
Forevermore

A Pat O'Malley Mystery

JIM MUSGRAVE

Other works by Jim Musgrave

The Digital Scribe: A Writer's Guide to Electronic Media

Lucifer's Wedding

Sins of Darkness

Russian Wolves

Iron Maiden an Alternate History

The Necromancers or Love Zombies of San Diego

Freak Story: 1967-1969

The President's Parasite and Other Stories

The Mayan Magician and Other Stories

Catalina Ghost Stories

Copyright © 2013 Jim Musgrave

All rights reserved.

ISBN: 1482063492

ISBN-13: 978-1482063493
DEDICATION

To my wife, Ellen. May our love remain a mysterious joy.
Forevermore

By

Jim Musgrave

© 2013 by English Majors Publishing

Published by English Majors Reviewers and Editors, LLC

An English Majors Publishers Book Copyright 2013

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner, except for a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.

This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

English Majors Publishers is a publishing house based in San Diego, California. Website: emrepublishing.com

For more information, please contact:

English Majors Reviewers and Editors, LLC

publisher@emrepublishing.com

Cover and book design by Graphicz X Designs
CONTENTS

Acknowledgements

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Epilogue

About the Author

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This is the first mystery in a series starring Pat O'Malley, a detective who is born out of the need to prove himself as a sleuth worthy of Edgar Allan Poe's C. Auguste Dupin. I want to thank the Edgar Allan Poe Society for their excellent resource materials and the editing of my wife, Ellen, who has been a mystery lover forever (and more). Finally, I want to acknowledge the works of all those mystery writers who have come before me. I hope I have contributed to the craft with an interesting look at history from a fictional perspective.
Prologue: The Murder

October 3, 1849, Baltimore

E

dgar fingered the outline of the Uberti pocket revolver. It was resting in a leather holster strapped diagonally across his chest beneath the black vest and under the black waist coat. As the hunted, he was well aware of the extra thunder he required in order to even the odds against the hunter. Where could his antagonist be? Was he perhaps the tall gentleman sitting in the window seat across the aisle from him? Edgar thought he saw the man glance in his direction several times after they both got on in New York.

It was so much easier writing down the plots of his mysteries. The writer is his own master, and the machinations of both hero and villain are clearly delineated in his mind from the outset. The reality of sleuthing in real time was quite different, however. He was at once aware of the immediate and infinite possibilities surrounding him. It was as if he were tasked with the job of describing every detail in this club car. There were two rows of seats on each side of the aisle, but not all seats were taken. He would need to walk slowly down the aisle to look at each suspect, evaluating his demeanor for telltale signs of nervousness or some tick in his mannerism that might give him away. This person could even be female, which would put into play even more possibilities for hidden weapons.

Instead, Edgar stared out of the window at the passing scenery, keeping his fingers folded over the gun, willing the courage into his being, as if the passage of time in the moment could inoculate him against the evil forces outside his mind. The green farm land rolled past like an emerald ocean. The speed of the powerful steam locomotive made Nature its plaything.

Edgar knew he had the upper-hand because they did not know he was on to them. Yes, the fictitious Detective C. Auguste Dupin would have had the advantage of assembling his evidence at a much slower pace. He would have sipped at his cordial while lounging inside his boudoir, fitting the evidence together as one fits together a picture puzzle. The pieces of his urgent puzzle, however, were assembling themselves all around him, and he was not in charge of their arrangement. Instead, it was his job to be the subservient mouse, the obsequious deer, or the meek rabbit. His sole advantage was the element of surprise and the hard lump of insurance under his jacket.

The conductor made his way down the aisle, his pocket watch bobbing up and down on its chain over his portly frame, his black uniform cleanly pressed with brass buttons gleaming under the lights as he shouted, "Bal-ti-more station! All those disembarking, please assemble at the double-doors! Last call for Bal-ti-more!"

Edgar slowly rose from his seat, keeping Dr. Carter's expensive Malacca cane in his right hand, watching the other passengers carefully to ascertain their demeanor towards him. He had accidentally taken the Richmond, Virginia physician's cane instead of his own. Edgar's right upper molar was bothering him again. It throbbed like a hellish demon, but his fear of the dentist had kept him in this insufferable state for three weeks now. He waited until all the others had formed a queue at the doors before he stepped out into the aisle. A woman in an ostrich feathered hat, a man in a bowler, and three youths in knee pants chasing each other around their mother. He moved behind them all as the doors whooshed open and their little crowd stepped down the steps onto the station platform.

The others scattered like chickens in the barnyard, and Edgar just stood there, looking up and down the train depot, watching for approaching danger. The devil winds were licking up eddies of abandoned rubbish, whirling it in haphazard, circular gusts. He could smell the engine exhaust, as it began its combustion process. The loud steam whistle blared out over the wooden platform, and the wheels of the train began to circle, slowly at first, and then with more speed, as the gigantic metal beast made its way out of the station.

Everything he observed took on ominous features as he walked out onto the paved street that led down to the wharf toward the pier where the ships were docked. They would soon be after him, and his entire body was on alert. He again fingered the pistol, and his other hand went up to his cheek to press on the throbbing toothache. He tried to walk as casually as possible down Light Street on the inner harbor. He didn't know where he was headed; he simply wanted to show himself to the ones he knew were after him. The passing pedestrians nodded to him as he walked, and he nodded back.

He was struck from behind. The tall man in a gray top hat and matching frock coat had raised his arm with a quick motion and then brought the leather sack filled with musket balls down upon Edgar's head. The other man, a short, stocky gent in a brown bowler, caught the falling victim and immediately wrapped Edgar's left arm around his own shoulder. The gray man took Edgar's right arm and wrapped it around his shoulder, and they both began to drag the body down the street toward the docks.

When they passed inquisitive faces, Gray said, "Poor Bill's in his cups, again, I'm afraid," and they continued to drag Edgar down the street. It was now dusk and the gas lights were being lit all along the walk. The horizon in the west was bleeding scarlet and blue as the sun sank behind the hills. The two men came up to a dilapidated shed on the waterfront, and Gray put a key inside the mortise lock, opened the door, and they carried Edgar inside.

* * *

When he came to consciousness, Edgar could smell the odor of alcohol all over his person. As a recently sworn member of the Sons of Temperance, this appearance of inebriety was most unseemly to him. He no longer wore his black frock coat and cravat. Instead, he wore tattered pantaloons that were too short and a long-sleeved white shirt and a black Bombazine alpaca coat that was soiled, ripped at the seams and reeking of robust spirits.

As his blurry vision improved, he looked around. He was downtown in Baltimore, and he was sitting on a bench in front of a tavern. He could hear the loud shouts of the patrons inside and the odor of burning cigars and pipes made his stomach lurch. He felt the top of his head, and it was adorned with a frazzled straw hat, something he would have never worn. Strangely, he still had the cane given to him by Dr. Carter. The blackguards had not taken that. He absent-mindedly twisted the gold hound's head at the top of the cane and it unscrewed and pulled forth to reveal an eight-inch blade. Dr. Carter's cane was also a weapon, it seemed, and something he had no use for now. His Italian pistol, of course, had been confiscated, and he had been dropped off in front of this tavern. He turned around to see the name on the building's façade: Gunner's Hall.

He could barely stand, and his mind kept playing tricks on him. Was it a fever that seemed to be spreading throughout his body? He grabbed the cane and lurched toward the entrance to the tavern. Perhaps he could get help from someone inside. However, when the swinging doors opened, he saw dozens of men standing about, and they each had the head of a cat! The pointed ears, the large pupils, the needle whiskers sprouting from a furry snout, and they all turned toward him in unison and snarled to reveal their sharp fangs! Was he insane?

Edgar turned around and staggered back out onto the boardwalk. The earth began to spin, out of control, and he sat backward down on the bench. He remembered the story he once wrote about a black cat that was buried inside the wall along with the murder victim. He felt as if he had been buried inside himself, as he could not make sense of his own thoughts as they tried to assemble in his brain. Instead, he lay down on the bench, and his throat constricted like it was inside a noose, and then he screamed, at the top of his lungs, "Reynolds! You bastard! Reynolds!" The darkness closed in upon him, and he passed into a state of delirium, never to fully revive again upon this earth.
1 I Knew Mister Poe

1865, Poe's Cottage, Bronx, New York.

I

found the cryptic message pasted inside the bed where she died. After several nights of tossing and turning in that same bed, my mind became filled with the nightmarish vision of my benefactor, "The Divine Edgar"; his large head came at me, that wide forehead, those penetrating dark eyes hidden within their cavernous sockets, his accusing lips writhing beneath that famous black mustache, and his visage shouted at me concerning the most foul, immodest and unwholesome behaviors I could have ever imagined a man could profess.

I awoke, thus, with a start, perspiring freely, my bedclothes quite drenched, afeared beyond mortal reason. Quite unintentionally, I found myself lifting the mattress upon that same bed where, upon a midnight dreary, his beloved Sis had perished from this earth, and I spied the long letter affixed to the headboard. I pried it off, as it was pasted with some sort of glue, carefully preserving its parchment, and brought it to my eyes under the gas light on my bed stand.

I must confess I knew him as he lived and breathed, in this same residence, in which I now reside. His aunt, Mrs. Maria Clemm, having sold this cottage in 1849, following her son-in-law's tragic death in Baltimore, wrote to the owners, the Valentines, allowing me to live here following the war. A union veteran, I served under General William Tecumseh Sherman in his campaigns at Shiloh, Vicksburg, Chattanooga, and Atlanta. I was heartily decorated as a war hero, receiving the highest award, the Congressional Medal of Honor, in a ceremony just before Mister Lincoln was assassinated in April of this year. My honor was for shielding, with my own body, the great general as he stood above the town of Atlanta and watched it burn. I spied a Confederate, in rags, as he took aim at the general from the woods near our regimental tent. Acting quickly, I dove in front of the speeding bullet and took it into my own body, inside my left shoulder blade, and thus I spared the life of my leader. I, like Edgar, served under a pseudonym during my military duties, as I had been paid handsomely by a wealthy business man in New York to serve in his stead. My warrior's name as Staff Sergeant was Stephan Pullman, but my real name is Patrick James O'Malley.

However, it was my love of Edgar and his writings that gained me the employment as manuscript messenger to his publisher in New York, as a mere lad of 18. I often came to this same cottage, during the year of 1846, until Virginia's death from consumption, at 24 years of age, on January 30, 1847.

It was the following poem I read on that day in 1865, my mind war-weary and my breast heaving with fright, as the storm clouds poured down their vicious torrents upon my cottage:

Ever with thee I wish to roam—

Dearest my life is thine.

Give me a cottage for my home

And a rich old cypress vine,

Removed from the world with its sin and care

And the tattling of many tongues.

Love alone shall guide us when we are there —

Love shall heal my weakened lungs;

And Oh, the tranquil hours we'll spend,

Never wishing that others may see!

Perfect ease we'll enjoy, without thinking to lend

Ourselves to the world and its glee —

Ever peaceful and blissful we'll be.

However, it was the small cypher at the end of this poem that drew my attention. It said, "I shall protect you, Sis, and I shall avenge the poor girl from the tobacco shop, bringing home money so we can live in our rural cottage, away from the trials and tribulations of this wretched age! Signed, Your beloved Eddy."

As an avid reader of Edgar's famous poems and stories, I was also an avid follower of his untimely demise, at the age of 40, allegedly from alcoholic delirium tremens, or what was known then as " _mania-à-potu._ " The story had it that after receiving news by letter from Maria Clemm that his childhood sweetheart, Sarah Elmira Shelton, had accepted his proposal of marriage, Edgar had planned to travel to New York to retrieve Mrs. Clemm, but he had, instead, begun drinking and ended up in Baltimore. He continued his spree of spirit consumption and on October 3, 1849, an election day, he was discovered in a comatose condition at the polling place for Baltimore's Fourth Ward. He supposedly died of delirium tremens at the Washington College Hospital on 7 October.

This case was supposed to be closed, but now, with my new bit of evidence, I was going to attempt to bring truth to light. Edgar would have wanted me to do this, and I believe this was why I was being tormented inside Poe Cottage. Like Edgar, I am also an Irishman, and we Irish have been often scourged with the disease of alcoholism, and it was this malady that brought asunder his brother, Henry, and my own brother, Timothy. I have abstained from John Barleycorn my whole life because of my brother's death, and when I read that Mister Poe had joined the Sons of Temperance in Richmond, on August 27, I became curious about whether or not he was indeed under the influence of alcohol in Baltimore. We Irish have been saddled with the ugly image of inebriety from our first appearance on the shores of this great land in the 1820s, and I wanted to prove that Edgar had not succumbed to drink, as they had reported in the press, as I knew him to be a most fine and kindly gentlemen during his employ, and it was he that encouraged me to write. I, like his famous detective, C. Auguste Dupin, will not give up until I arrive at the truth of the matter in the mysterious death of Edgar Allan Poe!

The note I found under Poe's bed led me to my first inquiry into this case. Who was this "poor girl from the tobacco shop" to which Edgar referred? Why did she need to be avenged? But first, I wanted to prove that Edgar Allan Poe was not drunk when he was in Baltimore, and for that I needed to talk to the only man who saw the writer during his last days on this earth, one Doctor, and a fellow Irishman, John J. Moran.

* * *

I took the train down to Baltimore, and it was filled with the usual collection of uniformed stiffs awaiting word on payment from the government. They were talking of riot and were quite inebriated, complaining of "damned President Johnson" and "we better get our just desserts." The civilians on the train would listen sympathetically, but I supposed they were as irritated at their drunkenness as I was.

I enquired at the Church Home and Infirmary in Baltimore, which was known in 1849 as Washington University Hospital, as to the whereabouts of Dr. Moran. A kindly Episcopalian woman by the name of Mrs. Drew told me I could find him at the Barnum House, 154 Baltimore Street. I recalled that earlier in the year this hotel was made famous up north for the Rebel raids which took place. In February of 1865, a band of Confederates known as McNeill's Rangers made a daring raid on Cumberland and entered the city undetected and captured General Benjamin Kelley who was asleep in his bed in the hotel. Union General George Crook was also captured at the nearby Revere House.

The hotel was four stories tall, and when I asked at the desk as to which room Dr. Moran might be staying, the attendant seemed bothered by my Yankee attire and voice. I had to repeat to him twice the name, and then he finally began to nod and told me I could find him in Room 218. "Dr. Moran stays inside, mostly," the young man stated, "except when he's seein' the haints."

"Haints?" I asked. "What is this word?"

"The doctor likes his toddy," the clerk said, pantomiming with his hand the action of imbibing from a glass of liquor. "When he drinks he says he can see ghosts. When he sees them, he follows them outside into the streets."

I was expecting the worst when I knocked on the doctor's door, but when he answered, the gentleman was not in his cups, but he did seem rather nervous in his demeanor. He was a tall, red-haired man, with spectacles and a wide forehead. He wore a business coat and necktie, and he seemed to me to be a person who would not chase after hauntings of any kind.

Immediately, I told him of my quandary, and that I needed to know if, when he examined Poe in 1849, whether the author was in a drunken state. Sadly, I was not given a direct answer, as the good doctor seemed to have been shaken to the core by my reference to his past. Indeed, I was given a brief recitation of the hard times following the panic of 1837, and how he was discharged from his duties at the hospital in 1851.

"The Fells Point Savings Institution owned our college's hospital," he told me, frowning. "The doctors who worked there were experimenting on the bodies sold to them from the nearby mortuary and cemetery in order to make a profit from the bodies for their training and research. Yes, grave-robbers and even kidnappers were known to bring snatched relatives to these nefarious scoundrels who called themselves interns of medicine. As a result, a mob tried to burn the place down in '53, by God!" Moran yelled, the veins in his neck pulsing with vigor.

"Please, Dr. Moran," I said, "Could you just tell me what occurred when you admitted Edgar Allan Poe into your residence?" I opened my jotter and took up my pen to make notes.

"I had him placed in a small room in the turret part of the building where patients were put who had been drinking freely. The room can be recognized in the cut by the star. He was clad in a shabby suit, and being unconscious, I had him put in the place indicated, not knowing at that moment the cause of his distress. I now know that he was perfectly sober when he returned to the city."

Dr. Moran motioned for me to be seated on his rather moth-eaten divan, and I did so. He then continued his report.

"My witnesses are Judge N. Poe, of Baltimore, a second cousin of the poet, and the conductor of the train, Captain George W. Rollins, well-known in Baltimore. The following testimony was given to me by the conductor a few days after the poet's death:

Meeting him on the street he said, 'I saw in the papers the death of the gentleman I had on my train the other day.'

I asked, 'Do you know who he was?'

He said he did not at that time, but he had learned since that it was Edgar Poe. He remarked that he was the finest specimen in appearance of a gentleman that he had lately seen. 'I was attracted to him from his appearance.'

I said, 'Captain, how was he dressed?'

He replied, 'In black clothes; his coat was buttoned up close to his throat. There were two men well-dressed that came aboard of the train from the other side of the river, having come from Philadelphia or New York. They took a seat back of Poe. From their appearance I knew they were sharks or men to be feared, and when I got out of the train at Baltimore I saw them following Poe down towards the dock.'

I asked the conductor if Poe was in liquor.

'Why,' said he, 'I would as soon have suspected my own father.'

I then related to him the facts regarding Poe and where he was found the next morning, and the conductor expressed his thorough belief that those two men went through him. A similar statement was given by this conductor to Judge Nielson Poe sometime during the same month, of the year 1849, and was repeated to me by Judge Poe last April two years ago while sitting in the court-room, after the court had been dismissed. We spent more than an hour discussing the poet's life and death."

"That sounds like valid information," I told him.

"And just here let me give you the words of Mrs. Shelton, who yet lives, regarding the style of clothing he had on when he left her in Richmond on the 4th of October. I asked Mrs. Shelton how he was dressed. She replied, 'In a full suit of black cloth,' remarking that he always wore black clothing, and was very neat in dress and person.

'Had he a watch or jewelry on his person?' She could not say, as he always wore his coat well buttoned up to his throat, covering much of his person.

I said, 'He told me his contemplated visit to New York was on business and that he expected to return in a few days.' I related to her the facts of his case, where found, how dressed when brought to the house, and she instantly exclaimed, with tears in her eyes, that he was robbed, as I have always believed, and drugged to accomplish it.

When brought to the hospital, as I have said, he was unconscious. I had him disrobed and made comfortable in bed. I placed an experienced nurse at the door of his room to preserve quiet, to watch over him and to notify me when he showed signs of waking. He was, at that time, in a heavy sleep or stupor.

I left him and on entering my office below, I discovered the hack still standing before the entrance door of the hospital, as you will see in the cut. I asked the driver, 'What are you waiting for?'

He said, 'My hire.'

I asked, 'Who sent you here?'

He replied, 'You have the ticket,' meaning the card he had brought with him.

I asked, 'Where did you find this man?'

'On Light Street wharf, sir.'

I said, 'Dead drunk, I suppose?'

He replied, 'No, sir; he was a sick man, a very sick man, sir.'

'Why do you think he was not drunk?' I asked.

'He did not smell of whiskey,' said the driver, 'he is too white in the face. I picked him up in my arms like a baby, sir, and put him in the hack.'

"It would seem he was ill and not with drink," I pointed out.

"Without further delay I paid the man his fee. Little did I then think that after sixteen years I should be called upon to give a full account of Poe's death and to defend the man whom I at that hour believed to be drunk; and that man, the great American genius, whose name is now a household word."

"I am much indebted to you for doing so, Dr. Moran. I wish that I could give you money, but, alas, I am but a lowly veteran," I said. He seemed undeterred, and he continued with renewed vehemence.

"In a few minutes Poe threw the cover from his breast, and looking up asked the nurse, 'Where am I?' The nurse made no reply but rang for me. I attended the call immediately, and placing my chair by the side of the patient's bed, took his left hand in my own and with my right hand pushed back the raven locks of hair that covered his forehead. I asked him how he felt. He said, 'Miserable.'

'Do you suffer much pain?'

'No.'

'Do you feel sick at the stomach?'

'Yes, slightly.'

'Does your head ache, have you pain there?' putting my hand upon his forehead.

'Yes.'

'Mister Poe, how long have you been sick?'

'Can't say.'

'Where have you been stopping?'

'In a hotel on Pratt Street, opposite the depot.'

'Have you a trunk or valise or anything there you would like to have with you?' supposing he had other clothing than that which he brought on his person to the hospital.

He said, 'I have a trunk with my papers and some manuscripts.' Note this; there _was no clothing in the trunk_. A new suit of wedding clothes was to have been placed in it for the _groom_. His visit was a business one and was to be a short one. I offered to send for his trunk. He thanked me and said, 'Do so at once;' remarking, 'Doctor, you are very kind.'

"I sent the porter of the house with an order for his trunk, which was brought in less than an hour.

The sick man said, 'Where am I?'

'You are in the hands of your friends,' I replied, 'and as soon as you are better, I will have you moved to another part of the house, where you can receive them.' He was looking the room over with his large dark eyes, and I feared he would think he was unkindly dealt with, by being put in this prison-like room, with its wired inside windows, and iron grating outside."

"Yes, it sounds much like a prison confine," I admitted.

"I now felt it necessary that I should determine the nature of his disease and make out a correct diagnosis, so as to treat him properly. I did not then know but he might have been drinking, and so to determine the matter, I said, 'Mister Poe, you are extremely weak, pulse very low; I will give you a glass of toddy.'

He opened wide his eyes, and fixed them so steadily upon me, and with such anguish in them that I had to look from him to the wall beyond the bed. He then said, 'Sir, if I thought its potency would transport me to the Elysian bowers of the undiscovered spirit world, I would not take it.'

'I will then administer an opiate, to give you sleep and rest,' I said.

Then he rejoined, 'Twin sister, spectre to the doomed and crazed mortals of earth and perdition.'

