by Ola Larsmo
Duluth / Swede Hollow
June 1928
WE WERE ALL ABOUT TO GATHER for one last time, including Father, whom we would leave behind in the ground. Ellen called and left a message for me with Mrs. Janson. It’s strange how everything has to be in such a hurry even though it’s already too late. I remember the previous time when we were all together, that was also for a funeral, and it was my Carl who was going to be laid to rest, and I screamed inside for a week without managing to utter a sound. Except to Matti, who didn’t say much either, but he was there the whole time, and he made the coffin for Carl; he worked on it for two nights, hammering and planing the wood without me asking him to do that, and he refused to take even a nickel in payment. But I didn’t tell anyone about that because Ellen might have got it into her head to pay him, and then everything would have been ripped open and turned into words again. The worst moment in my life was when we had to leave the gravesite; I couldn’t do it, I no longer knew what to do, and yet in a strange way part of me was thinking about what would happen the next day and the next, and even the next month. It was like I’d been turned inside out, with everything painful on the outside and everything you could have faith in hidden away and beyond reach. I don’t know how else to describe it.
When I heard that Father was dead, I wasn’t surprised, even though he’d looked healthy and fit the last time I saw him, but something sank inside of me for good, a weight that I’d never be able to get rid of again. I pictured it like the elevator counterweight I’d seen in an office building that I was cleaning down at the harbor. The weight was like a big black shadow that slid past inside the shaft, moving in the opposite direction before the elevator appeared—a heavy and inaccessible piece of darkness. And I said to Matt, “Matti, I can’t stay in Duluth, even though this is where Carl is buried, and you live here, but little Elsa and I have to go back to the Twin Cities,” and he just nodded and said he understood that’s how things were. And then he said, “Let’s just wait and see.” I was never afraid of what he would say; it might take a while but after he’d thought things through, he would always have something sensible to say. I was worried about how it would be for little Elsa, so I talked to Mrs. Janson, who said she’d look after the girl, and in the evening Matti said he’d take care of Elsa if Mrs. Janson couldn’t do it, at least in the evenings, since she was his daughter after all. And that was reassuring, even though I knew the child would be anxious while I was away. Then Matt said he and Elsa would come down to St. Paul after everything had been settled, and then we’d see what would happen next. And that made me feel happy and reassured.
The train trip was the worst part because I’d put on the black clothes I still had from Carl’s funeral, and they fit me more or less, though I had to alter them a little. Mrs. Janson helped me with that. But when people see that you’re in mourning, they act in a certain way, and that creates an uncomfortable atmosphere. I sat next to the window and looked out, thinking about Father, and I had the strange feeling that he would still be there when I arrived, even though the reason I was on that train at all was because he was gone, and then I cried.
When I got to Union Depot, Ellen was waiting for me, and I hadn’t seen her since Carl’s funeral. Her hair was cut short now, and she was wearing a dress that was much too light in color, and she looked at me and said, “The funeral isn’t until the day after tomorrow.” “I know that,” I told her, “but these are the black garments I had, so I decided to wear them.” And in a strange way it felt good to bicker with her, because then things seemed normal.
Father was going to be laid to rest in the Oakland Cemetery next to little Carl. The cross had long since vanished from Carl’s grave, but we knew where he was buried, and when we asked Pastor Sandstrom whether it could be arranged, he said he’d take care of things, and the very next day he told us it would be fine. So much time had now passed that the gravesites there were once again available for use. I don’t remember the whole funeral, because by then everything had become dark and prickly, and it was something we just had to get through; they say you’re supposed to say goodbye, and that’s right, you do, but at that moment you can’t bear to pause long enough to remember things very well. Ellen and I had to take care of Mother, who was withdrawn and silent and kept looking down at her hands, and it was almost like she wasn’t really there. I remembered how it had been at Carl’s funeral and left her in peace. But back then it was winter and horribly cold. Out at the Oakland Cemetery, on the other hand, it was a beautiful summer afternoon. The grave itself was in the shade of a hedge, but the sun shone down on the rest of us as we stood in a circle. Mother repeated the words of the blessing, but I saw that Ellen did not; she stood there staring straight ahead as Pastor Sandstrom prayed in his quavering old-man’s voice. I thought he’d gotten awfully stooped and gray, yet I was still a little afraid of him.
Afterward we were supposed to take taxis back, even though it wasn’t very far, and Ellen was going to pay the cab fares, and the whole thing seemed so odd. But when we were sitting next to each other in the back of the open automobile, I told Ellen that I was glad that at least Father would be lying next to little Carl. I didn’t mean that I was actually “glad,” and Ellen gave me a strange look, but then she said she’d been thinking the same thing, that now they’d be together somehow, and she was going to see about getting a real headstone put up this time, and she’d make sure that Carl’s name was on it too, because he couldn’t be very far from where Father was buried. I got a little worried that she’d start talking about money again, but she didn’t. It was strange to see that just as we were leaving the cemetery, the next funeral procession was arriving with a coffin on an open cart and with black-clad mourners following behind. There was no end to such things.
