The Land of Dreams (Minnesota Trilogy)

by Vidar Sundstøl

  “Oh, right. Sorry,” said Lance. “School is boring. I should know that. Besides, you’re on summer vacation.”

  Crowds of people were swarming around them. There was a steady hum of voices. He wondered which things they could skip, because there was way too much to see and do. They’d never be able to cover everything in one day.

  He regretted waiting so long to come back here. It had to be almost nine years since his last visit to the aquarium. Together with Mary, at the very beginning. Since then so many new exhibits and attractions had been added that he hardly recognized the place. What he did remember was the special atmosphere in the large building—all the sounds and voices, a sudden splash from somewhere, children hooting with enthusiasm. And the constant, bubbling sound of oxygen being pumped into all the surrounding tanks. Plus the light filtering through the glass roof high overhead. All of it made him feel as if he were underwater.

  He suddenly recalled the dream that he’d had long ago in which he was walking on the bottom of the lake. Could it have been their visit to the aquarium that had gotten mixed in with his dream that night?

  “What’s an eagle called?” he asked his son. They were standing in front of a bald eagle that was perched on a tree stump behind a glass wall, regarding them with a stern expression.

  “Migizi,” said Jimmy. The eagle shook its head when he said the word.

  Again he tapped on the glass, but more cautiously this time, using the knuckle of his little finger.

  “Hi,” Jimmy said in a low voice. He pressed the palm of his hand flat against the glass in greeting, but the eagle didn’t react.

  “His name is Birdie,” said Lance, reading the fact sheet on the wall.

  “I do know how to read, Dad.”

  “Sorry.”

  “Why was the eagle found on a golf course?” asked Jimmy after reading the sign.

  “Well, it says that the bird fell out of the nest before he learned to fly. So the nest must have been near a golf course.”

  “Do they have golf courses in Alaska?”

  “Of course they do.”

  Jimmy didn’t seem convinced.

  “But why is the eagle here if he was found in Alaska?”

  “I don’t really know,” said Lance. “Maybe it’s not that easy to find a home for a big bird like an eagle.”

  “Do they have aquariums in Alaska?”

  “I’m sure they do.”

  “So why isn’t the bird living there?”

  Lance had to laugh. “You’re sure full of questions today,” he said.

  Suddenly the eagle shot out a long, white spray of excrement.

  Jimmy burst out laughing as he pointed. “Look at that doo-doo!” he cried.

  “Uh-huh,” said Lance. “Eagles have to take a crap once in a while too, you know.”

  “But the doo-doo is white!”

  “That’s how it is with all birds.”

  The boy thought about that. “Ducks too?” he asked.

  “What?”

  “Is duck doo-doo white?”

  “Yeah. I guess it is,” said Lance.

  “Yeah. I guess it is,” said Lance.

  “So why doesn’t the water turn white from all the duck doo-doo?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “When there are lots and lots of ducks in the water, why doesn’t the water turn totally white from the doo-doo?”

  “Jeez, I don’t know. Maybe they wait to go until they’re on land,” said Lance. He could tell that he needed to get his son to think about something else. “Shall we go and have a look at the big fish tanks now?”

  “Yes!” exclaimed Jimmy eagerly. “See you later, Birdie!” He waved to the eagle, which sat there motionless behind the glass wall.

  On their way to the tanks, Lance threw away the rest of Jimmy’s ice cream, took a paper napkin out of his pocket, and wiped off his son’s mouth. As he stood there, leaning over the boy, he realized suddenly how much he missed the small daily routines. It was now three years since he’d lived in the same house with his son. And Jimmy had already started school. Before Lance knew it, he’d be in college in Duluth or the Twin Cities. And the only part of his son’s childhood that he would have shared was every other weekend like this one.

