The Methods of Maigret ( PDFDrive )

trees around the station were motionless, transfixed in a Sahara sun. It was very
likely that there had been an important market that morning, a fair or a fête, for
the carts, vans, and heavy lorries were mobile pyramids of early vegetables,
fruits, and flowers.
Mr. Pyke, just like Maigret, found his breath coming a little more quickly.
There was a real sense of entering another world, and it was uncomfortable to do
so with the dark clothes which had done for the previous day in the rainy streets
of Paris.
He ought, like Inspector Lechat, to have worn a light suit, a shirt with open
collar, and shown a red patch of sunburn on his forehead. Maigret had not
immediately recognized him, for he remembered his name rather than his face.
Lechat, who was threading his way through the porters, looked almost like a boy
from the district, small and thin, hatless, with espadrilles on his feet.
“Over here, Chief!”
Was this a good mark? For while this devil Mr. Pyke noted everything down,
it was impossible to tell what he classified under the good column and what he
put into the bad one. Officially Lechat ought to have called Maigret “Chief
Inspector,” for he was not in his department. But there were few detectives in
France who could deny themselves the pleasure of calling him “Chief” with
affectionate familiarity.
“Mr. Pyke, you already know about Inspector Lechat. Lechat, let me introduce
Mr. Pyke, from Scotland Yard.”
“Are they in on it too?”
Lechat was so taken up with his Marcellin case that it didn’t surprise him at
all that it should have become an international affair.
“Mr. Pyke is in France on a study tour.”
While they walked through the crowd Maigret wondered at the curious way
Lechat had of walking sideways, as though dislocating his neck.
“Let’s hurry through,” he was saying. “I’ve got a car at the entrance.”
It was the small official car. Once inside, the Inspector heaved a sigh:
“I thought you’d better be careful. Everyone knows it’s you they’ve got it in
for.”
So just now, in the crowd, it was Maigret the tiny Lechat was trying to
protect!
“Shall I take you straight to the island? You haven’t anything to do in Hyères,
have you?”