The Land of Dreams (Minnesota Trilogy)

by Vidar Sundstøl

  Later today he and Fries were going to the town of Finland, which was where the two Norwegians had stayed for a while before moving to the Whispering Pines Motel at the end of their trip. In Finland they would talk to the manager of the Blue Moose Motel and the employees who worked in the area’s only bar.

  There wasn’t much they knew with any certainty. But Lecuyer and Nyland did have a theory. They surmised that these two Christian young men had been lovers for a long time, although they were constantly filled with a strong sense of guilt for living what they thought was a sinful life. They may also have tried to end their relationship several times, but without success. In a desperate attempt to be “normal,” Georg Lofthus had gone out and found himself a girlfriend. The fact that she also belonged to the same Christian group of young people—which mandated that everyone remain celibate before marriage—must have been advantageous for two reasons. First, Lofthus could claim her as his fiancée without being required to have sex with her. Second, the vow of celibacy guaranteed that she would want to get married as soon as possible, because then she could have as much sex as she liked—and with God’s blessing.

  Nyland thought about the Bible the clerk at the Whispering Pines had given them, with the inscription from the grandparents to the newly confirmed Georg Lofthus that invoked a passage from St. Paul: “For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected, if it is received with thanksgiving.” Paul’s first letter to Timothy. He thought there was a certain tolerance in those words that was completely lacking from the rest of the case. What was it Bjørn Hauglie had said to Lance Hansen? “Kjærlighet.” Wasn’t that it? Yes, Lance had reported hearing Hauglie say the Norwegian word for love, a word that he recognized. He knew what it meant in English. It was the first thing Hauglie said as he sat there next to the cross, in shock and covered in blood.

  Thinking about Lance Hansen suddenly made Nyland remember something Bob Lecuyer had said. He was talking about the impression he’d had when he was interviewing Lance. A feeling that the Forest Service officer was holding something back. “I have no idea why. Sometimes you just get a gut feeling,” he’d said. Nyland tried to think of anything suspicious that Lance might have said or done as they drove from Duluth to Tofte, but nothing came to mind. The man had made a solid impression. Nyland had liked him at once. But according to Lecuyer, there was reason to be suspicious of Lance Hansen.

  Nyland took his notebook from the inside pocket of his jacket and then got out the business card that Hansen had given him before they parted outside the Bluefin Bay Resort that first evening. “If there’s anything you want to know, just give me a call,” Hansen had said.

  The foremost thing Nyland wanted to know, of course, was who had killed Georg Lofthus. Even though he and Lecuyer had a theory about the homicide, they weren’t positive that Hauglie had done it. Nyland also wanted to know if there was any credibility to Lecuyer’s suspicion that Lance Hansen was holding something back. No matter what, Hansen was a man who possessed extensive knowledge about the area. Maybe he knew something important even though he might not be aware of its significance.

  Nyland looked at Hansen’s card with the phone number. He decided to call him later in the day.

  The middle-aged waitress came over to ask if he wanted a refill. In one hand she held the coffeepot, and in the other a dishrag for wiping off the tables.

  “Sure, thanks. Just half a cup,” he said.

  She filled his cup almost to the brim. “There you go,” she said. And then, after a second’s hesitation. “You’re from out of town, aren’t you?”

  He gave her a smile. “You can certainly say that again.”

  “From Europe?”

  “Norway.”

  “Are you kidding?”

  “No, I’m not.”

  “I’m Norwegian on both sides of my family,” she said.

  Nyland leaned forward and pretended to be looking at both sides of her. “Amazing!” he said.

  She snapped the dishrag at him with a coquettish grin.

  “But apparently there’s also some Swedish blood mixed in, way back in time somewhere,” she added.

  He laughed, but made no move to check out this additional information.

  “Poor you, so far away from home,” she went on. “Don’t you have anybody here to look after you? To show you around and everything?”

  Nyland shook his head.

