“That’s where you’re wrong,” said Floyd. “It’s a national news story. And it’s sitting right here in Fort Moxie.”
“It is not a national news story,” said Lasker. “We’ve been on one TV show. And anyhow, most of the people who come out here think I buried the boat myself. They think the whole thing’s a scam.”
Floyd looked shocked. “There’s no truth to that, is there, Tom?”
Lasker glared at him, and Floyd subsided.
“Listen.” Charlie was a picture of magnanimity. “All of this is beside the point. There’s a lot of money to be made, and it occurred to us you haven’t been getting your share, Tom. Now, what we propose to do is to organize this in a more businesslike way.”
“How do you mean?”
“First thing,” said Floyd, “is to get the attraction off the trailer. I mean, no offense, but what we have here feels like a garage sale. I can understand why people don’t take it very seriously.”
“The attraction?” said Lasker. “It’s an attraction now?”
“No offense, Tom.” Charlie shifted his weight and his chair sagged. “We just thought it would be a good idea to put it on a platform.”
“Ed’s volunteered to make the platform,” said Floyd. That would be Ed Grange, who usually took charge of parades and other ceremonials. “He’ll do a good job, don’t worry.”
“We’ll put a tent over it,” continued Charlie, “and install some heaters.”
Lasker made a face. “I don’t want a tent on my front lawn,” he said.
“We know that.” Charlie’s benign expression signified that everything was under control. “We wouldn’t do that to you, Tom. We thought it would look better over where you dug it up, anyhow.” His eyes suddenly clouded. “You haven’t filled in the hole, have you?”
“Sure I have. We filled it in the day we got the damned thing out of the ground.”
“That’s too bad,” said Floyd. “Shouldn’t have done that.”
“Why not? The hole was thirty feet deep. If somebody’d fallen in there, they would have got a terrible bruise.”
“Well, it’s too late now,” said Charlie. “Wish we’d thought of that right away.” He rapped his fingers against the table. “Anyway, we’ll put up the shelter. We know where we can get an old circus tent. Old, but in good shape. But don’t you worry, that’s only temporary.”
“What do you mean, temporary?”
“The bottom line on this,” said Floyd, “is that we might have a permanent draw here if we play our cards right. We need to think about a museum.”
Lasker’s head was beginning to hurt.
“Well, not right away,” said Charlie. “Look, we’re going to do a publicity push. We’ll start charging an admission fee. You’ll get a cut, of course. And we’ll see how it goes.”
“Wait a minute. You can’t charge for this.”
“Why not?” Charlie was into his take-charge mode. “You want people to react seriously, you have to make them pay something. Not a lot. But something. I bet we’ll double the crowds the first week. We were thinking thirty percent for you; the rest goes to the town. Okay? It’ll all be pure profit for you. Cost you nothing.” He nodded at Floyd, and Floyd nodded back. “The city will pay for everything. Now, we’ve got a T-shirt design. Let me show you—”
His eyes found Floyd, and Floyd produced a folder. He opened it and pulled out several drawings. All featured the boat, in various aspects. But there were several legends. The Devil’s Boat, read one. And My Folks Visited Fort Moxie, ND, and All I Got Was This Lousy T-shirt. Another featured a map of the upper Red River, with the location of the “devil’s boat” site marked with an inset.
“What’s this ‘devil’s boat’ routine?” asked Lasker.
“It was Marge’s idea,” said Charlie. Marge Peterson was the town clerk. “Part of the public-relations initiative.”
“I think it’s a little overboard.”
“Listen,” said Charlie, “people love that kind of stuff. And this whole business does have a kind of Twilight Zone flavor. Right?”
“And it lights up, doesn’t it?” said Floyd. “You find the power source yet?”
Lasker shook his head.
“Good. No known power source. We need to push that, Charlie. And the markings. The markings are good.”
“Yeah.” Charlie reached for his coat. “Listen, enjoyed talking with you, Tom. We’ve already started the ball rolling on this thing. Couple of the boys’ll be out tomorrow to get it going. You just relax. You won’t have to do anything except sit back and watch the money roll in.”
They were up and headed for the door. “Oh, one more thing.” Charlie stopped, and Floyd almost collided with him. “A rest room. We’ll need a rest room.”
“No,” said Lasker.
“It’s okay. We’ll set something up outside. Put it back in the trees. Out of sight.”
They shook his hand, opened the door, and looked out. There were maybe twenty visitors, and two more cars were pulling up. “See what I mean?” Charlie said.
April held the packet where the light from the window could shine through it. “What we have here,” she said, “are a few fibers taken from the mooring lanyards. The fibers are wood. They’re from spruce trees.” She passed it over.
Max squinted at the samples. “What does that tell us? There aren’t any spruce trees around here.”
“Not anymore. But there used to be. At one time they were quite common, as a matter of fact.”
“When?”
“When the lake was here.”
They were in a steakhouse. Max listened to the murmur of conversation, the clink of silverware. “You’re sure?”
“I’m sure.”
Max’s insides churned. A waitress arrived, and he settled for a Caesar salad rather than the club sandwich he’d been planning. “So what we’re saying is that we’ve got a ten-thousand-year-old boat up there?”
April squirmed. “I’d rather not jump to conclusions, Max. Let’s just stick with the facts for now. One, the boat will not rot, rust, or decay over extremely long periods of time. Two, the lanyards that are in the Lasker barn were once tied up to a piece of wood that was cut from a spruce tree. The tree that the wood fibers came from was alive ten thousand years ago.”
“But the boat,” said Max, “is new.”
“The boat will always look new, Max. You could put it back in the ground and dig it up to celebrate your sixtieth birthday, and it would look exactly as it does today.”
“That doesn’t sound possible.”
April nodded. “I know. Look, it’s outside our experience. But that doesn’t make it irrational.” Her voice dropped. “I’m not sure what kind of alternative explanation might fit the facts. The age of the wood fibers is not in dispute. Neither is the composition of the original samples. I think somebody was here. A long time ago somebody with advanced technology went sailing on Lake Agassiz. They tied up at least once to a tree or a pier.”
“So who was it?” asked Max. “Are we talking UFOs? Or what?”
“I don’t know. But it’s a question worth asking.”
Diet Cokes came. Max took a pull at his while he tried to get his thoughts in order. “It doesn’t make much sense,” he said. “Assume for a minute you’re right. Where does that leave us? With the notion that people came here from another world to go sailing? I mean, are we seriously suggesting that?”
“It’s not out of the realm of possibility. Try looking at the big picture, Max. And I mean big. How many water lakes are there, I wonder, within a radius of, say, twenty light-years? Agassiz might have looked pretty good to a load of tourists.” She smiled. “Look, let’s stay away from the speculation and concentrate on what we know. What we know is that we have an artificial element that’s unique in the world.”