Apropos of Nothing

I was reading a story by the great French writer Georges Simenon, about Chief Superintendent Maigret, and came across the following brief passage, where Maigret was questioning a suspect:


"What reason would you have had for killing Monsieur Louis?"

"Don't you know that I borrowed money from him?"

"Borrowed?"

"All right, I asked him for money, if you like."

"Asked?"

"What are you suggesting?"

"There are different ways of asking.  Among others, there is a way that makes it almost impossible for the person concerned to refuse. In plain terms, blackmail."

He was silent, gazing fixedly at the floor.

"What do you have to say to that?"

"In actual fact I would have never told Madame Thouret."

"All the same, you threatened to"

"That wasn't necessary."

"Because a hint that you might talk was enough."


I just found that interesting.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

It's Okay, Never Mind

Image
The woman in this picture, equipped with the weapons and ammunition shown, was found outside a National guard base. She is apparently a big Glenn Beck fan, and believed that the base was a FEMA concentration camp. Think she's the only one out there? You just know this sort of thing is not going to end well.
Read more

Wingnut Wrapup

Image
 Well, I haven't done one of these in a while, but I thought it might be fun to see what the wingnuts are "thinking" lately, so let's just dive in: And the big news: "Breaking! Trump Just Truthed He's "The Real Commander-In-Chief" Well, he said it.  It must be true.  He "truthed" it! You know it wouldn't take long for this sort of "reporting" to happen: "Maui Directed Energy Weapon Assault, Like 9/11, Paradise, CA., Malibu and Boulder Fires" Of course, it can't be the result of global warming.  It must be the deep state attacking Hawaii for some reason.  That makes much more sense.  Here's a small selection of headlines from the dozens and dozens of other articles about this alleged treachery: "New Patriot Underground: Hawaiian Wildfire: Possible DEW Attack" Maui: "An Orchestrated Apocalypse" "Maui Hawaii Has DUMBs Underground 8 to 10 Sex Trafficking Tunnels We Just Lasered Them Out!
Read more

Hamas

  Of ocurse I am going to take the opportunity to talk about the Hamas attack on Israel.   First, I'd like to talk about my background, or baggage, regarding the country.   I have lived in Israel, some years ago.   This was not for religious reasons; I spent several months there working on a movie.   During pre-production, weeks of location scouting and shooting the movie, I was all over the country, and spent a fair amount of time in the West Bank, where we also shot.   This included a lot of places that normal tourists would not see, including predominantly Arab areas such as East Jerusalem, the Arab quarter of the old city, Ramla and the southern part of Jaffa, which is predominantly Arab.   It also included heavily Orthodox areas like Mea Shearim.   I dealt with Israeli Arabs, Palestinians and Bedouins.     Here are a few things I believe I learned there:   First of all, the Palestinians I knew were perfectly normal people with the same interest in living a safe, secure
Read more