Virgil Wander

by Leif Enger

  For now we’re catching our breath, in Tromsø.

  Rune and some friends are planning a party—that’s what they do when the sun reappears. Lucy is coming, which has Rune keyed up. We’ll gather to wait for the sun. They say it unsticks from the jagged Lofotens, shines half an hour, and settles again. It’s morning, it’s evening—the very first day. There’ll be music and fried cod and no doubt some akevitt. The event starts early and gets fairly loud, but a reverent silence is said to arrive in the final minutes of night. Some people weep and others cheer softly. Some blow out candles kept lit through the dark, and the smoke drifts away in the sun.

  Down in the harbor a sailboat is docked with a crazy American couple aboard—Rune claimed he saw some semblance of us, and took us down to meet them. He’s some sort of a vagabond writer, she an elfin creature aging in reverse. One night they both dreamed that they lived in the dark, in a boat all covered with snow; they provisioned their vessel and now here they are. Their plan is to sail farther north in the spring, to Svalbard they say, with its sluggish walruses and stark merry puffins. They invited us down to their tight little craft which is cold at the edges but snug where it counts.

  “What’s next for you two?” the old sailor wonders.

  We’ve seen them a lot. He asks every time.

  But all I can say is our future is airborne. I never saw a winter so blue. We all dream of finding but what’s wrong with looking? When the sun rises we’ll know what to do.

  Acknowledgments

  Thanks to Molly Friedrich for representing this novel with vigor and wit, and to Morgan Entrekin for giving it a home.

  I’m grateful to my editor, Elisabeth Schmitz, who along with Katie Raissian helped to get Virgil ready, stand him up straight, and prod him to make his short declaratives. The best copy editors protect you from yourself, and Kirsten Giebutowski performed this job heroically.

  Lee Enger started me early on the lifelong discipline of kite-flying, and briefly parked an antique Taylorcraft in Dad’s garage; Lin Enger read an early draft and delivered a hopeful verdict on a cold Saturday morning.

  Liz and Mike Towers gave steadfast friendship and encouragement, cinnamon rolls, even their Spare Oom in our time of need.

  Thanks to Paul and Paula for calm anchorage, as well as Dean and Sara. Ty and John are lifelines of humor and perspective. There’s nothing better than being resoundingly surpassed by your own.

  And I’m indebted still to Robin, champion of line and color, who somehow continues to suspend her disbelief.