The Ravens (22 page)

“How’d you manage to pull that off?” asked Chrissy, handing back the postcard.

“I wrote and addressed the cards and sent them to someone I know in Norway, along with dates when he was supposed to put them in the mail. I needed to convince everyone that I was actually in Norway.”

“While you were really working undercover.”

“Right.”

Lance tried to catch her eye, but she looked away.

“That night,” he said. “The night of the murder. You said you were at the cabin on Lost Lake, that you were having a party.”

“So?”

Her voice was barely more than a whisper now.

“But your father was at the cabin that night. At least that’s what he says. And if he was there, then where were you?”

Chrissy took a step closer and touched his arm.

“Not now,” she said.

Lance felt as if all he had to do was hold out his hand and the truth would instantly appear on his palm. That’s how close he was. But at that instant everything would fall apart, and he couldn’t let that happen. Not now, not here, surrounded by Inga’s things. All the rest could wait until later.

Silently they continued packing up the cowboys riding the
little white horses, the hand-painted birds, all sorts of bowls and plates that had never been used for anything; they were just meant to be decorative. Then they moved on to the clothes. After they had emptied the closet, neatly folding up each garment and placing them in a bag, Chrissy said to her uncle, “But who in the family is actually going to wear these clothes?”

They both started laughing. Lance could hear a strained wheezing coming from Chrissy as she tried to catch her breath in between soundless waves of laughter. But he laughed loudly as he gasped for air. Each time he thought of her question, it seemed even more ridiculous. And they’d just made such a point of folding everything up so neatly! After a moment he noticed that Chrissy’s laughter had changed to sobs, and then he realized that he didn’t know whether he was laughing or crying either. He was just sitting there, on the chair where he’d sat so many times, but without his mother, who had been sucked through the window and into the white landscape outside.

“Good God,” he muttered, wiping away the tears.

He looked at his niece, who had covered her face with her hands and was still sobbing.

“I remember once,” he said. “I must have been about five. It’s one of my earliest memories. Mom was digging potatoes out of the vegetable garden, and I wanted to help. I still remember that cold fall air and those big potatoes that Mom had already dug up. I can see it all so clearly.”

Chrissy straightened up and took her hands from her face. There were long streaks of mascara on her cheeks.

“Mom gave me a potato digger,” Lance went on. “Sort of a long-handled hoe. It was probably a lot smaller than the one she was using, but it felt big to me. And it was impossible to steer it properly. Since I was so young, it didn’t take long for me to get fed up. I started whining and complaining. But Mom didn’t get mad at me. She patiently showed me how to use the potato digger. Soon it got easier, and I managed to stick the digger in the ground, but I didn’t find any potatoes. Not until the third or fourth try. It was like finding gold. I swung the potato digger over my head as hard as I could and hit Mom in the middle of the forehead.”

“Yikes,” whispered Chrissy.

“I know. She had just leaned down behind me to pull out some potatoes. A sigh was the only thing I heard, as if the air had suddenly gone out of her. And then the sound of the bucket falling over and all the potatoes tumbling out. When I turned around, she was sitting on the ground with one hand pressed to her forehead. I still remember the look in her eyes. It was so strange. Like she was looking at someone else, not me. She seemed scared. But only for a moment. Then she yelled, ‘Good Lord, are you trying to kill me, or what?’ I ran inside and upstairs to my room. From the window I could look down into the garden. I remember how she slowly got to her feet. Then she set the bucket upright and began gathering up all the potatoes that had rolled out.”

Lance ran his hand over the surface of the small table between the two easy chairs. It was completely bare now. Her eyeglasses were gone. The last thing she’d done.

“But what I remember most,” he said. “The reason I’ve never forgotten that day . . . It must have been at a time when I’d just learned about death. I’d probably started to realize that everybody dies. And my mother had just asked me whether I was trying to kill her. As I stood at the window, hiding behind the curtain and looking down at her, I prayed to God the whole time, begging him not to let it happen. I was so incredibly scared she was going to die.”

THEY
WERE
SITTING
IN
THE
SAME
POSITIONS
—Lance in his usual chair, and Chrissy on the sofa. He thought she seemed better now. Or at least awake. Even so, he had no intention of allowing her to drive back home. Tammy and Andy would just have to come to Duluth to get their car. It was totally irresponsible of them to have let her drive today.

Chrissy picked up a photo album that was lying on top in one of the boxes. They’d already paged through it once, giving it only a cursory look before going back to work. Now she was studying the pictures on the first page.