"I was entirely shorn of my strength. Here was a patient supposed to have been drunk, very drunk, and yet refuses to take liquor. The ordinary response is, 'Yes, Doctor, give me a little to strengthen my nerves.' I found there was no tremor of his person, no unsteadiness of his nerves, no fidgeting with his hands, and not the slightest odor of liquor upon his breath or person. I saw that my first impression had been a mistaken one. He was in a sinking condition, yet perfectly conscious. I had his body sponged with warm water, to which spirits were added, sinapisms applied to his stomach and feet, cold applications to his head, and then administered a stimulating cordial. I left him to sleep and rest. He slept about one hour. When he awoke, I was again summoned to his bedside. I found his breathing short and oppressed, and that he was much feebler. I saw that his life was in great danger. He asked several questions as to where he was, and how he came there. Remarking, in answer to my question as to where he went after he returned from the _Susquehanna_ , he said that he had started for the boat. 'I remember no more,' said he, 'but a vague and horrible dread that I would be killed, that I would be thrown in the dock.'

I said, 'Mister Poe, you are in a critical condition, and the least excitement of your mind will endanger your life; you must compose yourself and remain quiet.'

"Did he say anything more?" I asked, reflecting upon my notes thus far.

"Only when he was crazed and delirious. He began to yell the name of Reynolds, and he shouted this name in a fevered frenzy for most of the night before he succumbed," Moran said, taking his spectacles from the bridge of his nose and wiping them with his handkerchief.

"Thank you, kind sir," I told him, getting up to leave. "You have assisted me greatly in my exploration." I left the good doctor to his day.

I was now certain that Poe had not been drunk on the day of his transport to the hospital. Why had he been accosted on the train? What was his reason for being in Baltimore in the first place? I thought about this for quite some time down in the hotel's tavern. I surmised that I needed to see what Poe meant when he said he would "avenge the poor girl from the tobacco shop." Perhaps this would give me the clue as to his purpose for taking the side-trip to Baltimore, which led to his death. I knew that the great author had written a version of the death of Mary Cecilia Rogers, the poor tobacco shop girl, which caused such a great media stir in 1841. Even though he called his version, "The Mystery of Marie Roget," and it was set in Paris and not New York, I believed that this unsolved murder could possibly connect with Poe's own demise, and so I wanted to visit a few people in New York to see if I could determine the real reason why Poe was sober in Baltimore in 1849.

As for Dr. Moran's report that Poe shouted "Reynolds" repeatedly in his delirium, this man was most likely Jeremiah Reynolds, an explorer who, in 1829, sailed to discover the Antarctic. Reynolds wrote about seeing a "Mocha Dick," a great white whale that destroyed a ship in the South Pacific. This, of course, later became Herman Melville's model for his "Moby Dick." Poe, also, used Reynolds' descriptive journals in his only novel, _Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket_. Poe was angry that Reynolds had not been chosen by the government to head the United States' Antarctic expedition because of Reynolds' theory that the Earth was hollow. "It is a great pity," Poe wrote, "that the control of this important enterprise was not given to its originator, Reynolds. He is, in every respect, as thoroughly qualified as Commander Wilkes is not. A more disgraceful—a more unprincipled—a more outrageous system of chicanery, never was put in operation, before the open eyes of an intelligent community, than that by means of which Mister Wilkes was made to occupy the position, and usurp the undeniable rights of Mister Reynolds." In his state of delirium, Poe was probably thinking back to Reynolds and his injustice and to Poe's own failure as a novelist.
2 The Suspects

W

hen I returned to New York, I went back to Poe's Cottage to go over what I had uncovered thus far. Dr. Moran was a strange bird, but he also had some motive for doing-in the great writer. With the passing of such a great personage at his hospital, he would be forever seen as the last man to have ever talked to Poe. He told me himself that his days at the hospital were over, and he spoke with some anger toward the administrators who had taken over the properties. He was cast into obscurity, and the only notoriety he had was his factual account of the "last days of the great author, Edgar Allan Poe." He would perhaps earn much acclaim and money on the lecture tours. He also had the means to kill Edgar. The variety of pharmaceuticals and poisons was at his disposal, and he also knew what the post-mortem examiner would be looking for. Dr. Moran is a good suspect, and I will keep him on my list.

Also, there were two literary gentlemen I wanted to interview. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, the famous Boston poet, was a known rival of Poe's, and he was reported to have had some violent confrontations with the author, especially when Poe had been drinking. I knew that Longfellow's work was much more popular than Edgar's, and this fact alone could make their relationship a heated one. In 1845, Poe had accused Longfellow of plagiarism, and this enraged the Harvard college professor even though he never responded publically to Poe's accusations. However, I also knew that Longfellow was a religious man, and he detested the macabre stories Poe created. He was once heard to say, "That man should go back to Hell from whence he came." __

However, I first wanted to visit a poet, friend and fellow writer of Poe's, Mister William Ross Wallace. He was the gentleman who recently had published the very popular poem, "What Rules the World?" In fact, he quoted his famous line from that poem when I asked him to do so. We were sitting inside a tavern on Pearl Street called Fraunces. Mister Wallace informed me that it was the regular meeting place of the Sons of Liberty before the American Revolution.

"Aha, but what rules the world, Mister Wallace?" I asked, smiling.

He smiled back and then spoke the famous lines from his poem, "The hand that rocks the cradle is the hand that rules the world," and we both laughed, tipping our pints. I was still on my first ginger, but Mister Wallace was well into his third spirited ale.

I then told the gentleman about my concerns. I informed him that I was aware he knew Edgar Poe when they both lived in New York, and I also told him that I was staying at Poe's old cottage out on Fordham Road in the Bronx. Finally, I read to him the note I had discovered inside the bed of the deceased wife of Poe. I asked him if he knew anything about why Poe would want to avenge the death of Mary Cecilia Rogers and did he know who wrote the poem I had just read to him?

Mister Wallace was a red-faced man with dark hair and blue eyes, and he wore the dark suit, much as Poe used to wear, to affect his mind-set of proper melancholy and artfulness. He was serious when he spoke to me. "That was Eddy's own wife, Virginia. She wrote that one. I know because he would read it to me, from time to time, whenever we were in our cups downtown. As for the avenging part, I suppose it could be that Eddy might have been sore about what Mister Anderson might have done to that little girl who worked for him."

Mister Wallace went on at length to explain the unsolved murder of Mary Rogers, the beautiful little tobacco store clerk. He seemed to know every detail of the case, and he explained these interesting facts to me that afternoon inside Fraunces.

"Who murdered Mary Rogers? Perhaps one way to answer that question is to ask who was Mary Rogers? Born in 1820 she grew up with a widowed mother. A brother who was in the merchant marine rarely came home, but when he did he threw the household into turmoil with his excessive drinking and over protectiveness of his sister. As Mary grew to be a beautiful and vivacious young woman, she got a job in a tobacco shop owned by John Anderson. The 'beautiful Seegar girl' became a major attraction in downtown Manhattan, with many believing that Anderson's success was connected to the magnetic powers of the young woman. A minor crisis occurred in 1838, which might be revealing. Mary mysteriously disappeared for a fortnight. Anderson's business immediately declined. The penny press increased coverage and circulation. The police were severely criticized. A suicide note, purported to be by Mary, surfaced to fan the sensation. Then, as strangely as she had disappeared, she reappeared much angered over the notoriety given to such a 'humble little cigar girl.' Mary continued to work for Anderson, and from her earnings she was able to buy an Inn for her mother."

I pushed my chair closer to the table and said, "There're those darned mothers again."

"Right!" he said, smiling. "Alfred Crommelin was a resident of the small lodging house owned by the Rogers family, and he immediately fell in love with Mary. Her mother, Phoebe, totally approved of the young lawyer as a means of socially upward mobility. Crommelin, however, was rejected by Mary and in a gentlemanly way he retreated into the background eventually even changing his lodgings to a short distance away. However, he continued to carry a torch and settled for a friendship with Phoebe and Mary. He became a steady source of help and advice for both. Actually, it will be Crommelin later on who will be called upon to identify the badly decomposed body, a horrendous experience even for the doctors and coroner who viewed her."

"Good God! I would think so!" I said. Wallace waved at a passing bar mistress to bring us another round of ale--mine ginger and his demonic.

"But it was Daniel Payne, a cork cutter by trade and alcoholic by weakness, who won Mary's heart. Phoebe disliked Payne enormously, as did Crommelin, of course. In June, 1841, Mary announced her engagement to Payne. Crommelin became despondent and Phoebe enraged. Arguments ensued between mother and daughter for a month. By the middle of July Mary relented, promising Phoebe that she would not marry."

"Mothers can be persnickety," I opined.

"Shortly after she promised not to marry Payne, Mary showed up at Crommelin's apartment. He was not at home and she left a note hinting strongly at reconciliation. Crommelin did not respond. A series of letters from Mary arrived, each one more frantic than the previous one. Finally, she asked--nay, pleaded--for a loan for an 'emergency.' When Crommelin failed to respond again, Mary turned to Anderson and got the money. Shortly after, on Friday July 23rd, Mary disappeared."

"I would assume this emergency was of the pregnant variety?" I asked, and Wallace just nodded and continued with his story.

"Payne, concerned over the fact that Mary did not keep an appointment on the weekend, spent much of Saturday and Sunday with his brother looking for her to no avail. Phoebe was uncommonly unconcerned. Perhaps she remembered Mary's strange disappearance four years earlier. Or maybe she knew something else. The only reported sighting of Mary was on a ferry boat to Hoboken, New Jersey. Someone claimed they saw her near the farm of Mrs. Loss. Frederika Loss owned a farm and tavern in the Hoboken and Weehawken area of New Jersey. Some reports by witnesses confirmed that Mary Rogers was seen near the Loss place sometime during the weekend. It was widely known that Mrs. Loss and her three sons were disciples of Madam Restell. Dubbed 'Madam Killer' by many, Restell had built a fortune by opening a home for unwed mothers on Greenwich Street in Manhattan. Her philosophy was simple: the only plausible birth control system was abortion. While public sentiment might have been revolted by the practice, the law and large numbers of clients sustained it. Her Greenwich Street mansion catered to the wealthy and influential who further protected her activities. Poorer clients were franchised out to subordinates like Mrs. Loss. Upon questioning Loss denied any knowledge of Mary Rogers, but she did admit hearing screams one night coming from a thicket nearby her farm. Which night, however, was not clear to her. An investigation of the thicket revealed several items of bloody and rain soaked clothing that resembled those worn by Mary."

"What a ghastly scene!" I said. The bar mistress came with our drinks and sat them down on the table. Wallace lit a cigar and blew two smoke rings before he continued.

"The new stories of cries from the thicket were given indirect verification with numerous other rumors of youth gangs and thugs seen on the ferries from Manhattan to Hoboken. By the 1830s and 1840s the street gangs of New York City were well developed in the Five Points area, the commonly accepted and feared low-life criminal district. They hung out in grocery stores, tobacco shops, taverns and dance halls. The earliest gang seems to have been the Forty Thieves. Others, particularly Irish based ones, quickly followed. They were the Kerryonians, the Bowery Boys, Chichesters, Roach Guards, Dead Rabbits, Shirt Tails and the Plug Uglies. The last one became the most notorious, especially along the river front."

"As such scoundrels, they give our Irish citizens a bad name," I said.

"Shortly after the revelations of Mrs. Loss, Mary's body was found. Mary's body seemed to be badly beaten and positive identification at first was difficult due to the time in the water and the hot humid conditions that had caused considerable putrescence. There was a strip of cloth around her neck tied in a slip knot, more commonly done by sailors and young roughs around town, rather than a 'lady's knot.' It was not clear if it had killed her or was a make-shift means of conveying her. Rigor mortis was still pronounced when she was found. The face was discolored and bloated; there was an ugly bruise near her eye and a deep scratch on the left cheek that ran down to the shoulder. The body had been allowed to lay exposed after it was taken from the water. In a short time the face darkened making identification impossible except with reference to her tattered clothing. Crommelin made the identification and then broke down. The coroner, making only the most casual examination, declared the body to have peculiar wounds around the vagina area."

"As if she had been abused there?" I asked. He nodded affirmatively.

"And in a tragic postscript others broke down as well. First, was Mary's rejected betrothed, Daniel Payne. On October 7th, two and one half months after Mary's death, Payne went to Hoboken to die. He got drunk and haunted all the sites supposedly visited by Mary. Then he took a lethal dose of laudanum poison that allowed him to linger long in agony. He went to the thicket, the place where Mrs. Loss had heard screams, and parts of his clothing were found, and he died. He left a suicide note that strongly suggested his complicity in the crime. But most discounted it as a lover's despondency because Payne had an air tight alibi; he had been seen all over town with his brother madly searching for Mary over the weekend she disappeared. His guilt and death were attributed to that of a lover's agony that ended in his losing his grip on reality and then on his life."

"So, then what occurred?" I asked, and my interest began peaking because we were getting close to the connection with Poe and Anderson.

"Over a year after Payne's death one of her sons accidently shot Frederika Loss. She lingered for two weeks in delirium raving that a ghost was at her bedside. She claimed that this shadowy figure had been sent to haunt her last hours. The sons worried over her delusions and rantings, fearful that she might let out some 'great secret.' All of the penny presses, hungry for sensational news comparable to the Rogers's murder and Payne's suicide, made much of the ghostly visitors and final hours of Loss. The _Tribune_ came out with a story highlighting the woman's abortion activities. Finally, Mrs. Loss came to an end but the mystery did not."

"And so, how does Poe fit into this?" I now asked, ready for the grand finale.

"I was at a meeting with Eddy and Mister Anderson, soon after the rich tobacconist had been arrested by the police and detained for questioning. We were sitting in this same tavern when Anderson requested that Poe write what he called a _pastiche_ on the Mary Rogers affair, and that he would pay him handsomely if he did so. Poe, who was quite destitute at the time, heartily agreed, and he even began to describe his plot that would take place in Paris, not in New York, and that he would make certain the character of the perfumery shop owner, where the girl Marie Roget worked, would be shown to be completely off the list of suspects."

"So, Poe was to be paid for writing a distraction, is this what you're telling me?"

"It would seem so. I happened to be a bit three sheets to the wind, if you get my drift, and I remarked that Mister Anderson should not belie the publicity of the case. I pointed out that he had made quite a bit off the pretty young thing selling his goods, and why wouldn't he want her pretty body connected to his business, even if it was in death?"

"Oh, that must have caused a stir!" I said.

"Yes, Eddy, my writer friend old Edgar Poe, jumped from his seat and took up a carving knife, making as if to strike out at me. When Eddy was in his cups, he was not a steady fellow," said Wallace. "But, he was of such pale demeanor and sickly stature that he simply snatched up some dinner rolls to take back to his cottage and his dying wife, Virginia, and proclaimed, 'I will expect to hear from you, Mister Anderson, when I've completed my story!' And that was the end of it."

"I see. And I can surmise from this that Poe wanted to revenge the death of Mary Rogers because he perhaps learned something about the case that we never knew," I said, raising my eyebrows.

"It would seem so," said Wallace, drinking another gulp.

"Yes, well, I want to thank you heartily for this important information, Mister Wallace. I am now going to talk to the only man who can shed some clear light of truth on this case, and if he can, then perhaps I will be able to get the proverbial 'two birds' with my one stone of information. Both the deaths of Rogers and of Poe are unsolved, and now I can see they are connected in a devious pattern that any detective would be happy to resolve. I am just a Yankee who is living at the behest of his public benefactors, so I suppose I am as good a candidate for sleuth as I am a candidate for the Medal of Honor they awarded me. Both jobs could get me shot, I should say," and I laughed, and I got up to leave. Mister Wallace stared up at me in wonder as I walked out of the tavern made for the Sons of Liberty and out into the Manhattan city life.

The interview with Wallace proved quite beneficial to my case. I wanted to interview two other men who were suspiciously linked to the murder of Mary Rogers. First of all, her fiancé, Alfred Crommelin, the attorney, certainly became angry when he discovered she was pregnant. If it were Poe who impregnated her, then Crommelin would certainly want to get even with his rival for Mary's affections. The second person I wanted to interview was the gang leader of the Plug Uglies. I knew him to be the most informed of the leaders, and if anybody knew anything about the criminal activity taking place in those days, Walter McKenzie would be the person who could help me.

* * *

Crommelin lived alone in a Manhattan brownstone at 128 Washington Street in the Financial District. He greeted me in his smoking jacket and slippers, and he offered me a drink. He was a tall man with willowy red hair with streaks of gray. "No thank you, Sir. I'm here to inquire about the death of Mary Rogers some time back," I said, sitting down on the plush, velvet-green divan in his parlor.

His mood changed immediately, and pallor overcame his face that would have been a fine addition to one of Edgar's stories, "The Mask of Read Death," perhaps? "Can you verify your whereabouts from October third until October seventh, 1849?"

Crommelin became defensive. His wrinkled face turned red, and his eyes riveted upon mine. "Are you from the police? I've been over this Mary Rogers case with dozens of police and members of the press over the years."

"No, I am not a policeman. I am a private detective concerned with the details of the death of a close friend of mine. If you could just answer my question, Sir, I would be most obliged," I said.

"As you may know, I am a barrister in this city, and I keep excellent records. Let me get my calendar from that year," he said, and he got up and walked over to a large secretary desk in the corner of the apartment. He brought back receipts from taverns and restaurants covering business meals during the five days in question. His signature was right there on each receipt proving he was in New York during the time Poe was in Baltimore.

"Thank you, Sir. You have been quite helpful. If I may stay in touch with you, however, may I do so? This case is proving to be quite a conundrum, so I may even require your assistance."

"Of course," he said, and he bade me farewell.

* * *

Walter McKenzie was drunk when I questioned him. His several assistants searched my person for weapons and led me into his lair in the back room of a dockside tavern in Hoboken. These thugs were keeping the wharf rats entertained by throwing them pieces of steak, laughing at the fighting rodents killing each other over the bloody meat.

McKenzie was a man in his early sixties. He was huge, weighing over 300 pounds, and he wore a silk frock coat, in the style of the Victorian era, with a red cape and a large gold watch chain sprouting from his red vest. He had a black patch over his right eye, and his beard showed scars, from previous fisticuffs, which ran like railroad tracks throughout the pattern of thick white facial hair.

"Oh, the slut, Mary Rogers? Anderson's wife contacted me twice about her. She wanted to know about how to get rid of the little problem Mary had, don't you know? Ain't it sweet? Female togetherness."

I decided it would not be to my advantage to question this man at length, even if what he was telling me were true. I was not crossing him off my list of informants, but I make it a policy to never interview witnesses or suspects who are inebriated before I begin my questioning. Although what he told me about Mrs. Anderson did sound interesting, I got up to leave.

"Thank you, Mister McKenzie, but I believe I'll come back when you've not been enjoying your afternoon as much," I said.

"Are you saying I'm drunk? Throw this jackass out on his ear," he told his henchmen.

However, after I extracted my trusty Colt service revolver from my boot, they did not dare lay a hand on me, and I walked out of the room unscathed. I vowed to question McKenzie for more information at a later date. I did not doubt that he was informed concerning what was going on in 1849, and I wanted him to be sober when I questioned him.

* * *

Mister John Anderson lived alone outside the city limits in Tarrytown, in a section called Sleepy Hollow, made famous by the Washington Irving story about the headless horseman. The land out there is lush with greenery, and I could breathe much better than in the factory smoke congestion of Manhattan Island. Many of the rich and famous had moved their lodgings out here when the banks of the Hudson become cluttered with people and businesses. Sleepy Hollow Park held the large mansion of the tobacco millionaire. It was three stories tall, and in the new Victorian architecture, it cast a wide shadow along the garden way as I rode my horse up to its steel-shuttered windows and doors. I had seen the same protective enclosures when I was visiting the Federal Prison at Elmira in upstate New York. This Mister Anderson was afraid of something, and I was going to find out what it was.

When I knocked on the metal door to his mansion, I had to wait a good fifteen minutes before two armed guards opened it. They wore the uniform of the Italian freedom fighter, Giuseppe Garibaldi, with the ostrich feathers in their helmets, the purple bloomers, and the field muskets in their hands. I suppressed a snicker as I watched them walk ahead of me down the long corridor leading to the drawing room where I met with Anderson. He had little furniture in this mansion. It was like being in an empty museum to some ungodly hero. The only art objects in the mansion besides the Garibaldi memorabilia were stuffed animals standing on tables. These were common animals like dogs, birds, fish and cats.

Mister Anderson was a short man, but his eyes were vibrant, his gray hair was cut short, and his mustache was in the distinguished style of the robber barons like the new Tammany Hall boss, and present Congressman, Fernando Wood. However, Mister Anderson's actions did not show a gentleman who was in his right frame of executive mindfulness. He skipped up to me, speaking freely to the walls around him, where were hung pictures of his dead son, Willie and this hero of his, Garibaldi. I was afraid to really question him, dreading that my detective abilities had finally met their match against this quite eccentric gentleman.

"Hello, Mister Anderson. My name is O'Malley. Patrick O'Malley. I am living out in Mister Poe's old cottage on Fordham Road at the behest of the Union Government and the Valentine family. I have come to discuss your knowledge of Edgar Poe and perhaps the affair of Mary Rogers and her murder most foul."

As Mister Anderson closed the steel door, he suddenly turned around, and a wild, abandoned look stood out from beneath those gray eyebrows. "What? Have you seen them? Mary visits me now, you know. She is quite the shrew. Never lets me be. In point of fact, I believe both Poe and she were out to get me from the start."

This was quite curious. "Out to get you? I don't understand, sir. What could they do to affect your life and safety?"

"It was Poe who killed her! That's the truth. He wanted money for his dying Lenore, his Annabelle Lee. He was a ghoul and an opium addict. His addled mind concocted the plot to sway the police away from his own activities. My Mary was young and available, don't you know? Longfellow and the others wanted her, but Poe, the blackguard, wanted her for himself. He wanted to replace his dying wife, Virginia, with this new one, this new phantasm for his wild and romantic imaginings!"

"But, dear sir. How can you say this? What solid proof might you have to accuse Mister Poe of such an egregious act?"

"Why, it's the best proof of all, don't you see? She tells me who killed her! How can I argue with her ghost? What more proof does a sane man require?" Anderson began to laugh, and dance around the room, skipping like a schoolboy on holiday.

