OU_214051 UNIVERSA - Osmania University

148 MAINLY MAIGRET
spat. Now and again someone would make a joke at which the others
would roar with laughter and slap their thighs.
A few yards from them were the boats, and behind them the
prim little town, nestling within the circle of its dykes. Further off
still, a crane was at work unloading a collier.
Maigret, as he approached the group, had time to observe them,
as at first no one noticed him coming along the wharf.
He already knew who they were. That is to say, he knew they
were the men who were laughingly spoken of as the Quay Rats
Club. But even without that information he would have had no
difficulty in guessing that the majority of these sailors spent the
greater part of their days at the same place, regardless of rain or
sunshine, yarning lazily, and bespattering the ground with their
saliva.
One of them was the owner of three clippers, fine sailing-boats
of four hundred tons, provided with auxiliary motors. One of these
was at that moment beating up the Ems and would, before long,
be entering Delfzijl harbour.
Others were of humbler station. One, a caulker, didn't look as
if he had very much to caulk. Another was lock-keeper of a disused
lock, but he had none the less the distinction of wearing a uniform
cap.
One, standing in the middle, eclipsed all the others, not only
because he was the tallest, broadest, and reddest in the face, but also
because one felt at once that his was by far the strongest personality.
Sabots. A smock. The cap on his head was brand new, and
somehow it looked ridiculous, as though it had not yet had time
to settle down on its wearer's head.
He was Oosting, more often called the Baes. He was smoking a
short-stemmed clay pipe while listening to the talk around him.
A vague smile hung about his mouth. From time to time he
would remove his pipe to exhale the smoke with greater relish
between his almost closed lips.
A minor pachyderm. Thick and tough, he had none the less very
gentle eyes. In fact, there was at the same time something tender and
something hard about his whole person.
His eyes were fixed on a boat that was made fast to the quay,
a boat about fifty feet long, of good lines, obviously fast. Probably
it had once been a yacht, but was now ill-kept and dirty. It was
his.
Beyond it stretched the Ems, twelve or thirteen miles wide, and