A child while is going to church to make an altar boy sees a corpse in the street. No one else sees that corpse, and two minutes later, that corpse is disappeared. Later the child claims to have invented the story. Maigret must find out, first of all, if the corpse is really existed or if it is a lie of the child.

Maigret is dispatched on a special murder case to the South of France with instructions from a very high source not to make waves while solving the crime. The homicide victim, an Australian ex-pat, was a hero in the French Resistance.

Maigret is spending a few days between assignments avoiding a long trip back to Paris and then on again to his next assignment. The seaside resort is run by an acquaintance from earlier days in Paris, Monsieur Louis. Staying at the resort is a art dealer, Monsieur Owen, who is wheelchair bound from MS and accompanied by a nurse. Also staying is a flamboyant actress with her newly acquired second husband and a dog. There is also a gentleman whom Monsieur Louis describes as a "fixer" who "helps" people not favored by Lady Luck at the Casino. A unknown dead man is found ...

Maigret travels ex officio to help the brother-in-law of commisionaire who is a friend of his. The brother-in-law is being anonymously accused of the murder of a man who died having been run over by a train just outside his property. At the same time an ex-inspector that Maigret had had dismissed also appears and seems to be following the same clues and talking to the same witnesses.