I realized this old gentlemen was not in his right mind, so I bade him farewell. I would look into his mental health and perhaps I could find out more legitimate facts about his relationship with Poe and Mary Rogers.

* * *

My interview of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow was the briefest on record. When I told him who I was and why I was there, instead of opening the door to his luxury apartment at 15 Central Park West, he shouted down at me from his outsized window above the street when he found out I was asking about the murder of Mary Rogers. "Schedule an appointment with my agent, you Irish potato head! I don't talk to riffraff without an appointment!"

Later, inside my booth at the Sons of Liberty, I went over my suspect list. The lawyer, Crommelin, was the only person who had a definite alibi for his whereabouts during the period when Mister Poe was in Baltimore in 1849. However, I needed to ask more questions of the gang leader, McKenzie, and certainly Mister John Anderson. They both needed to be more mentally acute for me to get valid information from them. William Wallace had proved the most beneficial of all at giving me specific information concerning Mary Rogers' death. I would assume he also was not anywhere near Baltimore in October, but I still needed to verify that fact. As for the poet, Mister Longfellow, I obviously needed to make an appointment with his literary agent. I could see why Edgar never liked the fellow. Mister Poe was many things, including being an alcoholic and a man plagued by death and tragedy, but he was never unapproachable. He would speak to the street urchin as well as the bank president. He made no class distinctions. I believe my case, however, was filled with such class rivalries, and I wanted to prove it.
3 The Madame

A

fter the war, New York became crushed with new residents coming in from all over the United States and foreign shores, and with this great influx of new people came those who would take advantage of them. The largest illegal business was prostitution, and there were many varieties of bordellos across the city, catering to just about every carnal appetite of which the mind can conceive.

Before the war, I was raised in the commercial area of New York in a rear tenement about three blocks from where my family first landed from Ireland in 1834. We had a great famine, and my father, who was a farmer in Kilkenny, came to New York to establish a new life. His wife and our mother, Kathleen, died in the famine, and he brought his two boys to America. I was four years old and my brother Timothy was six. At first, we lived near Castle Garden or Castle Clinton that was later turned into the Emigrant Landing Depot.

My father, Robert, quickly learned a trade as a bartender in a saloon called Mickey's near Five Points, and we later moved there. When his boss, Sammy O'Rourke, died, years later, the old man left the saloon to my da in his will. My father was a conservative man, and he supported the mayor, Fernando Wood, in his proposal to make New York a "free city" if the South seceded from the Union. Wood's Republic of New York idea was popular with a lot of business men in the city, including John Anderson. If there were two separate nations in the North and South, that would leave New York, with its vast ports and low tariffs, as the trade capitol of the western hemisphere. Wood and my father believed this would keep the city from taxing its people.

I remember my father saying we should not fight for the inferior Negro race, and that if Lincoln emancipated the slaves, we would all lose our jobs to this race when they moved in on us because they would no longer be employed on the farms down south.

However, when the rebels fired on Fort Sumter, the war began, and New York quickly realized it needed to remain with the government to stay solvent. Lincoln quickly called for 75,000 men to fight for three months and end this "little" revolt. This was in 1861. My father knew we could prove our allegiance to this country by entering the fray, so he encouraged me and my brother to enlist. My brother had chronic pancreatitis and was declared unsuitable for combat. I did him one better by making money as an enlistee by taking the place of the wealthy young stock broker, Mister Stephen Pullman. My family received ten dollars per month from Mister Pullman, in addition to my wages as a Union soldier.

However, in 1863, many of the Irish in New York did not feel as patriotic as I had been. On July 23, 1863, the new Draft Act was enforced. Benjamin Wood, Fernando's brother, printed in his _Daily News_ that this Conscription law "draws lots for its victims from among the sons of industry, the workers, leaving the rich man to his luxurious repose."

The mob was made up of mostly Irishmen, including my brother, Tim, who feared that Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation would lead to his unemployment. Newly freed slaves would come north and compete for jobs in an already congested and overpopulated working place, so the mob destroyed the draft office. Many institutions, which supported Lincoln and the Republican Party, had to barricade their entrances to keep the mob out. Horace Greeley's house was stoned, as he wrote articles in favor of the proclamation. Tim led a group downtown to Fifth Avenue where they looted, burned and destroyed mansions. The feeling that this was a rich man's war fought by poor men was given more credibility because of the $300 that could be paid for exemption. Tim already knew about my taking Mister Pullman's place. Therefore, I remember Tim writing to me and telling me that his battle cry when sacking the mansions was "There goes a $300 man!" and "Down with the rich men!"

This fury had built-up over the first years of the war and it consumed the city quickly, as most of the city's defenses, including myself, were off in Pennsylvania fighting General Robert E. Lee's army of Northern Virginia. The small squads of police called in were no match for my brother and his band of brothers. Anarchy was all around; even Police Superintendent John Kennedy was beaten until he was unrecognizable. The mob beat every policeman they saw; they even burned the houses of people they thought were aiding the fleeing police.

Racism was also part of the mob's brutality. The Negros in the city were dragged out of carriages and beaten, hung, burned, or all three. A Negro orphanage was burned killing over 200 children inside. After nearly four days, my brother wrote, "Lincoln sent in union troops fresh from the fields of Gettysburg to put down the rioters." It was reported that over a thousand people died in the riots.

My brother took to serious drink following the draft riots. My father wrote to me and told me, "Patrick, I can't get your brother off of that infernal bar stool. He's there from mornin' 'til closing time." He died before I even got back home, in a fight he had with Paul Kelley, the leader of the Five Points Gang, over a young prostitute named Katie. I thought it ironic that my brother had died defending the honor of a hooker named Kathleen, our departed mother's name.

My father still lives in New York, and he now owns three taverns in the city. I visit him from time to time, and we talk about politics, sports and business, but we have never talked about women or about what makes a good relationship with a woman. When my mother died, a great emptiness overtook my father's nature, and he refused to talk to any woman. My brother and I grew-up in this environment, and I can say we did suffer from an all-male complex.

In the Army, I learned about women in a more primitive way. I also learned about women from the poets, especially Poe and Walt Whitman. My literary hero, Edgar, seemed to understand the suffering I had gone through by losing my mother, and it came out in the longing contained in his verses.

The prostitutes followed us to our encampments. They, too, it seemed, were doing their patriotic duty. I was never able to have sexual congress with a woman, but I was able to reach their hearts by reading them poems and paying for my time with them. I respected these hookers, who had been given this name because it meant "to entice," but it became even more popular when General Joe Hooker, who was under General Sherman's command, allowed prostitutes to follow us and live outside our camps. This is where I first partook of the "world's oldest profession" and learned about the darker side of women.

After the war, I had not lost my enjoyment of these women "hookers," and so I still frequent the bordellos in New York in order to entertain them with my poetry readings and my war stories. Of course, I never partake of their intimacies, as I had seen many men who contracted diseases and became unserviceable to the war effort. Instead, I will have my woman disrobe and sometimes even dance while I read her my poems or tell her a story. This gives me enough of a fantasy life to attend to my personal manly needs in private, at my residence.

I met my favorite such woman after the Battle of Shiloh, and her name is Rebecca Charming, although, as she informed me later, her Christian name was Jones, and she came from a wealthy family of Joneses near Albany. Her father, Edward, in fact, is a New York Congressman, and he put Rebecca through finishing school and even to college at Vassar, where she learned she could make more money entertaining the male students there than by gaining a degree on her own. When the war began, Becky began following the Army of the Potomac around, and soon she became the Madame procurer, in charge of recruitment and training of these patriotic lovelies. Indeed, she even had secret contracts with Generals, especially ones like Hooker, and she became quite wealthy by the end of the war.

Because Becky is so intelligent, I also use her to discuss my cases and to ply her for information about what might be happening in the city. She obtains quite a bounty of information from notable politicians, business men and gangsters, and thus I am able to often get evidence I can use to solve a case.

Becky Charming has her "offices" in a luxury apartment near the theater district on Union Square near Broadway. She is a more educated and distinguished rival of the famous brothel madams where I hail from, Red Light Lizzie and Jane the Grabber. These women procure their prostitutes by sending recruiters dressed in fine clothes out into the country where they promise the girls jobs in the city. When they arrive, however, they are drugged and forced into prostitution.

Becky, on the other hand, prides herself on never forcing any of her "ladies" to do anything, except to be kind to the gentlemen callers, as she prefers to term her solicitors. As she often told me, "I am binding a contract between two consenting adults, and both sides must come out with an advantageous result, or else I do not want to do business." To accomplish this goal, Becky hires girls from business schools in New York City, as these women understand the more intellectual needs of the clients, and they are provided with the care of a regular physician, a Dr. Hiram Epstein, who looks after Becky's girls and gives them the most modern cervix diaphragms necessary to do their business successfully.

"What have you been doing with yourself these days, O'Malley? I trust you're keeping your feet dry, like I told you. Those fungi work their way upon bachelors' feet like mushrooms on a forest floor. Change your socks regularly, and you won't become infested." Becky always begins her greetings with certain chastisements she has for me, which are leftover from our previous meetings. It is my personal habits she is most interested in, as she knows the grooming malfeasances of bachelors, as they are a large part of her clientele.

"Don't go on about my personal habits, now Becky. I have more important matters to discuss. I would like you to inquire about some gentlemen for me. They are suspect in a case I am working on." I continued to tell her about my theory concerning the murder of Edgar Allan Poe, and I finished by giving her the names of Longfellow, Anderson, Crommelin, Wallace, Moran and McKenzie. If there were any shenanigans going on with these fellows, Becky would find out for me.

"Good. Now that you've taken care of your business matters, what would you like to read to me today?" Becky asked, sitting down on a Parisian lounge chair and crossing her legs. This woman had chosen her surname well. She is, indeed, a most charming woman. Her hair is a radiant mass of blonde curls that bounce when she walks, and her shapely figure is molded deliciously beneath the baggy orange trousers and short, open-fronted pea green Zouave jacket she is wearing. Beneath the jacket is her bare bosom, a most robust sight to see. She knows I enjoy her wearing some kind of military garb during our encounters, and this was no exception. Her aquiline nose is fetching between her aquamarine eyes, and her intelligent gaze is full upon me whenever she speaks. This is not a timid woman. I have seen her break the arm of a sergeant-at-arms who beat one of her girls. She has taken many martial arts courses, and her techniques at breaking bones and emasculating men come from all corners of the globe.

However, when I read something from Whitman, her heart becomes melted butter, and she moans with a quiet, seductive purr that is quite enthralling to this Irishman. I pulled out my poem and began, "A woman waits for me. She contains all, nothing is lacking, yet all were lacking, if sex were lacking, or if the moisture of the right man were lacking."

"Oh, my! That's quite good," said Becky, closing her long lashes in meditation.

"Sex contains all," I continued, watching her begin to writhe on her plush divan, her legs sliding back and forth under her pantaloons, "bodies, souls, meanings, proofs, purities, delicacies, results, promulgations, songs, commands, health, pride, the maternal mystery, the seminal milk; all hopes, benefactions, bestowals, all the passions, loves, gods, follow'd persons of the earth, these are contain'd in sex, as parts of itself, and justifications of itself."

When I had completed reading the entire poem, Becky was quite beside herself. She was moaning and whispering, and her lips were pursing together like fleshy rosebuds. It was my turn to say, "Oh, my!" Instead, I said, "Glad you enjoyed it."

That's when Becky got up from her lounge and came toward me. She had a curious gleam in her eye, and it was the same look she once had when the war was declared over after Lee surrendered to Grant at Appomattox. She wanted to seduce me!

I got up and raised my hands in the air like a citizen being robbed in the Bowery. "Don't come any closer, Becky. You know me. I don't like intimacy with women."

Becky hesitantly walked over to me, and I knew she could put her acrobatic forcefulness to work, so I was on guard. She didn't try anything tricky; she simply stood about a foot away and frowned. "Patrick, I know you have it in you! You have the heart of a true romantic, and all you need to do is become accustomed to your own gentleness. It's easy. Close your eyes and think about all the soft things you've ever known. The silken texture of a butterfly's wing. The soft plumpness of a baby's cheek. Or, this," she said, and she raised her vest up over her breasts and stepped over to me and pushed up against my arm.

I could feel the raised brown nipples against my skin and the delicate ambrosia of the swollen globes as they rubbed against my arm. It was as if I were being burnt with a hot poker. I backed away from her and shook my arm to rid it of all physical memory of the experience.

I tried to explain it to her. "I liked the way it felt, at first, Becky, but I suddenly became horrified that you would burn my skin. I don't know what's wrong with me!" I said, and I began to feel tears well up in my eyes and nose.

"Patrick, you have told me all about your dear mother and how your brother died. It's understandable that you wouldn't trust a woman. You must learn to be intimate by taking it slowly. Perhaps I come on too fast. You know me. I get transformed when you read to me. It's quite thrilling, actually, and this is something you must know about a woman. A woman needs to touch. It's like in the poem, you silly goose. Sex contains all. It's my business, and it's my philosophy. You must know that by now."

Quickly, I wanted to change the subject. She was getting too close to my Achilles heel. "I'm trying to prove that Edgar Allan Poe was murdered. That's why I want you to find out about those men. I found a note attached to the bed where his dear wife, Virginia, died from consumption. It said he needed to avenge the murder of the cigar store girl. I also went down to Baltimore and interviewed the only man who saw the great poet when he passed on. Dr. John Moran believes Poe was never inebriated when admitted to his hospital. He checked him over physically, and there was no sign of intoxication by alcohol. However, he did get testimony from a conductor at the train station who swore he saw Mister Poe being followed by two rather dubious-looking gentlemen. I am trying to find out if the murder of Mary Rogers, the cigar store girl, is linked to Poe and if someone else wanted him dead because of it. There you have it. If you can find out something that links Poe with one of those suspects I gave you, it will be a great boon to me and my case. You know I'm just starting out in this business, Becky, and if I can solve this famous death of Edgar Allan Poe, I most certainly will get recognized by patrons who will want to hire me for future such cases."

Becky had a determined yet disappointed look on her pretty face. "All right, detective O'Malley. I'll do the best that I can. I'll ask my ladies what they know about those gents, and I'll get back to you in a few days. Listen. Have you been eating three meals a day? I don't like the paleness of your skin right now."

"I get by," I said, picking up my hat from the table near the door. "I'll return to see what you have. I'll bring another poem also. I want to thank you for your reaction to today's reading. I still have no problem with intimacy of the onanistic variety," I added, smiling.

That's when Rebecca Charming lifted her right leg, in a lightning-quick move, and thrust it into my stomach. I staggered backward out into the hallway, a bit out of breath, yet laughing as I did so.

I was hoping I could get some information from Becky about my suspects so that my intrigue could continue. Without a firm connection between the death of Poe and one of these characters, I wouldn't have much to go on. However, this is what is so much more rewarding than military life. You need not follow the orders of your superiors, and the survival you learned was that of the sleuth who must live by his wits and make his own schedules.

As for my intimacies with the fairer sex, I was not very optimistic about learning how to do that on a personal level. Certainly, Becky wanted to teach me, but my family history was such that I had built a fortress around my heart, and to an Irishman, defending one's idea of love becomes the loneliest sport of all. It's affairs of the heart, after all, that eventually make us all behave like fools, and I was no exception. Perhaps this is what made me understand my dear friend, Edgar Allan Poe, so well. He was also hurt by women who left him at crucial times in his life, and it led to pouring his heart out to the world in the form of lovelorn verse. Now I was trying to save his reputation because I wanted to feel that same love he felt for his beloved women. Perhaps I would learn something when it was all over. Only time and circumstance would tell.
4 Alcohol and the Black Cat

T

he next day, I wanted to go back and see if I could get some real information out of Plug Ugly gang leader Walter McKenzie in Hoboken, New Jersey. He was doing business all along the docks during the time Poe was working in New York. Today, he was limited to the docks in Jersey. I was hoping he could supply me with some specific clues about Poe and his relationship with the murdered tobacco shop girl.

The cobblestone streets in the poorer neighborhoods collected refuse and dead animals. People threw their garbage out of the windows and the dead rats, dogs and cats fell down into big cracks in the road where they would stink to high heaven. One of our tortures as children would be to force the victim's face down into one of these cracks until he or she began screaming for release.

I went through the same inspection process as I entered the dockside building where McKenzie had his center of business. "Watch it with your hands, ladies," I told them, "don't touch anything you don't want to buy," I added, as they felt all around my legs and up my back.

"He's clean," said a ham-fisted gangster wearing a dock worker's uniform of black gabardines and red suspenders. He also had a cargo hook hanging from his belt that probably served more as a weapon than as a loading utensil. The three of them pushed me into the back room and slammed the door.

Today, Walter McKenzie was not in his cups. Instead, he had two prostitutes, one on each knee, giving him little chucks under his three chins and whispering sweet nothings in his cauliflower ears. They wore Chinese gowns with gold dragons on the front, and their black stockings could be seen as their legs crossed each other.

He swiveled his big chair around toward me. "O'Malley, is it? Ya ain't no relation to Father O'Malley, the priest who comes down to the docks to tell us we're all goin' to Hades, are ya now?"

"No, I'm just trying to show the world that the Irish aren't all a bunch of sots and drunkards. I thought maybe you could answer a few questions for me now that you're not besotted. The case I'm working on has to do with events happening in New York City from 1846 to 1849."

"It depends. I ain't no stool pigeon. And I won't help the police," McKenzie said, pushing the girls off his knees and standing up. "Get back to work on your backs!" he laughed, and the women left the room giggling.

"I won't ask anything that would put your grand reputation in jeopardy," I said, "and I am not a flat foot. I'm a vet who's trying to make a living in private investigations."

"A man of the Union, are ya then?"

I nodded.

"That's a horse of a different color, now ain't it? Ask away, O'Malley, me boy-o. Ya risked your life so's the likes of me can stay in business, and I'll give ya my best memory, 'though there's been a lot of malt into me bowels and a few whacks on me skull during all these years," McKenzie laughed, pointing to his head.

"Did you ever work for a gentleman by the name of John Anderson? He owned a tobacco shop in New York during those years," I said.

"Anderson. Let me see now. That name's familiar. It was an Anderson come to me about that Rogers girl. Mary Rogers was her name. But it weren't a Mister Anderson. It were Missus Anderson who come to me about the woman trouble that Rogers was having. She was ready with the money, and I told her about the best: Madame Restell, the female doctor with the mansion on Fifth Avenue."

I tried a different approach on the old blackguard. "All right. I know about Mary Rogers and her troubles. What I want to know is if Mister Anderson was mentioned at any point in your conversation with his wife?"

McKenzie furrowed his brow. "Ya know, she did say that the girl was living with them when she got into trouble. I thought it were strange, but these rich bastards are always knockin' up the hired help, if ya know what I mean," he snickered into his big hand. "She also asked me if I could send somebody to follow this Mary Rogers around. Missus Anderson said she was worried that she'd get into more girl trouble. So's I sent Bernie Ryan to do it."

Most of this information, except for the hired goon, verified what the poet William Ross Wallace was telling me about Anderson and his relationship with the Rogers girl. Ergo, if Anderson got his tobacco shop girl pregnant, and his wife found out about it, then she would certainly want to have the problem taken care of post haste. Mary Rogers and her mother moved into their own place shortly after that. She was finally out of temptation's way.

However, if Anderson did impregnate the girl, it still didn't prove he wanted to kill Poe. Poe, in fact, according to Wallace, was hired to write the story that helped keep the police from suspecting the tobacconist millionaire of killing the girl. Anderson would not have wanted Poe harmed, if he were being helped by the famous writer. No, there must be another connection between Poe's death and the death of Mary Rogers, and I needed more information to find out what that connection was.

"Is there any more information you remember about Rogers and the Andersons? Also, did you ever hear about Edgar Allan Poe having anything to do with the Rogers death?" I asked McKenzie.

"No, all I knew were that Missus Anderson wanted the problem handled by the best. I never heard no Mister Poe mentioned at all, me boy-o," said McKenzie.

I got up from my chair and reached out to shake Walter McKenzie's hand. His grip was still strong at age sixty-two. "Thank you. I'll be in touch, if you don't mind, if I can think of anything else," I said, and I handed him one of my business cards. "If you remember anything, just send me a message," I said, and I left the room.

* * *

I wanted to talk to Becky again about what she had discovered concerning my suspect list. Luckily, she was in her apartment, and she let me inside right away.

"Sorry, m'dear, but I've just been with Walter McKenzie, and I need to deodorize myself now that I wear clean socks on my feet," I told her while I walked over to her ever-present decanter of rosewater and poured myself a glass. I turned around to face her, and she was wearing a French gendarme's suit of blue with a pointy cap and the gold medallion on the front. "Quite fetching, as usual," I told her, and I walked over and sat in my usual place on the end of the sofa.

She took out the notebook she keeps for any of the information she gathers on my cases. It was inside her purse on the mantel. "Here you are, Patrick. The big event is that your lawyer, Mister Crommellin, has left the city, and nobody knows where he went or why he left. Not even his personal aide, a Miss Crumworthy. Miss Crumworthy, it seems, has an interesting appetite for the female flesh. Wanda June told me about it from her pillow talk with the young lady."

"Now that's certainly something I can use, Becky! Thanks for your assistance. Did you find out anything more?"

"It seems your Mister Longfellow still harbors a bit of a grudge against his old adversary, Edgar Allan Poe. One of my girls, Amanda Stocking, said he was telling her that Poe used to accuse him of copying the work of others, but that it was really Poe who plagiarized in earnest. She said the old poet told her, 'Poe was just a lazy drunkard who stole old stories anywhere he could find them and then revised them slightly.' She said Longfellow wanted to have Poe's literary history completely expunged and stricken from history."

"My, that's quite an angry tirade about a writer who's been dead sixteen years. How could he be a threat in the grave? I think I'll go speak to Mister Longfellow now that I have an official appointment for today from his agent. If he enjoys the services of your ladies, then he can't be any too angelic himself, one would assume," I said, smiling. "Not that any of your establishments lack charm for our most distinguished citizens," I quickly added.