  “And it’s going to be the Fourth of July soon. On Friday, you know. Stars and Stripes and the whole shebang. You really have to see the parade and the fireworks. Have you ever seen a Fourth of July celebration before?”

  Again he shook his head.

  She patted him lightly on the arm. “You’re going to love it,” she told him. “Promise me you’ll stay in Grand Marais for the Fourth of July. Promise?”

  “I promise,” said Nyland, holding up his hand, as if taking an oath. “What’s your name, by the way?” he asked.

  “Martha.”

  He was just about to say that Martha wasn’t a Norwegian name, but he changed his mind.

  “Martha Fitzpatrick. My maiden name was Vollum. That’s a Norwegian name, isn’t it?”

  “Sounds a hundred percent Norwegian to my ears,” said Nyland. “I got the name Fitzpatrick because I married an Irishman.”

  “From Ireland?”

  “No, from Duluth. He was originally from Chicago, but he lived in Duluth. Probably still lives there, as far as I know. Oh, here I go again, talking on and on about myself!” she said. “I apologize. I’ll let you drink your coffee in peace.”

  “No need to apologize. It’s nice talking to you,” said Nyland. “I don’t really know many people in Minnesota.”

  Martha Fitzpatrick laughed. “Well, I still better get back to work,” she said. “Enjoy your coffee.” Then she went back to the men eating breakfast in the other room. It was obvious that several of them knew her.

  Nyland watched as she talked and laughed with the customers as she briskly and efficiently made her way among the tables with the coffeepot and dishrag. What a job, he thought. Starting work at the crack of dawn every day, serving these people breakfast, wiping off their tables, and laughing at their jokes. Always the same little café in the same small town. He wasn’t sure whether he thought that was nice or depressing. Maybe it was both.

  Through the windows in the larger section of the café he saw a police car pulling up to park in front. A moment later Bill Eggum, the sheriff of Cook County, came in. He nodded to a few customers, exchanged a few words with Martha Fitzpatrick, and then headed for a table.

  Nyland raised a hand in greeting.

  “Hey, good morning!” said Eggum. “Didn’t expect to see you here. It’s quite a drive.”

  “Yes, but I woke up too early, before they started serving breakfast at the hotel.”

  “Me too,” said Eggum. “I mean, I got up before my wife was awake.”

  Nyland laughed briefly. It was still too early in the day for any sort of boisterous response.

  “Mind if I join you?” said the sheriff. He was wearing his official hat and his sheriff’s badge on his shirt.

  With a wave of his hand, Nyland invited Eggum to sit down. The sheriff squeezed his stout body into the booth, then took off his hat and placed it on the seat next to him. His shiny bald pate looked sweaty. He glanced around and caught sight of Martha, who was already headed toward them. Nyland noticed that she wasn’t carrying a menu.

  “Morning, Bill. What’ll it be?” she said.

  “Two fried eggs, bacon, sausage, and hash browns,” the sheriff immediately replied.

  “Toast?”

  “Rye.”

  Martha repeated his order and received an affirmative nod. “I’ll be right back with your coffee,” she said and went back to the other room.

  “Okay, great,” said Eggum as he stared vacantly out the window, clearly still try
ing to wake up.

  The two men had met on a daily basis, but never without other police officers present. The sheriff had regularly stopped by the Bluefin Bay to see Lecuyer and Nyland and inquire about the latest developments in the case. Lecuyer thought he was a nuisance. Nyland had no opinion, one way or the other, about Bill Eggum. He thought the man seemed almost a parody of a provincial law enforcement officer, but otherwise he hadn’t spent any time or energy thinking about Eggum. But now it was just the two of them, sitting here in a booth in a café called South of the Border.

  Martha came back with the coffeepot and a cup, which she filled for Eggum. “All right now,” she said. “Things are starting to look up. What about you?” She held out the pot toward Nyland, but he placed his hand over his cup.

  “No, thanks,” he said. “Otherwise I’m going to have to ask you for some Valium. That coffee is powerful stuff.”