  They reached the three big fish tanks, which extended from floor to roof, two stories high, rather like gigantic test tubes. Jimmy tipped his head back to look up. Lance did too. High overhead they could see daylight through the glass roof. Above them swam scores of fish, although most of them were actually not moving. They were hovering there in the water, their streamlined shapes dark and glistening silver. Occasionally one of them would flap its fins and dart away. Lance soon noticed that there was a system to how the fish were distributed. Various types dominated different levels in the tanks. The fish at the very top were just dark shadows high above. And they were big fish, at least six to nine pounds. Trout and salmon. He also saw a couple of eels and plenty of smaller fish that he couldn’t identify.

  “Look, Dad!” cried Jimmy. He was pointing at something right in front of them, at the bottom of the tank.

  “Look under that log.”

  There were lots of tree stumps on the bottom of the tank. Quite a few rocks too. Made to resemble a natural habitat.

  And then Lance caught sight of the big fish lying next to a log, not moving at all. It looked like it was almost as long as Jimmy was tall. Its head was strangely compressed, so that its mouth almost looked like a duck’s bill, and from its lips hung several long threadlike protuberances.

  “That’s a sturgeon,” said Lance.

  “Look, there’s another one!” Jimmy pointed. “To the right of that big rock over there.”

  And then he saw another one. And a fourth. None of the fish moved. They were resting at the very bottom of the tank that must have been a good sixty-five feet deep. Black shapes against a black bottom. Strange, prehistoric-looking fish. Occasionally one of them would open its mouth slightly, but that was all. Otherwise they didn’t budge.

  “Are there fish like that in the lake?” Jimmy was almost whispering now.

  “Yes, but there aren’t many of them left,” Lance told him. “In the old days tons of sturgeon were caught farther north. Near Hovland, for example.”

  “They’re sure big,” said the boy.

  “Uh-huh. And they can get huge.”

  “Have you ever fished for sturgeon, Dad?”

  “No, I don’t think I have. But your grandfather might have.”

  “You think so?”

  “I don’t know, but you can ask him.”

  Lance raised his head to look up through all the water that was held in place by those thin but strong walls of glass. He imagined them standing next to each other on the bottom of Lake Superior, father and son, and it felt as if that was where they belonged, enveloped by the lake. He pictured the bottom of a canoe gliding above them. Paddles were dipped into the water and pulled out again, quietly and rhythmically, soundlessly propelling the canoe forward. Then he sensed the presence of ice and knew where he was. He had been here before. Not far away was a cold and shimmering blue world. The deepest spot in the lake. His thoughts and will were being pulled in that direction, toward the great icebergs that he couldn’t yet see, although he knew they were very close by. He wished he could stand on that same icy lake bottom and once again see the wondrously beautiful underwater world.

  But then he happened to think about Jimmy, and he took a step back. His son was still staring at the sturgeons resting on the bottom of the tank. Lance put his hand on the boy’s shoulder. Jimmy turned his head and smiled up at his father. He was missing several teeth. Lance found the sight of those gaps in his mouth disturbing. At the same time he couldn’t take his eyes off them.

  “What’s wrong?” asked Jimmy.

  “I was just looking at your teeth. You’ve really lost a lot o
f them.”

  “Do you know what I do with them?”

  “No, what?”

  “I put them in a tin can and save them. I’ll show them to you next time.”

  Lance suddenly felt a wave of nausea come over him at the thought of his son’s teeth lying inside a tin can.

  “What’s wrong now?” asked Jimmy.

  “Nothing,” said Lance. “Why don’t we go upstairs and check out what’s up there?”

  Jimmy nodded, but he still looked a bit skeptical. Lance was worried that he might have upset the boy. He took his hand. Together father and son moved away from the big fish tanks and climbed the stairs to the second floor. Jimmy discovered at once that what he really wanted to do was lean over the railing and look down at the crowds on the floor below, at the very spot where they had just been standing.