The funeral reception was going to be held at the home of Inga and Jonathan, who’d taken over the arrangements because Mother just couldn’t do it, and besides, there was no room at her house. Pastor Sandstrom came with us to the Hollow and stayed fifteen minutes or so in Inga’s kitchen before he thanked us and left. I thought that was nice of him; he was one person who didn’t hesitate to come down to the Hollow when needed, but I didn’t want to talk to him because he might remember me and then he might ask whether I’d heard anything about what had happened to Leonard, and I hadn’t, so it was just as well not to say anything at all. After the pastor left, it was easier to talk. The strange thing about grief is that it comes and goes; you can be talking as usual with people and then it comes back and you stop in the middle of a sentence and can hardly breathe and you can’t speak at all. But after Pastor Sandstrom left, only folks from the Hollow were there; everybody knew each other, and if someone started to cry or looked down at the table and didn’t say anything for a long while, nobody got upset, because they all knew how it was. Some of Father’s Irish and Italian coworkers were there too; we didn’t talk much to them, but when they were about to leave, they came over and squeezed hands and looked us in the eye. I’ve always thought the Irish are good at dealing with death; they know how to behave in the face of grief. The Italians also knew what was the correct thing to do, even though they’d probably never been to a Swedish funeral before. Maybe Catholics are better at things like that.
Jonathan thanked them in English and shook their hands when they left. The whole time Mother sat with her hands on her lap and stared straight ahead; lots of people tried to talk to her, but she would just nod and say only a word or two in reply. Finally it got to be too much, and Inga took Mother by the arm and walked with her back to our house. I followed them a few minutes later, but then Inga came out and told me, “She’s sleeping, she was completely exhausted, the poor thing. And I don’t know what’s to become of Anna now.”
When she said that, I went to find Ellen and then the three of us sat on the porch of Jonathan and Inga’s house, with a view across the Hollow. Someone was singing in the twilight; it sounded like the song was coming from where the Italians lived, and it was a tu
ne I had never heard sung in the Hollow, although Inga didn’t seem surprised, so she must have been used to hearing it. “That’s Old Man Sanchelli,” she said. “He sings the same stanza every evening when he comes home from work, at precisely eight o’clock. You could set your watch by him.”
America, America,
God shed his grace on thee,
And crown thy good
With brotherhood
From sea to shining sea
When the singing stopped, I said what I’d been thinking: that I could come back to the Hollow for a while and live with Mother, to make sure she was doing all right, and maybe Inga knew of someplace I might find work, either cleaning or laundry washing. Times were bad up in Duluth. And Inga said they were bad down here too, but she could probably find me something if she took some time to look around. “What about little Elsa?” asked Ellen, and I said that she and Matt would come down on the train after I’d arranged things and we had somewhere to live. “And you two are still not married,” said Ellen brusquely, but I didn’t get mad. I just said that we’d talked about getting married, but it wouldn’t work because nobody knew where Leonard was, and if we couldn’t get hold of him and it was impossible to prove that he was dead, then I couldn’t remarry because that would be bigamy. That made her laugh a little, for the first time in a long while, and she said that of course she didn’t want her sister to be a bigamist. Matt had nothing against trying to find work in the Twin Cities. His family had come over after the civil war in Finland, and he’d worked in the forests. Then he ended up in Duluth after he got blacklisted by the sawmills farther north, and he was forced to move in with his parents across the courtyard. “I know he’s a good man,” said Ellen without looking me in the eye, and Inga nodded silently as she sat there in the shadow, even though she hadn’t met Matt. After Inga had been sitting there without speaking for a while, she mentioned something else that she’d clearly wanted to tell us, but she’d been waiting for the right time to bring it up. Next month David Lundgren was going to be released from Stillwater prison after serving out his sentence, and he would be coming to live with them.
There was another matter I wanted to talk to Ellen about, but not while Inga was there. I could tell my sister was getting ready to head back home to her husband and children because she’d started fumbling with her handbag, so I said I’d like us to take a little walk first, and then I’d accompany her part way up to the streetcar stop. She looked a little surprised, but she couldn’t very well say no. First we went down to Phalen Creek, but she said it smelled so bad this time of year and she was afraid the smell would settle in her clothes. So instead we went over to the Drewry Tunnel and then up to the open space below the Hamm Brewery, at the top of the Hollow. We didn’t talk much; I suppose we were both thinking about Father. Ellen told me about the times she and Father used to walk up to Seventh Street together, back when she was still working as a seamstress at the factory on Margaret Street, and then they would go their separate ways at the top of the stairs. I wondered whether she held it against me that I hadn’t been able to do the work as well as she did, but there was no trace of reproach in her voice; she just wanted to talk about Father, the way she remembered him, and so I listened. But finally she said, “What was it you wanted to talk to me about, without Inga?”
“Mother has gotten so small,” I said. “Have you noticed that?” Ellen nodded and just looked at me. “She won’t be able to take care of herself much longer,” I went on. “Without Father, she’s going to get smaller for every day that goes by.”
