"Soyez Braves"

Thin, bristling Police Commissioner Jean Eglenne of Cannes announced importantly: "We must reconstruct the crime." The criminals were still at large, but the victims willingly played their parts. The tubby Aga Khan, his pretty wife, a maid and chauffeur trooped out of the Aga's villa at Le Cannet, near Cannes, and showed just what had happened in the Riviera sunshine one day last week.

The Aga Khan and the Begum were on their way to the airport to take a plane to

Deauville in northwest France (long-considered much more chic in August than the hot Riviera), where they expected to visit the Aga's son, the Aly Khan, and his bride, Rita Hayworth. Just outside the gates of their villa, a black Citroen (license number 1707RN7) crowded their Cadillac to the side of the road. Three shabbily dressed men jumped out, and before anyone could snap a finger the Aga Khan's party was looking into the muzzles of menacing Tommy guns.

The bandits' leader had cased the job well: he demanded two of the suitcases in the car and the Begum's jewel case. In them was jewelry worth between $600,000 and $800,000 (insured with Lloyds of London) ; among the 40-odd pieces were a $125,000, 25-carat diamond and a $190,000 bracelet.

As the holdup men started back to their car, the Aga called them back, reminded them they had not taken his wallet, and handed it over. It contained about $600. As they left, the bandits said: "Soyez braves et laissez nous partir [Be good sports and let us get away]."

The re-enactment gave the police some clues. Explained one policeman: "Just little things. Like that expression soyez braves. Only a man from the south of France would have said it. One never knows just which little item will lead to the criminals." But at week's end, the only other clues found by the Cannes police in a blinding mistral were the abandoned Citroen and, in the car, a pair of maroon gloves and Basque beret, all with Marseille labels. Mused one policeman darkly: "Probably left in the car to throw us off."

Rumors swept the press that U.S. gunmen had pulled the job, but a French police spokesman said with wounded dignity: "There were no foreigners on this job, no Americans, no Italians, no nothing. This was a job conceived, planned and executed entirely by Frenchmen."

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