Lorsque le gardien du square donnant sous les fenêtres de Maigret ferme la quatrième grille, le commissaire constate que, curieusement, celui-ci n'a pas vu l'homme au complet gris, assis sur un banc. Maigret prend son veston et descend sur la place ; il se rend directement auprès de l'inconnu. Par la fenêtre, Mme Maigret voit son mari penché sur l'homme assis et hocher négativement la tête. Il est mort. L'enquête établit que l'homme (surnommé l'amoureux de Maigret par le commissaire) a été abattu à l'aide d'une carabine à air comprimé. Le coup est certainement parti d'un appartement donnant, comme celui des Maigret, sur la place des Vosges. Mais la surprise tient essentiellement au fait que la victime est en réalité un jeune homme de vingt-huit ans, qui portait un déguisement. Son édition pré-originale a été publiée dans l'hebdomadaire « Police-Roman », no 66 du 28 juillet 1939.
Author
Georges Joseph Christian Simenon (1903 – 1989) was a Belgian writer. A prolific author who published nearly 500 novels and numerous short works, Simenon is best known as the creator of the fictional detective Jules Maigret. Although he never resided in Belgium after 1922, he remained a Belgian citizen throughout his life. Simenon was one of the most prolific writers of the twentieth century, capable of writing 60 to 80 pages per day. His oeuvre includes nearly 200 novels, over 150 novellas, several autobiographical works, numerous articles, and scores of pulp novels written under more than two dozen pseudonyms. Altogether, about 550 million copies of his works have been printed. He is best known, however, for his 75 novels and 28 short stories featuring Commissaire Maigret. The first novel in the series, Pietr-le-Letton, appeared in 1931; the last one, Maigret et M. Charles, was published in 1972. The Maigret novels were translated into all major languages and several of them were turned into films and radio plays. Two television series (1960-63 and 1992-93) have been made in Great Britain. During his "American" period, Simenon reached the height of his creative powers, and several novels of those years were inspired by the context in which they were written (Trois chambres à Manhattan (1946), Maigret à New York (1947), Maigret se fâche (1947)). Simenon also wrote a large number of "psychological novels", such as La neige était sale (1948) or Le fils (1957), as well as several autobiographical works, in particular Je me souviens (1945), Pedigree (1948), Mémoires intimes (1981). In 1966, Simenon was given the MWA's highest honor, the Grand Master Award. In 2005 he was nominated for the title of De Grootste Belg (The Greatest Belgian). In the Flemish version he ended 77th place. In the Walloon version he ended 10th place.
