OU_214051 UNIVERSA - Osmania University

THE SAILORS' RENDEZVOUS 299
knees. Madame Maigret was holding back the girl, who was making
frantic efforts to throw herself on the injured man.
" Police . • ." Maigret whispered to the doctor.
" Can you get those ladies out of here? ... Til have to undress
him and • • "
" All right. . .."
" I'll need two people to help me. ... They ought to phone for
an ambulance straight away. . . ."
He was still in his bathing-suit.
" Is it bad? "
" I can't say until the wound's been probed. .. . But you can see
for yourself. ..."
Yes, Maigret could see for himself, a dreadful mess, flesh and rags
of clothes all mixed up.
The tables were set for dinner. Madame Maigret went out, taking
Marie L6onnec with her. A young man in flannel trousers came up
and said timidly:
" Would you allow me to help you? I'm a medical student...."
An oblique ray of the sun, violently red, struck a window and
was so blinding that Maigret went and let down the Venetian blind.
" Will you raise his legs? . . ."
He remembered what he had said to his wife that afternoon,
comfortably installed in a deck-chair, following with his eyes that
ungainly silhouette beside the smaller and livelier one of Marie
Lionnec as they meandered along the shore.
" A doomed man...."
Captain Fallut had died the moment he got back. Pierre Le
Clinche had struggled long and fiercely, perhaps he had still been
struggling with his eyes shut, one hand on the table, the other in
his pocket, while Adele went on talking, talking and playing to the
gallery.
8. The Drunken Sailor
IT was shortly before midnight when Maigret came out of the
hospital. He had waited to see the stretcher wheeled out of the
operating-theatre bearing a muffled white form.
The surgeon was washing his hands. A nurse was setting the
instruments in order.