Next day.
The paper wasn't large.
One page.
Typed.
Signed at the bottom in Moreau's fast, angular script.
Marked URGENT.
Stamped with the seal of the Élysée.
It left his desk at 06:42.
By 06:57, it was in Bonnet's hands.
By 07:05, the Cabinet had it.
By 07:23, the military had already begun transmitting its contents under coded cipher.
The message was simple.
Same as the meeting yesterday.
"Mobilize. Reorganize. Prepare. France must function faster."
Vincent Auriol's aide read it aloud once in his office and then sat down, suddenly pale.
"Justice commission is frozen," Auriol said. "Reassign half our clerks to identification work. Every former officer still unregistered needs to be catalogued by month's end."
"What about trials?"
"They can wait. War won't."
At the Ministry of Education, Jean Zay passed the note to his deputy without sitting.
"I want a school report from every province by Sunday."
"That's impossible."
