The drive lasts only a few minutes and before we reach the courthouse I see that the streets are filled with people, many of them chanting my name and holding signs that read Free Mata Hari and Innocent. Some women in the crowd are weeping. The sight touches me; I didn’t realize I had female admirers. If he manages to visit me again, I will thank Bowtie. He promised me that he would rally people in my support.
As soon as we come to a stop, a dozen reporters swarm the car. I regret that I am not wearing something glamorous, an ensemble that represents who I am, an entertainer. Instead I am dressed in a simple blue skirt and blouse given to me by my jailers. One of my guards opens the car door and the ambush is immediate.
“Mata Hari!” a reporter shouts. “Why are you spying for Germany?”
I ignore him and do not let my face betray my emotions. I step out and scan the throng for Bowtie; I don’t see him. The guards escort me toward the courthouse and the reporters follow like swarming bees.
“Mata Hari! Why were you arrested?”
I stop and answer this question. “Because I am a woman who enjoys herself very much.”
“Keep moving,” the nearest guard snaps at me. The crowd is surging and three men appear to clear a path so that I can enter the doors of the Palais de Justice.
Inside it is absolute madness. Reporters are crowding in the halls. I spot Bowtie. “Where is Edouard?” I call to him as I am herded past.
“He’s here—don’t worry. He’s already in the Cour d’Assises,” he answers and reaches out for my hand.
“No touching the prisoner!”
I’m taken down the hall to a paneled courtroom. I see seven tall wooden chairs that I imagine are meant for my judges, a long table, and behind that a French flag that covers an entire wall.
Edouard is sitting alone at a smaller table. It strikes me that his hair is almost completely white—was it still peppered dark when he first visited me in prison? He looks as though my arrest has aged him ten years. Next to him is an empty chair.
At a different table sit three men I don’t recognize, together with Captain Bouchardon. The table is weighted down with stacks of documents. All four men watch me as I enter. None of them stand.
As soon as he sees me, though, Edouard rises. He guides me to the empty chair and catches me looking up at the image of Justice painted on the ceiling above our heads.
“M’greet,” he says quietly, drawing my gaze downward. I can see that he’s nervous. He’s not a criminal lawyer, yet here we are. The files on Bouchardon’s table are so thick. What can possibly be written in them? I imagine they are lists. Lists of every man I’ve slept with.
Edouard whispers in my ear, “That man.” I follow his gaze: He means the tall one dressed entirely in gray. “His name is Andre Mornet.”
For a moment we are together in the Rothschilds’ jasmine-scented garden and he is saying Don’t speak at length with anyone who appears drunk, in particular the German ambassador . . . von Schoen.
“One of the best prosecutors in France,” he says, and I am snapped back into the awful present.
“I want you to answer him in simple sentences, M’greet, no matter how he phrases his questions. For your own sake, don’t embellish. Do not attempt to describe your version of events. I’ll do that for you. This is a military tribunal. All of the judges”—he inclines his head toward the seven still-empty chairs—“are members of the military. Do not try to charm them. Under these circumstances they will respond to facts, not stories.”
I wish that I were anywhere in this world instead of inside the Palais de Justice. I want to be at the top of the temple of Borobudur with Sofie, watching the sun set over the misty hills of Magelang. I want to be exploring the Javanese beaches with Non, picking my way across the rocks as the warm breeze tangles her hair.
“In a few moments the doors will open and the public will be allowed in,” Edouard is informing me. “Then the seven judges will enter. After they are seated, Andre Mornet will call witnesses.”
Witnesses? “Who do they plan to call?”
“I was not given that information. I’m sorry. A court martial is unlike a trial in the civilian world—”
“And our witnesses? Who has agreed to testify for me?” I have conflicted feelings immediately. How wonderful it will be to see familiar faces, and yet how horrible to see them under these circumstances.
“I’m sorry, M’greet.” Edouard pushes a glass of water into my hands.
“You are sorry? Why are you sorry? Who turned me down?”
He recites the list quietly. Guimet and Givenchy. Baron Rothschild. Felix Rousseau, my “banker.” Jeanne is dead. I’ve made so few real friends in my life.
“Has anyone agreed to speak on my behalf?”
“Yes. I located Henri de Marguerie. He will tell them you are of good character.”
A handsome man who spent the night with me after one of my shows. Salome? Cleopatra? Maybe Tristan and Isolde. I can’t summon an image of his face, but I remember his wristwatch—it was the first one I’d ever seen. I think back and eventually it comes to me. Henri de Rothschild’s chateau. I’d just performed Lady Godiva and the string quartet was playing something slow. A dark-haired man asked me to dance. He was wearing a Rolex. “It’s a wristwatch,” he said.