Robert Harris - An Officer and a Spy

That concluded the conversation. There were no more private approaches after that; no further invitations to dinner or to shooting, top-class or otherwise.

At the end of three years’ teaching, my gamble paid off and I was transferred from the École to the General Staff. There was talk even then of sending me to the Statistical Section: the skills of topography are a useful grounding for secret intelligence. But I fought hard to avoid becoming a spy. Instead I was made deputy chief of the Third Department (Training and Operations). And here I ran across Dreyfus again.

Those who graduate in the highest places from the École Supérieure are rewarded by a two-year attachment to the General Staff, consisting of six months in each of the four departments. It was part of my job to supervise the placement of these stagiaires , as they are called. Dreyfus had passed out ninth in his year. Therefore he was fully entitled to come into the Ministry of War. It fell to me to determine where he should go. He would be the only Jew on the General Staff.

It was a time of growing anti-Semitic agitation within the army, whipped along by that poisonous rag La Libre Parole , which alleged that Jewish officers were being given preferential treatment. Despite my lack of sympathy towards him, I took some care to try to protect Dreyfus from the worst of it. I had an old friend, Armand Mercier-Milon, a major in the Fourth Department (Movement and Railways), who was entirely free of prejudice. I had a word with him. The upshot was that Dreyfus went to the Fourth for his initial placement at the start of 1893. In the summer he moved on to the First (Administration); then at the beginning of 1894 to the Second (Intelligence); and finally in July he came to my department, the Third, to complete his rotation on the General Staff.

I saw very little of Dreyfus throughout that summer and autumn of 1894 — he was often away from Paris — although we would nod civilly enough to one another if we happened to pass in the corridor. From the reports of his section chiefs I knew that he was regarded as hard-working and intelligent but uncongenial, a loner. Some also spoke of him as cold and arrogant to his equals and obsequious to his superiors. During a General Staff visit to Charmes he monopolised General Boisdeffre over dinner and took him off for an hour to smoke cigars and discuss improvements in artillery, much to the annoyance of the more senior officers present. Nor did he make any effort to disguise his wealth. He had a wine cellar built in his apartment, employed three or four servants, kept horses in livery, collected pictures and books, hunted regularly and bought a Hamerless shotgun from Guinard amp; Cie on the avenue de l’Opéra for five hundred and fifty francs — the equivalent of two months’ army salary.

There was something almost heroic in his refusal to play the part of the grateful outsider. But looking back, one can see it was a foolish way to behave, especially in that climate.

A regular Jew. .

Operation Benefactor languishes in the August heat. There are no fresh sightings of Esterhazy in the rue de Lille. Schwartzkoppen seems to be away on leave. The Germans’ apartment is shuttered up for the summer. I write to Boisdeffre on his estate in Normandy asking for permission to obtain a sample of Esterhazy’s handwriting, in case it matches any scrap of evidence retrieved by Agent Auguste. My request is turned down on the grounds that this would represent ‘a provocation’. If Esterhazy has to be removed from the army, Boisdeffre reiterates that he wants it done quietly, without a scandal. I raise it with the Minister of War. He is sympathetic, but on this issue he refuses to overrule the Chief of the General Staff.

Meanwhile the atmosphere inside the Statistical Section is as noxious as the drains. Several times when I step out of my office I hear doors close along the corridor. The whispering starts up again. On the fifteenth there is a small party in the waiting room to say goodbye to Bachir, who is retiring as concierge, and to welcome his successor, Capiaux. I say a few words of thanks: ‘The building will not be the same without the presence of our old comrade, Bachir,’ to which Henry remarks into his glass, just loud enough for everyone to hear, ‘Well why did you get rid of him then?’ Afterwards the others all go off to continue drinking at the Taverne Royale, a favourite bar nearby. I am not asked to go with them. Sitting alone at my desk with a bottle of cognac, I remember Henry’s remark on his return from Basel: Whoever he is, he was never very important and he’s no longer active . Have I caused all this ill feeling in pursuit of an agent who in any case was never much more than a chancer and a fantasist?

On the 20th, Henry departs on a month’s leave to his family’s home on the Marne. Normally before he goes away he puts his head round my door to say goodbye. On this occasion, he slips away without a word. In his absence the building sinks even further into the August torpor.

And then, on the 27th, a Thursday afternoon, I receive a message from Billot’s orderly, Captain Calmon-Maison, asking if he might have a word with me as soon as is convenient. I have cleared my in-tray so I decide I might as well walk over right away: through the garden and up the stairs and into the office of the minister’s secretariat. The windows are open. The room is light and airy. Three or four young officers are working together congenially. I feel a stab of envy: how much better to be here than across the street in my dank and rancorous warren! Calmon-Maison says, ‘I have something here that General Billot thinks you ought to see.’ He goes to a filing cabinet and takes out a letter. ‘It came in yesterday. It’s from Major Esterhazy.’

The letter is handwritten, addressed to Calmon-Maison, dated Paris two days earlier. It is a request to be transferred to the General Staff. The implications of this hit me with a force that is almost physical. He’s trying to get into the ministry. He’s trying to get access to secret material he can sell. .

Calmon-Maison says, ‘My colleague Captain Thévenet has received a similar appeal.’

‘May I see it?’

He gives me the second letter. It is couched in almost identical terms to the first: I am writing to request an immediate transfer from the headquarters of the 74th Infantry Regiment in Rouen. . I believe I have demonstrated the qualities necessary for work on the General Staff. . I have served in the Foreign Legion and in the intelligence department as a German translator. . I would be most grateful if you could bring this request to the attention of the appropriate authority. .

‘Have you replied?’

‘We’ve sent him a holding letter — “your request is being considered by the minister”.’

‘Can I borrow these?’

Calmon-Maison responds as if reciting a legal formula: ‘The minister has asked me to tell you that he can see no objection to your making use of these letters as part of your inquiry.’

Back in my office, I sit at my desk with the letters in front of me. The writing is neat, regular, well spaced. I am almost sure I have seen it before. At first I think it must be because the script is quite similar to that of Dreyfus, whose correspondence I have spent so many hours studying lately.

And then I remember the bordereau — the covering note that was retrieved from Schwartzkoppen’s waste-paper basket and that convicted Dreyfus of treason.

I look at the letters again.

No, surely not. .

I rise from my seat like a man in a dream and take the few steps across the carpet to the safe. My hand shakes very slightly as I insert the key. The envelope containing the photograph of the bordereau is still there, where Sandherr left it: I have been meaning for months to take it upstairs to Gribelin so he can file it away in his archive.