“Come look at this,” she said.

Lance went over and sat down next to her on the sofa.

“Who do you think this is?” she asked.

At first glance he didn’t recognize the people in the photo, but then he realized they had to be his mother and her two sisters, sitting on a blanket at the edge of the water. On the left in the picture the rear of a red car was visible, with the big, bulbous contours of a vehicle from the fifties.

“That’s Inga,” he said, pointing. “And that’s Aunt Laura and Aunt Eleanor.”

“Jesus, I didn’t recognize her,” exclaimed Chrissy. “Look how young she is.”

“I think this was before my time, probably in the fifties. She must be about twenty.”

They paged through the album, past faces both familiar and unfamiliar, looking at pictures of various excursions and family celebrations. Other photos seemed almost random, as if someone had snapped the shot by accident. Like the blurry and crooked picture of the Aerial Bridge in Duluth. All the photographs in the album appeared to be from before Lance was born. Toward the back the first picture of Oscar showed up. A young man in a police uniform smiling confidently at the camera. In another he was wearing civilian clothes, sitting next to another young man on a bench in Leif Erikson Park. Maybe around 1960, thought Lance. In the background was Lake Superior, the blue of the water so intense and unreal, the way it was only in old color photographs.

Stuck in the very back of the album, between the last page and cover, was a loose picture that Lance immediately recognized as Andy’s school photo from his first year at Central High.

“Is that Dad?” asked Chrissy.

“Uh-huh. Sixteen years old.”

She turned over the photo. Someone had written a big question mark on the back.

“What do you think that means?” she said.

Lance reached out to take the photo from her. He stared at the question mark, as if he could somehow wrest its secret from the symbol. Who had put that there? Probably his mother. But why? The picture didn’t belong in this album, yet she’d stuck it between the back cover and the last page.

“I don’t know what it means,” he said.

“In a way, it makes sense,” said Chrissy.

“What do you mean?”

“If I had to draw a picture of Dad, without drawing a face, this is exactly how I would do it.”

Lance flipped the picture over a few times, looking first at the front, then the back. A smiling young face, and a question mark, written in pencil.

INGA
HANSEN
was buried on a February day when the temperature was below zero and the wind was blowing in off the lake.

Lance stood with his hand on his son’s shoulder as he watched the coffin being lowered between the dark earthen walls that glittered with frost. Jimmy’s mother, who stood on the other side of the boy, had placed her glove-clad hand on the back of his neck. They looked like a family. The silent boy’s small body trembled, but Lance couldn’t tell if it was due to tears or the cold. Only a few yards away stood Chrissy, her head bowed and her face racked with grief, but she didn’t utter a sound.

The church had been almost full, and many of the mourners had also come to the gravesite. Not just close family members but old friends and acquaintances from a long life in Duluth. There were quite a few that Lance didn’t know.

With a muted thud the coffin reached its end station. They sang “Abide with Me,” and with that Lance Hansen’s remaining parent was laid to rest. He cast a glance at Andy, who was standing nearby with his family. He looked ill, making a tremendous effort just to stay on his feet. As Lance continued to stare at his brother, Andy’s face contorted and he emitted a long-drawn-out gasp that everyone at the gravesite could hear. Tammy looked at him in alarm and then reached out to clumsily stroke his back.

Lance looked away, not wanting to risk meeting Andy’s eye.

The mourners who had stood in a semicircle around the grave hesitantly began to leave. Lance heard several people clear their throats to say something, but everyone spoke in quiet, respectful tones. Slowly they headed toward the exit, in pairs or small groups. Still to come was the gathering in the Sons of Norway hall. Lance had taken it upon himself to prepare a brief speech in memory of his mother. He was the one who had made all the funeral arrangements. He had phoned Tammy to tell her that he was taking charge of everything. The alternative would have been to sit home alone, doing nothing. Or to drive around aimlessly, also alone.

He felt suddenly dizzy as he walked between Mary and Jimmy, hearing in all directions the creaking sound of boots on the snow. He felt as if all the blood had drained out of his face. For a moment he thought he might fall, but then the dizziness subsided, leaving behind a faint nausea.

IN
NORWAY
HALL
on Lake Avenue a mural painted in the typical Norwegian rosemaling style adorned one end of the room, while Norwegian and American flags dominated the other. The catering company had set out food and drinks on schedule, and the gathering of thirty to forty guests began helping themselves from the smorgasbord buffet. The long table where they would all be seated was nicely decorated with a white tablecloth and candles in the big candelabra.

