A single paragraph, that is all.
At army headquarters, Leclerc’s aide-de-camp comes to fetch me. I follow him down a wide corridor past an office where a sergeant sits bent over a typewriter, picking out the letters with excruciating slowness. Leclerc himself appears equally oblivious to the enormity of what has occurred in Paris. Evidently he doesn’t read
He greets me cheerfully. I hand him my report on the murder of Morès. He glances through it quickly, eyebrows raised. ‘Well don’t worry, Picquart,’ he says, handing it back to me, ‘I’ll make sure you have a perfectly decent funeral. You can choose the hymns before you go.’
‘Thank you, General. I appreciate that.’
He goes over to the map of the French protectorate hanging on his office wall. ‘It’s a hell of a trek, I must say. Don’t they keep any charts these days in Paris?’ He traces the route from Tunis in the north due south, past Sousse, Sfax and Gabès, all the way down into the vast desert area towards Tripoli where the map is blank of roads or settlements. ‘That must be eight hundred kilometres. And at the end of it: a whole region swarming with hostile Bedouin.’
‘It is somewhat daunting. May I ask where the order came from?’
‘Yes, I dare say you can — it was from General Billot himself.’ Leclerc sees my grim expression; it only increases his amusement. ‘I think perhaps you must have slept with his wife after all!’ And then when I still don’t smile, he becomes serious. ‘Look, don’t worry about it, my dear fellow. Obviously it’s a mistake. I’ve already sent him a telegram reminding him that this was the very spot where Morès was ambushed barely a year ago.’
‘And has he responded?’
‘Not yet, no.’
‘General, I don’t think this is a mistake.’ He looks at me and cocks his head, puzzled. I continue, ‘When I was in Paris, I had command of the secret intelligence section of the General Staff. In that capacity I made certain discoveries that revealed there was a traitor in the army, and that it was he who had committed the crimes for which Captain Dreyfus was condemned.’
‘Did you, by God?’
‘I brought this to the attention of my superiors, including General Billot, with a recommendation that we should arrest the real spy. They refused.’
‘Even though you had proof?’
‘It would have meant admitting that Dreyfus was innocent. And that would have exposed — well, let us say certain
Leclerc holds up his finger to stop me. ‘Hold on. I’m a slow fellow — too many years in the sun. Let me be clear about this. Are you suggesting that the minister wants to send you on this hazardous mission because he hopes to get rid of you?’
In reply I hand him
I reply with the formula agreed with Louis. ‘I have not given him any facts myself, General.’
‘And presumably this was why you were so keen to go to Paris in the summer?’