Free Pedigree by Georges Simenon Page B

then’ as if they had just had a lengthy conversation.
    â€˜Well, then … If she needs anything …’
    She rarely pronounced the name of any of her daughters-in-law, of Élise, of Catherine, Lucien’s wife, of Juliette, Arthur’s wife, even less of Guillaume’s wife who was not really his wife since she had been divorced by her first husband so that they had not been married in church.
    A poke at the fire in the stove. Désiré emerged on to the pavement, set his legs striding at their usual pace, and lit his second cigarette of the day.
    He had never missed his daily visit to the Rue Puits-en-Sock. Lucien and Arthur had never missed it either. Only Guillaume, the deserter for all that he was the eldest of all the children, had made a bad match and had gone and opened an umbrella shop in Brussels.
    In the ill-proportioned room overlooking the orchard where the women were spreading out their washing, Léopold, scowling fiercely, contemplated his handiwork, pulled at the painter’s smock he had made young Marette put on, and pushed in the shapeless, paint-spattered felt hat.
    â€˜You’ve got the wallet and the sandwiches?’
    When Léopold worked, it was usually as a house-painter, and his sisters turned aside in shame when they caught sight of him in the street, perched on a ladder.
    â€˜The pots … Drink … Go on, drink!’
    He made him swallow some gin and the boy looked as if he were going to be sick.
    â€˜Some more!’
    He spoke harshly, as if he were threatening the boy.
    â€˜Come along. Shut the door.’
    The boy’s teeth were practically chattering. It was the first time he had ventured out since the night of the Grand Bazaar.
    Now they were out on the pavement, two house-painters with down-at-heel shoes, filthy smocks, and paint-pots in their hands.
    â€˜Keep your mouth shut.’
    There was a policeman at the corner of the Rue Jean-d’Outremeuse.
    â€˜Keep walking.’
    The boy would have been quite capable of halting in his tracks and bursting into tears at the sight of a policeman.
    â€˜Keep a tight grip on your bucket.’
    A bucket full of dirty water with a big sponge floating in it.
    Désiré was walking along too. He was walking along looking at the sky, at the patches of sunshine on the pink bricks. He saw the backs of two painters and passed them without knowing who they were, without looking back at Léopold’s bearded face and the panic-stricken face of the young anarchist.
    They followed the same road. All three of them went towards the Guillemins station, crossed the Pont-Neuf, and went past the bishopric just as a chubby canon with a blotchy complexion was ringing the bell at the gate, as he did every morning.
    There were a few yards between them; the distance increased, on account of Désiré’s great strides and Marette’s stupid hesitations.
    â€˜Keep walking!’
    Wasn’t it strange that, that particular morning, Élise should have thought about her brother? She went on thinking about him. The thought of him nagged at her mind, and she longed to talk about him to Madame Smet, who was sitting there smiling beatifically.
    It was five minutes to nine when Désiré reached the corner of the Rue des Guillemins from which he could see the station clock, and three minutes to nine when he passed Monsieur Monnoyeur’s house. It was a big, gloomy house, built of freestone. The offices were a sort of annexe to this building and looked out on the Rue Sohet. The two buildings were separated by a garden.
    Monsieur Monnoyeur was ill, had always been ill and sad like his mother with whom he lived and who, oddly enough, was the terror of the young ladies of L’Innovation, where she spent her afternoons.
    Monsieur Monnoyeur had bought an insurance business in which to invest his money, so as not to look as if he did nothing to earn his living. Désiré was already in the business