The Caillaux Drama. John N. Raphael
I foresaw passed before my eyes, and little by little I made up my mind to take my husband’s place, and I decided to go and see Monsieur Calmette that same evening.”
As I have already explained, Madame Caillaux knew, as every Parisian knows, that the most likely time to find a newspaper editor in his office was after five o’clock, and, as we know, she had promised to be at the Italian Embassy at a quarter-past eight and had telephoned to her hairdresser to go to her and dress her hair in the Rue Alphonse de Neuville at seven. It is fairly clear therefore, that when she left her house at three she had no very definite idea of what she was going to do. At three o’clock Madame Caillaux left home—the home to which neither she nor her husband has returned since—and drove in her grey motor-car to a registry office, where she engaged a new cook for the next day. She then drove to the sale-rooms of the armourer Monsieur Gastinne-Renette in the Avenue d’Antin. Even then, she declares, she had no intention of killing the editor of the Figaro, but intended to ask him to cease his campaign against her husband, to refrain from publishing letters which she was convinced he intended to publish, and in the event of his refusal, to “show him of what she was capable” (these words are a quotation from her statement to the examining magistrate, Monsieur Boucard), and fire her revolver not to kill, but to wound him. I wish it to be understood, clearly, that I am quoting the foregoing from the evidence of Madame Caillaux herself. I do not wish in any way to comment on this evidence. It is my object merely to try, to the best of my endeavour, to place before the public the state of this wretched woman’s mind immediately before the crime which she committed, and by so doing to allow my readers to form their own judgment of her motives. Madame Caillaux was well known to Monsieur Gastinne-Renette, who for that matter knows everybody in Paris society. She told the armourer that she would be motoring a good deal, by herself, between Paris and her husband’s constituency of Mamers, during Monsieur Caillaux’s coming electoral campaign, and that she wanted a revolver for her own protection. The first weapon which was shown her did not satisfy her. It was expensive, costing £3 19s. 6d., and she hurt her finger, she says, when she pulled the trigger. She was then shown a Browning which cost only £2 4s., and worked more easily. She went downstairs to the shooting-gallery below Monsieur Gastinne-Renette’s sale-rooms, and tried her new acquisition, firing six shots from it. By a tragic coincidence her shots struck the metal figure in almost exactly the same places as the bullets she fired afterwards struck her victim. She then put six bullets into the loader, and she told the examining magistrate that her first intention was to put only two cartridges in, but that the salesman was watching her and she thought he might think it strange if she only loaded her revolver partially. At this point in Madame Caillaux’s examination, Monsieur Boucard interrupted her. “If you did this,” said the magistrate, “you must surely have made your mind up to murder Monsieur Calmette?” “Not at all,” said Madame Caillaux. “The thought in my mind was that if he refused to stop his campaign I would wound him.” From the armourer’s, Madame Caillaux drove home again to the Rue Alphonse de Neuville, where she wrote a note to her husband. In this note, which is now in the hands of the lawyers, she wrote, “You said that you would smash his face, and I will not let you sacrifice yourself for me. France and the Republic need you. I will do it for you.” I have not seen this letter myself. My quotation from it is taken from the report in the French papers of March 25 of the examination of Madame Caillaux by Monsieur Boucard. She gave this letter to her daughter’s English governess Miss Baxter, telling her that she was to give it to Monsieur Caillaux at seven o’clock if she had not returned home by then. It seems only fair to believe that Madame Caillaux at that time, while she foresaw the likelihood of a stormy interview with the editor of the Figaro, did not intend committing murder. Madame Caillaux’s engagement for tea with friends was at the Hôtel Ritz, but she did not go there to keep it. She arrived at the Figaro office exactly at a quarter-past five, and she waited until a little after six o’clock for Monsieur Calmette to come in. When she heard that he had arrived, she asked one of the men in uniform to tell him that a lady whom he knew, but who did not wish to give her name, wanted to speak to him. “He will only receive you,” said the man, “if you let him know your name.” Madame Caillaux then, as I have already said, put her visiting card in an