Free Cécile is Dead by Georges Simenon

not
     going to any trouble to pretend they felt deep grief, followed more discreetly,
     discussing the inheritance, and after them came Monsieur Dandurand, with the gentlemen
     who wore such large rings, one of whom brought up the rear of the procession, driving
     their car.
    From the first the pace was much too fast,
     because of the horse with a mind of its own. On the other hand, when everyone had to
     turn left for the church, thus crossing the main road, there was a terrible shambles,
     and the traffic was held up for several minutes, including three trams one after
     another.
    Gérard’s wife had not come, heavily
     pregnant as she was. Her baby would be due in a week’s time at the most. Maigret
     had spent an hour with her the day before, in the couple’s lodgings: a two-roomed
     apartment in Rue du Pas-de-la-Mule, above a butcher’s shop.
    She must be barely twenty-three years old,
     and the
resignation of a poverty-stricken
     housewife could already be seen on her face, which had lost the bloom of youth. You
     could tell that she was struggling to make those two rooms habitable, with insufficient
     financial means. A number of items must already have gone on their way to the
     pawnbroker’s, and Maigret noticed that the gas had been turned off.
    â€˜Gérard has never had any luck,’
     she sighed, without resentment. ‘Yet he’s such a nice man, and much more
     intelligent than many others who have good jobs. Perhaps he’s
too
intelligent?’
    Her name was Hélène. Her father worked in
     the indirect taxation office, and she dared not tell him the household’s real
     situation but let him think Gérard was working and the two of them were happy.
    â€˜You found him a little embittered, I
     expect, but put yourself in his place. Everything has gone against him for so long. He
     chases round all day, answering the small ads … Oh, I hope at least you don’t
     suspect him, inspector. He could never do anything the least little bit dishonest …
     Maybe it’s because he’s over-scrupulous that he’s getting nowhere. You
     know, in his last job, when he was working for a firm selling vacuum cleaners, there was
     a theft, and Gérard suspected one of his colleagues, but he didn’t say anything.
     And when his boss started asking
him
questions, as if he were accusing him,
     Gérard left rather than give his colleague away … Oh yes, you can look round our
     lodgings. You won’t find anything interesting, only bills.’
    And there was the pot plant standing on the
     window-sill!
Maigret had noticed that while
     the soil looked freshly turned, the geranium in the pot had died some time ago. So he
     took advantage of the moment when Hélène wasn’t looking …
    Now, with his hands in his pockets, he was
     walking along the pavement, to one side of the procession, which allowed him to smoke
     his pipe. Bringing up the rear, he saw the two Siveschi girls, Nouchi and Potsi, who
     were acting as if they were at a party and wanted to see everything there was to be
     seen. Madame With-All-Due-Respect had handed over her lodge to a woman neighbour for an
     hour (she was unaware that Maigret had stationed a police officer opposite the
     building). She was going to the church but not to the cemetery because of her stiff
     neck; she was afraid of draughts.
    Suddenly the column stopped, a halt that was
     not part of the programme. The mourners craned their necks and stood on tiptoe to see
     what was going on.
    Juliette Boynet and Cécile were out of luck.
     Another funeral procession, this one late while theirs was early, was coming out of a
     road intersecting their own and making for the church. The horses pawed the road with
     their hooves. Some of the men left the procession for a moment to go into a little café
     for a quick drink and were seen wiping their mouths as they came out again.
    Organ music was heard. Behind