Then came the Lowry Hill Tunnel where the freeway narrowed. Scores of frustrated drivers were backed up once again, some staying on I-94, some shifting to I-394, and some, like me, carefully picking their way across several lanes of unyielding traffic to reach the exit shared by Hennepin and Lyndale avenues. It was as if the artnappers had deliberately chosen a time and place guaranteed to make sure I was in the best frame of mind for a gunfight, which certainly would have been one-sided since I wasn’t carrying a gun as per instructions.
Eventually I parked the Audi on Willow Street in the shadow of a brownstone apartment building on the east edge of the park, not far from a coffeehouse. I left the engine running but turned off the radio. Enter Loring Park at the Willow and Fifteenth Street entrance, they had instructed. Enter at 6:27 P.M. Not 6:15, not 6:30, 6:27, which convinced me that the artnappers were purposely messing with me.
At 6:23, I left the Audi and its warm interior and heated seats. The wind and cold immediately reminded me that it was winter in Minnesota. I felt goose bumps up and down my body—even the most seasoned Minnesotan sometimes needs a moment or two to adjust—but they soon went away.
I stepped behind my car. There was ample space between my bumper and the vehicle parked directly behind me. Because of the heaps of snow and ice thrown up onto the boulevard by the plows, we were both parked several feet away from the curb, which narrowed the roadway and put sideview mirrors in jeopardy. A narrow path through the mound of snow began where the other car’s front bumper ended and led to the sidewalk.
There was plenty of traffic, both vehicle and pedestrian, much more than you would expect on what was ostensibly a side street. When I was sure there was none close at hand, I popped the trunk, using the remote control key chain, and muscled the dolly and the gym bags out, and I do mean muscled. The dolly, bags, and money together weighed over a hundred pounds, and as has already been established, I’ve been letting myself go lately. Looking carefully right and left, wishing I had ignored the instructions about the gun, I grabbed hold of the handle and wheeled the heavy dolly across the street to the entrance of the park.
Instead of shoveling or snowblowing the many trails that circled the small lake and traversed the park, the city had plowed them so they were much wider than they would have been normally and were covered with packed ice. The wheels on the dolly didn’t so much spin as they skidded behind me as I followed the trails. Sometimes the wheels found a rut or a chunk of ice and I had to yank the heavy dolly forward with both hands. Walk clockwise around the lake until you reach the Loring Park Community Arts Center, they told me, so I did.
Loring Park was established one hundred thirty years ago. It’s bordered on the east and south by expensive condominiums, apartments, office buildings, and that bastion of discontent, the Woman’s Club of Minneapolis. On the west, across Lyndale, are the Walker Art Center, the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden, Lowry Hill, and, behind that, the very wealthy, very contented Kenwood neighborhood. On the north you’ll find a number of restaurants, art galleries, and clubs housed in a series of buildings that are nearly as old as the park itself, as well as the Minneapolis Community and Technical College. Looming above it all is the mighty century-old dome of the magnificent Basilica of St. Mary’s.
Yet despite its high-tone neighbors, Loring Park is more than a little creepy. The lights aren’t what they could be, and the shadows they cast hold a menacing quality despite the bright city skyline that hangs above them. Some people call it “whoring park” because of its reputation as a prime site for late-night hookups. When I was a kid, it was also known as a spot where gay men would cruise other gay men, especially after the bars closed. Suburbanites would drive up and down Willow and Fifteenth, point at a man, any man, and say, “There’s one.” That was a long time ago, though. The Twin Cities Gay Pride Festival is held in Loring Park now.
I once heard a story that when the city temporarily drained the lake a couple of decades back, they discovered the remains of at least twenty bodies settled in the soft bottom. It was said that most of them were allegedly deposited there by Isadore Blumenfeld, alias Kid Cann, who ran the rackets in Minneapolis until he was arrested for violating the Mann Act and jury tampering in the early sixties. I presume the story was exaggerated. On the other hand, last November they found a human skull in the marshy area around the dock that juts into the lake, and as far as I knew, forensic anthropologists still haven’t determined its age, sex, or race, much less who it had belonged to.
In any case, the people I encountered did little to contradict the park’s checkered past. I counted at least five meth addicts chilling on the metal benches that faced the lake. One kid strolled by cradling a bottle of Grey Goose vodka. “Time to get my goose on,” he said before disappearing up a trail that led to the park’s horseshoe pitch. In the distance I heard a flute—there’s always a white guy playing the flute, always.