Zola says, ‘It’s fantastical! The most astonishing story there has ever been.’
Ranc says, ‘It makes one ashamed to be French.’
Clemenceau, who is also taking notes, says, without looking up, ‘So who are the senior members of the military hierarchy most culpable, Colonel Picquart, in your opinion?’
‘Among the senior ranks I would pick out the five generals: Mercier, Boisdeffre, Gonse, Billot and now Pellieux, who is running a cover-up disguised as an inquiry.’
Mathieu Dreyfus interjects, ‘And what do you think will happen to you now, Colonel?’
I light a cigarette. ‘I would imagine,’ I say, twirling the match and extinguishing it with as much nonchalance as I can summon, ‘that after Esterhazy is formally cleared of all charges, they will discharge me from the army and put me in prison.’
There is a muttering of disbelief around the table. Clemenceau says, ‘But surely even the General Staff wouldn’t be that stupid?’
‘I fear they’ve trapped themselves in a position where their logic doesn’t leave them much alternative. If Esterhazy is innocent – as they are determined to find him, in order to avoid reopening the Dreyfus case – then it follows that the campaign against him is a wicked conspiracy; and as I am the one ultimately responsible for that campaign, I must be punished.’
Reinach says, ‘So what is it you would like us to do, Colonel?’
‘That is not really for me to say. I’ve told you as much as I can, without disclosing national secrets. I can’t write an article or publish a book myself – I’m still subject to army discipline. What I do believe is that somehow this affair must be taken out of the jurisdiction of the military and elevated to a higher plane – the details need to be assembled into a coherent narrative, so that everything can be seen for the first time in its proper proportions.’ I nod to the Renoir and then glance at Zola. ‘Reality must be transformed into a work of art, if you will.’
‘It already is a work of art, Colonel,’ he replies. ‘All that is required is an angle of attack.’
Before the hour is up, I stub out my cigarette and rise to my feet. ‘Excuse me, gentlemen, but I should be the first to leave. It would be better if everyone departed at intervals, perhaps of ten minutes? Please don’t get up.’ I turn to Charpentier: ‘Is there a back way out of the house?’
‘Yes,’ he says, ‘there’s a garden gate. You can get down to it through the kitchen. I’ll take you myself.’
‘I’ll fetch your things,’ says Louis.
I make my way round the dining room shaking the hand of each man in turn. Mathieu covers mine with both of his. ‘My family and I cannot adequately express our gratitude to you, Colonel.’
There is something proprietorial about his warmth which makes me feel awkward, even chilly.
‘You have no reason to thank me,’ I reply. ‘I was simply obeying my conscience.’
The street outside is clear and I take advantage of the fact that I have temporarily shaken off my police tail to walk quickly along the boulevard Saint-Germain to the de Comminges house. I give my card to the footman and am shown into the library while he goes upstairs to announce me. A minute later the door is flung open and Blanche rushes in and flings her arms around me.
‘Darling Georges!’ she cries. ‘Do you realise you’re now the most famous person I know? We’re all in the drawing room having tea. Come along right now – I want to show you off!’
She tries to pull me after her, but I resist. ‘Is Aimery in?’
‘Yes, and he’ll be thrilled to see you. Come upstairs. I insist.’ She tugs at my hand again. ‘We want to hear everything!’
‘Blanche,’ I say gently, detaching her hand from my arm, ‘we need to talk in private, and I think perhaps Aimery should join us. Would you mind getting him?’
For the first time she sees that I am serious. She gives a nervous laugh. ‘Oh, Georges,’ she says, ‘this is too ominous!’ But she goes and fetches her brother.
Aimery saunters in, as young-looking as ever, wearing a well-cut grey suit and carrying two cups of tea. ‘Hello, Georges. I suppose if you won’t come to the samovar, the tea will have to come to you.’
And so the three of us sit by the fire, and while Aimery sips his tea and Blanche smokes one of her brightly coloured Turkish cigarettes, I describe how her name has been used on a fake telegram, almost certainly dreamed up by du Paty, sent to me in Tunisia. Her eyes gleam. She seems to think it a great adventure. Aimery, though, scents the danger at once.
