Of all the cancers that ate at the vitals of the Third Republic none was more conspicuously malignant than the "affaire Stavisky." It took its name from Mystery-Millionaire Alexander Stavisky, who one day in 1934 was found shot to death in a snowbound Alpine hideout (TIME, Jan. 15, 1934 et seq.). Sûretée agents had trailed him there to ask him about the failure of the municipal pawnshop at Bayonne, in which Stavisky held the controlling interest.
Within a fortnight French taxpayers knew that, with the connivance of Government officials, they had been bilked of some $18,000,000 in pawnshop bonds. Soon...
To continue reading:
or
Log-In
