THE JUDET AFFAIR BEGINS

After his acquittal, Mr. Judet tells us his plans for the future.

Today I met Ernest Judet in the office of his hotel which is his temporary office. I found him in a blue jacket and green hat—a hat that comes from Switzerland—alert and busy, not cheerful, but full of inner joy. After the compliments, I asked him, abruptly, the question.

— Did you say: “The Judet affair begins!” " What do you mean. Mr. Judet goes for it. His large body stretched out on the armchair, his eyes myopic and blue, his complexion colored, his hair silvery and thick, he speaks abundantly, harshly. This simply means that there is a police and justice system, in a free and civilized country, which must no longer exist. An instrument of force in the hands of an arbitrary power, it undoubtedly had its reason for being during the war but it no longer has it. We must definitively break with this system which constitutes an unacceptable tyranny. The Judet affair!... I am nothing in this but an example. The fact that I managed to escape must simply open your eyes to evil.

Fatally, Mr. Judet relives a painful adventure - which was, twenty years ago, that of another accused, also exonerated, Captain Dreyfus.

— We cannot imagine the amount of evil things that were directed against me. It was understood that people wanted to “have my skin”. That's the word. so we gave carte blanche to people who, because they knew they were irresponsible, did what they wanted. A whole system of hostility was built against me. Easy, isn't it? not, by launching: documents which are authentic and immediately take on the air of being irrefutable. For 4 years, everything that was said “against me” was sacred, as if critical thinking was not one of them. bases of justice... Everything against me, nothing for me.
From the first hour, my resolution was made to return to France. But to return and offer yourself defenseless to the machine gun battery! I stayed in Switzerland. I needed space and time to try my hand at wrestling. I “started at the beginning, attacking the artisans of slander
But what I suffered there: repeated and irregular investigations! The police people, the snitches that were sent to me! What if they had only sent me snitches!
I received, in the same way, when I thought I was dealing with a friend, a man who, unfortunately, belongs to our profession, sullen and brilliant, and who tried to persuade my wife to bring me back to France. I have experienced these procedures, these low-level operations to the point of disgust: stolen letters - some, addressed to my wife, were not dated, like several of the 500 letters that I sent to her during our union, and they brought to my attention these words from an investigating judge: — Not putting a date is proof of bad conscience.
Stolen letters, I say, - investigation into burglaries, all these maneuvers which resulted in the creation of a file of 9,000 items! “Don’t you think this has gone on long enough?” I don't consider it enough to have triumphed over it. Suppose I got sick. At my age this is possible. I was crushed, dishonored - What are you going to do?
— Publish. first, the pleading of Me Léouzon le Duc. This will be the starting point. We will then notify.
- But still?.
— I'm going to get back to work. I really want it. I only wish that my strength does not betray me. I don't want to give up studying foreign policy.
— Are you going to do journalism again?
- I think. But I don't have a diary, that's a fact. And I need a means of expression. If newspapers lend themselves to my ideas, if they do not go against theirs and if I maintain my independence, I will gladly collaborate,
— Your ideas?
— Most of my ideas don't change. But there are ways of evolving. Moreover, this is aimed much more at people than at the ideas themselves.
—Will you stay in Paris?...
— I will go when I like, when I have to do long-term work, in my little corner, in Switzerland. I have my installation. Switzerland, for me, is not abroad. I love its relaxing landscapes. Now I can't wait. to go back to take a vacation. But I will also have my own corner in Paris! — Will you be leaving for Switzerland soon?
— In a few days, around July 24. I'm being pressed.
Indeed, Mrs. Judet, smiling and happy, accompanied by her daughter, asks me for her husband, whom she accuses me of monopolizing. But Mr. Judet reminds me.
— I'm going to Switzerland, he said to me, laughing, but, sapristi, don't go saying that I'm fleeing

HENRI SIMONI