"Amanda also said that Professor Longfellow accused Mister Poe of obtaining the plot for the story 'The Black Cat' from a story written by a French writer," Becky said as she walked me to the door. "Why should the author of _The Song of Hiawatha_ and _Paul Revere's Ride_ be afraid of Edgar Allan Poe?"

"Oh, I know. Rufus Griswold was another writer who thought Poe to be a drunken lout not worth any consideration as a real artist. I still want to talk to Longfellow. I think he might be able to shed some light on Poe and his personal habits, although I might find out more concerning our friend the Harvard professor," I said, giving Becky a peck on her cheek.

"Wash your face when you finish eating," she said to me, as a way of parting advice. "Your jowls glisten like a greasy spoon."

* * *

Before I ventured over to the plush abode of Henry Longfellow, I decided to stop in the city library and read the story, "The Black Cat," which the good professor claimed Edgar had purloined from another source. The library was near Becky's apartment, and I was able to find the copy of the _Saturday Evening Post_ where the story was published in 1843 in the August 19th issue. I had read it once before, while I was working for the master of the macabre before the war, but this time I was reading it for symbolic importance. I knew that Becky believed that dreams played an important part of one's mental condition, and I also knew she believed I needed to get in touch with the feminine side of life in order to be able to enjoy intimacy once more with women. The cat has always symbolized the feminine, more intuitive side of life, and yet in this story, the cat is half-blinded by the narrator in a frenzy of anger. Like boys who torture cats, he cannot abide the slinking, purring and quick leaps of the cat, much as a woman can often be seen curiously spying about, jumping upon the bed and moaning when aroused--either by passion--or by the appreciation of something artistic and beautiful. It infuriates a male who sees himself as straightforward, robust and linear in composure and demeanor. I can see that much. But this black cat becomes this storyteller's arch nemesis. Indeed, he kills his wife and tries to hide her body inside the wall, and yet this feminine spirit-being, this one-eyed monstrosity of a beast, lets out a banshee wail when the police are there, letting them know about the burial place of the poor woman, and thus ends the story, with our narrator getting his just punishment.

And yet, the cat remains. It is an enigma, just as Edgar Poe was an enigma as a writer, and I am also an enigma as a man. We are all joined together in this mystery of terror and blood; this death of a great artist who was, most likely, just beginning to live a life of sober reflection, ready to create his greatest work ever.

Confound it! I refuse to believe he died an inebriated scoundrel, either by his own hand or by the hands of some election-day coopers who gave the alcoholic Poe drinks and dressed him up in different costumes, so he could vote many times for their candidate. No, I refuse to believe that Ethyl Alcohol killed the Divine Edgar. Perhaps it might have been the loss of his feminine spirit that killed him, just as it may kill me if I can't find it in my own psyche. This entire case was driving me to drink!

I finally arrived at 15 Central Park West and climbed the fourteen steps up to the brownstone door, a scarlet affair with a brass knocker in the shape of an American Revolutionary cannon. The black ball was hanging out of the cannon by a gold chain, and one need only lift this ball up and let it fall against the door to arouse the person inside. Quickly enough, the door was answered by a well-dressed butler who escorted me into the parlor where Professor Longfellow stood, smoking a long pipe and drinking from a brandy snifter. He turned to me and his long gray beard almost rustled as he did so, it was so wide and thick, and I was immediately taken in by the man's poetic affectation. His smoking jacket was Egyptian cotton, and the lining was silk, and it was a most striking blue. His cap was Oriental in appearance with a great turquoise tassel that hung down on the side and kept moving as he moved, a most disconcerting object, much like being distracted by a running child across the battlefield. I couldn't help but imagine what I would do to that tassel if I were, for example, a black cat.

"Welcome, Mister O'Malley! A hero of the great emancipator, Abraham Lincoln, God rest his soul! Why didn't you inform me that you had such credentials? I would have let you in immediately! The Congressional Medal of Honor? Egad, man, it is I who should be interviewing you! Please, have a toddy and relax on my divan." The great American poet motioned toward a long and ornately decorated lounging couch that took up half the parlor. Behind it was a wall filled with books. I walked over and sat down in my usual place on the end.

He, however, decided to strut before me and drink his brandy and smoke his pipe, peering down at me from the lofty heights of academe, I imagined. Certainly, this was far different than my casual meetings with Edgar Allan Poe at his tiny cottage in the Bronx, and I much preferred the latter.

"I read with great interest about the five-year altercation you had with the deceased, Edgar Allan Poe, when he was an editor in New York City. I believe they called it the Longfellow War. It began in 1839 and ended in 1845 with his accusation in 1840 that you copied most of your poem _Midnight Mass for the Dying Year_ , from Alfred Lord Tennyson, I believe it was," I began, watching the old man's face for any emotion.

He became immediately somber. His entire demeanor resembled a person who had thought long and hard about something and was just beginning to be able to discuss it. "This man did not know about literature at all. He was an imposter, and he knew it. So much was made in the press about the loss of his women. His mother, his step-mother, his young bride. Oh, the tragedy of it all! He never knew about my own tragedies, and he did not care, the scoundrel! My first wife, Mary, died from a miscarriage. My second, Fanny, died horribly right before my eyes when she dropped a lighted match she was using to melt some sealing wax, and her dress caught fire. In my futile attempts to put out the fire and save her life, I was physically scarred. That's why I wear this full beard. No, this Poe simply wanted to make a name for himself by attacking famous artists such as me."

I was sympathetic to his personal tragedies, but there was something deeper gnawing at this Longfellow. "Why are you trying to get Poe's work renounced by the literary establishment? Did you have any other, perhaps more personal, disagreements?" I probed.

Longfellow began to strut before me like a cock on the walk. "The man was demented. Have you read his work? People being chopped up with pendulum blades, bodies buried in walls, women murdered in cold blood! Ghastly! I'm no prude, but death belongs in its place. War and patriotic endeavors certainly have a place for death, but this is macabre, and this man was a perversion of the arts!"

"Did he do anything you found to be reprehensible in his personal life?" I asked, penetrating a bit deeper.

"Yes, yes he did! While his own dear wife was dying in her bed, he was carousing with the young tart in the tobacco shop! I saw him with her on several occasions walking hand-in-hand in Central Park! And then she turns up molested and pregnant and dead in the river! That man deserved to be investigated, but nobody did so!"

"I see. Well, I thank you for this information, Dr. Longfellow. It certainly opens up some new territory for inquiry. I'll keep you apprised about my research. I hope to clarify things when I'm finished, and you've been quite helpful."

I stood up to go, but the old man grabbed me by my shirt. "It was the drink, you know! That's what made him truly evil and deserving of death. Have you ever seen a man become perverted by drink? It's a horrible thing to watch, and I've seen it happen. It's a mortal sin, and it's an abomination to civilization!"

"Yes, well, keep up the good work, Professor. I'll be seeing you," I said, wrenching myself out of his rather perilous grasp and heading out the door.

"Watch yourself, war hero! That man can strike you from beyond! His soul was as black as any Hottentot witch doctor's!"

* * *

When I returned to my thinking booth inside the Sons of Liberty tavern, I wasn't able to put my new puzzle pieces together before the grappling hook gangster from Hoboken came up to me, out of breath, and he had a message from his boss, the Plug Ugly king, Walter McKenzie.

"O'Malley? Boss says you need to watch yer back. Word on the street says somebody's got a contract out on yer. Boss must like yer, 'cause he don't do this for nobody. If you got the money, he can even put some protection on yer sorry tail."

"Okay, but tell the boss I don't have the money to pay for protection. I'll try to safeguard my own sorry ass," I said, and the lout just smiled and walked away, his cargo hook swinging from his belt like a gruesome talisman.

I now knew I had angered somebody with my investigation, and the stakes were getting higher because I was closer to the solution. I decided to order a draft beer and play my game of "stare down the devil." I did this whenever things became tight for me. It was a way for me to focus on what I needed to think about, and, of course, I never took that first drink! 
5 Connecting the Pieces

A

s the evening crowd of revelers assembled inside the Fraunces, I mentally arranged the information I had so far in my investigation into the death of Edgar Allan Poe. I knew that Dr. Moran had given me a lot of specifics proving the circumstance that Poe had not been drunk when he was admitted into the hospital, even though the historians seemed to want to accept his inebriation as fact because of his past alcoholism. Certainly, the poet, Longfellow, believed this, as did Poe's former colleague, Dr. Rufus Griswold, who died of consumption in 1857. After Poe's untimely death, Griswold tricked Poe's aunt, Maria Clemm, into giving him all of Poe's authored works in exchange for promised money. However, he never put this into a contractual writing, and the result was Griswold's "gift" to Mrs. Clemm of six sets of the two volumes of the _Collected Works of Edgar Allan Poe_ to sell for whatever she could get.

Griswold was a most despicable character, in that he re-wrote many of Poe's personal letters to make Griswold look good and Poe look bad. He also wrote that "Poe was expelled from the University of Virginia" when, in fact, he voluntarily left. Griswold also said that Poe was "a deserter" from the military, but Poe was honorably discharged. Why should anyone believe this cad when he says that Poe died from alcoholism in Baltimore when Griswold was caught falsifying documents and letters and lying about his former rival?

I wanted to see how close Longfellow was to this Griswold. I think the old professor had become enraged enough by Poe to want to do him harm, and if Griswold was fuel to his fire, so to speak, it might have just been enough to push him over the edge into murder.

In fact, I wanted to test my theory about the Black Cat with all of these suspects. What was my theory? Actually, it was a hunch more than a logical theory, but when Becky told me about dreams and the feminine side of me, I began to experience a regularly occurring dream about this cat. It was exactly the same cat I had pictured in Poe's story, one-eyed and menacing, and all my suspects were inside Poe's cottage with me in this dream. The cat kept going from one to the other suspect, rubbing up against him, snarling, and showing its fangs. It wanted to be recognized, and it was angry, but each of the suspects kept ignoring it. When the cat came to me I became petrified with fear. I was expecting it to jump at me and claw me, but instead, I woke up completely soaked in my own perspiration.

I wanted to question each of these suspects and mention the black cat from Poe's story to see how they reacted. Something told me it could elicit a reaction in one of them who could know more about Poe's murder. Already I knew Longfellow had mentioned the story by Poe and the fact that he believed Poe had directly plagiarized it. That made him my prime suspect, so I wanted to ask him a more probing question to determine whether he might give himself away.

The waitress brought the beer and set it down in front of me. It began to perspire, and drops of liquid ran in lazy paths down the side of the mug. I stared hard at it. What about Crommelin, the one who saw Mary Rogers' body first in New Jersey and who was a jealous rival of all the other men pursuing this lovely young woman? He left town without telling a soul. Perhaps he was trying to escape further scrutiny by me. Could he have ordered the attempt on my life by some professional killer or killers? Any of the men who came into Anderson's Tobacco Emporium could have met some of the other gangster-types who also frequented the establishment. Any of these suspects could order my death very easily.

Before I went out to question these men, I wanted to go over my black cat theory with Becky. It was she who made me uncomfortable in the first place, and it was going to be she who explained it to me, so I could make the most of my inquisition.

Again, Becky was at home when I arrived. Why not? She was a "woman of leisure," and she had all her young ladies out and about town to drum up new business. It was Becky's job to keep the clients happy and to make certain these ladies weren't manhandled. Rebecca had a few roustabouts to keep the johns honest, and she has also been known to break a few bones herself.

She was wearing another military outfit for me. This time it was French Foreign Legion uniform, adapted for her occupation, of course. She had a blue top with gold epaulettes and the kepi with a rounded, flat top, black duck bill, and white cloth draped down the sides for life in the desert. However, she did not wear the usual pantaloons. Instead, she walked toward me in high heeled shoes and fishnet stockings--also of the French variety, but far more sensually attractive.

I got right down to business. "The word around the docks is that somebody has taken a contract out on my life," I said. "I must be getting close to the quick of this case," I added, aware of Becky's eyes becoming large and concerned.

"Patrick James O'Malley! Why are you doing this? Is clearing the name of one writer worth your life?" she said, punctuating her words by hitting me on my bicep with her fist.

"Don't fret, my dear. While I was in the Union Army, there wasn't a day that I didn't have somebody putting his bead on my gorgeous body and pulling the trigger. I became quite immune to the threat of death. However, I was offered protection for a price from Walter McKenzie of the Plug Uglies."

"Yes! Do it! I'll pay, don't worry about the cost," Becky said, now pulling on my shirt sleeves.

"Please, Rebecca, don't pull so hard. I only have two of these shirts in my wardrobe. I don't want any extra help. Those goons would probably attract so much attention that I would never be able to capture my assailant. I want to be able to interview this hired gun to find out who employed him."

We both sat down on the divan. I wanted to discuss my black cat theory.

"Becky, remember when you told me I needed to use my feminine intuition? You were correct, my lady. I have had a recurring dream about a black cat, and I do believe it may have something to do with Poe's death. In fact, when I questioned Longfellow the other day, he accused Poe of stealing the plot of his story 'The Black Cat' from a French author. What do you make of that?" I asked.

Becky became very animated at that point. Her hands gesticulated and she had a mysterious smile as she spoke, as if she were revealing a secret doctrine of the ages to me. "I have been studying Emerson, Thoreau and the philosophy of the Transcendentalists. I know, it's been out of favor since the war, but I still believe in its basic precepts. I especially believe in the concept of the Oversoul. In other words, each manifestation in Nature is a direct communication from God. There is no good or evil attached until we act upon it. It is simply the meaning we can gather from the specific object or being and how we can make it relate to our lives in a dynamic way. For example, if you have this image of the black cat recurring in your subconscious, then it can become a key to anything you want it to solve in your life. Don't you see, dear Patrick? It is your logical connection with the black cat that makes it work. How do you think it can work in this instance?" she asked, her green eyes gleaming with insightful candor.

"I want to use this image as a ploy to perhaps get a reaction from the guilty party. If it is indeed an object that links me to an answer as to whom killed Edgar Allan Poe, then it is a gift from the gods. Shall I just allow my instincts to manipulate the logic of the image?" I was serious. I had no idea about this philosophy, whether it was out of favor or not.

"No. Don't manipulate anything. Just let your mind concentrate on the image of the black cat, and then, when you are confronting the person, the answer will appear from out of the recesses of your subconscious mind. This so-called 'sub-conscious,' by the way, was what the Transcendentalists believed to be the direct connection to the Oversoul. It is where we get our myths and our religious ideas," she said.

"Goodness. This is becoming quite a mysterious conversation. However, I will try anything at this point. I only have one legitimate suspect, and he is one of the most famous poets of our age. I want to find out where each of these men were during the time period of Poe's demise. After that I should be able to narrow my list down somewhat. I thank you once again for your superb assistance, Miss Charming," I said, and I stood up to leave. I took both of her ivory hands into mine and kissed them both at once.

"You watch out for that contract killer, Patrick James. How can I ever live without my intellectual paramour?" she said, as she opened the front door. "Are you brushing your teeth with regularity? Have you tried the new brushes with the boar's head bristles?"

"No, I have not. I had thought my head to be quite boring to those who bristle at my puns," I said.

"Get out of here, you dolt!" Becky said, and she pushed me out the door.

* * *

No inspection of my person was needed in Hoboken. I walked directly back into the rear of the dockside building to see Walter McKenzie. He was at his desk counting the daily receipts of his business transactions around the city. "Sit down, me boy-o! Have ya decided to get some protection? I can give ya my best man," said McKenzie.

"No, I appreciate your offer, but I can take care of myself. I did want to know if you could verify your whereabouts on the dates of October third until October seventh, 1849."

"1849? That's sixteen years, O'Malley. I was in New York City then, down on the Hudson." McKenzie stood up and walked to the door. "Gotschalk! C'mon in here for a minute!" He turned back toward me. "He's my accountant, and he keeps all the records of my business and my appointments about town, don't ya know."

A little man with wire-rimmed spectacles limped into the room. His head had one patch of gray hair at the front and that was all. "Boss?" he said in a high-pitched voice.

"Gent here wants to know where I were in 1849. October third to October seventh. Can ya find out?"

"I'll look in the back room. I have all the calendars in there," he said, and he entered a dark room off to the right.

Several minutes later, he came back with a large sheet of paper. It was the month of October 1849. "You were at the races in Saratoga Springs. All week. See? Here are the train reservations I made for you," he said, and the stamped receipts were affixed to the calendar.

"Thank you, Mister Gotschalk. Ya can go back to work," McKenzie patted the old man on the back, and the man returned to the front of the building.

"I've been having dreams of a black cat," I said, watching McKenzie's face carefully for a reaction of some kind.

"I guess ya can dream about anything ya wants on yer own time. It's a free country, ain't it?" McKenzie's big stomach rolled as he laughed. "Me? I dream about me money. Never got me enough of it," he said.

"Yes, I understand that worry," I said, getting up to go. "I hope I can still count on you if I need some help. Maybe if I can catch this gentleman who's pursuing me, you can identify him for me. Is that possible?"

"For a hero of the war? A fellow whiteboy from Ireland? Ya damned straight!" McKenzie pounded me on the back as I turned to leave.

"I will let you know if I can get our fellow Irishman, Edgar Poe, cleared of his bad reputation," I added.

"Sure, ya do that, O'Malley. It's good on ya!" I heard him say as I shut the door.

My next suspect to question was William Wallace, the poet. As luck would have it, when I got back onto the New Jersey to New York ferry, he was on the same one I was taking. I saw him standing by the railing looking out over the Hudson River. The waves were choppy, and the winds were strong out of east. The boat was dipping up and down at quite a pace.

"Getting seasick, Mister Wallace?" I asked him.

He turned toward me and smiled. "No, Mister O'Malley, just the usual melancholia we artists always experience. I think it's the waters that do it to me every time."

"I meant to ask you last time about where you were on the dates of October third through October seventh, 1849. It's part of my investigation, and I needed to clear up some details." I knew he didn't have access to any official records, but as I believed he was not a prime suspect, I thought he might have a logical answer to assuage my doubts.

"Oh yes, I know what you're getting at. You want to know if I was involved in the death of my friend, Eddie. You know, Mister O'Malley, you may be a decorated soldier, but you have a lot to learn about artists. Eddie and I were comrades in art, the same way you were a comrade with your fellow warriors. I would have given my life for Eddie, and he would have protected me with his. When we drank together, we would exchange insights into the most depraved and sordid facts of life. This is what poets do. We explore the deeper realities that normal citizens would not venture to search out. This leads, unquestionably, to disagreements and even to violent behavior. Yes, Eddie and I would argue and even fight about our art, and about our women, but we never violated the sacred bond we had about the liberty we artists must possess in order to survive. This liberty was what we wanted most to protect. Without the freedom to write anything we deemed important, our jobs as artists were as useless as a soldier's without a patriotic cause."

"That's all well and good, Mister Wallace, but you did not respond to my question. Where were you on those dates?" I said.

"Dammit, man! Eddie had just written to me about his engagement to his childhood sweetheart, Sarah Shelton, and I was enraged! I went on a spree, if you want to know the truth. A drunken debauchery all over the city. I was losing both a drinking partner and a close friend! I have no proof, but if you were to ask any tavern keeper or brothel madame on the Bowery or Five Points, who was there on those dates, he or she would most certainly remember me. As you have already seen and heard, I am not a quiet soul when I am in my cups. I am like dear Eddie. We did not hide our deep emotions when inebriated."

"I've been having this reoccurring dream about Poe's black cat. Do you know the one I mean? What do you make of that?" I asked. Wallace did not show any emotion other than a reflective nod, as if I were asking a student question in the classroom.

"I suppose you've been focused on this case so much that Eddie's literary devices have been implanting themselves in your dream world. I often do that purposely to be able to call up images for my poetry. I will wake from a deep sleep by setting my alarm, and then I write down whatever dream I was having at the time. It's quite a good method of tapping into some quite creative ideas," he said, turning back to his reverent gaze upon the water.

"Yes, I see what you mean," I told him. "I'm glad you told me about your relationship with Poe. It makes me understand the literary game a bit better. My family was lacking in that regard, so I suppose that's why I began reading so much in the library. I always wanted to understand writers and why they wrote what they did."

"I don't know if we understand why we write," said Wallace, expectorating into the sea. "It's rather like spitting or pissing into the wind, I would imagine," and he laughed. "Say, would you like to join me in the Fraunces when we land? I'm very thirsty right now, and I would like your company. I'll tell you more about my literary ambitions, if you wish."

"No, not this time. I must make another inquiry before I head back to the cottage in the Bronx. But, we shall do it another time, all right, my friend?"

Wallace looked a bit crestfallen. "All right. I'm now going to go inside the galley and see if I can't buy a pint to get my evening started. Farewell, my warrior! Watch out for those insidious black cats--they can be quite unlucky if they pass in front of you."

* * *

I ate a fast dinner at Poe's Cottage and headed out to visit the Anderson mansion in Tarrytown. I rode my horse, Sherman II, out to visit the old millionaire, and the night was brisk and full of sounds. It was obvious why Washington Irving chose this area to create his famous story about the Headless Horseman. The pitch darkness formed inside the trees that grew over the paths going through the forest, and I felt enclosed within the Devil's tomb.

I was hoping Anderson was in a better state of mind than at our previous encounter. The door was opened once more for me by those Garibaldi soldiers, and I again watched their flowing, colorful bloomers and old muskets with some amount of military humor as they escorted me back into the library where Mister Anderson was. Anderson was seated today, and he turned in his big leather chair upon hearing me enter. "Hello? Oh, it's you. The Union man. What can I do for you, young man?"

Obviously, he had completely forgotten his prior shenanigans, and I supposed we were starting again with our conversations, as it were, and it was rather like meeting him for the first time. His eyes were calm and his gaze lucid, and so I began my questioning, "Mister Anderson, sir, I was wondering if you could verify your location on the dates of October third through October seventh in the year of 1849? I am doing some research for an old friend, and I wanted to collect some information for him. It's nothing that will be placed in the newspapers, so you don't' have cause for concern."

Anderson ran a bony hand through his white hair and looked around, as if he were looking for something. "Indeed. Let me ring my butler, Johnson. He can get that information for you. He's been with me since my days in New York City," he said, and he pressed on a button next to the blotter on his desk.

