OU_214051 UNIVERSA - Osmania University

I. The Man Who Ate Glass
" HE'S the best lad in the place, and the mother, who has no one
but him, may die of it. I am certain, as everyone is here, that he
is innocent. But the sailors IVe talked to say that he will be condemned,
because Civil Courts have never understood anything
about sea affairs. Do all you can, as if it were for me. I read in the
papers that you have become a big noise in the Police Judiciaire>
and .. ."
It was a morning in June. The windows were all open in the
flat on the Boulevard Richard-Lenoir, and Madame Maigret was
finishing packing some big basket-trunks while Maigret, collarless,
was reading the letter half-aloud.
" Who's it from? "
" Jorissen. We were at school together. He became a teacher at
Quimper. Tell me, are you very keen on spending our week's
holiday in Alsace? "
She looked at him without understanding, the question was so
unexpected. For twenty years they had invariably spent their holidays
with relations in the same village in the east.
" Suppose we went to the sea instead? "
He re-read half-aloud some passages from the letter:
" You are in a better position than I am for getting accurate
information. Briefly, Pierre Le Clinche, a young man of twenty
who was a pupil of mine, sailed three months ago on the Ocean, a
Fecamp trawler which fishes cod in Newfoundland. The boat came
back to port the day before yesterday. A few hours later, the captain's
body was found in the dock, and all the evidence points to
murder. Now Pierre Le Clinche has been arrested. ..."
'' Fecamp would be no worse for a holiday than anywhere else,"
sighed Maigret, without enthusiasm.
But there was opposition. Madame Maigret was at home in
Alsace, she helped with the jam and the plum-wine. The idea of
living in a hotel in the company of other Parisians scared her.
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