OU_214051 UNIVERSA - Osmania University

214 MAINLY MAIGRET
As for Madame Wienands, she could hardly be called a woman
at all. Just a mother! Just a housewife! She was wiping the nose
of her litde girl whose tears were gradually petering out.
" Do you want me to stay here? " asked Jean Duclos from the
platform.
" Please."
And Maigret, going up to Pijpekamp, whispered a few words in
his ear. The Groningen detective left a moment later with Oosting.
In another room people were playing billiards, and every few
seconds the clack of ivory balls could be heard.
In the lecture-room the atmosphere was now thoroughly oppressive.
It was something like a spiritualist stance. Everybody expected
something uncanny to happen. Everybody was cowed, except Any,
who suddenly got up and, after a considerable effort to find her
voice, said:
" I can't see what all this is leading to. ... It's . . . it's . .."
" It's time," cut in Maigret shortly. " Hallo! Where's Barens? "
He had forgotten all about him. He found him far from the
others, leaning with his back to the wall.
" Why didn't you take your proper place? "
" You said we were to be where we were the other evening ..."
His eyes darted here and there nervously. The words came
jerkily.
"... And the other evening I was with my shipmates in the
fifty-cent seats."
Maigret took no further notice of him, but went and opened a
door which led tlirough a porch directly on to the street and
enabled people to come and go without passing through the cafe.
He glanced outside. The people who had been gathered there
seemed for the most part to have dispersed, for there were only
three or four silhouettes visible in the darkness.
Turning back towards the room, he said:
" I imagine that, as soon as the lecture was over, people crowded
round the platform to congratulate the speaker...."
No one answered, but the words sufficed to recall the scene. A
general bustle, the scrape of chairs on the floor, the bulk of the
audience streaming slowly through the exit, while the more important
people gathered round the platform to shake the professor's
hand and compliment him on his success..,. The room slowly
emptying. . .. The last group finally moving off towards the door.
... Barens joining the Popingas.. ..