Chief Inspector Maigret Visits London Read Online Free

certainly saved your hide when you put the wrong man on trial in Paris last month.’
    â€˜You’re remarkably well informed, Chief Inspector Scott. Should I be looking for a Scotland Yard spy at Paris HQ?’
    â€˜Would we do that to our French colleagues? No mole, I assure you. However, we
do
live in a global village these days and word gets around about such er… embarrassments.’
    I’ll just bet it does, Philippe Maigret thought wryly. Especially when it’s the French who are on the receiving end of the embarrassment! ‘This is all academic anyway, Chief Inspector, because I won’t let Mrs Lisle do it. And that’s final.’
    â€˜And exactly
what
won’t you let me do, Philippe?’ Megan asked, standing in the doorway.

Chapter Four
    â€˜Don’t you ever do that to me again, Philippe,’ Megan said as they walked towards the lift a few minutes later. Not if you want to have a long happy marriage.’
    â€˜What, my love?’
    â€˜And don’t try to sweet talk me either. I want to stay cross with you for a long time!’
    â€˜
Comment?’
    â€˜And don’t speak French, either.’
    â€˜But I
am
French, darling. It’s what we do. It’s my
mother
tongue.’
    â€˜Now you’re laughing at me!’ And he was.
    However, by the time the lift had reached the ground floor, they had kissed and made up. But only after Philippe Maigret had solemnly promised, with his hand on his heart, that he would never again –
in this or any other Universe!
– presume to speak on Megan’s behalf without first knowing her thoughts on the subject under discussion.
    The next day Chief Inspector Scott’s hastily arranged information gathering plan was put into action, but not without opposition.
    â€˜This is the most ludicrous surveillance operation in which I’ve ever had the misfortune to be involved,’ Philippe Maigret said. It was not the first time he’d voiced his objections but now he was incredulous. ‘Two strangers, one dressed like a vicar, walk in off the street to ask for old books? How believable is that? It will never work. Who would do such a thing? Nicole will smell a rat the moment you’re inside the door. Assuming she actually lets you in the door in the first place.’
    â€˜Of course it will work. People do it all the time in the summer when the local churches are having their fairs. I’ve done it lots of times myself,’ Megan said calmly.
    â€˜They just
give
you their old books? It’s
incredible!
Are these people mad? Have they no souls?’ At that moment the penny dropped for Megan. ‘Sweetie, you
do
realise that we’re not talking about antique
books or
First Editions,
don’t you? People give us paperbacks
or old travel guides and children’s books. Any books they no longer need but that other people might like. And not just books. Bric-a-bracand old pieces of jewellery too. People donate lots of saleable things, especially when it’s for a church or a charity. It’s an upmarket form of recycling. Don’t people do that in Paris?’
    Philippe shrugged. ‘Maybe, in the
marché aux puces
or places like that, but not where… ’
    â€˜Oh, I see! In the flea market, but not in the
16 th arrondissement,
or any other posh parts of Paris, like those where chief inspectors might choose to live.’
    â€˜And now you’re calling me a snob as well as an ignoramus,’ he laughed. ‘Which is unfair because you know where I live and it’s not in the16 th !’
    An hour later, Megan Lisle together with the chubby Met policeman, Sergeant Andrew Gillespie – looking slightly red-faced and uncomfortable in his vicar’s collar – started their door-knocking assignment in the small development of mews houses where Nicole and the mysterious Serge Vachon lived. To make this seem more real they knocked on the first