"The Forest Secret" - Chapter 24

It was as if Charley hadn’t been at the Timesfor months.  The events that had occurred in Paris in only the few days before felt like they had filled a lifetime.  Now, sitting in Sandra’s New York office with just the two them, she felt strangely detached, as if an umbilical cord still somehow tethered her to Paris, Aramis, and the rest.

While on the plane, she had opened the Mont Blanc journal and discovered an epigraph on the front page.

I have two things to say concerning this volume. The first is that neither it nor the pen were gifts from me alone.  Peter and Bernard agreed that we should all chip in and get you something of meaning that would assist you in remembering your Parisian friends and the great work we did together.  They asked me not to tell you of their generosity, but, hey, I thought you would appreciate knowing.  The second is a wish.  Use these two gifts to write about yourself, Charley.  Clearly gifted at telling the stories of others, I nevertheless fear that your own personal journey and how you have chosen to deal with your talent, is something that should be left for posterity - just as Aramis did.  Your specialness to us became clear on our very first day at the office (poor Peter, he’ll never get over not asking you out:). As important as anything you ever write is the writer herself.  Put yourself down on paper, even if just for yourself, and let this pen and journal be your vehicle for that revelation.  I can’t tell you how much I appreciate you.  Stephanie

“Everything okay?”

Charley looked up to see Sandra staring at her in mild concern.  “Sorry, Sandra, what did you say?”

“It doesn’t matter right now, Charley.  Obviously you lived a lifetime in this past week.  I don’t think any of us had a notion of just how dynamic this story would become in real time.  You did a masterful job of pulling it all together the way you did.”

Charley looked at her boss, the corners of her mouth elevated slightly into a grin.  “I think we both know who is responsible for that,” she said. “Bernard is as much of a wonder in the Paris office as you are here.”

The older woman gave a slightly bemused expression. “He told you, did he?  About us, I mean.”

“No, he would never do that.  But the staff all appeared to know and they find it not only fascinating but appealing.”

“I miss him,” Sandra offered.  “This piece you’re working on has provided Bernard and me with the opportunity of doing the kind of journalism we love best, and that is rarely seen nowadays.  We had many discussions about you in these last few days, you know.  He boasted to me that you had a great and natural ability to draw the experiences out of others and that your instincts were remarkably sound.  And he was slightly amazed that he gained that impression without reading one bit of your work.  I offered to send him the links to your pieces from the last few months, but he refused.  ‘I want to read her work through the eyes of discovery, not as an editor,’ he told me. Seems you made quite an impression.”

The two sat in silence for a moment, Bernard filling both their thoughts.  Sandra offered coffee, which Charley refused while gratefully accepting a glass of cold water.

“Is there one thing that struck you above everything else you gleaned while over there?” Sandra asked her writer.

Charley looked directly at her before replying. “Yes, absolutely, and it was what you gave me before I ever left this place on the way to Paris: the love affair between Aramis and his cathedral.  Everything continued to come back to it.  Even Bernard, impatient as he was to go chasing after the Rembrandt finding, came to agree with your instinct.  It was brilliant, Sandra, and it stood up as the key story even during all of the unfolding developments.”

“I thought so … and I believed Bernard would as well. Despite his demands for details, he is, at heart, a romantic.”

Something you would know personally,Charley thought, but never voiced. 

“And now your real task begins,” Sandra continued. “All that has been done, discovered, and researched comes down to you now.  Feel intimidated?”

“No,” Charley answered directly, somewhat to the surprise of her editor.  “But I’ve migrated in my thinking on the narrative somewhat, and I fear it isn’t something you would prefer.”

“So, it’s no longer about love?” Sandra asked, her head tilted slightly in curiosity.”

“No, no, it is,” Charley assured her.  “But it’s more about our need of it instead of just Aramis possessing it for his church.”

“Better explain that.”

“Actually, the idea for it came from a talk with Stephanie, the photographer, just yesterday.”

“I’ve seen her photos already,” Sandra noted. “There’s no choice but to feature them prominently in the story; they’re just that good.”

Charley nodded in agreement, then continued. “She is worried that the world is coming apart and that citizens worldwide are feeling alienated more than ever before.  She felt that all we are really left with is the desire for comfort and material things because those values we truly desire - sacrifice, generosity, forgiveness, support, attention - are no longer being offered to us by our politics or our economics. It helped me realize that people are increasingly lonely and isolated in a life that no longer has institutions that it can count on.  It was an insight and remained with me.”

“How does that fit into the story, then?”

“That’s just it; I’m not sure,” Charley replied. “But there was something just so virtuous in the simple life of Aramis.  Yes, he loved the Cathedral, but he also lost his role as guide a few years ago, just as he had lost Mary decades before that.  And yet he still believed in the power of love, and in the role of institutions to round off the harsh corners of our humanity, and in the simple life, as he had lived it, because it still had purpose and a contribution to make to the betterment of the world.  Somehow we all seem to be losing that and it’s creating all this dislocation in the world.”

“Sounds like you should be writing more of a political piece,” Sandra noted with a look of understanding.

“No, that’s just it.  Somehow in this turbulent political and economic world we need to make room for people like Aramis.  He and millions - billions really - like him are the hope for our future, not all those aggressive purveyors of power or wealth seeking to remake this world through their own designs.  Aramis had once loved a woman and he kept alive the love for a religious icon that was still attracting millions to its sanctuary.  For him, this was enough to feel purpose and transcendency in a confusing world.  Yes, Aramis was a remarkable individual who died tragically in the fire, but he was also the prototype of a noble human who chose to offer himself on the altar of a refined humanity.  I want to fit that into the story.”

“Charley, you should hear yourself.  What you’re saying is how I felt about life when I was in college: it could be shaped; there was hope in the virtuous acts of individual citizens; and the potential was there to change the world through individual acts of nobility.  Just listening to you causes all those things to come flooding back to me.”

Both were silent for a time, still unsure what this meant for the story Charley would soon compose.  The lens was no longer focused only on the death of a beautiful man. It had widened to humanity itself and its need for examples like Caron’s in order to find meaning in life again. It would be a journey not easily navigated by any writer.

“How long do you need to finish this piece?” Sandra asked.

Charley laughed lightly.  “When all those events in Paris and Britain unfolded the way they did over such a short period of time, I thought I might require a few weeks just to make sense of it.  But there is an essence to the story of Aramis that I have discovered, and that was always going to be the hardest part.  I think I’ll have it finished in three or four days.”

Sandra rose, walked to her office window near the top of the Chrysler Building and looked out over the teeming masses of humanity making their way through New York’s busy streets.  Without even looking at Charley, she said, “You’re a unique writer, Charley - saying things in ways that are revealing and compelling. I’m sure we’ll be able to effectively use whatever you come up with.  My sense, however, is that this will be something different - not only for you, but for the magazine.  We’ll all be keen to see what you create.”

“Thanks Sandra, Charley said, rising from her seat. “And don’t worry, at it’s very core will be a love affair between an intriguing man and an icon of history.”