«I understand. But where do I come in?»
«Let’s take it step by step. If by chance you have any information on terrorist groups, you need hide nothing from me. I understand in your time you have reported to the French secret service about dangerous anti-Bonapartists. And the only people who can do that are their friends, or at least those who know them. I am not shy. I too in my time have had contact with Russian terrorists. It’s all water under the bridge now, but that’s how I climbed the ladder in the antiterrorist services, where those who are efficient are the ones who’ve worked their way through the ranks of subversive groups. You have to break the law before you can serve it properly. Here in France you have the example of your Vidocq, who became head of police only after serving time in jail. Beware of policemen who are too, how do you say, clean. They are prigs.
But let’s return to us. We have recently become aware that a number of Jewish intellectuals are working among the terrorists. I have been appointed by certain persons at the court of the tsar to try to show that the Jews are undermining the moral fiber of the Russian people and threatening their very survival. You may hear it said that I am regarded as a protégé of Witte, the minister, a well-known liberal who would not agree with me on such matters. But you should never serve only your present master, remember that. Always be ready for the next one. However, I shall not waste time. I’ve seen what you have given Madame Glinka.
Most of it is rubbish. You have, of course, chosen the occupation of junk dealer as a cover—someone, in other words, who sells used stuff for more than it costs new. But several years ago in Le Contemporain you published some interesting documents you had received from your grandfather, and I would be surprised if you didn’t have more. I have heard it said you know a great deal about many things»—and here Simonini was reaping the benefits of being a spy in appearance more than reality. «Therefore I would like some reliable material from you. I know the difference between wheat and chaff. I will pay. But if the material is no good, I get annoyed. Is that clear?»
«What exactly do you want?»
«If I knew that, I wouldn’t be paying you. There are people in my department who are very good at constructing a document, but I have to give them the contents. And I cannot tell the good Russian people that the Jews are waiting for the messiah, which is of no interest to either the peasant or the landowner. If they’re waiting for the messiah, it must be explained in terms of their pockets.»
«Why are you after the Jews in particular?»
«Because in Russia there are Jews. If I were living in Turkey, I would be after the Armenians.»
«So you want the Jews to be destroyed, as Osman Bey does…I assume you know him.»
«Osman Bey is a fanatic. He’s also a Jew. Better to keep away from him. I don’t want to destroy the Jews. I might even say the Jews are my best allies. I’m interested in the morale of the Russian people. It is my wish (and the wish of those I hope to please) that these people do not direct their discontent against the tsar. We therefore need an enemy. There’s no point looking for an enemy among, I don’t know, the Mongols or the Tatars, as despots have done in the past. For the enemy to be recognized and feared, he has to be in your home or on your doorstep. Hence the Jews. Divine providence has given them to us, and so, by God, let us use them, and pray there’s always some Jew to fear and to hate. We need an enemy to give people hope. Someone said that patriotism is the last refuge of cowards; those without moral principles usually wrap a flag around themselves, and the bastards always talk about the purity of the race. National identity is the last bastion of the dispossessed.
But the meaning of identity is now based on hatred, on hatred for those who are not the same. Hatred has to be cultivated as a civic passion. The enemy is the friend of the people. You always want someone to hate in order to feel justified in your own misery. Hatred is the true primordial passion. It is love that’s abnormal. That is why Christ was killed: he spoke against nature. You don’t love someone for your whole life—that impossible hope is the source of adultery, matricide, betrayal of friends…But you can hate someone for your whole life, provided he’s always there to keep your hatred alive. Hatred warms the heart.»
Drumont
Simonini found the meeting unsettling. Rachkovsky appeared to be serious about what he was saying. Unless Simonini gave him some new material he would get «annoyed.» It wasn’t so much that he was short of material—indeed, he’d put together a considerable number of documents for his series of Protocols—but he felt that something more was needed—not just the stories about the Antichrist, which were fine for characters like Glinka, but something more relevant to current events. After all, he didn’t want to sell his updated version of the Prague cemetery story for less than it was worth; on the contrary, he wanted to raise the price. And so he waited.
He went to see Father Bergamaschi, who had been pursuing him for material against the Masons.
«Look at this book,» said the Jesuit. «La France juive by Édouard Drumont. Hundreds of pages. Here’s someone who obviously knows more about it than you.»
Simonini flicked cursorily through the book. «These are the same things that old Gougenot wrote more than fifteen years ago!»
«So? The book is selling like hotcakes. His readers clearly know nothing about Gougenot. And you imagine that your Russian client has read Drumont? You’re the master of recycling, aren’t you? Go and sniff about, find out what Drumont’s companions are saying and doing.»
Making contact with Drumont was easy. At Salon Adam, Simonini had become well acquainted with Alphonse Daudet, who had invited him to the soirées that were held, when it was not the turn of Salon Adam, at his house at Champrosay. Kindly received there by Julia Daudet, he met personalities such as the Goncourts, Pierre Loti, Émile Zola, Frédéric Mistral and Drumont himself, whose fame took off after the publication of La France juive. Over the next few years he took to meeting with Drumont, first at La Ligue Antisémitique, which he had founded, and then at the offices of his newspaper, La Libre Parole.
He took to meeting with Drumont, first at La Ligue Antisémitique, which he had founded, and then at the offices of his newspaper, La Libre Parole.
Drumont had a leonine mane and a large black beard, bent nose and fiery eyes, and you could have described him (judging from the illustrations of the time) as a Jewish prophet. In effect, there was something messianic about his anti-Judaism, as if the Almighty had given him the specific task of destroying the chosen people. Simonini was fascinated by the virulence of Drumont’s anti-Semitism. He hated the Jews, you might say, with love, with single-mindedness, with devotion—and with a fervor that sublimated all sexual desire. Drumont’s anti-Semitism wasn’t philosophical and political like Toussenel’s, nor theological like Gougenot’s. He was an erotic anti-Semite.
It was enough to hear him talk during the long, leisurely editorial meetings.
«I was more than willing to do the preface for that book by Abbé Desportes on the Jewish blood mystery. And they’re not just medieval practices. Even today, those splendid Jewish baronesses who hold salons put the blood of Christian children into the sweetmeats they offer their guests.»
Or: «The Semite is mercenary, covetous, scheming, shrewd, crafty, whereas we Aryans are enthusiastic, heroic, gentlemanly, disinterested, straightforward, trusting to the point of naivety. The Semite is earthly, never sees anything beyond this life—have you ever seen any mention of the hereafter in the Old Testament? The Aryan is always rapt by a passion for transcendence; he is a child of the Ideal. The Christian God is up there in the heavens; that of the Jews is sometimes on a mountaintop, sometimes in a burning bush, never in the sky. The Semite is a shopkeeper, the Aryan a farmer, poet, monk, and above all a soldier, because he challenges death. The Semite has no creative ability. Have you ever heard of Jewish musicians, painters or poets? Have you ever known a Jew who has made scientific discoveries? The Aryan is an inventor, the Semite exploits the inventions of others.»
He quoted what Wagner had written: «It is impossible to imagine that a character, whether antique or modern, heroic or amorous, be performed by a Jew without feeling instinctively struck by how ridiculous such a performance would be. What we find most repugnant is the peculiar accent that characterizes Jewish speech. Our ears are particularly irritated by sharp, hissing, strident sounds of this kind. Very naturally, the innate barrenness of the Jewish manner that is so distasteful to us finds its greatest expression in song, the most lively, the most authentic manifestation of individual feeling. We might recognize in the Jew an artistic aptitude for any other kind of art except that of song, for which he seems entirely