"Also, did you know about the black cat of Mister Poe's? I've been having a recurring dream about such a beast, and I wanted to know if anyone understood why I might be having such dreams," I said, while we waited for the butler.

Suddenly, Mister Anderson became frantic once again. He stood up, scurried around the desk, and lunged at me, his skeletal hands grasping my vest and pulling me toward him. I could smell his rancid breath as he spat, "It's part of his evil treachery! He killed young Mary Rogers, and he lives inside animals--he can live inside you if you don't watch out!"

I pushed him gently backward. "Please, Mister Anderson. I understand your emotional hardship at losing your wife and your employee. And, from what I've heard, you also lost your young son, is that true?" I was trying to probe his psyche, as I had read about his losses while in the library reading about the entire Mary Rogers affair.

The butler came in at that moment, and Anderson suddenly changed back to his former self. It was uncanny how the old man could turn his mania off and on as if he had a switch inside his brain. "Johnson, please look at the records and report back to me about my location on October third through October seventh in the year of our Lord 1849. Bring the result back to me immediately."

"At your request, sir," said Johnson, and he turned right around, although with some difficulty because of his advanced years, and he left the room.

"He's a good man. I found him begging for food at my cigar store, and I sensed in him some refinement. He has been my most loyal servant for all these years," Anderson said.

When Johnson returned, he had the record of Mister Anderson's location on the aforementioned dates. "There, so I was attending to my wife's illness. She had come down with the whooping cough, and I was at the hospital with her. See? Here are the surgeon's directions to me, and I signed the release for her," he said, and he handed me the sheet of paper.

"Thanks so much, sir. I can now complete my research. "Do you know Mister Longfellow, by any chance?" I asked.

Again, Anderson went into his mania, "Longfellow! He was another lout after my dear Mary Rogers! They all followed her around my store like she was a bitch in heat! Get out, young man. I can't stand your presence anymore. I need to rest."

I was dismissed, so I left. This was the way with the rich. They welcomed you when they wanted you, and they dismissed you when they did not. I wanted to pour over my evidence back in the cottage, so I rode Sherman II a bit harder than usual. He's a good old nag, although he was frothing a bit when I finally pulled up to Poe's Cottage in the Bronx. The last thought I had was concerning the fact that all my suspects were in New York City when Edgar died. Not one of them was in or near Baltimore.
6 A Walking Tour

I

was almost back to the beginning of my investigation following the questioning of my suspects about where they were when Poe died in Baltimore. Of course, common sense told me that the killer did not have to be one of them. Instead, just as someone had hired a professional to kill me, one of the suspects could have hired somebody to kill Poe.

Judging from his demeanor, Henry Longfellow seemed to be the person who had the most antipathy toward Poe. I will look into that area of their relationship, especially as concerns their rivalry for Mary Cecilia Rogers' affection. However, I needed a lead onto someone who might have known about this kind of flirtation existing in the Anderson Tobacco Emporium. I realized that John Anderson was no help in this area, as he had obviously been deeply affected psychologically by many factors. No, I needed to find someone who was in the shop when Mary Rogers worked there and who had access to the comings and goings of the patrons who shopped there. I know Walter McKenzie often visited the shop, so I made a note to inquire of him as to what kinds of conversations and intimacies were happening just before her murder.

Of course, William Wallace might also know about any intrigues Poe might have had with the cigar store girl. He was quite honest about being privy to the most confidential areas of Poe's life, so this was another possible lead.

As for Poe being the murderer of Rogers, as Anderson believed, I should be able to prove this theory false as well. However, Poe's beloved Virginia had died in 1847, so it is conceivable that the author might have been mesmerized by the obviously magnetic female attraction of Mary Rogers. However, why would Poe write that note I found behind Virginia's bed that said he wanted to avenge the death of the cigar store girl? It would seem he already knew who killed the girl. I certainly needed to find out the exact relationship between Poe and Mary Rogers before negating Anderson's theory altogether.

I suppose it's my family's total ignorance of anything literary that makes me so attracted to Poe and to the literary world in general. I found it quite an exquisite escape to be able to visit a library in New York City, where a friendly librarian on duty would open up worlds to me that I never realized existed. Of course, I would also follow the writings of my greatest idol, Edgar Allan Poe, when he wrote and worked for _Graham's Lady's and Gentleman's Magazine_. I still remember buying a copy when I was sixteen and reading the story, "The Murders in the Rue Morgue," and becoming immediately fixated on the science of detection and the deductive logic of solving murders. This, to me, was not fiction. It was a way to arrive at the heart of everything that was important to me.

I wanted to do everything I could to gain the favor of this dark and mysterious man, Edgar Allan Poe. I would sit in the audience at his readings where the majority of the listeners were female. I read every scrap of poetry and criticism he wrote, and it was my ability to quote Poe that landed me the job with his publisher as Poe's official manuscript messenger.

As a young man, I would follow Poe when he would make the rounds on Publishers' Row in New York City. Therefore, today, while I go over the facts of my case, I want, in my memory, to walk those same steps my former employer and I walked in 1844 and 1845, perhaps to make some real sense out of all this.

When Poe returned to New York, at the age of 35, he was destitute and searching for new employment. He was also not averse to asking for loans from friends and relatives to keep the wolves at bay, as he had done during the year 1837, when the banks were in crisis and he wrote his only novel. His sole ambition was to reestablish himself as a magazinist of the same excellent caliber he had been while working in Philadelphia at _Graham's Magazine_ and earlier in Virginia at the _Southern Literary Messenger_. He would often tell me about his "dream magazine," _The Stylus_ , as he sat at his table working on a draft of an article.

Poe was a man who cared about other writers and about the lack of respect and monetary remuneration paid to writers. I remember him sitting in a café, before he had shown me around the New York publishing industry. I was in awe of this man, although he was not a big fellow. He was somewhat slender, about five feet eight inches in height, but he was well proportioned. His complexion was fair, his eyes gray and restless, always looking about, and his hair was black and curling. He was an athlete and long-distance swimmer in college. And that day in the café, he was honest about his lot in life.

"Patrick," he said, as he always addressed me by my first name and not by some lesser title given by a superior elder to his younger servant, "the business of being a writer of poetry and fiction in this country has become one of drudgery and little pay."

When Poe talked to me, I felt like an equal, and even at 18 years of age, I was fascinated by his vast knowledge of the world around him. "Did you know, for example, that my best-selling book is _The Conchologist's First Book_ , a textbook on shells, for which I was paid the handsome sum of fifty dollars? Why is this, you might ask? Well, the reality is that this country values profit over ideals and substance over philosophy. There are, of course, those wealthy gentlemen of the North who are men of leisure, and they receive large sums for their literary pursuits. I will give just one example. Professor Henry Wadsworth Longfellow of Harvard received the sum of three thousand dollars for a single poem! Alas, we devil writers in the trenches, especially we writers from the South, have become slaves to the machinery of capitalism in the North. As an editor, I have increased the revenue of magazines by writing stories that have sold-out issues, and I did not receive any more compensation than if I had written about sea shells! Art has no value to these owners in the North, and all they understand is the profit that they receive. I understand this, but I do not like it! I would rather go to my grave a true artist and pauper than be puffed-up by the literati who care not about the inherent quality of the work they publish and admire."

Poe continued to tell me about his adversary, Mister Lewis Gaylord Clark, the editor of _The Knickerbocker Magazine_. In the 1840s there was no commercial book advertising as there is today, so magazines like Clark's would "puff up" a new book by reviewing it favorably, for which he would receive a large fee, and the coterie Whig newspapers would follow suit around the country, making the book a bestselling work, even though it might be a horrendously written tome of no literary worth. Clark could make or break any author simply by using this commercial practice of "puffery."

"Come, my boy, let me take you on a grand tour of our literary elite, our bastions of capitalistic profiteering. You deserve to know about such things. Who knows? Perhaps one day you will thank me for it," said Edgar, and off we went on what I like to believe was an honest portrait of a struggling artist and his personal war with the literary establishment of New York City.

When we arrived at the famous triangle formed by the convergence of Maiden Lane with Liberty and William Streets, Poe immediately pointed to a small walk-up at Cedar and Greenwich Streets, which was almost directly west of Nevelson Square in the publishing quarter. "That was the first room Virginia and I lived in. The house looks old and buggy, but the landlady gave us a back room on the third floor--night and day attendance--for seven dollars--the cheapest board I ever knew. Now, let me take you down here to Liberty and Nassau Streets to Gowan's Antiquarian Bookstore," said Poe, moving down the sidewalk in his usual quickstep.

Inside the establishment, Mister Gowan, the owner, told me about when he had lived with Poe and his wife in that same boarding house. Poe listened intently to the old man, nodding appreciatively from time to time as Gowan spoke. "For eight months or more, that one house contained us all. One table fed us. During that time I saw much of Eddie, and I had the chance to chat with him and his beautiful wife, Virginia. And, I must say, I never saw him the least affected with liquor. He was one of the most courteous, gentlemanly, and intelligent companions I have ever met."

"Oh, Bill, you know you just enjoyed hearing my theory of the universe. I told William about my creation idea whereby the universe began because of a gigantic explosion which sent out the elements of creation into the cosmos, where they reassembled in a fantastic array and grew out of the oceans and developed upon the lands. William is certainly an excellent antiquarian, but he may not be the best judge of character," said Poe, and he patted the elderly gentleman on the back before we left his store to return to the noise of the city.

Looking westward toward Broadway and Liberty Streets, we saw a row of four-story brick-and-frame buildings with shops on the ground floor and offices above. At 161 Broadway was the white and black shingle of Wiley & Putnam, a cornerstone of New York publishing. In 1845 Wiley & Putnam brought out two volumes of Poe's works, for which Edgar received only copies and no money. "This is the world of big publishing," he told me, as we turned right onto Nassau Street.

When we arrived at 107 Nassau, Poe pointed to the building and remarked, "I found my first job here when I arrived in April, 1844. This is the _Sunday Times and Weekly Newspaper_ , owned and run by Major Mordecai Noah. He gave me the non-literary position as a mechanical paragraphist. In other words, I set type," Poe laughed, and we continued up Nassau Street toward Fulton.

At 124 Fulton Street, Poe stopped and looked up at the great building. He seemed mesmerized for a moment before he spoke. "In 1844, I needed cash. Virginia's consumption was worsening, she was spitting up blood, so I concocted a piece of news for this largest penny daily in New York. You see, Patrick, _The Sun_ would print or invent any kind of news to keep up its circulation, and they eagerly bought my fictitious report of a trans-Atlantic balloon flight. I can still picture it on that day. The whole square surrounding this building was besieged, blocked-up--ingress and egress being alike impossible--and I never witnessed more intense excitement to get possession of a newspaper." Poe informed me that he got a job as a result of this scam, as Mister Charles Briggs, a humorist, asked Poe to become his co-editor at _The Broadway Journal_.

We turned left on Fulton, and headed to Broadway, where we once more turned right. We walked down to Ann Street and turned right to stop at 4 Ann Street, Mrs. Foster's boarding house.

"We lived here in 1844, and the amount of general annoyance wrought by street noises was incalculable. The din of vehicles, however, was even more thoroughly and intolerably a nuisance." Poe pointed down to the cobblestone pavement of the road in front of the house, "Are we never to have done with these unmeaning round stones? Is there a more ingenious contrivance invented for driving men mad through sheer noise?"

I could also smell the odors borne upon the updrafts from this street--a street in which garbage and effluvia mingled within openings in the gutters, fed upon by free roaming pigs. Fresh piles of manure were steaming in the center of the road, pushed there from the livery stables for the traffic to beat down. It was disgusting.

At 26 Ann Street, the headquarters of _The New World_ , where Poe's arch-nemesis, Rufus Griswold was editor, Poe stopped dead in his tracks. "In 1839, Rufus Griswold joined in crime with publisher Park Benjamin of this business to steal and then publish foreign authors without paying them a cent in royalties! Griswold and Benjamin rushed new English novels into print in cheap, gigantic formats and had newsboys peddle them on the streets for ten cents each. These demonic scoundrels, almost single-handedly, ruined book publishing in New York City because reputable publishers charged one dollar per book and were slower at printing them. Of course, these reputable publishing houses also paid their authors!" said Poe. "The want of an international copy-right law renders it impossible for our men of genius to obtain remuneration for their labors," said Poe, his voice filled with indignant rage. "Now since, as a body, the want of the international law represses their efforts altogether."

As we proceeded up Ann Street, we stopped at the corner of Ann and Nassau. Poe pointed to the sign of _The Evening Mirror_ at 105 Nassau. "I worked here from October, 1844 until February, 1845. As a sub-editor and critic, I earned twenty dollars per week. Of course, the co-owner, Nat Willis, made $1,500 per year writing fluff pieces, while I was paid $5 per page, and Willis was paid $11 per page in addition to his yearly salary."

However, Poe then sighed deeply and said, "But Mister Willis did publish my poem 'The Raven,' after I had left his publication, and it made me famous. I owe him that. I was then able to receive $50 per poem, the same as that egotist and Harvard elitist, Longfellow was then receiving!"

This was the second mention I had heard from Poe about the rival poet. This was one of the main reasons why I was still centered upon Longfellow as my prime suspect in the murder of Poe. He was close friends with Griswold and his ilk, and the stories about Poe amongst the "Northern Literati" were often scandalous and incriminating, which, ironically perhaps, contributed to the power of Poe's mystique as a poet.

It was while employed on the _Mirror_ that Poe began his "little war" against Longfellow. He had accused Longfellow, the popular idol, of misusing his talent by imitating foreign poems instead of creating original work. Any scandal touching Longfellow excited the public, and the _Mirror_ 's circulation rose. Nassau Street was alerted to Poe as a new source of copy.

We ended the tour that day at his Bronx Cottage, where Poe showed me his office and writing workroom. As he sat down to go over more articles that were being published, I could not help but wish I were inside that brain to hear what was happening. What were the leaps of imagination that took him to those strange and wondrous worlds where anything was possible? Despite his past and his fixation upon the darkness, I enjoyed being around Edgar Allan Poe, and I now wanted to prove his reputation as a man to be clear of any chicanery or deceit.

* * *

I wanted to interview Wallace once more to find out about Poe's relationship with the Rogers girl. He was, not unusually, at his Sons of Liberty watering hole, the Fraunces, in a back booth. He had paper and pen, and was busily jotting down something as I approached him. He casually looked up. "Aha, O'Malley! Please, sit down. I was just going over this list of editors I must approach to solicit my new batch of writings. Life goes on in the big city, does it not?"

"Listen, Wallace," I said, sitting down inside the leather confines of the booth, "did you ever know of any intimacies that your friend Poe might have had with Mary Rogers?"

Wallace stopped writing and looked over at me. "Poe and that little wench? Oh, no. We might have speculated as to the shape of her figure beneath that lovely dress, but no more than any of the other young roosters were doing inside the emporium."

"So, you never once saw him alone with her? Even after his wife died?"

"No! Never. Poe was a lot of things, but one thing he was not was a womanizer. Now Anderson, the owner? He was a man who gazed lecherously after this girl. It is not a wonder that his wife, Amanda, would often watch him prowling about the store, following the crowds of men as they pursued the young clerk."

Wallace was indignant about this, and I doubted he was lying. "What about Longfellow? Did you see him around the woman?"

"Longfellow? No, he was busy lecturing. He spent little time around the tobacco shop. Now, Fennimore Cooper. He bought the little lady all kinds of trinkets and was often seen whispering to her in the corner of the shop. Although, I never saw him approach her outside of the store," Wallace said.

"Thank you, William, you've been very informative. I must go on now to my day," I said, and he waved at me before he returned to his listing.

I had not been able to establish the connection between Longfellow and the Rogers girl or that there was any kind of jealous rivalry about the girl between Poe and my prime suspect. It was horrible to think that Poe was murdered because of his relationship with a woman--especially one who was so steeped in controversy as Mary Cecilia Rogers. What could have happened to cause this person who wanted me dead to erupt in such fury? What had I stumbled upon to make me a character in one of Poe's murder stories? I was waiting for the killer to make the next move, and it was difficult to be in this position. I am a man of action, and I have always been this way. However, there was no solution to this conundrum, and I was at an impasse in my investigation.

I was still interested in Longfellow and his motives, so I wanted to pay him another visit. This time, I was going to probe him about his secret hatred of Poe and dark fiction. If a man like John Anderson, who was obviously demented, hated Poe to the point of blaming him for Rogers' murder, then what about intelligent and sane men who believed the same thing? Longfellow, despite his lack of a personal relationship with Mary Rogers, was still a prime suspect.
7 Reynolds

A

s one might have ascertained, my travels around the city were being curtailed quite a bit because of the threat on my life. I am not a coward, but suffice it to say, there are prudent ways to do things, and my not becoming a moving target was one of these. I needed to investigate Longfellow's motives once again, and I also wanted to interview perhaps the one man who could probably give me some information about who this mysterious Reynolds might be. Granted, I had heretofore accepted the theory about him being the Antarctic explorer, whose journals Poe used for his only novel. This is now doubtful because without an identifiable person at the scene in Baltimore, I really had no case. It was a fact that Poe screamed out "Reynolds" several times, and this made me believe this was a person Poe recognized from his past and that this Reynolds had done him a grievous injury.

I made certain my Colt .44 caliber service revolver was in good working order before I set out for Longfellow's residence. However, I now kept another weapon on my person, a .42 caliber LaMat revolver. About 2,000 of these weapons were made for the Confederacy. It was developed in New Orleans in 1856 by Dr. Jean Alexander Le Mat, and I was able to take one of these pistols from a Confederate officer, whom I met by chance one day rounding a corner on his horse at the Battle of Vicksburg. He was so close to me I could make out the wax on his mustache--a most inferior brand--because the ends were drooping like a shamrock in the rain.

The distinguishing characteristic of LeMat's revolver is that its nine-shot cylinder revolves around a separate central barrel of larger caliber than the chambers in the cylinder proper. The central barrel is smoothbore and can function as a short-barreled shotgun (hence the nickname "Grape Shot Revolver") with the shooter selecting whether to fire from the cylinder or the smoothbore barrel by flipping a lever on the end of the hammer. Flipping the lever down caused the moveable striker to fall upon the primer set directly under the hammer, discharging the lower barrel, while leaving it in the standard position would fire the chambers in the cylinder, much like any other revolver. I assume he was unable to get his thumb on that lever to shoot at me using his long barrel or his grape shot barrel, and this probably saved my life on that day. Call me a realist, but I much prefer a gun that requires no such doubtful pause. As a result, I have modified this most excellent gun by allowing both types of ammunition to discharge with only one pull of the trigger. It creates many more treacherous and discomfiting holes in your enemy. In fact, I have seen cheeses imported from the Swiss Alps that rather resemble the body of a man hit from the firing of this weapon.

Longfellow greeted me at the door, once again attired in his auspicious hat with the tassel and blue smoking jacket. Does this man ever tire of his pompousness? "O'Malley! Good to see you again! Come back to the study. I've got something I want you to see," said the professor, guiding me back to his library.

"I need a few more questions answered," I told him, not wanting to get distracted by literary peccadilloes of his.

"Most certainly! I just wanted to show you my latest volume. It is a translation, and I believe you can learn a lot from its inherent wisdom. I have taken the liberty of autographing it for you," he said, picking up a leather-bound book sitting on the mahogany table near the window that served as his writing desk. He handed it to me, and I turned to the title page.

It read: " _The Divine Comedy_ , by Dante Alighieri, translated by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow."

"You may not like to hear this, young man, but I am a pacifist and a Unitarian. When my son, Charlie, enlisted in the war, my wife Fanny and I were beside ourselves with grief. We have always believed the Negro to be equal to us, but war became the only answer to resolve the problem of slavery. But when the war took over my own child, it became too much to bear."

"I am indeed sorry to hear about your son. Did he survive the conflict?" I asked, curious, in spite of my need for answers concerning a different subject.

"Yes, although he was wounded in Virginia, he came back to us and was treated well by surgeons in the Union Army. He is now employed and raising his own family. His mother's death, however, had as great an effect on him as it did me."

"Sir, if you don't mind, I would like to ask a few more questions about your relationship with Edgar Allan Poe," I said.

"Right. Your investigation. Proceed," he told me in a clipped voice.

"I now understand about your opinion of Mister Poe and his work, but did you ever accost him physically? Did he ever threaten you or you him?"

"No! Of course not! I told you I am a Unitarian pacifist. I do not believe in violence of any kind. Certainly, I have strong feelings about Poe and his dark night of the soul, and I still want his work censored for the good of the public, but I would never advocate violence to his person." Longfellow's voice was adamant and sincere.

"I understand. Thank you, sir, for your candor. I also thank you for this volume. I often believe this case I am now working on to be a strange version of comedy, although not quite of the divine nature. You have been most helpful to me," I said, and I turned to go.

He touched my arm, and I turned back around to face him. His eyes were full of tears. "I want to thank you for what you did for us in the war. I now realize this conflict was necessary to give hope to an entire nation. Perhaps now we will be able to progress and grow without any more divisions."

"I hope so, too, professor," I said, and I shook his hand and left the premises.

As a religious man and a pacifist, Longfellow would not have been maliciously motivated to harm Poe. I realized that his differences were more of the moral type; the old poet simply did not like Poe's work because it was so gloomy and depressing. Longfellow, because of his personal tragedies, was, in his old age, simply trying to rid the world of its negative influences.

As I walked down the street toward the wharf, in order to take the ferry over to Hoboken, I realized that my prime suspect was fading into the background of my case. I also wondered if my problem might have something to do with my own war history. I saw every person as a potential killer because that's what happens in a war. Longfellow, a life-long pacifist, became a dangerous murderer in my eyes simply because any outward exhibition of anger or distrust translated into violence in my own mind. I hoped that McKenzie could put me back on a hot trail toward solving this dilemma.

* * *

"Where'd ya hear that name, O'Malley?" screamed McKenzie, so forcefully that I could feel the spray from his words against my face.