“She has Inga,” said Ellen, and she had that set look on her face, but I knew she understood what I meant. “Inga. Yes, well,” I said. “I can see that things are getting worse for her now, even though she pretends everything is fine. But Inga doesn’t get out much anymore. She still keeps an eye on what’s going on, but the question is how long she’ll be able to do that. She has her girls and Jonathan.” And then I decided to be blunt. “But I don’t know how long her strength will hold out. Haven’t you noticed all the worried looks Jonathan keeps giving her?”
Ellen looked as if I’d hit her. It wasn’t pleasant thinking that Inga might not be there forever, but I thought Ellen knew what I was getting at.
Finally I said what was on my mind. “I’m going to come home and make sure they can all manage. I’ll bring Matt with me, and he’s a reliable sort. We’ll take care of things. I just want you to know that everything will be all right, and I’ll stay with Mother until we find our own place.”
Ellen stood still for moment, without replying. Then she said, “So you’re saying you want to come back here? To the Hollow?” It sounded like she didn’t believe me.
“Yes,” I said. “This is where I’m from, and I know how things are in the Hollow. So why shouldn’t I live here? Somebody has to take charge, and it might as well be me, since I know how things work.”
Ellen looked relieved, as if she’d been expecting to hear something else.
“You’ll do that?” she said. “Will you really do that?”
I nodded, and it was as if she stood up straighter in her expensive black suit with the mourning veil on the hat and her shiny shoes. Then she took my hand in both of hers and held it for a moment. In the distance we heard the two signals from the Duluth train as it approached the railroad tunnels down by Connemara, and as we stood there I thought I was going to have trouble getting used to that sound again.
“I’ll come and visit all of you,” said Ellen.
“Yes, do that,” I said.
“To see if there’s anything you need,” she said.
“Yes,” I said. “I know you’ll do that.”
Then she squeezed my hand and let go and headed for the Drewry Tunnel. She turned around right before entering the vaulted arch to go up to the street, and maybe she was thinking of saying something, but at that moment the train gave the two warning signals, so she just shook her head and left. Then she was gone. Maybe you could say it was then and there that we parted for good, but I think both she and I knew that even if she showed up again on a few occasions, she had long ago put the Hollow behind her forever.
Swede Hollow
June 1935
THEY WERE WHISPERING to Anna from the edge of the woods; they were in there somewhere, in the dim light beneath the trees on the slope up toward Dayton’s Bluff, those familiar, comforting voices. Inga was there, and Gustaf, her mother, and Carl, her own Carl, still seven years old; he never said anything, but sometimes she might catch a glimpse of him running between the trees. She liked to sit there on the bench in the evening, and suddenly she’d hear a few words, part of a sentence carried toward her on a gust of wind or simply echoing among the tree trunks, which were still lit by the sun. What they said was rarely important; it was the sound of the familiar voices that made her feel calm. She thought they probably had a lot of other things to talk about now, things she couldn’t even comprehend. About that other place, and what went on up there beyond the cliff. She imagined it as a grand celebration, but with serene and somber people. Yet it was all very hazy, even in her own mind.
Lately she’d been feeling oddly fragile. She blamed herself for that; she ought to be able to muster her strength and attempt to climb the slope a short distance, to follow the sound of their voices upward through the trees. Maybe they were actually standing there waiting for her, and if she didn’t hurry up, they might grow tired and disappear one day, and there would be only silence even when the wind blew. Then it wouldn’t matter how hard she strained to listen as she sat on the bench in the evening, because there would no longer be any echoes to hear.
They would probably stay for a while longer, but she couldn’t climb that high anymore. She’d never been good at such things, and it had been a long time since she’d ventured out of the Hollow. One day she’d pull herself together and make another attempt—before it was too late.
But sometimes she could hear them when the wind blew from that direction, t
hough only a word here and there. She could only make out the tone of voice, which was always so soothing. They were there, and they seemed to be talking about wondrous things, though using perfectly ordinary phrases. And she could no longer follow.
“Golden,” said Gustaf. She thought that’s what he said. “Yes,” said Inga. That much she was convinced she’d heard. Then she’d stop listening so closely for a while, and when she tried again, they were silent. But then she caught a glimpse of Carl’s shirt, just a flash of white between the tree trunks; it was the soft shirt he’d liked so much, and for that reason it had been hard to keep clean. The shirt was a little too big for him, and it actually still existed, carefully washed and ironed and lying at the bottom of the big suitcase at home. But she hadn’t looked at it for a very long time.
Then Anna thought about the fact that when she was gone, no one would be able to hear them anymore. And that made her sad.
She was sitting there on the bench, lost in her own thoughts, when one of the younger girls came and took her by the arm. It was warm, and the sun shone in her face, so she couldn’t really tell who it was. Maybe Elisabet’s oldest daughter. Or maybe Inga’s. They were so big now, and so alike. The girl smiled and helped her off the bench so she stood upright. “They’re here, Mother Anna,” said the girl. “And they’re going to sing now. We thought you’d like to come and listen. We know it’s something you like.”
She could have said, I want to stay here and listen to the ones up on the hill. But she decided to go along. “Can I go dressed like this?” she asked, smoothing down her black skirt. “It’s fine,” said the girl, who then held her arm as they walked down the path. The Hollow was green in the warmth of early summer. There were more bushes and vegetation than she remembered from before; otherwise everything looked the same.