  Lance had been looking forward to showing Jimmy the big model of the lakes, which was in the next room. Built on the surface of a large table, it was a scale model of the five Great Lakes and the surrounding terrain—from the St. Louis River, which runs into Lake Superior in the west, to the St. Lawrence River, which flows out of Lake Ontario in the east. Then the river runs through the former French hub in North America, past the cities of Montreal and Quebec, before it finally empties its huge load of freshwater into the Atlantic Ocean. The model also showed the various canals and locks that ships had to pass through in order to make it all the way from the sea to Lake Superior. That was one of the things he remembered from the time he visited the aquarium with Mary nine years ago. He still recalled how she had reached across the table to point at the St. Mary River, that short, shallow stretch of river connecting Lake Superior with Lake Huron. There, near the town of Sault Ste. Marie, the shipping traffic passes through an enormous system of locks. As they stood there, she had told him about the incredibly abundant fishing the Ojibwe had enjoyed at that spot long ago. She gave such a vivid account of those days, as all the while her slender hand hovered over the St. Mary River.

  Even though he remembered that scene so clearly, there was something unreal about the fact that he, Lance Hansen, had actually stood here in this room together with Mary, the woman he had loved so much. He wondered whether he would ever be in love like that again.

  But before he could think any more about his failed love life, Jimmy grabbed his hand and began pulling at him. “Let’s go over there,” he said eagerly. “I want to look at the axes!”

  He’d caught sight of some glass display cases that held old flint axes, spears, and arrowheads. These were artifacts belonging to cultures that preceded the Ojibwe. There were objects that were several thousand years old, all discovered in the area around Grand Portage. On the wall at the other end of the room hung an Ojibwe birchbark canoe.

  Jimmy held up an imaginary bow and soundlessly shot an invisible arrow through the room. “Pow!” he said, as if it had struck a target in the distance. “Can I have another ice cream?”

  “No, you’ve already had two. That’s enough. No more ice cream today. But maybe we should eat the lunch we brought along. Are you hungry?”

  Jimmy shook his head.

  “Okay, do you want to stay here a little while longer?”

  He nodded.

  “What would you most like to see?”

  The boy thought for a moment. “Crocodiles,” he said.

  Lance laughed. “The aquarium only has fish and animals that live in the Great Lakes. Crocodiles live in Africa.”

  He noticed that Jimmy was starting to get restless and was losing interest. He’d probably been expecting too much—it would be hard for a seven-year-old to take in everything in a place like this. But before they left, he wanted to show Jimmy the impressive view from the veranda.

  “Come with me,” he said. “Let’s go out on the veranda over there.”

  “Why?” said Jimmy, sounding reluctant.

  “There’s a huge, superpowerful pair of binoculars out there. You might be able to see all the way to Grand Portage.”

  Jimmy gave him a dubious look.

  “You don’t believe me?” said Lance. “Come with me and I’ll show you.”

  They made their way past the other visitors and went out to the veranda, which faced northeast. Here too there was a big crowd, and they had to wait awhile for their turn at the binoculars. Finally Lance was able to put the required three quarters in the coin slot.

  “Here,” he said. “Take a look and see if your grandfather is out in his boat.”

  “Grandpa can’t go out in his boat anymore. He’s too old,” said Jimmy, in his most precocious voice. Then he stepped forward to peer through the big binoculars.

  As Lance stood there looking at his son, it occurred to him that in a sense Baraga’s Cross provided a link between the murder of the young Norwegian and the mystery of the medicine man’s disappearance more than a hundred years ago. The cross had stood there since 1846, albeit in three different versions. Was it starting to take on a new meaning for him? Previously he had viewed it as a historical landmark and local tourist attraction. A destination for a Sunday outing. Barbecues and sunbathing. Listening to the clamor of kids running around and playing. Watching the water from the Cross River calmly flowing into the lake. Just one place among many—that was what Baraga’s Cross had always been. On a par with the giant potholes in the Cascade River, the magnetic boulders near Gunflint Lake, or Artists’ Point at Grand Marais, where pioneers and early tourists had carved their names into the soft hillside, often including the date and year.

