CHAPTER 3

Monsieur Sorbonne Discovers His True Vocation

The following day, Monsieur Sorbonne was greeted in his cellar crypt by the artifacts Curator-in-Chief, who, like a monolith from Stonehenge, was standing just inside the door.

“You’re late,” he said, definitively, when Monsieur Sorbonne walked in. “You left untimely, prematurely early yesterday. You have done nothing, I see, with the Pre-Columbian group, and frankly, your days are numbered.”

Monsieur Sorbonne, undaunted, hung up his coat on the hat rack, while the curator, like a starving, zoo-caged lion was fretfully pacing. “You don’t seem to comprehend the seriousness of all this,” he went on. “Your position, Monsieur, is in jeopardy. I am threatening you,” he said now, quite nakedly, “with almost imminent unemployment.”

“I understand,” said Monsieur Sorbonne. He was amazed at the quality of his composure, so still and strong, so clear and lucent did his own voice seem. He was slightly aware as he spoke, of being vaguely, innerly haunted by the photographs of Madame Métier. They hadn’t failed, it occurred to him now. They had, in fact, most exceptionally succeeded. It had been given to him, for no reason and for every reason, to capture not the material but the interior essence—the spirit—of a most extraordinary human being. And this—this was far beyond artifacts, this was far, far, far beyond the mere reconstruction of things. This was the meaning beyond, within, outside of, and inherent in all living things. He had breathed it, felt it yesterday as he sat and stood and moved in Madame Métier’s presence. And he had captured it, in his most remarkable photographs. He had a direct experience of meaning, and in having it had found his true vocation.

Contemplating all this in the midst of the Museum Curator’s presence, Monsieur Sorbonne felt strongly at peace, impervious to the threatening huffings and puffings.

Indeed, a circle of silence seemed to have fallen around them. As if he had felt the power of Monsieur Sorbonne’s discovery. The Curator-Chief himself seemed strangely suddenly still, excerpted from all motion, and his voice, when he spoke once again, seemed somehow to have had changed. “Perhaps,” he said, now quite sympathetically, “you have been going through some exigencies of your own.”

“I have, as a matter of fact,” said Monsieur Sorbonne, “and I more than a little appreciate your noticing.”

“Well, then, we shall be more than patient with you,” the Museum Curator said. “So have a good day.” And so saying, he rather quickly let himself out of the room.