Robert Harris - An Officer and a Spy

‘The point about Mercier,’ I say, when Labori and I are ensconced in his makeshift study, ‘is that the Dreyfus affair would never have happened without him. He was the one who ordered the spy-hunt to be confined to the General Staff — the original and fundamental error. He was the one who ordered that Dreyfus should be held in solitary confinement for weeks in order to break him. And he was the one who ordered the compilation of the secret dossier.’

‘I’ll challenge him on those three points.’ Labori is making rapid notes. ‘But we’re not saying that he knew all along that Dreyfus was innocent?’

‘Not at the very beginning. But when Dreyfus refused to confess, and they realised that the only thing they had against him was the handwriting of the bordereau — that was when they started to panic, in my view, and to fabricate the evidence.’

‘And you think Mercier knew of this?’

‘Definitely.’

‘How?’

‘Because at the beginning of November, the Foreign Ministry broke an Italian cipher telegram that showed that Panizzardi had never even heard of Dreyfus.’

Labori, still writing, raises his eyebrows. ‘And this was shown to Mercier?’

‘Yes. The decrypt was handed to him personally.’

Labori stops writing and sits back in his chair, tapping his pencil against his notebook. ‘So he must have been aware more than a month before the court martial that the “lowlife D” letter couldn’t refer to Dreyfus?’ I nod. ‘Yet he went ahead anyway and showed it to the judges, along with a commentary pointing out its importance in proving Dreyfus’s guilt?’

‘And he was still maintaining the same position yesterday. The man is quite shameless.’

‘So what did the Statistical Section do with the Italian telegram? Presumably they simply ignored it?’

‘No, worse: they destroyed the original War Ministry copy and substituted a false version which implied the opposite — that Panizzardi knew all about Dreyfus.’

‘And Mercier is ultimately responsible for this?’

‘That is my belief, after months of thinking about it. There are plenty of others with dirty hands — Sandherr, Gonse, Henry — but Mercier was the driving force. He was the one who should have halted the proceedings against Dreyfus the moment he saw that telegram. But he knew it would do him terrible damage politically, whereas if he brought off a successful prosecution he might just ride it all the way to the Élysée. It was a stupid delusion, but then he’s fundamentally a dim man.’

Labori resumes writing. ‘And what about this other document from the secret file he quoted yesterday — the report by the Sûreté officer, Guénée — can I tackle him on that?’

‘It was falsified, without a doubt. Guénée claimed to have been told by the Spanish military attaché, the marquis de Val Carlos, that the Germans had a spy in the intelligence section. Henry swore Val Carlos told him the same story three months later and he used it against Dreyfus at the original court martial. But look at the language: it’s all wrong. I raised it with Guénée soon after I discovered it. I never saw a man look so shifty.’

‘Should we summon Val Carlos as a witness? Ask him to confirm if he ever said it?’

‘You could try, although I’m sure he’d plead diplomatic immunity. Why don’t you call Guénée?’

‘Guénée died five weeks ago.’

I look at him in surprise. ‘Died of what?’

‘Of “cerebral congestion”, according to the medical certificate, whatever that may be.’ Labori shakes his large head. ‘Sandherr, Henry, Lemercier-Picard and Guénée — that secret file turned out to be a blood pact.’

I rise at five on Monday morning, shave and dress carefully. My gun lies on the night stand beside my bed. I pick it up, weigh it in my hand, ponder it, then put it away in the chest of drawers.

A gentle knock at my door; Edmond’s voice: ‘Georges, are you ready?’

As well as lunch and dinner, Edmond and I have also taken to having breakfast at Les Trois Marches. We eat omelettes and baguettes in the small parlour. Across the road, the shutters of Mercier’s house remain tightly shut. A gendarme wanders up and down outside it, yawning.

At a quarter to six, we begin to descend the hill. The sky is filled with rain clouds for the first time; their greyness matches the stone buildings of the quiet town; the air is cooler, glassy. Shortly before we reach the canal there comes from behind us a shout of ‘Good morning, gentlemen!’ and I turn and see Labori hurrying to catch us up. He is wearing a dark suit and a straw boater and swinging a large black briefcase.

‘We shall have some amusement today, I think.’

He seems in an excellent mood, like a sportsman eager to get into the arena. He joins us and walks between us, I to his right and Edmond to his left, along the wide dirt path beside the canal. He asks me some last-minute detail about Mercier — ‘Was Boisdeffre present in the room when the Minister ordered Sandherr to disperse the secret file?’ — and I am on the point of replying when I hear a noise at our backs. I suspect an eavesdropper and half turn.

Someone is there all right — a big, youngish fellow, red hair, black jacket, white cap — with a revolver pointing from his hand. There is a tremendous bang that sends the ducks scattering across the water, crying in alarm. Labori says in mystification, ‘Oh, oh, oh. .’ and drops to one knee, as if winded. I put out my hand as he topples forward on to his face, his briefcase still in his hand.

My first instinct is to kneel and try to support him. He sounds more puzzled than in pain: ‘Oh, oh. .’ There is a hole in his jacket almost in the dead centre of his back. I look round to see the assassin about a hundred metres away, running away along the side of the canal. A different instinct — a soldier’s instinct — kicks in.

I say to Edmond, ‘Stay here.’

I set off in pursuit of the gunman. After a few seconds I am aware of Edmond running behind me. He shouts, ‘Georges, be careful!’

I yell over my shoulder, ‘Go back to Labori!’ and lengthen my stride, pumping my arms.

Edmond runs for a little longer then gives up the chase. I put my head down, forcing myself to go faster. I am gaining on my quarry. Exactly what I will do if I get my hands on him, given that he presumably has five bullets left and I am unarmed, I am not sure: I will deal with that situation when it arises. In the meantime, there are bargemen up ahead and I shout out to them to grab the assassin. They look to see what is happening, drop their ropes and block his path.

I am close now — twenty metres perhaps — close enough to see him point his gun at them and hear him scream, ‘Get out of my way! I’ve just killed Dreyfus!’

Whether it’s the gun or the boast, it does the trick. They stand aside and he runs on, and when I race past them, I have to hurdle a foot that is stuck out to trip me over.

Abruptly the houses and the factories fall away and we are into open Breton country. Beyond the canal to my right I can see the railway line and a train steaming into the station; to my left are fields with cows and distant woodland. The gunman suddenly leaves the towpath, darts off to the left and heads towards the trees. A year ago I would have caught him. But all those months in prison have done for me. I am out of breath, have cramp, my heart feels strange. I leap a ditch and land badly, and by the time I reach the edge of the wood he has had plenty of time to conceal himself. I find a stout stick and crash around in the undergrowth for half an hour, slashing at the ferns, startling pheasants, conscious all the while that I might be in his sights, until at last the silence of the trees defeats me and I make my way, limping, back to the canal.