The Day of the Jackal

by Frederick Forsyth

Part One: Anatomy of a Plot

The book begins in 1962 with the (historical) failed attempt on de Gaulle's life plotted by, among others, Lieutenant-Colonel Petit-Clamart: Operation Charlotte Corday. Following the apprehension of Bastien-Thiry and various other conspirators, the French security forces wage a short but extremely vicious "underground" war with the terrorists of the OAS, a militant right-wing group who believe de Gaulle to be a traitor to France after his grant of independence to Algeria.

The French secret service, particularly its covert operations directorate (the "Action Service"), is remarkably effective in infiltrating the terrorist organisation with their own informants, allowing them to capture and interrogate the OAS operations commander, Antoine Argoud. The failure of the Petit-Clamart assassination, and a subsequent betrayal of the next attempt on de Gaulle's life at the [[École Militaire]], compounded by Bastien-Thiry's eventual execution by firing squad, likewise demoralise the antagonists.

Argoud's deputy, Lt-Col Marc Rodin, carefully examines what few options they have remaining and establishes that the only way to succeed in killing de Gaulle is to hire a professional mercenary from outside the organisation, someone completely unknown to both the French government and the OAS itself. After extensive inquiries, he contacts an English hitman (whose true identity is always unknown), who meets with Rodin and his two principal deputies in Vienna, and agrees to assassinate de Gaulle, although he demands a total of US$500,000 (roughly US$3.5 million in 2021 dollars). The killer further requires that half of the amount be paid in advance and the rest on completion. They also agree on a code name, "The Jackal". The triumvirate of OAS commanders then take up residency on the top floor of a Rome hotel guarded by a group of ex-legionnaires to avoid the risk of being captured, like Argoud, and subsequently revealing the assassination plot under interrogation.

The remainder of this part describes the Jackal's exhaustive preparations for the forthcoming project. He first acquires a legitimate British passport under a fake name, "Paul Duggan", which he intends to use for the majority of his mission. He then steals the passports of two foreign tourists visiting London who superficially resemble him for use as contingency identities. Masquerading as Duggan, the Jackal travels to Brussels, where he commissions a master gunsmith to build him a special suppressed sniper rifle of extreme slimness with a small supply of mercury-tipped explosive bullets. He also acquires a set of forged French identity papers from a professional forger. The latter makes the mistake of attempting to blackmail him, for which the Jackal kills him and locks his body in a large trunk where he determines it will not be found for a considerable time. After exhaustively researching a series of books and articles by, and about, de Gaulle, the Jackal travels to Paris to reconnoitre the most favourable spot and the best possible day for the assassination.

Following a series of armed robberies in France, the OAS is able to deposit the first half of the Jackal's fee in his Swiss bank account. Meanwhile, the French authorities, suspicious about Rodin and his subordinates being holed up in the hotel, composes and despatches a fake letter that lures Viktor Kowalski, one of Rodin's bodyguards (and a hulking giant) to France, where he is caught and tortured to death. Interpreting his incoherent ramblings, the secret service is able to decipher Rodin's plot, but knows nothing of the assassin himself save for his codename. When informed of the plan, de Gaulle (who was notoriously careless of his personal security) refuses to cancel any public appearances, modify his normal routines, or even allow any kind of public inquiry into the assassin's whereabouts to be made: any investigation, he orders, must be done in absolute secrecy.

Roger Frey, the French Minister of the Interior, organises a conference of the heads of the French security authorities. Because Rodin and his men are in the hotel under heavy guard, the group determines that it is impossible to catch and interrogate them about the assassin (unless it is achieved through a commando-style operation), nor can they be executed. The rest of the meeting is at a loss to suggest how to proceed, until a Commissioner of the Police Judiciaire reasons that their first and most essential priority is to establish the Jackal's true identity, which is something that he insists is "pure detective work". When asked to name the best detective in France, he volunteers his own deputy commissioner: Claude Lebel.

Part Two: Anatomy of a Manhunt

Granted special emergency powers to conduct his investigation, Lebel does everything possible to uncover the Jackal's identity. He first calls upon his old boy network of foreign intelligence and police contacts to inquire if they have any records of a top-class political assassin. Most of the inquiries are fruitless, but in the United Kingdom, the inquiry is eventually passed on to the Special Branch of Scotland Yard, and another veteran detective, Superintendent Bryn Thomas.

A search through Special Branch's records turns up nothing. However, one of Thomas's subordinates suggests that if the assassin were an Englishman, but primarily operated abroad, he would most probably come to the attention of the Secret Intelligence Service. Thomas makes an informal inquiry with a friend of his on the SIS's staff, who mentions hearing a rumour from an officer stationed in the Dominican Republic at the time of President Trujillo's assassination. The rumour states that a hired assassin stopped Trujillo's car with a rifle shot, allowing a gang of partisans to finish him off. Additionally, Thomas also learns that the assassin was an Englishman, whom he identifies as a man named Charles Calthrop.