  Martha laughed and was about to leave, but she suddenly thought of something. “So I guess you’re not entirely without friends here in Minnesota, after all,” she said, nodding to the sheriff. “Sheriff Eggum and I are working together,” Nyland told her. “Oh?” she remarked, her eyes wide.

  “This man is a famous homicide detective from Norway,” said Eggum.

  “Is that right?” exclaimed Martha.

  “Only the part about being a homicide detective from Norway,” said Nyland.

  “Are you here because of that terrible thing that happened near Baraga’s Cross?” she asked in a low voice.

  Nyland nodded.

  “I can’t believe what some people can do,” she said. “Just imagine killing a Norwegian!”

  Nyland couldn’t help laughing.

  Martha looked at him in alarm. “But don’t you agree? Don’t you think it’s simply unbelievable?”

  He had no idea what to say.

  “Don’t go taking over the whole investigation, now,” said Eggum. “All right, but if it was up to me, the guilty party would end up getting a beating that he wouldn’t soon forget.”

  “I have no doubt about that whatsoever,” said the sheriff. Martha Fitzpatrick pretended to give him a playful slap. It was obvious that they had known each other for a long time.

  She went back to the other customers, leaving the two policemen on their own.

  Nyland wondered if he might glean something useful to the investigation from this unexpected tête-à-tête with the sheriff. It was amazing what he could sometimes discover if he just let people talk.

  “Eggum?” he said, as if appraising the sheriff’s surname. “You must have Norwegian roots too. Am I right?”

  The sheriff had, in fact, never talked about such matters before. In that sense, he was unlike all the rest of the Norwegian Americans in the region.

  “Yep, you’re right. Norwegian on my father’s side, and that’s where the name comes from. But I’m actually mostly Swedish. My mother’s maiden name was Seagren.”

  “Must have been originally Sjögren in Swedish,” said Nyland.

  “I’m not sure about that,” said the sheriff. “I don’t speak Swedish. But I do remember the tale behind the name. It was one my grandmother’s favorite stories. Three young Swedish emigrants sailed from Europe to America. I don’t recall anymore what their names were. Anyway, it was a really difficult voyage, on board an old steamship. With stormy weather pretty much the whole way. The three young Swedes stuck together, through thick and thin. Worst of all was the seasickness. They threw up more than they’d ever thrown up in their lives. Before they were even halfway across the Atlantic, their stomachs were completely empty, but they kept on throwing up all the way to New York. At a certain point they actually thought their last hour had arrived, and so the three made a pact. If, in spite of everything, they managed to survive—and they didn’t have much hope that they would—each of them would take a name in the New World that would remind them of the trials that they’d been through. They agreed to take names that included the word ‘sea.’ When they finally set foot on American soil, they had decided on the names Seaberg, Seaholm, and Seagren. Young Mr. Seagren was my great-grandfather. At least I think so. Or was he my great-great-grandfather? Well, no matter what, that’s what happened. Do you think it’s a true story?”

  Eirik Nyland thought it sounded like a typical immigrant story, but he didn’t want to say that.

  “It sounds plausible enough,” he said.

  “Yeah, I think so too,” said Eggum.

  Nyland could hear from the tone of his voice that not everyone had the same faith in the tale.

  “Are there some people who question whether it happened that way?” he asked.

  Eggum uttered a resigned groan. “You know how it is. Some people read so much they end up all fuzzy-headed.”

  “Oh, really?”

  “Have you met Lance Hansen, the man who found the dead body?”

  Nyland nodded.

  “Well, Hansen is a kind of local historian. And for the most part, his knowledge is impressive. But he thinks he knows everything about the immigrants who came to these parts, and that no one else has anything to contribute. If it hasn’t been recorded and approved by Lance Hansen, then it’s not worth knowing.”

  Eggum shook his head in dismay at the very idea.

  “And Lance Hansen doesn’t believe the story about how the Seagren name originated?”

  “No. Do you know what he did?”