Everyone wanted to say something to Lance—about his mother or the funeral or the food or the cold that had settled in, or about the decreasing number of members in the Sons of Norway, or all of the above. Andy sat at the table, silent and unapproachable, leaning over his plate. Tammy had retreated to a corner, and Chrissy was nowhere to be seen. More or less on autopilot, Lance answered all the questions, nodding and putting on a somber expression. More than anything, he wished he could usher everybody out, every single person, emptying the whole place so he could finally be alone. Not just alone, but so far away that nobody could reach him. He wanted to get sucked into the white landscape, merging with it, just as his mother had. It didn’t really
help that everything related to the funeral would be over soon. It was other things that he found insurmountable. What he should he do about Andy? And Chrissy?

All around him was the muted buzz of voices. Bill Eggum had already sat down and started to eat. People were again talking about ordinary things like the weather and the Minnesota Wild hockey team, but no one had presumed to laugh out loud. The ritual solemnity of the funeral would stay with them until they got in their cars and drove home.

Gary Hansen came over with a cup of coffee in his hand. Gary was Lance’s cousin who ran Northwoods Outfitters, a business that sold and rented outdoor gear. The murder victim, Georg Lofthus, and his companion had rented a canoe from him. Lance and Gary had always been good friends.

“My condolences,” Gary said as they shook hands.

Lance nodded briefly.

“It’s not easy when a parent dies,” said Gary.

“No, it’s not.”

“At least it happened quickly, from what I hear.”

“Yeah. She died suddenly, sitting in her chair.”

“Was it her heart?”

“Yes.”

Gary took a sip of his coffee.

“So, how are you doing?” he asked his cousin.

“Okay,” said Lance. “How about you?”

“Well, er . . . You know that we’re separated, right?”

Lance shook his head.

“Barb moved out right before Christmas.”

“Probably not the best Christmas for you, huh?”

“No, it wasn’t,” Gary agreed.

“What about your son?”

“He’s living with her.”

“Ah. Welcome to the club,” said Lance.

Gary wasn’t sure whether to say thanks or not.

“I thought you were in Norway, by the way.”

“I’m back,” said Lance.

“Good thing you got home before this happened.”

“Uh-huh.”

“She must have been thrilled to hear all about it when you came back from the old country.”

Out of the corner of his eye Lance noticed that Chrissy had just come into the room.

HE
TAPPED
HIS
KNIFE
AGAINST
HIS
GLASS,
and the hum of voices at the table faded. Then he stood up. He had practiced his speech for a couple of days, but he still needed to refer to the key words that he’d written down on a piece of paper.

“It was good to see so many people at the church today,” he began. “And it’s good to see that so many have joined us here in Norway Hall. I would like to thank all of you on behalf of my family.”

His hand holding the notes had now started to shake. He didn’t know whether anyone else could hear the paper rustling, but to him it sounded incredibly loud. He took a sip of mineral water and then went on.

“Mom’s family was originally from Norway. Nothing unusual about that.” Some of the older people sitting at the long table nodded. “I suppose you could say that she was a rather modest person. She didn’t exactly like to call attention to herself. But for my part—and I feel certain I can speak for Andy as well, in this regard—I will always be eternally grateful to her for the home she created for us on Fifth Avenue. I know that everyone sitting here has their own memories of Inga Hansen. Whether she was your friend, your neighbor, your mother-in-law, or your grandmother.”

He cast a glance at Chrissy, who had found a seat between two elderly men. She was wearing a nice black outfit, with a shawl draped around her shoulders, and her hair was pinned up in a grown-up style. As he was about to take another look at his notes, she smiled at him. A radiant smile that didn’t seem appropriate, given the setting.

“But for me, she will always be Mom,” he continued. “Irreplaceable. A bond that can never be broken, not even by death. Every family has its difficulties. Problems that cannot necessarily be solved; things that you just have to live with. It was like that in our family too. But because we come from the home she
created for us, in the long run all of us will find our way to a safe harbor.”

Andy was staring straight ahead, his face pale and drawn.

“Finally, I’d like to share a little story with you. Well, it’s not really a story, just something that’s a vivid memory for me. About Mom. The last time she and I took a drive together—this was last summer—we headed north along the Shore and talked about the lake. Mom said something like ‘I’ve lived my whole life on Lake Superior, but it’s only seldom that I notice it. Isn’t that strange?’ I don’t remember how I replied, or if I even answered at all. But today I know what she meant. That’s the way it is when you live so close to something so vast. Most of the time you don’t see it. But what if one day it was gone? What if you woke up one morning and the lake wasn’t there? Then you would miss it. And that’s how I’m missing my mother now. Thank you for everything, Mom.”

