While staking out a boarding-house where is staying Emile Paulus, a suspect, Detective Archambaud is wounded by a bullet shot from an undetermined place. To further the investigation, Maigret, his superior, decides to put up at the boarding-house posing as an ordinary guest. He is welcomed by Mademoiselle Clément, the dignified owner, and soon discovers the various people living in the place. He also takes a special interest in a woman who dwells in a neighboring block of flats, Françoise Boursicault, the lonely crippled wife of a purser most of the time at sea... A common thread through all of them is that... they seem to have something to hide...
The pragmatic, reserved and refined Maigret investigates murders in his singular unhurried manner and inevitably discovers the truth.
