An Officer and a Spy

Parisian life – children playing in the park, the clip-clop of traffic, the cry of a hawker – seem charged with menace.
    Anna returns and says that Louis will come as soon as he can get away from court. She cooks me an omelette for lunch and I tell her about life in Sousse as if I have been on some exotic grand tour – the narrow stone alleyways of the old Arab town unaltered since the days of the Phoenicians, the hot stink of tethered sheep on the street corners waiting to be slaughtered, the foibles of the tiny French community, only eight hundred souls out of nineteen thousand. ‘No culture,’ I complain. ‘No one to talk to. Nothing Alsatian to eat. My God, how I hate it!’
    She laughs. ‘And I suppose you’ll tell me next they’ve never even heard of Wagner.’ But she doesn’t ask how I ended up there.
    At four, Louis arrives. He crosses the carpet on his dainty feet and we embrace. The mere sight of him helps restore my nerve. His trim figure and beard, his neat appearance, his mild voice, his economical gestures – all convey an air of supreme competence. ‘Leave it to me,’ his personage seems to say. ‘I have made a study of all that is difficult in this world, I have mastered it, and I am ready to place my mastery at your disposal for an appropriate fee.’ Even so, I feel I have a duty to warn him what he might be getting into. So after I have fetched my suitcase from the children’s bedroom, and Anna has made tea and discreetly withdrawn from the sitting room, I sit with the case on my lap and my thumbs poised on the locks and say, ‘Listen, Louis, before I go any further, you ought to be aware that for us merely to have this conversation could put you in some danger.’
    ‘Physical danger?’
    ‘No, not that – I’m sure not that. But professional danger – political danger. It could become all-consuming.’ Louis frowns at me. ‘I suppose what I’m trying to say is that once you start on this I can’t promise you where it may end. And you need to be aware of that now.’
    ‘Oh do shut up, Georges, and tell me what all this is about.’
    ‘Well, if you’re quite certain.’ I press my thumbs on the locks and open the suitcase. ‘It’s difficult to know where to start. You remember I came to see you in the middle of November, to tell you I was going away?’
    ‘Yes, for a couple of days or so you said.’
    ‘It was a trap.’ From a false compartment at the bottom of the case I take out a wedge of papers. ‘First of all I was sent by the General Staff to Châlons to inspect intelligence procedures in the 6th Corps. Then I was told I would have to go straight on to Nancy to write a report on the 7th as well. Naturally I asked for permission to return to Paris, for a few hours at least, just to pick up some clean clothes. That was turned down flat by telegram – you see?’ I hand it over. ‘All these letters I’ve kept are from my immediate superior, General Charles-Arthur Gonse, ordering each move – there are fourteen. From Nancy I was sent to Besançon. Then to Marseille. Then to Lyon. Then to Briançon. Then back to Lyon again, where I fell ill. This is the letter I received from Gonse while I was there: I’m sorry that you are suffering, but I hope that after resting in Lyon you will regain your strength. Meanwhile prepare yourself to depart for Marseille and Nice . . . ’
    ‘And all this time you were not permitted to return to Paris, not even for a day?’
    ‘See for yourself.’
    Louis takes the handful of letters and scans them, frowning. ‘But this is ridiculous . . .’
    ‘I was told I would be meeting the Minister of War over Christmas in Marseille, but he didn’t turn up. Instead I was ordered to sail directly for Algeria – that was at the end of last year – to reorganise intelligence. And then a month after I got to Algeria I was ordered to Tunisia. Once I was in Tunisia I was transferred out of my old regiment and into a native outfit. Suddenly it wasn’t an inspection trip any more: it was a permanent posting to the colonies.’
    ‘You must have complained, I assume?’
    ‘Of course. Gonse simply wrote back telling me to stop sending him so many letters: You just have to let things go and gain satisfaction from serving a regiment in Africa. Effectively, I’d been exiled.’
    ‘Did they give you a reason?’
    ‘They didn’t have to. I knew what it was. I was being punished.’
    ‘Punished for what?’
    I take a breath. It still