I could not move my feet, and my arms were tied behind me on the chair. The giant Walter McKenzie stood above me, glaring down at me like a rogue elephant. I had simply mentioned the name "Reynolds" to him and this was the result of his fury. Four men pounced upon me, before I could reach for any weapon, and they forced me into a chair and wrapped me up with line rope used to dock a ship.

"What ails you, man? Reynolds was the name that Poe shouted in Baltimore before he died. I don't know who Reynolds is. I simply wanted to know if you did." I squirmed in my confinement, while one of McKenzie's men took my guns from my boots.

After hearing this, McKenzie's rage seemed to dissipate, yet he was still fuming, stalking around in front of me, the boards to the wharf deck creaking loudly under his tremendous weight. "Ya don't know this man Reynolds? Where'd ya hear his name then?" McKenzie asked.

"I told you. When I questioned Dr. Moran in Baltimore, he told me about hearing Poe shouting this name out several times during his delirious state of mind. This was the last word Poe ever uttered," I said, "and I just wanted to see if you knew who this Reynolds was."

The four goons laughed. "Stow it!" McKenzie shouted, and the men stopped. "Release him," he told them, and my friend, the cargo hook thug, began untying my arms and legs. Soon, I was able to sit up in the chair like a human being instead of a captured ape.

"Why did you react so vehemently? Who is this Reynolds to you?" I asked, taking my two pistols from one of the men and placing them under my pants legs and into their leather calf holsters.

"Back in 1847, when I was in New York, I owned most of the gambling halls and bordellos on the Bowery and in Five Points. I had me a beautiful and educated wife, and I weren't a fat pig like ya sees now. I was quite a handsome rake. Gloria was the daughter of a Quaker whaling owner from Nantucket, David Barclay. We met when I was a seaman aboard one of his ships. She married me when I was a lad of twenty, and she stayed with me when I moved to New York and got into me life of crime. Never said a word against me, and she loved me dearly," said McKenzie, tears coming to his eyes. "This Reynolds was a loner who started hanging out in one of me bordellos. He was always lookin' over the girls like he owned them. And then, girls started turnin' up dead. All over the city. My business was being ruined! No girl would show up to work for fear she'd have her throat slit by this killer."

"Was it Reynolds?" I asked.

"Just listen, me boy-o. Sure, I put men on it. We was our own police back then. We had no city police force worth a leprechaun's fart. That's when it happened," McKenzie said, and his appearance became sullen. His face looked like a deflated pink balloon, sagging upon his chest in rolls of fat and tears. "My Gloria was accosted outside the theater on Union Square. I shouldn't have let her go! She was always lovin' her dramas, she was. The bastard slit her throat in the alley. That's where we found her. Shoved up inside all the garbage and the fish heads. My beautiful wife!"

"I'm sorry, Walter," I said, putting my arm around his huge frame. His entire body was shaking from remorse.

"Then, I gets a letter from this Reynolds. He tells me he's for hire at a high price! Can you believe it? I found out he was sendin' out these letters to all the gang leaders of New York City! A regular, what ya call, solicitation for services."

"You mean he was showing you how good he was by killing your own people?" I asked.

"That's right. I soon found out he'd killed other gang leaders' whores, their wives, and even their children! Why, it was completely insane, but this Reynolds was makin' his mark. When he began gettin' jobs from us, then the murders of our own stopped. This Reynolds had become the most perfect killer for hire this city has ever known. I never used him once, though! Not me! I wouldn't give the bastard the satisfaction. So, I've never remarried, I've lost business, and I lose a girl from time to time, but it's worth it to me not to give this monster any money!"

"You say all this happened in the 1840s? It was never in the newspapers. Why not?" I was incredulous.

"We never wanted it in the papers! If word ever got out somebody could kill our people whenever he wanted, our business would be over in this city. No journalist would dare print a story about this Reynolds and his killing spree, me boy-o."

"This would explain why Poe would shout out this man's name. If this Reynolds was such a notorious contract killer, then I am certain Poe would have known about him. Was he known in the taverns and in the street?" I asked, and I held my breath waiting for McKenzie's response.

"Of course he was! Everybody in the city knew about him. His murders were never connected to him by name in the papers. That was the catch. He was like the boogie man, don't ya know. Every kid knew about the tall killer, dressed in gray, who could slit yer throat wherever ya was. Standin' in line at the theater. Buyin' yer vegetables at the market. Playin' in the school yard. He was the gray ghost butcher of New York. He even printed cards with an imprint of a cleaver on 'em! The sick bastard!"

I worked for Poe from 1844 to 1846, but he never once mentioned this man to me. Poe must have heard about him just before he died. The great writer died in Baltimore in 1849, so I would surmise the name "Reynolds" was known to Poe shortly before he succumbed. This killer may have even told Poe who he was so he could be ensured of the notoriety. As the killer of a great author, I would assume this Reynolds believed he would, in a twisted way, become immortal.

I decided to tell McKenzie about my theory. "Walter, I believe this Reynolds is now contracted to kill me. He is the one we have to assume has been hired to stop me from investigating Poe's death."

McKenzie slammed his huge right fist into the palm of his left hand. "O'Malley! This is a horse of a different color! Why did ya not tell me about this Reynolds in the first place?"

"I was not aware of this connection to my case," I said.

"I'm putting a man on yer tail, me boy-o. He'll be on yer front step like the milk man, and he'll follow ya like yer guardian angel. Ain't no charge for this, O'Malley. This is war!" McKenzie said. "I want this bastard more than you do!"

"But I still need him alive until I can ascertain who hired him. Without this knowledge, I won't be able to discover who killed Poe and how he did it," I said.

"Ryan! Go with O'Malley. I'll send a relief man tomorrow mornin'," said McKenzie, and the cargo hook thug, Ryan, followed me out of the building and into the sunshine. I looked back at him once. He was following me at a leisurely pace, as if he were out for a stroll. I knew he had done this work before, but I still felt uncomfortable. I was like the man Reynolds who was hunting me. I preferred working alone. However, in light of this new information, I supposed it was good insurance. I knew I was getting close to finding out what happened in Baltimore, in 1849, and I also knew the murderers would be closing in on me. I felt like the man in the Poe story tied to the wooden slat of his prison cell down in the pit of hell. This case was becoming my pit, and this Reynolds was the pendulum. I knew the lines by heart: "I shrank back--but the closing walls pressed me resistlessly onward. At length for my seared and writhing body there was no longer an inch of foothold on the firm floor of the prison. I struggled no more, but the agony of my soul found vent in one loud, long, and final scream of despair."
8 Becky's Plan

W

hen I returned to my cottage out in the Bronx, Ryan camped outside my door, and I then tried to make some meaning out of everything I'd discovered about this case thus far. I sat at the little table in the parlor where Edgar wrote his articles, poetry and fiction. It gave me some amount of inspiration to do so. I could hear the night noises outside. Owls were blending their hoots with the howls of the wind, and the trees were rustling their leaves in a cacophony of restlessness.

I now believed I had the true identity of this infamous "Reynolds," even though nothing is ever certain in life until it appears before you to be scrutinized with your senses. The certainty of this fact was that McKenzie knew of him, and this Reynolds was a professional killer who plied his trade in New York City. I now had to see if and when this scoundrel was employed by someone, hopefully one of my suspects, to kill Poe in 1849. The idea that Reynolds had informed Poe of his name, just before giving the famous author a poison or other murderous concoction, was a logical one. Reynolds must have known that the drug would put Poe out of his senses, thus causing the author to seem to die of some natural cause. It was Dr. Moran who had correctly diagnosed the fact that Poe was not under the influence of alcohol. However, because of Griswold and the other famous people who wanted to destroy Poe's character, it was assumed that Poe had died from drunkenness and not from some other cause.

I also believe that this Reynolds was probably not supposed to reveal his identity. I would guarantee that whoever had employed this ruthless killer did not want him to give out any personal information that could be tracked back to its source. This mistake on Reynolds's part was caused, most likely, because the killer wanted to impress the great writer in some way. Perhaps Reynolds was an admirer of Poe's work, and he just wanted to let Poe know who he was out of some kind of macabre fascination with the author's stories. Many people have described the uncanny effect that Poe had on you when you met him. This Reynolds thought he could capture Poe's mystique by letting Poe know who he was and how much Reynolds admired his work. Or, maybe Reynolds' partner in crime let slip the name while conversing with each other in front of their kidnapped victim. Whatever the cause, I was now being hunted by this Reynolds, and only my wits and my weapons stood between me and certain death.

The suspects in my case were not involved directly with the tobacco store girl, Mary Rogers, nor were they aware that Poe was involved in some kind of romance with her. The authors, Wallace and Longfellow, are out of the picture for now because each has his own story about why he would not harm a fly on Poe's head. Rogers' fiancé, Alfred Crommelin, was not in town to interview, although I doubt he had much to share about the murder of Poe or of his sweetheart. Unless Poe was having a romance with his fiancé, Crommelin would have no reason to want Poe dead. I am fully aware that women are both unpredictable and fascinating, but I really believed there must be some connection between the Rogers murder and Poe's demise.

If I must be pursued by an experienced killer for the rest of my life because of this case, I am ready to give it up. What's the chance that I will be able to capture this killer? Even if I do capture him alive, how will I be able to get the information from Reynolds concerning who paid him to kill me? I needed to talk about my clues and about what I should do to set a trap for the killer. As I now knew Reynolds enjoyed the company of ladies of leisure, I wanted Becky Charming to assist me in this endeavor. I picked-up my old Army coat and headed for the door.

Ryan was right outside on the porch swing. He was smoking a cigar. He glanced up at me and smiled, "Goin' somewheres, O'Malley?"

"Quite right, Ryan, me boy-o," I said, mimicking McKenzie, "I am headed for the Theater District across town. You are welcome to accompany me, as long as you don't touch any merchandise. The woman you will meet has a strong proclivity for breaking the skulls of those gentlemen who cannot mind their manners around her."

"Sure, and I bet I know who she is. Charming's her name, am I right? Know what we calls 'er on the wharf?"

"No, but I would be anxious to know," I said, walking at a faster pace toward the city's transportation over to Manhattan.

"We calls 'er Becky Malarkey. She thinks she's Miss high and mighty, ain't that right?" said Ryan, moving up to walk alongside me for a moment.

I grabbed him by his coat collar and lifted him up off the pavement. "You best shut your trap about her, Ryan, or I will be forced to throw you high and mightily."

"Put me down, O'Malley! I won't be sayin' nothin' to yer woman, man. I was just tellin' yer what they calls 'er, that's all," he said, and I dropped him. He fell back to follow me at about twenty yards behind.

* * *

"Why have you done this, O'Malley?" Becky Charming was not wearing any military garb, as she was not expecting to see me. Instead, she had on a conservative green satin dress with a whalebone corset and a bonnet--of all things--sitting atop those wonderful blonde curls of hers. She looked like one of the Southern Belles that used to take pot-shots at us from their mansions outside Atlanta.

"It's my last opportunity to catch this killer and find out his connection to Poe. I won't be hurt. McKenzie also has given me protection," I said, nodding over at Ryan, who looked very uncomfortable sitting on the plush red French divan. He nodded back, smiling crookedly, as if he were an alley cat forced to sit on a silk cushion.

"It's your last opportunity to be committed to Bellevue Hospital, you mean! I refuse to help you in this insane endeavor. Do you believe I could live with myself if you were killed?" she said.

"I need your help to set-up a lure for this killer. We can be there when he comes and find out who employed him. Can you get a woman for me that can attract this beast out of his lair? His name is Reynolds. Have you heard of him?" I asked, afraid of what she would tell me.

"Reynolds! Wasn't he the one who was killing all the hookers? My ladies are terrified of that man! You expect me to get one of them to become bait for this monster? Now I indeed know you are insane," said Becky, taking off her bonnet and throwing it on the floor.

"Rebecca, I need you to help me in this. Isn't there a way you can find out how to bring him out of hiding just for this one rendezvous?" I was pleading. This was the best chance at my capturing this rogue, and I knew Becky could do it.

"What have you done for me, Patrick James? Exactly nothing. I tried to get you interested in me by wearing those ridiculous outfits. Now you want me to lure a devil from hell so that you can solve your little mystery? I doubt it," she said.

I decided to risk it all. I walked over to her and took Becky into my arms. I kissed her with a great passion, until Ryan began coughing from his seat on the divan. It must have done something to her, however, because she looked at me with her eyes glittering and her breast was heaving greatly.

"All right. I'll do it. I know how to get him here," she said.

"You do? How is that?" I was now keenly interested.

"The risk of getting him to come to meet a call girl is too great. The only way I have of making certain this man will come is to offer him money to do a job for me. I will have to meet him, and I will have to get the word out that I want somebody killed," she said.

I was dumbstruck. "You? I cannot let you put your life in danger! I will not have it!"

"Do you want this Reynolds, or do you not?" she was adamant.

"Yes, but not if I could lose you, Becky," I said.

"Listen, you great oaf. I will tell this Reynolds that I want to contract him to kill Walter McKenzie because I want to take over the Plug Uglies' territory in New Jersey. I will also offer him a share in the dividends. This will ensure that Reynolds shows up at my office," she said.

Actually, it was a brilliant plan. I could hide out and then entrap him when he was visiting Becky. I would then interrogate him about who hired him to do me in. This was the final piece to my puzzle of who killed Edgar Allan Poe!

"Yes, I agree. I allow you to do this, but I must be in hiding when he enters. You must make certain you get a definite time he will be here, or this will not work. Do you understand me?" I took both of her hands. "Do you?"

"I do," she said.

"I now pronounces yer man 'n wife. Can we go get some eats, O'Malley? I ain't et since mornin'," said Ryan, standing up and heading for the door.

I turned toward him. "I have to do this alone, Ryan, so you must tell McKenzie. This is the only way the plan will work. We cannot risk two of us here," I said.

"Right-o. Now let's get out of here!" he said.

"It was quite astute of you to use McKenzie as the one to be killed, Becky. They have hated each other for years, and McKenzie's been attempting to kill Reynolds for years but has never succeeded. It will do him well to see his adversary behind bars at last," I said.

"Behind bars?" Becky's voice was shrill. "You can't turn Reynolds over to the police. They are incompetent. You must turn him over to McKenzie for real justice," said Becky.

"Oh, I see what you mean," I said, not really understanding the law of the underground world in New York. Most of my work to this point had been private affairs. Finding lost wives or children or tracking down stolen property for the wealthy. I had yet to work with the New York Police Department, such as it was.

"Yes, and O'Malley?" said Becky, moving up close so that I could smell her rose perfume. "You must continue what you began tonight, understand? Intimacy must grow as favors are bestowed," she smiled, and I saw a blaze of passion spark in those green eyes.

"Just keep me apprised of this development. I must come over before he gets here, understand?" I said, and I walked to the door. Ryan was already there waiting impatiently.

"Gargle a bit more carefully with antiseptic. Especially when you go to meet a lady," said Becky.

We adjourned.

* * *

When McKenzie discovered he was being offered up as the killer's target, he laughed mightily, Ryan told me, and he agreed to allow Ryan to serve as my steady bodyguard. I supposed the cargo hooker was taking a liking to me, and I to him.

Ryan and I played poker all week waiting for Becky to inform us about the Reynolds plan. I won a lot of money off the rowdy, as he was always giving away his hand by raising his thick eyebrows when he had a winner. It was rather like stealing, so I would then allow him to win back much of it, and we continued in this manner for quite some time. The ghost of Edgar must have enjoyed our shenanigans.

On the following Tuesday, a young boy knocked on the door to Poe's cottage. He was delivering a message from Rebecca Charming. It read: "Come on this Thursday, three PM." It need not say anything else, as I was aware of the subject. I gave the boy three cents, and I prepared for battle. This was going to be a confrontation to turn the tide of my case, and I was not going unprepared.

I cleaned and oiled my two guns, and I oiled the interior of my leather holsters for rapid extraction when the time came. The loss of a fraction of a second could mean my life, so I wanted to be certain all preparations were in order. I took a deep breath and stood up. I wore all black so as to stay invisible in the darkness of Becky's closet. Ryan said I looked nice in black. "Like the undertaker!" he laughed, and so did I. We shook hands before I left, and the short man vowed to hunt down Reynolds if I, perchance, lost the confrontation. "I'm outside watching fer that bastard, O'Malley. If he comes down those stairs, he's a dead man!"

"Thank you," I told him. "By the way, you must have a first name. What is it? I believe friends should be on a first name basis, don't you?"

Ryan looked down at his feet and then back up. "Aloysius. But you kin call me Roy," he said.

* * *

It was two in the afternoon when I arrived at Becky's office off of Union Square on Broadway. Roy Ryan was stationed downstairs before the main entrance to the building.

I greeted her with a peck on the cheek and no more. I soon was stationed inside her closet, with the curtain in front of me. It smelled like all her perfumes rolled into one, and I was afraid I would sneeze. That would be most disastrous, so I told her to give me one of her hankies. I would thrust it upon my nose if I should come close to such a sternutation. I listened inside the dark recesses of the closet for the sounds of any approaching person into the room. Becky agreed to meet him inside her boudoir, which was my location.

Almost an hour had passed when I thought I would give up and leave my closet when I heard her answer the door in the other room. "Hello. Yes, come in," said Becky, and I heard their footsteps approaching. I could barely hear them as they talked in the outer parlor. I began to sweat. I reached down to extract my LeMat, and I could feel the perspiration drip down my arm and into the leather holster. The long gun slid out of the holster easily. They were in the room, and they continued their discussion of the contract.

"You want him dead by what date?" the man was asking her.

"I don't want you to be rushed, Mister Reynolds. Let us say in a month. Would that be sufficient for your planning?" Becky said.

"Quite sufficient. For your additional bonus, I could have him dead tomorrow. We have no love lost between us, Mister McKenzie and I," Reynolds said. "It has always been business with me. However, with McKenzie, I must say, the Irish are always an emotional breed, and he is indeed a most disproportionate rapscallion. I shall enjoy putting him asunder."

I chose that moment to draw back my curtain and face my nemesis. "Reynolds, you may raise your arms into the air, if you will," I said, pointing the pistol at him. He was a tall man with red hair and a gray suit. He had a large white straw plantation hat on his head with a black band. He also had a long scar along the ridge of his nose. It would seem this man had been in a few scrapes during his time, and perhaps even a battle. He could have been called handsome, if there was not the taint of blood on his soul. He slowly raised his hands, staring at me all the while, his gaze not wavering one bit. It was almost as if he were expecting me.

I took five paces toward him. "I assume you are curious as to my identity. I will not disappoint you. I am Patrick James O'Malley. I believe you have me down on your dance card. I am sorry to say I have to sit this square dance out. As a matter of fact, I am calling the steps to this dance. I need some information from you."

"Is that so? I suppose you must know that I am rather short on information, but I do provide action," he said, and he smiled. The man had the whitest teeth on a man I have ever seen. They almost shined.
9 The Switch

"I

t seems you have me at a decided disadvantage," said Reynolds.

"It not only seems. It is indeed so," I said. "I am not going to kill you, but I need the answer to a very important question. If you choose not to answer, then I will be forced to shoot you. You were accosting this young woman, and I caught you. There should be no problem with legal authorities." I was not going to tell him my real plan, which was to turn him over to Walter McKenzie and his bunch to carry out their brand of justice upon him.

"I shall do my best," he said, smiling.

"Were you employed to murder the writer, Edgar Allan Poe, in Baltimore? The year was 1849. If you were, then I need to know who this person was who employed you." I was holding my breath while my captive was thinking this over. The time interval seemed a lot longer than it actually was before he finally responded.

"Who is it you think I am?" he asked, still with that ever-present smile.

"Your name is Reynolds! You were asked here by Miss Charming to do a job for her." I was confused.

"No, I was paid by someone I do not know to come here and negotiate a contract. I was also paid to write down the result of this negotiation on a piece of paper, seal it in an envelope, and put it in a designated location. I was not paid to do anything else, sir," he said.

"This can't be true!" Becky shouted. "You must be Reynolds. I was told you were going to meet me in person," she added.

"I'm sorry, Miss, but I don't know anybody who might have asked me to come here and negotiate this contract. I only know that I was to agree with whatever you said, and I was to find out your terms, and then I was to agree with them if they fell within the predetermined range. That is all. Nothing more, nothing less."

I should have known that Reynolds would have something up his sleeve. This made complete sense. Why would he come in person to a meeting that smelled to high heaven of entrapment?

"I see. This makes things a bit more complicated," I said. "However, we will both have to make a small journey over to New Jersey to see if we can get an identification of you."

This man did not change expression. He was smiling, and he seemed not to be the least bit frightened nor wary.

"Whatever you believe needs to be done, I am, obviously, at your immediate disposal," he said.

"Let's go, then," I told him, shoving my gun under my Army coat and then into the small of his back. He dropped his arms and headed toward the door. "Becky, please search this man for weapons and then open the door for us. We will return if this gentleman's credentials prove to be true."

"All right, Patrick," she said, walking over and pulling out a pistol from his holster and then opening up her front door. We walked out into the hallway and down the stairs. I kept my gun trained on my prisoner. "You failed to give me your real name. How may I address you?" I asked.

"Garland. John Garland," he said. I wished that smile of his could be wiped off.

At the bottom of the stairs we met up with Roy Ryan. "What'cha got there, O'Malley? Reynolds?"

"I don't know yet," I told him. "Come with us. We're going to pay a visit to your boss. I need another guard. I don't trust this gentleman."

"I'd be pleased to!" said Ryan, and we all walked with a bold purpose toward the Hoboken Ferry.

We reached the ferry terminal without incident. I kept at his side the entire way, with my gun pointed at him under my coat.

It would take an hour to reach Hoboken, so I sat next to my captive on the outside seats near the bow of the boat. He kept his gaze fixed upon the water as we bounced over the waves. I kept thinking about what I was going to do if he were, indeed, merely an ignorant middle man. My pursuit of the murderer of Poe would be curtailed, perhaps permanently.

* * *

"This ain't Reynolds!" McKenzie was shouting, marching in front of my captive like a crazed elephant. "Reynolds were white-haired, and he had a southern accent. This man's red-haired, and he's from New York."

