The Two-Penny Bar by Georges Simenon

borrowing 18,000. And this 18,000 cost him 25,000 to repay – old Ulrich liked to exact a price! I should say that Feinstein always honoured his debts,
he always paid up on time. But he was paying off his debts by getting further into debt. For example, he repaid 15,000 francs on the 15th and borrowed another 17,000 on the 20th. He repaid this the following month, only to borrow 25,000 straight afterwards. By March, Feinstein owed Ulrich
32,000 francs.’
    â€˜Did he repay it?’
    â€˜I beg your pardon? From that date on Ulrich is never mentioned in the books again.’
    And there was a very good reason for that: the old Jew from Rue des Blancs-Manteaux was dead, a death that left Feinstein the richer by 32,000 francs.
    â€˜Who took over from Ulrich?’
    â€˜No one, for a time. A year later, Feinstein was in trouble again and asked a small bank for credit, which he received. But the bank soon lost patience with him.’
    â€˜And Basso?’
    â€˜His name crops up in the later books – not under loans this time, but bills of exchange.’
    â€˜What was his situation like at the time of his death?’
    â€˜No better or worse than usual. He needed twenty grand to bale him out – at least until the next payment date! There are thousands of small traders in Paris in exactly the same situation – constantly chasing the exact sum they need to stop
themselves tipping over the brink into bankruptcy.’
    Maigret stood up and reached for his hat.
    â€˜Thank you, Monsieur Fleuret.’
    â€˜Do you want me to do a more in-depth analysis?’
    â€˜Not just yet.’
    It was all going well. The inquiry was now running like clockwork. Paradoxically, Maigret was feeling down, as if he thought it was all falling into place rather too easily.
    â€˜Any news from Lucas?’ he asked the clerk.
    â€˜He’s just phoned. He said your man had gone to a Salvation Army hostel to ask for a bed. He’s now sleeping.’
    Of course Victor didn’t have a single sou on him. Was he still hoping to receive 30,000 francs in return for the name of old Ulrich’s murderer?
    Maigret walked along the river. He hesitated in front of a post office, then went in and wrote a telegram:
Will probably arrive Thursday, stop. Love.
    It was Monday. He hadn’t been able to go and join his wife since the start of the holiday. He stuffed his pipe as he re-emerged on the street. He seemed to hesitate again, then he hailed a taxi and told the driver to take him to Boulevard
des Batignolles.
    He had handled hundreds of cases in his time, and he knew that they nearly always fell into two distinct phases. Firstly, coming into contact with a new environment, with people he had never even heard of the day before, with a little world which
some event had shaken up.
    He would enter this world as a stranger, an enemy; the people he encountered would be hostile, cunning or would give nothing away.
    This, for Maigret, was the most exciting part. He would sniff around for clues, feel his way in the dark with nothing to go on. He would observe people’s reactions – any one of them could be guilty, or complicit in the
crime.
    Suddenly he would get a lead, and then the second period would begin. The inquiry would be underway. The gears would start to turn. Each step in the inquiry would bring a fresh revelation, and nearly always the pace would quicken, so the final
revelation, when it came, would feel sudden.
    The inspector didn’t work alone. The events worked for him, almost independently of him. He had to keep up, not be overtaken by them.
    This was how it had been since the Ulrich discovery. Only this morning, Maigret had no clue as to the identity of the body in the Canal Saint-Martin.
    Now he knew he was a second-hand dealer who doubled as a loan shark, to whom the haberdasher owed money.
    Now he had to follow this thread. A quarter of an hour later, he was ringing the bell at the