‘Why would du Paty use Blanche’s name?’
‘Because she knows Germain Ducasse, and Ducasse worked for me on an intelligence operation against Esterhazy. And so it looks as though we’re all part of this imaginary “Jewish syndicate” that is working to free Dreyfus.’
‘It’s utterly ridiculous,’ says Blanche through a mouthful of smoke. ‘No one will believe it for an instant.’
Aimery asks, ‘Why use Blanche’s name? I also know Ducasse. Why not use mine?’ He sounds genuinely puzzled. He glances at me, and then at his sister. Neither of us can quite bring ourselves to meet his gaze. A few awkward seconds pass. Aimery is no fool. ‘Ah,’ he says quietly, nodding slowly, ‘I see.’
‘Oh, for heaven’s sake,’ exclaims Blanche irritably, ‘you’re worse than Father! What does it matter?’
Aimery, who is suddenly very tense and silent, folds his arms and stares hard at the carpet, leaving it to me to explain: ‘I’m afraid it does matter, Blanche, because you’re bound to be questioned about the telegrams, and then it’s certain to reach the newspapers, and there will be a scandal.’
‘Let there be—’
Aimery interrupts her furiously: ‘Just be quiet, Blanche – for once! It doesn’t only concern you. It drags the whole family into the mess! Think of your mother. And don’t forget I’m a serving officer!’ He turns to me. ‘We’ll need to talk to our lawyers.’
‘Of course.’
‘In the meantime, I think it would be better if you didn’t come to this house or make any attempt to contact my sister.’
Blanche appeals to him: ‘Aimery . . .’
I stand to leave. ‘I understand.’
‘I’m sorry, Georges,’ says Aimery. ‘That’s just the way it has to be.’
Christmas and the New Year pass, the former spent with the Gasts in Ville-d’Avray, the latter with Anna and Jules in the rue Cassette; Pauline stays in the south. I sell my Erard piano to a dealer for five thousand francs and send her the money.
Esterhazy’s court martial is fixed for Monday 10 January 1898. I am summoned to appear as a witness; so is Louis. But on the Friday before the hearing, his father finally succumbs to his long illness and dies in Strasbourg; Louis is excused to go home to his family.
‘I don’t know what I should do,’ he says.
‘My dear friend,’ I reply, ‘there is no doubt about it. Go and be with your family.’
‘But the trial . . . You’ll be alone . . .’
‘Frankly, it will make no difference to the outcome whether you are there or not. Go.’
On Monday, in the pre-dawn darkness, I rise early, don the pale blue tunic of the 4th Tunisian Rifles, pin on the ribbon of the Legion of Honour, and, trailed by a pair of plain-clothes police agents, make the familiar journey across Paris to the military court building in the rue Cherche-Midi.
The day is hostile from the start: cold, grey, spitting rain. In the street between the prison and the courthouse a dozen gendarmes stand dripping in their caps and capes, but there are no crowds for them to control. I walk over the slippery cobbled forecourt into the same bleak ex-nunnery in which Dreyfus was tried more than three years ago. A captain of the Republican Guard shows me into a holding room for witnesses. I am the first to arrive. It is a small whitewashed chamber with a single barred window set above head height, a flagstone floor and hard wooden chairs ranged around the sides. A coal-burner in the corner barely suffices to take the edge off the chill. Above it
is a picture of Christ with a glowing index finger raised in benediction.
A few minutes later the door opens and Lauth sticks his blond head around the corner. I see from his uniform he has been promoted to major. He takes one look at me and hastily withdraws. Five minutes later he comes back in with Gribelin and they go over to the corner furthest away from me. They don’t look once in my direction. Why are they here? I wonder. Then two more of my former officers show up. The same procedure: straight past me and into the corner huddle. Du Paty marches through the door as if he expects a band to strike up a tune at his entrance, whereas Gonse sidles in, smoking his inevitable cigarette. All keep their backs to me except for Henry, who enters loudly, banging the door, and nods as he passes.