He sat down, and suddenly he didn’t know what to do. So far no one at the table had said a word. No one showed any sign of speaking or continuing to eat. Everyone just sat there, staring down at the tablecloth. Lance wanted to pick up his knife and fork to cut off a piece of the open-face sandwich on his plate, but he couldn’t get himself to be the first to break the frozen mood.

Chrissy was the one who did it.

“Woo-hoo!” she shouted so loudly that the elderly man next to Lance cringed. Then she started clapping, turning her smiling face toward her uncle. She was beaming like the sun.

CHAD
AAKRE,
an old friend of the family and a fanatic birder, had started talking about the eagle population on the North Shore. Lance tried to look interested. He nodded and raised his eyebrows in surprise, interjecting an occasional “exactly” or a “wow, I can’t believe it” as he inwardly struggled not to succumb to the weight of the day, which was at last coming to an end.

Finally he excused himself, saying he really ought to circulate and thank people for coming and wish them a safe drive home, and so on. He paused for a moment to take a look around. He immediately caught sight of Bill Eggum and Andy, talking to each other over by the door. He thought about what Eggum had said
about the anonymous tip the police had received about Lenny Diver. They had traced the call to a public phone booth in Duluth. A man’s voice, Eggum had said. Lance wondered if it was true that the sheriff really hadn’t recognized the voice.

Suddenly Chrissy appeared at his side.

“You’re so great, Uncle Lance,” she said with a smile. “Taking care of everything like this.”

At first he felt flattered, but then he noticed the false warmth in her eyes.

“Better to keep busy on a day like this, you know,” he said.

Chrissy looked around the room at the rosemaling mural and the Norwegian and American flags hanging on the wall. She rolled her brown eyes, as if she and Lance were pals, sharing a secret.

Over by the door, Andy and Bill Eggum seemed to be concluding their conversation. Lance thought there was something animal-like about the way his brother looked. He was scowling and his lower jaw jutted out slightly—an expression that Lance had never seen before. He thought about the wolf up in Canada that had stood in the road in front of a dead deer. When he saw Andy talking to Eggum, he felt as if a dead body were lying next to him too. At the feet of his brother and the ex-sheriff lay Georg Lofthus, his bashed-in head a bloody mess. But Lance was the only one who could see him.

“Can you give me a lift home?” asked Chrissy.

A glassy film had settled over her eyes.

“I’ve got to stay and clean up,” said Lance.

“I’ll help you.”

“No. You need to drive home with your parents.”

“But I don’t want to,” she whined.

“Pull yourself together,” he hissed. “This is a funeral.”

Then he spun on his heel and headed for the door, not because he had any specific purpose in mind. He just wanted to get away from his niece.

Eggum turned to greet Lance.

“Nice speech,” he said.

Lance mumbled something, noticing that Andy was looking away.

“Inga was a fine person,” Eggum went on. “I remember her so well from the time when your father and I worked together.”

Lance felt uncomfortable standing so close to his brother. There was still something odd about Andy’s face, but maybe it was just because he was so worn out. Lance felt a wave of exhaustion flood through his body, from his feet to his head.

“It won’t be long before Lenny Diver’s trial begins,” he said.

“That’s right,” said Eggum. “Are you thinking of attending?”

“Shouldn’t we be there? All three of us?” Lance asked.

“Do
you
have an interest in the case?” Eggum gave Andy a surprised look.

“I don’t even know what you two are talking about,” said Andy.

“The murder at Baraga’s Cross,” replied Eggum.

“No, that doesn’t interest me.”

Again Lance pictured Georg Lofthus lying on the floor next to Andy. The image kept growing. Blood appeared on the floor; dark, sticky blood through which people were plodding, wearing their Sunday shoes. He imagined all the bloody footprints in the snow outside Norway Hall.

The guests were starting to say their good-byes. Everyone wanted to shake hands with the two brothers before they left. Chrissy reappeared.

“Can we go soon?’ she asked her father.

Andy put his arm around her shoulders.

“We’re going now,” he said. “Take care.”

Bill Eggum and Lance nodded in reply. Then Andy ushered his daughter, gently but firmly, out of the room.

Lance could clearly see the two sets of bloody tracks they left in their wake.