Monsieur Monde Vanishes Read Free Page A

back.”
    â€œWas he likely to go off like this?”
    â€œIt never happened before.”
    â€œDid he never have to go off into the provinces suddenly on business?”
    â€œNever.”
    â€œAnd yet you went on waiting for him for three days?”
    Without replying, she stared at him with her little black eyes.
    â€œI suppose you informed his daughter, who, you tell me, is married and lives on Quai de Passy?”
    â€œShe came to the house herself and behaved in such a way that I had to throw her out.”
    â€œYou don’t get on with your stepdaughter?”
    â€œWe never see one another. At least, not for the last two years.”
    â€œBut your husband still saw her?”
    â€œShe used to hunt him out in his office when she needed money.”
    â€œIf I understand you correctly, your stepdaughter recently needed money and went to Rue Montorgueil to ask her father for some. I suppose he usually gave it to her?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œAnd there she learned that Monsieur Monde had not reappeared.”
    â€œProbably.”
    â€œAnd then she rushed off to Rue Ballu.”
    â€œWhere she tried to get into the study and search the drawers.”
    â€œHave you any idea what she wanted to find?”
    Silence.
    â€œIn short, supposing Monsieur Monde should be dead, which seems to me unlikely …”
    â€œWhy?”
    â€œâ€¦ unlikely, the question would arise whether he had left a will. What were the terms of your marriage?”
    â€œSeparate maintenance. I have an income of my own and some property on Avenue de Villiers.…”
    â€œWhat is your stepson’s opinion about his father’s disappearance?”
    â€œHe hasn’t got one.”
    â€œIs he still on Rue Ballu?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œDid your husband make any arrangements before he left? About his business affairs, for instance. I suppose these require some working capital.…”
    â€œThe cashier, Monsieur Lorisse, has his signature.…”
    â€œDid the cashier find the usual sums in the bank?”
    â€œNo. That’s the point. On January 13, just before six, my husband went to the bank.”
    â€œIt must have been closed?”
    â€œTo the general public, yes. Not to him. The clerks work late, and he went in by the side door. He withdrew three hundred thousand francs, which he had had in his account.”
    â€œSo that next day the cashier was in difficulties?”
    â€œNo, not next day. He had no important deal to put through that day. It was not until yesterday that he needed to pay out certain sums, and then he learned that the money had been withdrawn.”
    â€œIf I understand correctly, your husband, when he disappeared, left no money either for his business or for yourself and his children?”
    â€œThat’s not quite correct. The greater part of his capital, represented by various securities, is in his safe at the bank. Now he has withdrawn nothing from the safe lately, he has not even visited it, so the bank manager tells me. As for the key, it was in its usual place at home, in a small drawer in his desk.”
    â€œHave you power of attorney?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œIn that case …” he said, with unintentional off-handedness.
    â€œI went to the bank. I had promised the cashier to let him have the money. I was refused access to the safe on the pretext that I could not certify that my spouse was still living, according to the accepted formula.”
    The Superintendent heaved a sigh, and nearly took a cigar out of his case. He had understood. He was in for it.
    â€œSo you want us to make an investigation?”
    She merely stared at him once again, then rose, twisting her neck to look at the time.
    A minute later she walked through the waiting room, where the woman in the shawl, leaning sideways under the weight of the baby she was carrying on her arm, was humbly explaining that for the last five days, ever