‘You have a good colour, Colonel,’ he says cheerfully. ‘It must be all that African sunshine!’
‘And yours must be all that cognac.’
He roars with laughter and goes to sit with the others.
Gradually the room fills up with witnesses. My old friend Major Curé of the 74th Infantry Regiment carefully ignores me. I recognise the Vice President of the Senate, Auguste Scheurer-Kestner, who offers me his hand and murmurs quietly, ‘Well done.’ Mathieu Dreyfus enters with a slim, quiet, dark-haired young woman on his arm, dressed entirely in widow’s black. She seems so young I assume she must be his daughter, but then he introduces her: ‘This is Madame Lucie Dreyfus, Alfred’s wife. Lucie, this is Colonel Picquart.’ She gives me a faint smile of recognition but doesn’t say anything, and nor do I. I feel uncomfortable, remembering those intimate, passionate letters of hers – Live for me, I entreat you . . . On the other side of the room du Paty eyes her keenly through his monocle and whispers something to Lauth: there was a story that he made a pass at her when he went to search her apartment after Dreyfus was arrested; I can believe it.
And so we sit, the military on one side of the room and I with the civilians, listening to the sounds of the proceedings getting under way above us: the thump of feet climbing the stairs, the cry of ‘Present arms!’ as the judges arrive, and then a long interval of silence during which we wait for news. Eventually the clerk of the court appears and announces that the civil suits brought by the Dreyfus family have been rejected, and that therefore there will be no reconsideration of the original court martial verdict, which stands. Also, the judges have voted by a majority that all the evidence given by military personnel will be heard in secret. Thus we have lost the battle before it even starts. With a practised stoicism, Lucie rises, expressionless, embraces Mathieu and leaves.
Another hour passes, during which presumably Esterhazy is being questioned, and then the clerk returns and calls, ‘Monsieur Mathieu Dreyfus!’ As the original complainant against Esterhazy to the Minister of War, he has the privilege of going first. He does not return. Forty-five minutes later Scheurer-Kestner is called. He does not return either. In this way the room gradually empties of its various handwriting experts and officers until at last, in the middle of the afternoon, Gonse and the men of the Statistical Section are all summoned en bloc. They file out, every one of them avoiding eye contact, except for Gonse, who at the last minute pauses on the threshold to look back at me. I cannot fathom his expression. Is it hatred, pity, bafflement, regret, or all of these? Or is it that he just wants to carry one last image of me in his mind before I disappear for ever? He stares for several seconds, and then he turns on his heel and the door closes, leaving me alone.
For several hours I wait, occasionally standing to pace the room to try to keep myself warm. More than ever, I wish Louis were with me. If I had any doubts of it before, I have none now: this is not Esterhazy’s court martial; it is mine.
By the time the clerk comes to fetch me, it is dark. Upstairs the court has been cleared of all civilians apart from the various lawyers. There are no outsiders. The atmosphere, in contrast to the freezing waiting room, is warm from the closely packed male bodies, almost clubbable; there is a drifting fug of tobacco smoke. Gonse, Henry, Lauth and the other officers of the Statistical Section watch me as I approach the judges’ bench. Behind General Luxer, who is the president of the court, sits Pellieux, of all people; and there to my left is Esterhazy, lounging back more or less as I remember him on the only other occasion I saw him, with his feet stretched out and his arms hanging loosely at his sides, as relaxed as if he were still in the nightclub in Rouen. I have time only for a sidelong glance, but I am struck again by the singularity of his appearance. The bald, oddly delicate round head cranes up to look at me; a glittering eye, like a falcon’s, focuses on me for an instant and then flickers away. He appears bored.
Luxer says, ‘State your name.’
‘Marie-Georges Picquart.’
‘Place of birth?’
‘Strasbourg.’
‘Age?’
‘Forty-three.’
‘When did the defendant first come to your attention?’
‘About nine months after I was appointed chief of the secret intelligence section of the General Staff . . .’