The gentleman smiled up at McKenzie from his seated position. Three guns were trained on him--Ryan's, mine and one of McKenzie's associates. "I told this other gentleman I was not this Reynolds person," he stated. "I was paid discreetly to negotiate business with Miss Charming, and that's what I was doing. I never found out the identity of my employer," he added.

"Perhaps we can create a ruse whereby he deposits the result of his negotiations at the appointed place, and we can see who picks it up," I said, thinking out loud.

"C'mon, me boy-o! Do ya think Reynolds would come in person to pick-up that paper? He's too smart fer that!" said McKenzie.

"Yes, but it's worth the chance, is it not? We can follow whoever picks up the paper. He might lead us to Reynolds," I said.

"You have a point, O'Malley. Take this cur outside. We need to discuss how we're doing this," said McKenzie, pointing to Ryan.

My partner stuck his gun under his coat and put it to this gentleman's back. "Let's go, Garland. Walk," Ryan ordered, and they walked out of the wharf building and into the light of day.

McKenzie put his big hand on my shoulder. "I don't like it, O'Malley. This smells real bad, if you ask me. How'd this bugger get to be trusted by Reynolds? He don't trust nobody. I told ya, he always works alone."

It was at that moment that a panic filled my senses. I remembered this man's smile, and those teeth! Those weren't the teeth of a normal man. They were like the teeth of some type of manikin. I rushed toward the front door and opened it.

There, about five feet away was Ryan, lying in the dirt of the alley, his head bleeding profusely, his hand still grasping his gun. I knelt down next to him and felt for a heartbeat in his jugular vein. None existed. There was a long slice along his throat, and the blood was pooling beneath him like a scarlet eddy. I became choked with emotion, and I stood up.

However, it was what was lying next to his body that gave me the most fright. It was a full mask of some kind, made of rubber material--most life-like--and the hair on it was red and the skin was like human skin. Next to the mask were porcelain caps that could fit upon the outsides of a man's teeth! My captive was, indeed, Reynolds! The killer had changed his identity to fool us all. Why didn't he pick-up Ryan's gun and come back inside to finish us all off? Perhaps he was waiting to kill only me because he had another purpose in mind. What could that purpose be?

Walter McKenzie came outside, looked down at Ryan, and exclaimed, "No wonder that bastard Reynolds lasted so long! He's a blasted magician. A bloomin' Jean Robert-Houdin!"

* * *

I had a steak dinner at Fraunces with Becky. As I cut my meat, I suddenly saw Ryan's blood, and I could not bring the forkful to my mouth. I tossed the fork down on the table. "Why didn't we see that coming, Becky?" I asked. "A killer like Reynolds does not stay in business for fifteen years unless he is able to fool the people who come after him. I told McKenzie I didn't want any more bodyguards. I didn't want another man murdered on my account."

"Oh, and I suppose you can handle this Reynolds all on your own. What makes you so certain now that he's tricked you once? I would wager the odds have increased quite a bit in his favor, don't you believe?" Becky dabbed at her lips daintily with her napkin. She looked radiant, despite the topic at hand.

"I want to thank you for helping me. We almost had him. If I had just recognized those teeth earlier in the game," I said, waving my arm to the waiter.

The skinny man in a red suit came over. "Sir, may I help you?" he asked.

"Yes, get the lady another café. And I'll have one as well," I told him.

"Certainly, sir!" he said, and he turned and walked toward the back of the restaurant section of the tavern.

"At least I know where I stand now. This Reynolds will be after me, and if I can plan the proper entrapment, then I can still discover who he was working for. Without that knowledge, I will never solve this case," I said.

The waiter returned with two mugs of coffee. Becky poured cream into hers, and I put two spoonsful of brown sugar into mine. We both took sips.

"What, pray tell, do you have in mind to entrap this man? I hope it's better than my plan," said Becky, smiling behind her mug.

"I actually believe Reynolds is now afraid to go after me in person. He saw that I had a bodyguard, and I would assume he would believe this to be the case in the future. What is really in it for him? If he gets me, all right, then he receives whatever reward this murderer of Poe is willing to pay him. I don't believe Reynolds will do it. He has proved himself more interested in the financial gain than he is in the danger of the assignment itself," I said, sipping at my brew.

"I see what you mean," said Becky. "Why endanger years of successful business for just one job?"

"Yes. As a result, I believe if he does attempt to kill me, he will sub-contract it out to some other thug. If this is the case, then I should have an easier time of it. The danger will be minimized, one would hope," I said.

"But how does this allow you to get the necessary information about who hired Reynolds to kill Poe?" Becky was the ever-present fly in the ointment.

"It does not help my case, quite true, but I may be able to find out something from this person, if I can capture him alive," I said.

"Have you determined anything about your suspects? Who do you think had the best motive to get rid of Poe?" Becky asked.

I was afraid of that question. I was not certain that I had eliminated all the major suspects because I had not made the vital connection between the murder of Mary Rogers and Poe.

"I don't believe the two writers had any motive to have killed Poe. That leaves us with Crommelin, the lawyer, McKenzie, the gangster, Anderson, the tobacco millionaire, Moran, the doctor, and you," I said, with my face as serious as I could make it.

"Me?" Becky was quite aghast, as I expected she would be.

"Yes, I was curious as to why you came up with this plan of yours. Could it be you know Mister Reynolds from before this rendezvous? Could it even be true that you really have a rivalry with McKenzie about business? Did Poe discover what you were up to?" I watched her face as I asked these questions. She seemed surprised at first, and then her expression changed to one of extreme rage.

She stood up and gathered her shawl about her lovely white shoulders. "I have underestimated your hatred of women, Patrick James O'Malley. You have become the worst misogynist I have ever had the displeasure to know! I do not want you to visit me from this day forward. Is that understood?"

"Becky, you know I must put my work before any personalities. I needed to know whether you have had any dealings with McKenzie or Poe. Have you?" I moved toward her, but she backed away from me.

"I shall not dignify that question with a response!" she said, through clenched teeth, and then she was gone. I watched her figure move quickly down the middle of the tavern aisle, pushing past drunken hands that reached out to her, grabbing the door before the young black lad could open it for her.

"Waiter!" I shouted over the din.

The red suit came quickly and stood beside me.

"Bring me a whisky!" I ordered.

"At your request!" he said, and he turned to go.

This called for a stare-down with the grand master from Ireland. Whisky had caused rebellions and had propelled politicians into office. It had destroyed the Natives in America so that they were easily defeated by their white conquerors.

"Here you are, sir," said the waiter, setting down the shot glass in front of my eyes on the table.

I handed him money for the dinner and drinks and enough to give him a night out on the town of his own.

"Thank you, sir! I hope you have a rewarding evening!" said the waiter as he cleared the table. "I'm sorry about the lady," he added.

"Do not fret, young man," I told him, staring hard at the amber liquid. "She followed me onto the battlefields of hell itself. I do not believe she has deserted me completely," I said.

"Good on ya, sir! That's the spirit!" the lad said, hauling away the dishes and glasses on his tray.

As I stared at the whisky, I tried to logically arrange my case's puzzle pieces, so I could make meaning out of them. One piece that kept popping up into my visage was the infernal black cat! How did she fit into this complete mess? Who could have had an interest in this animal, and what was she used for? Poe was the only owner of a cat, and her name was "Cattarina." She was not black, however; she was a tortoiseshell color. I saw it many times in Virginia's lap on the bed when I would come to the cottage to deliver and pick-up a manuscript. Was it Poe who killed Mary? I did not want to believe it! There must be some other proof that showed there was animosity toward Poe by one of these suspects.

Again, I was at the mercy of any one of these suspects. In my worst nightmare, it could even be Becky. It seemed my only hope was to ensnare this would-be murderer by capturing his pawn and then going to his rook, Reynolds.

I picked the whisky shot glass up and brought it to my nose. "This is what killed my brother, yes," I said, "but I will be damned if I believe it killed Edgar Allan Poe! And I'll prove it yet!" I set the whisky back down on the table with a thud. Some of the liquid spilled over the sides.

That is when a curious thought came to my mind. What if I were the one being maneuvered? Perhaps this killer was waiting to plant the final piece of the puzzle right in front of my eyes so I would jump for it, as a cat jumps for a moving mouse. I felt strangely calm, as if my body had been lowered into an early grave. This was another of the "Divine Edgar's" common intrigues. I am like the man who is buried alive, without a chance to show his answer to the mystery to those living personages up above the worms and dirt below. I had my intuition about the cat, and I had my suspects, but I was lacking the final connection that would allow me to escape being buried alive along with my benefactor, E. A. Poe.

As I left the Fraunces that evening, my senses were on high alert. "Come for me now, you blackguard!" I whispered, as I strolled down the street toward the Bronx cottage waiting for me in the silent gloom. "It's now or never!"
10 The Maiden

A

s I sat inside my cottage, it came to me. Why should I go out to endanger myself in strange environs, when I could stay inside Poe's cottage and have the killer come to me? It is with this idea in mind that I proceeded to concoct my trap for this paid intruder.

In order to plan the most ingenious subterfuge, I sat at Edgar's writing desk to think. The night was windy, and the sounds of the whippoorwills, owls and other night creatures massaged my dark mental processes in a most delightful way. I had a fishing net used to drag the Hudson. Poe was a resourceful man, and this was one of the tools he used to supplement his meager author's income. As a Southerner, Poe knew that fishing was a certain way to increase one's menu, and the netting I found was quite wide and long, exactly what I needed to create my booby trap door apparatus. It was not exactly the pendulum or the cask of Amontillado, but it would have to do.

I was able to stand on a chair and hang the fish netting above the door frame. I placed the netting inside a bucket and then attached a fishing line to the handle on the pail. This line was then brought down to fasten on the doorknob. When the door was opened, the line would pull the bucket over, and the wide netting would fall onto the intruder, rendering him helpless, as I pulled the netting tightly about his form.

It was with this trap that I set about to wait for my prey. I moved Poe's chair over to a place in the center of the parlor, and I sat down in it. I kept my LeMat revolver on my lap during this reconnoiter, eating all my meals in the chair, and leaving my watch station only to use the privy out back.

For three days and nights, I sat by my duty station, waiting patiently for my pursuer to arrive. This was the only way for me to find out the missing link in my case. I had exhausted my leads, interviewed all the suspects, and alienated my best female friend. What more could I ask for?

He did not come in the night. It was early morning, about five AM, when I saw the black knob on the front door begin to turn. I thought he would be stupid, but this was a killer who was obviously expecting me to be asleep and dreaming of black cats. When the door opened, as I had not locked it, the line became taut, and then it pulled at the bucket above the door frame. As the intruder stepped through the doorway, the bucket overturned, spilling the fishnet down upon his body, covering him completely with an array of strong netting. I noticed, with interest, that he had no gun in his hands.

I stood up slowly, pointing my revolver at him. "Good morning. Let me get that netting off of you. I don't believe you can speak as well as a mackerel," I said, walking over to him and pulling the net up and over his body.

This was a short man, in his early forties or fifties. He was dark, with walrus-style mustaches and long sideburns. He wore a brown gabardine suit and no hat.

"We can get this over quickly," I told him, keeping my pistol aimed at his head. "Get on your knees!" I said, and he obliged at once.

"No, I think you should get on yours to pray!" A voice said. It was coming from behind me. I was just about to turn and roll across the floor to come up with my pistol firing, but it was I who was hit first.

The projectile entered my back, just below my shoulder blade. I was immediately immobilized by whatever was injected into my body. I felt my knees buckle under me, my gun fell from my hand, and I fell to the hardwood and into darkness.

* * *

I awoke to a scene out of the Middle Ages. It was a torture chamber unlike any I had ever seen. I had visited Andersonville Prison when we invaded Atlanta, where there were many torture devices used to get information from Union prisoners, but this room had some instruments of torture that went beyond the pale of human suffering and indignity.

My body was stretched out upon a flat surface of wood, extended about ten feet long, with ropes on either end tied to circular metal bars. My head and arms were inside what looked to be two planks of polished wood with the holes cut through to accommodate my appendages. I felt my blood throbbing inside the crooks of my arms and on my neck due to the confinement they were in. I could not ascertain how this device worked, but I feared my imagination would soon meet the reality of experience.

To my left, I could see another torture instrument. It was all-metal and had a frame about six feet square. Inside this frame, suspended above a bar at the bottom, was a circular helmet device that was attached at the top by a metal piston-screw, which obviously was used to compress this helmet downward upon the head of a human. This helmet had the added luxury of sharp spikes on the oval piece where the helmet met the head. I could picture the result very clearly. The torturer turns the screw and presses the bar and cap together. This would naturally compress the cap down onto the bar at the bottom, causing pressure on the skull, probably resulting in the shattering of the victim's teeth and the eyeballs would eventually pop out of their sockets.

To my right, I was aghast at what I saw. There was already a victim tied securely on the wooden plank by strong hemp, and he was dead, with blood and intestines extending outside his naked form from wounds that came from a small cage tied to his stomach. I could hear the hideous squeals from a rat, which had been tortured itself by the red coals burning above the cage in a wire container. The result was that the victim had perished due to the rat trying to escape the horrendous heat by devouring the man's entrails!

I heard the rolling wheels first. My back was now aching, and my skin was chafing where it met the wood. A tall cabinet of some sort was rolled into the room. At first, I could not ascertain what it was, but, as it rolled closer, I saw that it was a casket with the image of a woman on the outside door facing me. The woman had a halo above her head, and her face had the angelic smile of none other than the Mother of Jesus. As the hooded man rolled the upright casket close to the side of my vertical prison, I heard the sound of laughter coming from the side of the room, in some kind of vestibule or closet.

Another hooded figure walked Becky into the main room, and it was she who was laughing. She was, in fact, giggling like a school girl, and this was, obviously, highly inappropriate considering our predicament.

"Nitrous oxide! It's the cosmic wonder of the universe! I enjoy it when a little lady can have a good time, don't you? This scourge to womanhood deserves a little laughter before she gets to meet our Blessed Virgin's exotic squeeze. Halleluiah, brother! Say, amen!"

"Who are you? What are you going to do to Becky?" I screamed.

"How sweet! I knew this would be a marriage made in Hell! Joshua Reynold's the name, and I am a member of the new underground Confederacy! General Jackson never made me higher than a corporal rank, but in _my_ army, I'm the general! Yes, this here little room's where I practice my persuasive arts. Y'all should feel quite honored to be here! Most of the losers I kill get tossed in the alleyway or out into the river. I save this room for my most cunning adversaries. Welcome to my kingdom, Mister O'Malley. I'm really sorry we could not meet during our little foray on the fields of battle, but this will do just as well, don't you agree?"

"You were in the war? What regiment? Who did you fight under? Stonewall Jackson?" I asked, as I wanted to stall for more time.

Reynolds began to pace across in front of the giggling Becky. He had on suspendered overalls and a plaid shirt. I could not see any of his face through the thick black hood. "I fought on my own! I killed many Yanks in the war, and I still kill them. Of course, most of my prizes are monetary rewards."

"What do mean to do with us?" I asked, and my throat constricted. I had completely underestimated the cunning of this fellow. He was quite dangerous and intelligently so.

"The only regret that I have from the killing of Edgar Allan Poe is that he is no longer alive to write. I am probably the most loyal reader and collector of Poe memorabilia who exists in the world today. Honestly, I cried after I did it. I am not a writer, and so I have humbly attempted to duplicate his genius by incorporating these devices into my business. In some small way, I hope I can recapture the vivid fear and terror of our immortal Poe!"

He killed Poe, and now I had the proof. If I could just find a way to get out of this lair of insanity, then perhaps I could even find out who employed Reynolds.

"Sorry to be in such a rush, boy. I would love to chat with y'all, but I must take care of my business. Let me describe the Holy Maiden for y'all. Don't worry about Miss Becky here. She'll be a laughin' it up regardless of what I say and do. I don't like torturin' women folk, but when they do what she did, I have to make an example of her. You can understand that, right O'Malley?"

"You can go to hell," I said.

"I shall accept that as a negative. Now, look here at our Maiden. She was developed to put the fear of Christ into folks like the Jews and Muslims who never wanted to accept the power of our Lord. What's a better lesson than gettin' stabbed by the Holy Mother of God?" Reynolds pulled open the access to the casket and displayed the inside of the door. The door contained removable spikes that jutted outward so that when the door closed they would come into contact with whoever was placed inside.

"Now, let me move Miss Becky up in here so we can fit her for her conversion to saintliness! She's been a sinner all these years, but now she can repent like those heathens who were tortured in the Inquisition! Repent all ye sinners! The kingdom of God's at hand!" Reynolds took a rag from his back pocket and placed it over Becky's mouth, and she renewed her uncontrollable fits of laughter. Her hands were tied against her back and her feet were bound together as well by strong rope. Reynolds was a big man, and he lifted Becky bodily up into the inside of the Maiden with no trouble.

"Damn you! Take me instead!" I shouted.

"Oh, no. This little lady needs to repent, Yankee boy! She won't even notice what with her laughing so much. Will you, gal?" Reynolds moved the spikes on the inside of the door so they would come into contact with non-lethal parts of Becky's body. The gray ghost butcher of New York then closed the door to see where the spikes would hit her before leaving the door ajar for my benefit and for his own brand of horrendous drama.

"It is now time for the moment of repentance! If y'all want to pray a bit, then do it. She won't be wantin' to pray. She's havin' too much fun. Aren't ya, darlin'?"

"Stop it! You fiend!" I shouted.

"Don't get impatient, O'Malley. I'll get to you in a minute. Let me move Becky Charming over to this hole in the floor. See? She won't be dyin' just yet. She needs to bleed a whole lot before she can do that. Then, faster than a greased piglet, she'll get dropped down a trap door I built inside the Maiden and she'll plop right down into the river below!"

River? This was odd. That meant we were somewhere near the docks.

Suddenly, there was a great commotion outside. "Reynolds! O'Malley! Yer in there! We're breakin' down the door right now!"

"Who hired you to kill Poe?" I asked Reynolds, as he pulled a gun from his holster and began firing into the door that was cracking asunder from the weight of the Plug Ugly gang who were forcing their way in.

He glanced my way for a second. "I want to enjoy killing you, O'Malley. And your little lady's not worth the effort. Who hired me to kill Poe? Let me tell you this. The cat's already out of the bag. If y'all don't know, then why all the fuss? I killed the Divine Edgar. That's all that matters to history. I will see you soon, Yank, you can bet your medal on it!"

Reynolds shoved his pistol into his holster and broke into a run. He was out the trap door below Becky's Maiden before McKenzie and his men could completely break the door down. There was a small boat below; I could hear him rowing away.

I was wondering why Reynolds let us live another day. Did he really just want to enjoy the moment of the kill without any disturbances? I think not. He was, after all, a business man. Even if he did kill us now, he would risk being caught, and his timetable for executions did not have limitations. Whoever was paying to have me killed was not worried about how long it would take. Reynolds knew he had the information to link his employer to the murder of Poe, and he played his cards well. Perhaps he really did believe he was doing the great author justice by toying with me.

The door was finally burst open by the men, who then piled inside, out of breath and brandishing pistols, rifles and even a few swords. McKenzie himself walked up to me, his great chest heaving, and he said, "Which way did he go, O'Malley? The bugger was right down the street from us, did ya know? My man followed ya here."

"You won't catch him, Walter," I said, "He's gone by boat below. Look after Becky inside that casket." Thank goodness, Walter had kept a bodyguard on me after all!

Walter turned to look at the tall casket and opened the front door slowly. Seeing the sharp spikes aimed at the lovely woman's breasts, legs and arms, he cursed, "Damnation!" But when Becky began to laugh at him, Walter became enraged. "What's this?"

"He drugged her. Get her out of there. Reynolds said he would get to me later," I said. "What do you think he meant by the cat already being out of the bag?"

"Ya missed somethin', me boy-o. There's a person you've passed by without lookin' at 'em close enough. Go back over yer case and see who it is. That's all I can tell ya," said McKenzie, and he huffed as he picked up Becky and stood her outside the Maiden.

After untying both of us, McKenzie told us he wanted to go out and search for Reynolds anyway. Three of his men had already left before him, so he was going to catch up.

I walked over to him and hugged his huge shoulders as best as I could. "You saved our lives, Walter. I will never forget it. I owe you my life," I said, and I looked into his eyes with admiration. "And I'm so very sorry about your wife," I added, remembering his other motivation.

"All right, O'Malley. Stop yer blubberin'. Take the lady home and give 'er some whisky. She needs to get serious!" said McKenzie, and he walked daintily over the broken slats and pieces of wood to get to the outside.

I took Becky back to my cottage. She was still unnerved from the nitrous oxide in her system, and I didn't want to risk leaving her downtown in her "office." We were going to stay together until this monster Reynolds could be stopped permanently.

I looked up into the night sky. The clouds passed the full moon in slivers of gray. One cloud was shaped like a cat, and my thoughts returned to what Reynolds had said. There was something I missed when I questioned one of these suspects, and I was going to do everything in my power to find out before Reynolds could make another attempt at my life. Next time, I might not have the Plug Uglies to come to my rescue. There is a guard outside my cottage, however, just in case.
11 The Visitor

T

he next morning, Becky was at the little pantry fixing breakfast. She was in her white muslin underdress, and her blonde curls bobbed provocatively upon her neck as she stirred the pancake batter.

I sat at the table in the tiny kitchen. I wore my nightshirt and slippers. We resembled a couple at home enjoying the beginning of a new day instead of two survivors of a kidnapping and attempted murder.

"Do you recall anything that happened to you yesterday?" I asked, hoping to perhaps elicit some new information about Reynolds that I had not heretofore known.

Becky turned around to face me with the spatula dripping batter. She held her hand under the drippings to catch them. "All I can recall was a sense of complete joy and thoughts of humorous frivolity. In fact, my entire idea of what happened was a belief that my father had taken me to a circus that was in town. I thoroughly enjoyed the sideshow of inventions. What really happened, O'Malley? I am quite fearful to ask."

"I finally met Mr. Joshua Reynolds. It appears he now is not adverse to hire thugs of his own to assist him in his work. I had set a trap for him right here. Reynolds, however, appeared out of nowhere to inflict a drug into my body that worked instantly to disable me and render me unconscious. This was what happened to you, as well. He used nitrous oxide, known as laughter gas, on you. That is why you were acting with such frivolity."