  Lance suddenly felt very alone. He realized that Baraga’s Cross would continue to be that sort of place for everybody else here on the North Shore. He was the only one for whom it had started to take on new meaning. Because he was the only one who knew about both of the unsolved mysteries connected to the place. Of course, by now everyone had heard about the murder of Georg Lofthus. But only Lance knew that the medicine man Swamper Caribou had disappeared without a trace from his hunting cabin near the mouth of the Cross River on the same night that fifteen-year-old Thormod Olson almost lost his life.

  What really happened on that March night in 1892? According to the version Lance had always heard, Thormod fell through the ice and nearly drowned in the frigid water. Then he had survived a night in the woods with the temperature well below freezing. That’s the kind of stuff we’re made of, he thought. But now the convergence, in both time and space, between that story and the medicine man’s disappearance had sown doubt in his mind. And he knew his suspicions would continue to grow until he eventually figured out what happened. Lance realized that he must be the first person in his family ever to doubt the story. The family’s primordial myth.

  He looked at Jimmy, who was still staring northeast through the big binoculars. For a moment he questioned what he’d just been thinking. Maybe he was imagining things as a result of his recent traumatic experience. It hadn’t made his hands shake, but instead maybe it had undermined his sense of judgment. Lance looked at his son standing there, the back of his boyish neck so tender and vulnerable. And he thought that he had to do everything in his power to uncover the truth about those stories. Jimmy shouldn’t have to grow up surrounded by lies and deception.

  I need to find out what Andy was doing that night at the cross, Lance thought.

  THEY WERE DONE EATING. The empty ice chest stood open on the bench beside Lance. He was keeping an eye on his son, who was playing with a remote-controlled truck on the brick pathways in the park. Occasionally someone would stop to watch the toy for a moment. Usually older men. They seemed to be enjoying the sight of the little monster truck racing across the bricks, making an energetic buzzing sound.

  Leif Erikson Park was looking its most beautiful, with all the rose beds blooming in glorious colors. There were probably more than a hundred different varieties of roses, which the Duluth Garden Flower Society maintained with both diligence and expertise so that the ro
se garden in Leif Erikson Park was actually considered a tourist attraction.

  From the bench Lance had a view of the innermost western tip of the lake. On the other side was the town of Superior, Wisconsin. A long bridge connected the two cities.

  He thought about how he’d felt like he was standing at the bottom of the lake a short time ago, and recalled the sensation of being on his way back to the cold world of ice that he’d once seen in a dream. He didn’t want to think about what that might mean.

  Behind him stood the statue of Leif Erikson, erected by the Norwegian League in 1956, and beyond the statue, on the other side of the street, was St. Luke’s Hospital, where both he and Jimmy had been born.

  He looked at his son again. Half Ojibwe, with a drop of Spanish blood from Chief Espagnol, and a few French genes from Lance’s French Canadian great-grandmother, Nanette. The other half was Norwegian American. Immigrant fishermen from Halsnøy in Norway. Jimmy Hansen was a genuine son of the North Shore. He was a descendant of both those who had come here from somewhere else and those who were already here when the immigrants arrived.

  Lance got up and began packing away the few lunch items that remained on the bench. It was time to head for Lakeview to visit Jimmy’s grandmother. That would complete the three items on the agenda for today’s Duluth expedition: the aquarium, lunch in Leif Erikson Park, and visiting Grandmother. Tomorrow he had to drive Jimmy back to Grand Portage, but tonight they would have a barbecue outdoors, just the two of them.

  He called to his son. Jimmy began walking along the brick path toward the bench where his father stood, keeping the toy monster truck going the whole time. It raced along in front of him as if to guide the way. Finally it stopped when it ran into the toe of Lance’s shoe, buzzing like an insect.

  11

  ON MONDAY, JUNE 30, around lunchtime, Eirik Nyland and the FBI agent Jason Fries drove into the parking lot in front of the Whispering Pines Motel. Fries was in his late twenties, with dozens of tiny scars on his face, which Nyland assumed must have come from acne. He was Bob Lecuyer’s assistant.