In all, I testify for perhaps four hours – an hour or so in the darkness of that late January afternoon and three hours the following morning. Pointless to relate it all: it is Pellieux redux. Indeed, Pellieux himself, in defiance of all the rules of procedure, seems to be in control of the court martial. He leans forward to whisper advice to the president of the judges. He asks me hectoring questions. And whenever I try to bring up the names of Mercier, Boisdeffre and Billot, he interrupts me and orders me to be silent: ‘These distinguished officers have no relevance whatever to the case of Major Esterhazy!’ His methods are so heavy-handed that halfway through the Tuesday morning session one of the judges asks the president of the court to intervene: ‘I see that Colonel Picquart is the true defendant here. I request that he be permitted to present all the explanations necessary to his defence.’
Pellieux scowls and briefly falls silent, but Esterhazy’s slippery young advocate, Maurice Tézenas, quickly takes over the attack: ‘Colonel Picquart, you have sought from the beginning to substitute my client for Dreyfus.’
‘That is not true.’
‘You forged the petit bleu.’
‘No.’
‘You conspired with your attorney, Maître Leblois, to blacken my client’s name.’
‘No.’
‘You showed him the secret file relating to the conviction of Dreyfus as part of a plot to undermine public confidence in the original verdict.’
‘I did not.’
‘Come now, Colonel – several witnesses yesterday testified to this very court that they saw you do it!’
‘That is impossible. What witnesses?’
‘Colonel Henry, Major Lauth and Monsieur Gribelin.’
I glance across the room to where they sit, impassive. ‘Well, they are mistaken.’
Tézenas says, ‘I request that these officers step forward and confront this witness.’
‘Gentlemen, if you please.’ Luxer beckons to them to approach the bench. Esterhazy watches with an air of utter indifference, as if he is attending a particularly tedious play, the ending of which he already knows. Luxer says, ‘Colonel Henry, is there any doubt in your mind that you saw Colonel Picquart show documents from the so-called secret dossier to Maître Leblois?’
‘No, General. I went into his office late one afternoon about a departmental matter and he had the file on his desk. I recognised it at once because it has the initial letter “D” on it, which I wrote there myself. The colonel had it open and was showing a particular document, containing the words “that lowlife D”, to his friend Monsieur Leblois. I saw it all, as plain as I see you now, General.’
I look at him in amazement: how is it possible to lie so brazenly? He stares back at me, entirely unfazed.
You order me to shoot a man and I’ll shoot him . . .
Luxer continues: ‘And so your testimony, Colonel Henry, is that you then went away and immediately described what you had seen to Major Lauth and Mo
nsieur Gribelin?’
‘I did. I was profoundly shocked by the whole thing.’
‘And the two of you both still swear this conversation took place?’
Lauth says fervently, ‘Yes, General.’
‘Absolutely, General,’ confirms Gribelin. He darts a glance at me. ‘I might add that I, too, saw Colonel Picquart show the file to his friend.’
They have come to hate me, I realise, far more than they ever hated Dreyfus. I maintain my composure. ‘May I ask, Monsieur President, if Maître Leblois could come and give his opinion of this?’
Tézenas says, ‘I’m afraid, Monsieur President, that Maître Leblois is in Strasbourg.’
‘No,’ I say. ‘He returned late last night, accompanying the body of his father. He is waiting downstairs.’
Tézenas shrugs. ‘Is he? My apologies: I did not know.’
Louis is fetched. For a man in mourning, he is remarkably collected. Questioned about the meeting and the dossier, he confirms that there was no such meeting, no such file, ‘except for some nonsense about pigeons’. He turns to the bench. ‘Could the court ask Colonel Henry when this incident is alleged to have occurred?’
Luxer gestures to Henry, who says, ‘Yes, it was in September ’96.’
‘Well that is quite impossible,’ replies Louis, ‘because my father first fell ill in ’96 and I was in Strasbourg the entire period from August to November of that year. I am quite sure of this – indeed I can prove it, because it was a condition of my visa that I had to report daily to the German authorities throughout my stay.’