which shone with intelligence of an entirely different order.
    Maigret was twenty years older than him, and it was obvious.
    â€˜
Listen, little man …
’
    Janvier, who had overheard, tried hard not to laugh and also to contain his delight in rediscovering the chief he knew.
    Maigret merely added, in the same off-hand good humour:
    â€˜We’ll meet again one of these days, you’ll see.’
    Whereupon he nodded to the bartender, thrust both hands into his pockets and left.
    â€˜I think that they’re the ones, but I’ll go and check,’ said the clerk in the Georges V as he inspected the banknotes which Maigret had just handed to him.
    A moment later he was talking down the phone to the bank.
    â€˜Hello? Would you have the serial numbers of the hundred 100-franc notes which I sent a messenger round to collect yesterday morning?’
    He wrote them down with a pencil, hung up and turned to the inspector.
    â€˜It’s them, all right. I hope there’s no problem, is there?’
    â€˜Not at all … Are Monsieur and Madame Crosby in their suite?’
    â€˜They went out half an hour ago.’
    â€˜Did you see them leave personally?’
    â€˜As clearly as I see you now.’
    â€˜The hotel has several exits, does it?’
    â€˜Two. But the second one is the service entrance.’
    â€˜You told me that Monsieur and Madame Crosby got back last night at around three. Have they had any visitors since then?’
    They questioned the porter, the maid and the doorman.
    In this way, Maigret had proof that the Crosbys had not left their suite between the hours of three and eleven o’clock in the morning, and that no one had had access to their rooms.
    â€˜And they did not send any letters via the messenger-boy either?’
    A blank.
    But there was also the fact that from four the previous afternoon until seven o’clock next morning, Jean Radek had been locked in the cells at Montparnasse police station, from which he could not have communicated with the