The Jackal takes shelter with Jules Bernard, then kills him

The Jackal takes shelter with Jules Bernard, then kills him in a Paris episode that turns a chance offer of lodging into a brief, lethal concealment. Posing as a young American student with nowhere to stay, he lets Bernard believe he has found a new companion to pursue. The arrangement gives the fugitive a private flat during the manhunt, but the television news brings his assumed identity into the room and makes Bernard a witness who cannot be allowed to live.

The Invitation

At a bar, the Jackal approaches Jules Bernard after a rival has left. He asks if he may sit with him, offering Bernard a way out of the earlier insult and a new chance to draw the attractive young American’s attention. The Jackal plays the part of a broke student down on his luck, admitting that he has nowhere to stay. Bernard responds by offering him a room in his own flat, which he describes as quiet, well decorated, and free of intrusive neighbours.

The offer serves the Jackal’s immediate need for a place to hide, but it depends on Bernard reading their encounter as the beginning of a personal relationship. The Jackal accepts with apparent gratitude. Before they leave, he goes into the bar’s single lavatory and returns with heavy mascara, powder on his cheeks, and lipstick. The change is conspicuous enough to unsettle Bernard, who objects to the makeup outside, but he continues with the arrangement. The Jackal’s performance is therefore not a seamless disguise: it works because Bernard’s interest outweighs his discomfort.

A Private Refuge

They reach Bernard’s flat by two in the morning. The Jackal insists on sleeping on the studio couch in the drawing room, while Bernard suppresses his objections and peeks through the bedroom door as the young American undresses. The detail makes clear how differently the two men understand the offer: Bernard sees an opportunity to seduce a guest, while the Jackal treats the flat as a temporary hideout. Bernard’s attraction supplies the welcome, but it does not make the fugitive safe from scrutiny.

The Jackal assesses the practical limits of the refuge as soon as he can. The kitchen is well appointed and effeminately decorated, but the refrigerator holds enough food for one person for three days, not two. In the morning Bernard wants to go out for fresh milk; the Jackal keeps him inside, saying that he prefers tinned milk in his coffee. They spend the morning talking indoors, and the Jackal insists on seeing the midday television news. These small decisions keep Bernard close and give the Jackal a reason to monitor the public search without leaving the flat.

Recognition and Murder

The broadcast begins with news of the killing of Madame la Baronne de la Chalonnière two days earlier. Bernard reacts with horror at the report of violence. Then the screen displays the face of a young man with chestnut-brown hair and heavy-rimmed glasses. The announcer names the wanted killer as an American student, Marty Schulberg, and asks the public for information. The disguise that had gained the Jackal entry to the flat is now displayed as the police description of a murderer.

Bernard turns from the screen and looks up. The announcer has described Schulberg’s eyes as blue; the eyes above Bernard are grey. That discrepancy is the last distinction Bernard registers. The Jackal’s hands close around his throat, and the recognition of the mismatch arrives at the same moment as the attack. The scene sharply reverses the terms of the shelter: Bernard had taken the Jackal in as a desired guest, but the broadcast makes him a potential source of identification, and the Jackal answers exposure with murder.

A few minutes later, the Jackal shuts the hall coat cupboard on Bernard’s body. He takes a magazine from the drawing-room rack and settles down to wait for two days. The flat remains both refuge and crime scene: Bernard’s invitation has bought the Jackal time, but his murder leaves another death behind while the pursuit continues outside.

The Search Outside

During those two days, the police search Paris on a vast scale. They check guest lists at hotels ranging from the most expensive to the sleaziest, search pensions, hostels, rooming houses, and other lodgings, and circulate the wanted man’s picture through bars, restaurants, nightclubs, cabarets, and cafés. Police also raid homes and flats belonging to known OAS sympathisers. More than seventy young men who bear some resemblance to the killer are questioned and released; crowds in streets, taxis, and buses are stopped for identification checks, and roadblocks appear at major approaches to the city.

The breadth of the search contrasts with the Jackal’s concealment in one private flat, where the body of Jules Bernard remains hidden in the cupboard. The episode gives the fugitive a short interval in which the city’s attention is directed everywhere at once, while his immediate danger comes from the person he has invited into the room. His shelter is temporary, his identity dependent on performance, and his escape bought at the cost of Bernard’s life.