“Your first glass of wine, then.”
Håkan nodded.
“I am honored that it is my wine and that I am the one pouring it for you. I hope you like it.”
They looked into their glasses. The black liquid dawned into light crimson toward the surface. Håkan took a small sip. It made his tongue dry and harsh, like a cat’s. It tasted of unknown fruit, salt, wood, and warmth.
“What do you think?”
Håkan nodded.
“Oh, wonderful. I’m glad.”
The captain swirled the wine into a vortex, stuck his nose into his glass, closed his eyes, inhaled deeply, and then took a sip, which he held in his mouth for a while, moving it around like a bite of scalding food, and then swallowed. He opened his eyes, and his face, relaxed with pleasure as he was drinking, wrinkled into a thoughtful expression.
“How long have you been in America?”
“I don’t know.”
From under his brow, Håkan looked at the barrels and then back down. He wanted to look at the ceiling. Instead, his eyes fell on his hands, which appeared to him like articles someone else had placed on the table. He put them on his lap, out of sight. Now that he had tasted the wine, he could smell its sugary presence all over the cellar.
“A long time?” the captain insisted gently.
“Almost all my life. I was a boy when I left.”
“You lost your brother. Do you have any other family here? Friends?”
Håkan shook his head.
“Where in America have you been?”
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know?”
“I arrived in San Francisco. I’ve been to Clangston. Twice. Then another city. But that was just for a few days. All these years, I’ve been traveling. The desert, mountains, the plains. I don’t know what those places are called.”
“How did you live? What kind of work have you done here?”
“I’ve been. Traveling east, to find my brother. I couldn’t. Then I stopped.”
The captain repeated the swirling, the sniffing, and the sipping.
“Trouble?”
Håkan nodded.
The captain nodded.
“Well, whatever it was, it must have been a long time ago. We’re both old, after all.”
Both men stared at the table.
“I make this wine now. The best in America,” Captain Altenbaum said, addressing the wine in his glass more than Håkan. “But I used to be a fur trader. That’s how I paid for all of this. Furs.” After a pause, the captain looked up and across the table. “That paw you gave Sarah. Remarkable. I took a quick look, but I noticed that you stretched it open to tan it. Exceptional tanning, by the way. The soft yet lifelike feel. I wonder how you did it. Very rare. Then you stuffed it and stitched it back. With sinew! Visible only to an expert eye. Extraordinary. Extraordinary work.”
Håkan looked down.
“With your talent, I could find you work. Quiet work. You could even live here, if you like. We’d be neighbors of a sort.”
Hoping the captain would be staring into his glass, Håkan looked up, but as he met the fur trader’s kind eyes, he lowered his head.
“May I look at that rolled-up fur you have there?” the captain asked.
Håkan looked at the bundle next to his chair but did not move.
“Please. I noticed how many kinds of skin you’ve used. It seems so unusual. Just to satisfy the curiosity of a fellow trapper. Please.”
Slowly, Håkan got off of his chair, crouched down next to it, undid some leather straps, removed the tin box and the few other things kept inside the bundle, and then, little by little, as he let the coat unfurl, gave up his humped and bowed posture and drew himself up to his full height.
The captain stood up, leaving his fingertips on the table, as if that slight contact with a familiar object could keep him anchored to reality, while he stared ahead, gaping in disbelief. His eyes trembled as they traveled over the coat and then up to Håkan’s face.
They stood there, in silence.
Captain Altenbaum finally sat down and filled his glass. Håkan’s had remained untouched since his first sip.
“I can see how much you learned through the years. You’ve become a master. And all those animals. From everywhere. Of every kind. Even reptiles.” A brief silence. “And that lion.”
What Håkan saw in the captain’s eyes as he uttered those last words made him roll up the coat and glance toward the staircase.
“Please sit down. Please.”
Hesitating, Håkan sat down on the edge of the chair. He was about to shrivel back into his decrepit pose but stopped himself.
“Are those your instruments?”
Håkan nodded.
“May I?”
Håkan slid the box across the table, and the captain, gently, with the utmost respect, opened it and looked in without touching anything.
“Incredible.” He paused, passed the box back, and drank—this time, without ceremony. He sighed and seemed to be absorbed by a stain on the table that he was scratching off with his fingernail. “I have a child,” he said at last. His voice was serious but very calm—even sweet.
Håkan got up.
“Wait. Please. Whatever happened to you.” The captain failed to find the right words. “Whatever you’ve done, I can tell that your life has been hard enough already. I’ve heard all the stories, but I don’t know what the truth is. You may have been a bad man once. I don’t know. But what I see now is a tired old man who has been traveling without rest and needs to end his journey in peace.”
Håkan could not look at him.
“Like I said,” the captain resumed in a more composed tone. “I used to be a fur trader. My shipping company now has a vast fleet. Have you heard of Alaska?”
Håkan did not respond.
“It’s a new territory. Not new to me—that’s where I made my fortune. But it’s a new territory for the Union. You would like it there. Nobody around. Good trapping. It can look like Sweden. I can get you there safely.”
Later, in the main house, the captain showed Håkan Alaska on a globe. He pointed out the different stations and outposts his company had along the coast and discussed the virtues of each one of them.
“I have fur trading posts here.” The captain showed him three or four patches of coast. “Some salteries and canneries here and here. Small mines here. And we get ice from here and here. Whichever spot you choose, you can be sure that you will be left alone. And that game will be abundant.”
Then, in passing, the captain pointed out how close Alaska was to Russia, how the two lands were separated by a narrow strait, and traced a line with his finger across that immense country that went straight to Finland and then Sweden.
“Just the place for you,” Captain Altenbaum said, bringing his finger back to Alaska.
Håkan, who had never seen a globe before, walked around it, trying to track his long journey and seeing how all those lands came together in a circle.
A bleak glow was washing away the stars. The black sky and the white expanse hesitated for a moment before merging into one boundless gray space. Now and again, the groan of the icebound hull, the snap of slack canvas, or the crack of a fracturing floe revealed the scale of the silence.
They had kept the fire going through most of the night but had run out of fuel some time ago. Even so, none of those who were still gathered around the dimming embers had moved. The fringes of their circle were littered with oily tins, food scraps, burned tobacco, and empty bottles. Nobody looked up, except for the boy, whose eyes were fixed on Håkan’s face.
Throughout the long night that was now coming to an end, Håkan had spoken in his soft, vacillating voice. No one had interrupted him; no one had asked questions. He had often made long pauses. Sometimes he had seemed to nod off. During these prolonged silences, the men would exchange confused looks, wondering if the story had concluded. A few prospectors and sailors even got up and left. But no matter how absent Håkan was during these pauses—however long they were—after opening his eyes and stroking his beard, he always continued, in his hesitant way but as if he had never stopped, with his narrative. This time, however, after telling how he had traveled to San Francisco with Captain Altenbaum’s help and then boarded the Impeccable, one of the many ships in his fleet, Håkan stood up. His listeners pretended to arrange their coats and their few belongings scattered around them. The boy kept staring at him.