To his surprise, Thomas is summoned in person by the Prime Minister (unnamed, but most probably intended to represent Harold Macmillan), who informs him that word of his inquiries has reached higher circles in the British government. Despite the enmity felt by much of the government against France in general and de Gaulle in particular, the Prime Minister informs Thomas that de Gaulle is his friend, and that the assassin must be identified and stopped, with a limitless amount of resources, manpower or expenses at Thomas' disposal. Thomas is handed a commission similar to Lebel's, with temporary powers allowing him to override almost any other authority in the land. Checking out the name of Charles Calthrop, Thomas finds a match to a man living in London, said to be on holiday. While Thomas confirms that this Calthrop was indeed in the Dominican Republic at the time of Trujillo's death, he does not believe it justifies informing Lebel, until one of his junior detectives realises that the first three letters of his first name and surname form the French word for Jackal (Chacal).

Unknown to any member of the council in France, there is an OAS mole among them: the mistress of an arrogant Air Force colonel attached to de Gaulle's staff. Through pillow talk, the officer unwittingly feeds the Jackal a constant stream of information as to Lebel's progress. The Englishman enters France through Italy, driving a rented Alfa Romeo sports car with his weapon soldered/wired to the chassis. Although he receives word from the OAS agent that the French are on the lookout for him, he assesses that he will succeed whatever happens and decides to take the risk. In London, the Special Branch raids Calthrop's flat, finding his passport, and deduce that he must be travelling on fake papers. When they discover that the Jackal is travelling in the name of Duggan, Lebel and a police force comes close to apprehending him in the south of France, but due to his OAS contact he leaves his hotel early and evades them by only an hour. With the police on the lookout for him, the Jackal seeks refuge in the [[château]] of a woman whom he encountered and seduced at the hotel: when she goes through his things and finds the weapon, he kills her and flees after disguising himself as the first of his two emergency identities. He disposes of Duggan's belongings in a ravine in the process. The murder is not reported until much later that day, allowing him to board the train for Paris.

Part Three: Anatomy of a Kill

Lebel becomes suspicious of what the rest of the council label the Jackal's apparent "good luck", and has the telephones of all the members tapped, which leads him to discover the OAS agent. The Air Force colonel withdraws from the meeting in disgrace and subsequently tenders his resignation. When Thomas checks out and identifies reports of stolen or missing passports in London in the preceding months, he closes in on the Jackal's remaining secondary identities. While meeting the council on 22 August 1963, Lebel deduces that the killer has decided to target de Gaulle on 25 August, the day commemorating the liberation of Paris during World War II. It is, he realises, the one day of the year when de Gaulle can definitely be counted on to be in Paris and to appear in public. Believing the inquiry to be over, the Minister orchestrates a massive, citywide manhunt for the Jackal now that he can be publicly reported as a murderer, dismissing Lebel with hearty congratulations – but the killer eludes them yet again: slipping into a gay bar while disguised as his second contingency identity, he gets himself picked up by a local man and taken to his flat, where he kills him and waits.

On the 24th, the Minister summons Lebel yet again and tells him that the Jackal still cannot be found. Lebel listens to the details of the President's schedule and security arrangements, but can suggest nothing more helpful than that everyone "should keep their eyes open", much to Roger Frey's dismay. On the 25th itself, the Jackal, masquerading as a one-legged French war veteran, passes through the security checkpoints carrying his custom gun concealed in the sections of a crutch. He makes his way to an apartment building overlooking the Place du 18 Juin 1940 (in front of the soon-to-be-demolished façade of the Gare Montparnasse), where de Gaulle is presenting medals to a small group of Resistance veterans. As the ceremony begins, Lebel is walking around the street, questioning and re-questioning every police checkpoint. When he hears from one CRS guard about a one-legged veteran with a crutch, he realises what the Jackal's plan is, and rushes into the apartment building, calling for the patrol to follow him.

Having sneaked into a suitable apartment to shoot from, the Jackal prepares his weapon and takes aim at de Gaulle's head, but his first shot misses by a fraction of an inch when the President unexpectedly leans forward to kiss the cheeks of the veteran he is honouring. Outside the apartment, Lebel and the CRS man arrive on the top floor in time to hear the sound of the first, silenced shot. The CRS guard shoots off the door lock and bursts in as the Jackal is reloading: the Englishman turns and fires, killing him with a shot to the chest. At this point, the detective and the assassin, having developed grudging respect for each other during the pursuit, stare at each other briefly. The Jackal scrambles to load his third and last bullet while the unarmed Lebel snatches up the dead policeman's submachine-gun: Lebel is faster and shoots the Jackal with half a magazine-load of 9mm bullets, instantly killing him.

Epilogue

In London, the Special Branch are searching Calthrop's apartment when the real Charles Calthrop storms in and demands to know what they are doing. Once it is established that Calthrop truly has been on holiday in Scotland and is totally unconnected with the killer, the British are left to wonder "if the Jackal wasn't Calthrop, then who the hell was he?" The Jackal is buried in an unmarked grave in a Paris cemetery, officially recorded as "an unknown foreign tourist, killed in a car accident." Aside from a priest, policeman, registrar and grave-diggers, the only person attending the burial is Police Inspector Claude Lebel, who then leaves the cemetery to return to his family.