New York_ The Novel - Edward Rutherfurd [460]
Only one person that he knew himself had died that terrible day. Old Sarah Adler. If it hadn’t been for her, he’d have been in the headhunter’s office in the World Trade Center himself. Whether he’d have been trapped and lost his life it was impossible to say. But whether or not she’d saved his life in a physical sense, she’d saved it in every other way.
Sarah Adler had gone. Along with more than a thousand others, she had left not a trace of her body that could be identified. An absolute and final loss.
Not absolute, perhaps. She was remembered. Whenever he looked at the great space in the sky where the towers had been, he always thought of her with gratitude, and affection. And thousands of others were remembered, in a similar fashion.
And he was glad that a new, Freedom Tower would arise to take the former towers’ place, for it seemed to him that this was everything that New York stood for. No matter how hard things were, New Yorkers never gave up.
He continued walking. He came down past the Waldorf-Astoria, and the enclave of office buildings around the lovely, Byzantine-looking church of St. Bartholomew. As the lunch hour approached, a jazz band had started playing in the entrance of one of the bank buildings. People were gathering to stand or sit and listen to the music.
How delightful it was in the sun. Even here in New York, time could sometimes stand still.
And suddenly it came to him. That Strawberry Fields garden he’d come from, and the Freedom Tower he’d been thinking of: taken together, didn’t they contain the two words that said it all about this city, the two words that really mattered? It seemed to him that they did. Two words: the one an invitation, the other an ideal, an adventure, a necessity. “Imagine” said the garden. “Freedom” said the tower. Imagine freedom. That was the spirit, the message of this city he loved. You really didn’t need anything more. Dream it and do it. But first you must dream it.
Imagine. Freedom. Always.
Acknowledgments
During the course of researching this novel, I have consulted a great many books, articles and other sources. I should like in particular to record my thanks and appreciation as follows.
My warm thanks Professor Kenneth T. Jackson, for the most courteous and kindly overall guidance, and for The Encyclopedia of New York City, which sits in joint pride of place upon my desk, beside the magnificent Gotham, by Edwin G. Burrows and Mike Wallace.
I owe a thirty-year debt of thanks to the curators and staff of the New York Public Library, and thanks for kind help from all the staff at the Museum of the City of New York, the New-York Historical Society, the American Museum of Natural History, the American Indian Museum, South Street Seaport, the Lower East Side Tenement Museum, Ellis Island Immigration Museum, and further special thanks to Carol Willis for her help and guidance at the Skyscraper Museum.
One of the greatest joys of my professional life is the chance to work with distinguished historians, scholars and experts in the preparation of these books. The following have graciously read sections of my manuscript, in several cases hundreds of pages, made corrections and given invaluable counsel. I am therefore privileged to thank Graham Russell Hodges, Professor of Early American History at Colgate University; Edwin G. Burrows, Professor of History at Brooklyn College, City University of New York; Christopher Gray, Office for Metropolitan History, and “Streetscapes” Columnist, The New York Times; Barry Moreno, Curator, The Bob Hope Memorial Library at Ellis Island; Rabbi Robert Orkand, Temple Israel, Westport, CT; and Mark Feldman, of Weston, CT. Whatever shortcomings remain are mine alone.
Special thanks are also due to Dan McNerney for his invaluable research assistance. And though space does not permit a complete list of all the many kind people who have given help, support, and information during the gestation of this book, I should like in particular