title: Maigret's Holiday (Inspector Maigret)
author:  Georges Simenon 
description: <b>Praise for Georges Simenon:</b><br /><br />One of the greatest writers of the twentieth century... Simenon was unequaled at making us look inside, though the ability was masked by his brilliance at absorbing us obsessively in his stories. <i>The Guardian</i><br /><br /> These Maigret books are as timeless as Paris itself. <i>The Washington Post</i><br /><br /> Maigret ranks with Holmes and Poirot in the pantheon of fictional detective immortals. <i>People</i><br /><br /> I love reading Simenon. He makes me think of Chekhov. William Faulkner<br /><br /> The greatest of all, the most genuine novelist we have had in literature. Andr Gide<br /><br /> A supreme writer... Unforgettable vividness. <i>The Independent</i> (London)<br /><br /> Superb... The most addictive of writers... A unique teller of tales. <i>The Observer</i> (London)<br /><br /> Compelling, remorseless, brilliant. John Gray<br /><br /> A truly wonderful writer... Marvelously readablelucid, simple, absolutely in tune with the world he creates. Muriel Spark<br /><br /> A novelist who entered his fictional world as if he were a part of it.lle Peter Ackroyd<br /><br /> Extraordinary masterpieces of the twentieth century. John Banville
zlib_text: Georges Simenon
  
  
  Maigret and the Spinster
  
  
  
  
  
  A book in the Inspector Maigret series
  
  
  1942
  
  
  
  
  
  A young woman who shares an apartment with an elderly aunt returns to police
  headquarters repeatedly to complain of strange shifts in the position of her
  furniture during the night. On a particularly busy day the Inspector puts her
  off just long enough for disaster to strike. Translated by Eileen Ellenbogen.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ## PART ONE
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ### ONE
  
  
  
  
  
  From the moment he lit it, in the doorway of the apartment house on Boulevard
  Richard-Lenoir, Maigret savored his pipe with greater enjoyment than on other
  mornings. The first fog of the year was an unexpected treat, like the first
  snow to a child, especially as this was no noxious, yellowish winter fog but,
  rather, a milky haze interspersed with haloes of light. The air was crisp. He
  felt a tingling in his fingers and the tip of his nose, and his footsteps rang
  out on the pavement.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  A faint smell of mothballs still clung about 