envelope, and sent it in to Monsieur Calmette. In her evidence to the examining magistrate Madame Caillaux stated that she heard Monsieur Calmette a few moments afterwards say aloud, “Let Madame Caillaux come in.” This statement of the prisoner is flatly contradicted by the man who took her card in to the editor of the Figaro, and by Monsieur Paul Bourget, who was with Monsieur Calmette when Madame Caillaux’s card was brought to him. It is contradicted also by a gentleman, who was in the waiting-room with Madame Caillaux, waiting to see another member of the Figaro staff, and by a friend who was there with him. Madame Caillaux, however, declared in her evidence to Monsieur Boucard that she heard Monsieur Calmette speak her name aloud, and that she was furiously angry because her identity had been made known. This is Madame Caillaux’s own account of the crime itself. “The man opened the door to usher me into Monsieur Calmette’s office, and as I walked to his room from the visiting-room, I had slipped my revolver, which was in my muff, out of its case. I held the weapon in my right hand, inside the muff, when I entered Monsieur Calmette’s private office. He was putting his hat on an armchair and said to me, ‘Bonjour madame.’ I replied, ‘Bonjour Monsieur,’ and added, ‘No doubt you can guess the object of my visit.’ ‘Please sit down,’ he said.” Madame Caillaux declares that she lost her head entirely when she found herself facing her husband’s mortal enemy. “I did not think of asking him anything,” she said. “I fired, and fired again. The mouth of my revolver pointed downwards.” This statement is undoubtedly true, for the first two bullets fired were found in the bookcase quite near the ground. Madame Caillaux says that she went on firing without knowing what she did. Two of her bullets inflicted mortal wounds, and though everything was done that science could do, her victim died a few hours later.
Monsieur Caillaux had spent the greater part of the afternoon in the Chamber of Deputies, and his first news of the crime, which his wife had committed, reached him at the Ministry of Finance. He had returned to his office there to sign some necessary papers before returning home to dress for the dinner at the Italian Embassy, and he did not therefore receive his wife’s note until much later in the evening, after the commission of the crime. Monsieur Caillaux, whatever his faults may be, is a strong man and a plucky one. He turned ashy pale when he heard what had happened, but said nothing further than to ask for a cab, and without a moment’s loss of time he went as fast as the cab could take him to the police-station in the Rue du Faubourg Montmartre. There he was at once allowed to see his wife. Before leaving the police-station Monsieur Caillaux telephoned to his chief, Monsieur Doumergue, the Prime Minister, resigning his position in the Cabinet as Minister of Finance. He told the Prime Minister then, that nothing would induce him to reconsider his resignation, and that he would devote himself exclusively to his wife’s defence, and take no further part in the political life of the country. The news of the murder was not definitely known at the Italian Embassy until fairly late in the evening, although all the guests were surprised at the absence of Monsieur Caillaux and his wife. Monsieur Poincaré was the first to be told the news, and left the Embassy immediately, followed by all the other guests. A little later in the evening, at about ten o’clock, Monsieur Doumergue summoned his colleagues to a Cabinet Council which was held at the Ministry for Foreign Affairs. The Council lasted from ten o’clock till after midnight. Just before the Ministers separated the news of Monsieur Gaston Calmette’s death reached them over the telephone wire. The Ministers’ first thought was to save the political situation. They realized the grave dangers of a Cabinet crisis at this moment, and dispatched Monsieur Malvy, the Minister of Commerce, to Monsieur Caillaux to endeavour to induce him to reconsider his decision to resign. Monsieur Caillaux refused to reconsider it, and Monsieur Doumergue himself failed, though he tried hard, to get him to withdraw his resignation and to remain in office. Even then the colleagues in the Cabinet of Monsieur Caillaux refused to accept his resignation definitely, and the Council adjourned until the Tuesday without coming to any definite decision. On Tuesday, realizing the political impossibility of his retaining his portfolio, even if he could have been persuaded to retain it, the Government decided that the Minister for Home Affairs, Monsieur René Renoult, should become Minister of Finance in Monsieur Caillaux’s stead, that the Minister of Commerce, Monsieur Malvy, should succeed him at the Home Office, and