  “No. What?”

  “He laughed right in my face. Then he asked me whether I really believed in stories like that.”

  “That really doesn’t seem . . . ” Nyland tried to appear indignant. “No, I agree. And the story isn’t all that unlikely, is it?”

  “Not at all.”

  “I personally know about stories that are ten times less likely, but they can still be verified as true. Stories in my own family.”

  Nyland had no desire to hear any of these stories. At least not right now. It was too early in the morning for more of Eggum’s family anecdotes.

  “This Hansen that you mentioned,” he said.

  “Yeah, what about him?”

  “What’s your honest opinion of the man? I mean from a professional point of view. Since he’s our most important witness.”

  Sheriff Eggum seemed astonished by the question. He paused to think for a few seconds and then said, “Lance Hansen is a good man, both personally and as a police officer. That’s something everybody knows. He might seem a bit eccentric when it comes to matters of history, but otherwise I can’t think of a single reason to criticize him.”

  “Okay. That was the impression I had of him too.”

  They sat there for a few minutes in silence. The sheriff finished his coffee. Then Martha appeared with his breakfast. Fried eggs, bacon, sausage, and hash browns. The greasy smell coming from the plate made Nyland feel a bit nauseated. He declined yet another offer of coffee and then kept his eyes fixed on the window as the sheriff ate his breakfast. He thought the man ought to be able to enjoy the first meal of the day without somebody watching him.

  As he stared out the window and listened to the sheriff chewing, Nyland noticed that he had started to feel quite at home here in Cook County. So far he’d been focused on getting up to speed on the case and establishing a good working relationship with Bob Lecuyer and his assistant, Jason Fries. But now, on his fifth morning in Minnesota, Eirik Nyland had the distinct feeling that he liked it here. Maybe because of the lake. He saw it every day, both when he was driving around and from the windows of the conference room at the Bluefin Bay Resort, where the FBI had set up their central command post for the investigation. He could even see the lake from his hotel room. And it had been within sight the whole time he drove up here to Grand Marais early this morning. He had seen the sun come up over the quiet, smooth surface, which began right below the road and looked as if it continued on into space. Or maybe he had started feeling so
comfortable here because of the people he’d met.

  He let some more time pass before he glanced over at Eggum and concluded that it looked like the sheriff had finished eating. A few hash browns and half a piece of toast were all that remained on his plate.

  “Good food?”

  “Mmm,” said Eggum almost reverently.

  “There’s one thing I’ve been wondering about,” said Nyland. “What’s that?”

  “Is there a drugstore nearby? I’ve got a headache.”

  Eggum nodded. “When you drive back to Tofte, there’s one on the right-hand side, just as you’re leaving town. The drugstore and souvenir shop are in the same building. Look for a sign that says ‘Viking Hus.’ By the way, my niece works in the drugstore. A great gal. I think they open at nine.” He glanced at his watch. “It’s five past eight right now,” he said, and then downed the last of his coffee. “So I’d better get over to the office.”

  NYLAND STAYED UNTIL JUST BEFORE NINE O’CLOCK. Then he drove over to the drugstore, which, as far as he could tell, shared a front entrance with the souvenir shop.

  He parked his car and went inside. The first thing he saw was a big poster in the hallway. It was a drawing of a man with a dripping red nose, and the text above read, “Ask your pharmacist!” In Norwegian. He’d seen the same poster at his own drugstore back in Norway, but he seemed to recall that it had been a few years since that particular advertisement was in use.

  Could the thin, dark-haired woman behind the counter be Eggum’s niece? She looked like she was almost the same age as the sheriff, so he doubted it. She wore a badge that told him her name was Deb Nelson.

  “I need something for a headache,” he said. “I’ve been taking something called Excedrin, and it works fine.”

  Deb Nelson got him a bottle of Excedrin. “Anything else?” she asked.

  Nyland was about to say “no, thanks” but then he thought about Vibeke and the girls. He really should bring something home for them.