What typically helps produce his unforgettable results is a tight unity of place and time: in most of Simenon’s books, what might be happening in Paris, let alone the outside world, is rarely a consideration. Chez Krull is a departure from that norm: the outside world impinges forcefully. Borders are crossed (the novel even ends in Italy); we hear of Hans in Belgium and Hans in Germany. What is his stated reason for refusing to return there? It made my head jolt back. ‘Because there was talk of putting me in a concentration camp.’ The words camp de concentration occur four times in the novel (in a different lie, Hans’s long-dead father has recently been put in one). I checked the date of the book: Simenon finished it at La Rochelle on 27 July 1938. What was all that about most people being ignorant of concentration camps until after the war? It is there in the popular fiction of the day.