"I see! I am certain this drugging played no part in my being here, now did it? Not that I am entirely disappointed at our rendezvous. I have never had the immanent pleasure of seeing you in your lounging attire, for example. That in itself is worth laughter gas." Becky poured the pancake batter upon the skillet on the wood-burning stove. The odor that emanated from the browning cakes set the entire cottage aglow with delicious temptation. In addition, she threw two long slabs of side pork into a greased frying pan. When that began to pop and sizzle, Poe's cottage became a wonderland of homespun decorum.

"We need to think about what happened last night. How does it fit into the overall case? This Reynolds could have done us in without any problem. Why did he take us to that macabre den of torture?"

Becky brought over the stacks of pancakes and set some on my plate and then fewer on hers. She then returned to the stove and brought over the two slabs of bacon. She placed these slices on our plates as well, and we began to eat.

"Obviously, Reynolds was not pleased that I set him up with my little business ruse. I don't know about what he told you. I was quite out of the picture because of the drug he administered to me." Becky chewed a forkful of pancake, smothered in butter and maple syrup.

"He told me about his fascination with Poe and his writings. He also admitted that it was he who killed the author, and he wanted to somehow pay tribute to Poe's work by using those instruments of torture on special victims such as ourselves." I took a piece of pork and put it together with the pancake on my fork and shoveled it into my mouth. Becky was quite a good cook. It was much better than the fried steaks and potatoes I had eaten for many days.

"Do you think he's just toying with us? Was he actually going to kill us, or did he simply want to show us how he used the instruments?" Becky was being the excellent devil's advocate once again.

"I think he was serious. It was simple happenstance that he had his little den in the same neighborhood as McKenzie and his gang. I just cannot get the cat image out of my mind. He told me the 'cat was out of the bag already.' What can that mean? I know, McKenzie said it meant I missed something when I was interviewing suspects, but what did I miss?" I picked up my coffee mug and took a healthy draft.

"Remember what I told you about your feminine side? This is a chance to utilize it. You must relax, first of all. I have been meaning to get you relaxed for years now. There is only one way you can become supremely relaxed enough to be able to focus on the past and remember exactly what you might have missed." Becky smiled conspiratorially at me from over the brim of her mug. Her green eyes were magnetic.

"Do you seriously believe that having an intimate relationship with you will give me the power to see things?" I was quite doubtful, and my masculine stubbornness did not want me to accept such a ridiculous proposal. I had successfully repelled Miss Charming for over four years, through battles and gunfire, and I did not want to break down my defenses now.

"Think about where we are, Patrick," she said, rising up from her seat and walking, very cat-like, over to my side of the table. She then sat down on my lap and put her arm around my neck! I was frozen with more fear than if I were facing a row of Confederate cannons on the horizon. Her perfume wafted into my nostrils and permeated my very existence. "Edgar Allan Poe, your benefactor, lived in this very cottage with his only bride, Virginia. They shared the most intimate moments together. Where do you think he got his inspirations to write such interesting mysteries?" Becky reached over to her silk sleeve and brought it down over her breast. There it was, staring me right in the face. It was a pleasantly rotund mound of pinkish flesh with the nub of paradise at its center. "Now, just imagine this is a pancake, Patrick. I've put a cherry on the top for you to enjoy! Please, take your pleasure, and we can proceed from there."

My mind was filled with the past. Explosions of cannon fire, shots fired past my head, screaming comrades falling over in the mud, the cold winter frost biting into me, and all these horrors were making my body contract and pull inward. It was as if my body was at war with the feminine presence of Becky. I did not want to go into her deep, passionate embrace, but I kept remembering what she had told me about finding my inner female and the ability to intuit what I needed to know about this case, so I found myself succumbing to her charms. "Becky Charming," I whispered, as my mouth moved over her breasts, gently lapping my tongue over her hills and valleys. At last, I picked her up and carried her to Virginia's bedroom.

We were both breathing heavily as I set her down on the mattress and followed her lead. She guided my hands most skillfully, showing me how to arouse her most native passions. The room began spinning, and I clutched at her before the moment came to enter the void. This was a moment I had always feared as a boy and as a young man. Would I be devoured? Would I lose my strength and become a weakling?

The explosions were all around me and I began, but as we slowly started moving together, in a most natural and sustaining rhythm, the fear and the violence of my life gradually started to fade. My body took over the moment, and the past became obliterated inside her. I felt cleansed as I became the one who exploded, and I fell back, completely exhausted, on the bed. Beneath me, Becky was writhing and humming to herself. She looked up at me and said, "See? Now you can become a vessel for the other world."

I then fell into a deep sleep on that bed where   
Edgar Allan Poe's young bride finally passed on, leaving her man a broken and dark figure in the world of lonely spirits and plotting men of fortune. I dreamed of the cat from Poe's story, "The Black Cat." Its one-eyed ferocity made me squirm and become fearful, and yet it was coming toward me, its back raised in anger, its hissing fangs snapping in the air like tiny daggers. I then saw the inside of John Anderson's mansion. I was following those Garibaldi twins down the passageway and to my right and to my left were the animals. I seemed in my dream to be in the heart of a great jungle, with waterfalls and misty rainforest vegetation all around, and the stuffed animals came alive. Anderson stood alone at the end of the hall, beckoning me forward with his hand. The two cats were on his shoulders, digging into his coat like demons; one feline was pitch-black and the other was a tortoiseshell, like Poe's pet, and yet they both seemed crazed and growing out of Anderson's body. Yes, there was no point where the claws of the cat ended and Anderson's shoulder began. They were fused together into one creature! This screaming and hissing being came toward me, and I awoke, shouting, "Poe! Edgar! I shall save you!"

"Patrick! Darling, what is it?" Becky moved toward me in the bed, her two breasts grazing my chest.

"I saw Anderson, the crazy tobacco store tycoon, who employed the girl who was murdered—Mary Rogers. The cats were in it as well. They seemed to be perched on his shoulders. However, they were part of his body! Their claws were fused into him. What could this mean? Do you suppose Anderson was involved in Poe's murder? If so, how did it happen?"

Becky stared hard at me. "I told you it would work. The moment you broke through your barrier to women, you were able to see the clues you had missed previously. What was in Anderson's house that gave you this premonition? This will perhaps lead you to the final break-through you were looking for in your investigation."

"Let me put the facts together. If Poe wrote the story for Anderson to mislead the press and the police, then Anderson could have something to cover up. Mary Rogers had at least one aborted child. She also lived in the Anderson home with her mother. If John Anderson got her pregnant, then he must have wanted her to get rid of the child to avoid the scandal. But, according to McKenzie, it was Anderson's wife who came to see him about getting Mary to Madam Restell. Why did she come to McKenzie? What was the link between Poe and the Anderson family?"

"I think you will have to visit Anderson again to answer that. Also, what about the cats? I promise you, Patrick, your intuition is now at its greatest power. You must find out if it works. Go now, before you lose the thread of gold," said Becky, wrapping both her arms around my neck. I knew I would have to leave at once before I was pulled back into her garden of earthly delights.

I rode Sherman II over to Sleepy Hollow and Anderson's place. As I rode past the forest, this time I felt the uncanny presence of Poe permeating the atmosphere. His dark reality made the willows weep with extra fervor, and the sounds of the primitive force that kept things in the universe balanced, the way the Transcendentalists said it was, filled my head with reverberations that sent my mind reeling with fantasies. Was I at last on a path to finding out who killed my revered Edgar?

A tall man in black clothes stood in front of me on the path in the moonlight. He was beckoning me to stop. I pulled up Sherman II and the man called out, "Don't be frightened, my good man! I am Pastor Ralph Newsome. Are you headed to the Anderson mansion?"

I was surprised that someone would be out in the woods at this time of the evening, but the gentleman looked to be in distress. "Yes, I am. What ails you, my good man?"

"I am concerned about the master of the house, John Anderson. Passersby had reported to me that he has been acting quite strangely these days. I did not want to report him to the authorities, as he is a well-respected neighbor and a contributor to our community in many ways."

I was interested in what this reverend had to say. If my theory about Anderson were correct, then this could be corroborating evidence. "What say you then? How should I be concerned?"

"People have reported that he runs outside to warn them of ghosts and other spectral apparitions. We are worried that he might do harm to himself or others. If you go there, could you please tell him we are concerned?" The pastor looked very disturbed.

"Thank you for the information. I will try to advise him, and I will be discreet."

"I thank you, kind sir. I hope Mister Anderson's mental faculties are better tonight. Please tell him Ralph Newsome asked after him. We used to play chess together when he was less encumbered."

"I will do that. I have noticed his peculiar behaviors, and I am happy to hear the community is aware of them." I gave Sherman II the heels of my boots, and I was on my way again, but I was perhaps even warier about what I would discover when I arrived.

The mansion looked even more foreboding as I pulled up. I noticed that the grounds had not been taken care of and there were extra steel bars on the windows. It also took almost fifteen minutes before anybody answered my knocking on the front door. When the door finally opened, the usual Garibaldi guards did not greet me. Instead, it was the master of the house, John Anderson. His appearance was quite disheveled, and his hair and beard were in disarray, as if he had not groomed himself in days. The whites of his eyes were bloodshot from lack of sleep or from some drug, and his voice sounded distant and much less authoritative than at our previous encounters.

"Oh, it's you," he said, pulling open the door. "Won't you come in? I was just going to sit down to eat."

I followed the short man into his abode, looking around me as if I were back in my dream. Certainly, there were the stuffed animals on all the tables. Why hadn't I noticed them before? Anderson led me back into the kitchen. There was no butler or maid to do the cooking, so the room was filled with used pans, pots and iron skillets. The smell was disgusting. Rats were running back and forth among the spilled garbage, and maggots had infested some of the leftover meat that was on the pewter plates.

"Would you care for some victuals?" Anderson asked, and he pulled a long pan from the oven. It was covered with a large lid, and he grunted as he carried his dinner over to the table. The long table was stacked with even more plates and wine glasses, strewn all about over the surface. "This is the delicacy I prefer most these days," he added.

I watched the old man as he sat down on the chair. He kept waving his hands in the air at something only he seemed to be aware of. "I already ate. But you may certainly go ahead," I told him.

"He has been visiting you also, hasn't he?" asked Anderson, tucking the large, previously used napkin inside his white shirt collar.

"He? I don't understand."

"Poe, of course. He has come to drive us mad. I suppose he believes he can relieve his own murderous guilt by haunting us, but I have my own ways of handling this kind of torture." Anderson raised the metal cover from the pan, and inside were two roasted cats! They had not been cleaned of their fur. They were whole and open-mouthed, their fangs showing amidst the gravy from the juices of their bodies. I felt an immediate need to vomit, but I held back with great effort.

"What is this? Have you lost your mind completely?" My voice was filled with suppressed rage.

"The witch who visits me gives me these recipes to keep Poe's devil spirit from attacking me. I can send her around to you as well, if you wish." Anderson began to plunge his fork into the meat on the leg of one of the cats, and his eyes bulged out with frantic eagerness as he pulled the meat off the bone.

Despite the conditions of his mental depravity, I knew I had to question him about the murder. This was my last chance to solve the mystery of Poe's death, and I needed one more clue to fit into the puzzle.
12 The Solution

"W

hy did you want Poe killed?" I asked him. There was no longer any time for niceties. My life had been threatened, and Becky's safety was also at risk.

"I never wanted Poe killed. I want his haunting to stop, that is all. He is the murderer! He killed Mary, and he'll kill anybody who stands in his way."

I decided to pursue the matter further, even though I was obviously dealing with a demented soul. "But, Mr. Anderson, sir. What about your first wife? She accused you of having sexual relations with this beautiful employee of yours, did she not? What have you to say about her?"

These words seemed to turn the old gentleman into a raving lunatic. He stood up and walked into the center of the kitchen. He then began spinning in place, like a whirling dervish, and when he stopped, he stared into my eyes, and I shall never forget the look of abject horror in them when he spoke. "She? Another one of _them_? These woe men? Why, I have put her away for good keeping. Just like Eddy would do! Yes, she and her little stories are safely tucked away in the manger of my family and our estate to come! If you want this brand of worldly truth, then you'll have to dig it out, my union soldier! Why then, why don't you go _now_? Get it over with! Find out your beloved truth. You're no better than Poe and his lust for his own reality of warped demons and black witchcraft and sorcery! I have solved that problem, too! I have placed the four authors of the eternal Truth around her lies. She will never escape! That's my protection for now, don't you know. Little Willie guards the vault of her hell! Now, get out, soldier! Get out of my house, or I'll bring the wrath of hell down upon _your_ wide shoulders!"

I had heard enough, and now I knew I must get away to figure out what the puzzle of his words really meant. The case was becoming more complicated with each turn. Poe, a murderer? Or, was Edgar killed because he wanted to link the murder to Anderson? Was Missus Anderson killed also because she knew too much? What was happening here? I wanted to rest and figure it all out in a calmer setting. I left the mansion and rode back to the city.

* * *

Later, inside the Fraunces Inn on Pearl in Manhattan, I thought about what the old millionaire had told me. What could he mean by the "manger of his family and the life to come?" Wait one moment. These rich ones like to imitate the classical nobility. He worshipped Garibaldi. Republics all over the world! Eternity--that's what he meant! They always want to live in some form or other forever! He was talking about a mausoleum! Where do these rich ones pile up their family after they die? Their mausoleums! The old bastard has buried his own wife inside, and there must be some record of the real events of 1844 somewhere inside. Everything was coming full circle here. If I can find Anderson's newly built mausoleum, then I can search inside it to find the truth!

I dropped Sherman II off at the city livery, and I walked over to the library in Manhattan. They were open until eight PM, so I had time to search through the records to find what I needed to know.

It wasn't difficult to find where Anderson's family mausoleum was located. In the City Library, there was a big article from 1861 headlining it in the _New York Examiner_. "Millionaire Tobacconist and Philanthropist Builds New Mausoleum in the Greek Style," it read. "Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn." That's where I was headed. I thanked the evening librarian, and I left.

The cemetery Green-Wood was built in response to Manhattan's rotting corpse problem–as the population density in New York grew in the early 1800s, churchyard cemeteries changed from small burial grounds into festering eyesores. The overflowing layers of rotting corpses were a public health hazard, and yellow fever and other outbreaks not only contributed to the unmanageable number of dead but were also suspected of originating in the cemeteries themselves. City planners looked outward, across the river, to the then unused farmland in Brooklyn and imagined an alternative to the putrid, cluttered church cemeteries in Manhattan. The plan wasn't just a dignified dumping ground for the deceased but also an oasis of peace that reflected the Victorian ideal of a beautiful death.

I picked up my horse at the livery, and I also borrowed a small sledgehammer from the proprietor. As I rode my steed over the lush hills, I saw all the beautiful memorials to death and, perhaps, to a future life beyond this veil of tears. No Catholics, Jews or other heathens need apply, however. Souls like Poe and I had to rot in our own graves, far from these hallowed cemeteries of the Truth and Light.

I should have realized that it was Anderson's wife who held the key to this mystery. She was the one who was trying to help Mary Rogers escape the clutches of her husband, and she was also eliminated once she found out how Anderson killed the girl to prevent his indiscretions with the young woman from being discovered.

As I came upon the Anderson tomb, it looked just as I had imagined it. It was four columns of gray cement, with the statues of the four ministers of Truth: Mathew, Mark, Luke and John, the four supposed authors of the testament of Jesus. As I stepped inside, a cold chill hit my back. I looked into the darkness and saw another statue: a statue of a little boy, standing proud and alone in the center of the mausoleum's gloomy atmosphere of death. I had the sledgehammer in my hands that I had brought from the city. I hoped there was no night watchman on duty, because I may have to also pull out the trusty Colt pistol from my army days, which I had tucked safely away inside my boot.

If I were wrong about this, I would possibly be spending many more months--possibly years--back in that upstate steel prison I visited long ago. If Anderson killed his wife, then he would probably hide her "little stories" inside his son's statue. Anderson wanted to be found out, as his mind had become ill, but his conscience was still eating away at him.

I swung down upon the little boy's head--for that was little Willie, of course--and his cranium split asunder, revealing the manuscript inside a boy, from his deceased mother. When I picked up this manuscript, it began to rain outside, and I sat down inside the Anderson mausoleum to read it. When I had completed it, I was on the inside of what Poe would have called the maelstrom of hell.

_Wednesday, July 1, 1841._ _I saw them together again. He was humping her from behind, on the stairs, and when I confronted him about it, he just cursed and swore, telling me I knew nothing. Once again, little Mary and I had to succumb to the male ego. Thanks to Mister McKenzie, I now know of a good abortionist named Madame_ _Restell out on Greenwich Street. She has promised me, for the right price, I can send Mary over to her. Restell is for the wealthy in this town, and I trust her. I am writing this down because we must take care of ourselves in this world of depraved men._

Saturday, July 4, 1844. Again, he is at it. She works her fingers to the bone, and still John goes to her for his pleasures. He has paid one of the sharpers named Reynolds to take her out to New Jersey for the next abortion. Reynolds comes in with those gangsters from the wharves. John has his rich hands on everything--but he will no longer touch me! I believe he will be discovered in this plot. Something will happen in that den of iniquity. He never listens to me at all.

July 26, 1844. What did I tell him? Now, Mary Rogers is no more! And what has he done? He has hired Mister Edgar Poe to write a ruse of a story to attract the attention away from him as a suspect! What will be next? Is he insane?

October 1, 1846. The worm is finally turning on my dear husband, the tobacco tycoon. Mr. Poe has discovered his plot, and he knows the name of Reynolds--John's conspirator--and Mr. Poe has promised me, in utmost secret, that he will go down to Baltimore to lure this killer into a trap. I must find out what counter-plans John and Reynolds might have for poor Mr. Poe. I fear his literary detection is much more astute than his real life methods. Men are always so very astute on paper, but when you get them into the bedroom--all hell is the master!

They know of Mr. Poe's plot! I must get to him before he leaves. They have hatched an ingenious method for Mr. Poe's demise. I overheard them talking in the den. That's a good name for their lair: den of demons. John has read in one of his many science books that the hydrophobia disease is spread to humans from animals with a simple scratch. He laughs, and he tells this Reynolds, 'We will take my black cat down with us to Baltimore, meet him on the train, and then concoct a rendezvous at the wharf to allow our black master to scratch or bite our poet and enemy and become lethally infected with the virus I have injected into this cat.'

If I cannot get to Mr. Poe in time, I don't know what will become of him. He will surely die in some gutter. They will change his clothes to make it look like he was robbed, that is a surety. Mr. Poe will not last at the hands of these two! I am going to the police--this is the only answer. Before another innocent human becomes a victim, I must collect my wits about me and visit the constabulary. I am so worried, though. John laughs at these stupid officers behind their backs. The story Poe wrote worked like it was heaven-sent. What story will they write for me? Will I be just another dark tale in some future Gothic fiction?

"Stand up to meet your maker," said a voice behind me. I turned around to see a tall figure standing at the portal to the mausoleum, and the lightning flashed, so I could see his face. There was a scar running all along his forehead and down to the underside of his chin. He held a long pistol, possible a cavalry model from the Confederacy, I couldn't be quite certain. I knew it was now or never. I drew my gun from my boot and fired. Thank God, Reynolds fell to the earth inside the mausoleum, right next to the broken boy's head. I felt his carotid on the neck, and it was silent.

However, just as I was going to reach over to extract the manuscript of Missus Anderson, in order to prove to the world that the events leading to the two murders were finally solved, the sky erupted in a flash of dynamite fire, and it cracked through the roof of the mausoleum and struck the manuscript full force! In a blaze of yellow and red, the flames leaped from the writing, and I watched it turn quickly to powdered ash. My ears were ringing, and my body soon became soaked with the incessantly falling showers.
ePILOGUE: The Cat is Out of the Bag

"H

ow did you know that Anderson had used a cat to commit the murder of Poe?" Becky sat on the front porch swing of the cottage, as I explained to her about the exactitudes of the case.

"It all began with the vision I had of Anderson and the cats. I was able to remember the animals that were inside the mansion, and then it all fell into place. Anderson hired Reynolds to kill the Rogers girl, and he also hired him to follow Poe to Baltimore and murder him. The cat was used to inflict the fatal disease of rabies into Poe's blood stream. I had surmised correctly that Reynolds told Poe who he was so as to make a lasting impression on the great writer's mind. Reynolds knew Poe would be delirious from rabies, so it became a mystery about the identity of this Reynolds after Poe died. Most people believed the propaganda put out by Griswold and the others who were jealous of Poe's talent." I started to push Becky in the swing. The sounds of spring were in the air all around the cottage. If Poe's spirit were haunting us, then he must have at least been given a reprieve from his agony. There was no raven at the door cursing Poe with "Nevermore!"

"I'm sorry the letters of Missus Anderson were destroyed. Now you won't be able to prove definitively that Poe was killed by Reynolds. Did the police even want to know why Reynolds tried to shoot you?" Becky asked.

"No, they had no idea that Reynolds was the gray ghost butcher of New York. I did not bother to explain the case to them. They just knew I had been accosted inside Anderson's mausoleum, and when they questioned Pastor Newsome, he told them about Anderson's mental instability, and the police had the old millionaire committed to the hospital for treatment. I would wager he'll be out soon, and nobody will have discovered his guilt. Only Reynolds and I knew about Poe's murder."

"But you said there were two men who accosted Poe in Baltimore in 1849. Who was the other man?" Becky tucked her legs beneath her dress and looked up at me.

"It had to be Anderson. He was the only one who knew how to administer the fatal dose of rabies. He must have traveled down to Baltimore with Reynolds, and when Anderson saw what a horrible deed it was, his mind became clouded with guilt. This guilt developed into a serious mental illness later on." I stopped the swing and sat down beside my charming love.

"What will you do now? Are you sorry about all that happened?" Becky took my hand and gazed into my eyes.

"No matter that the world does not know the truth about Poe's death. Just as I learned about love from you, the world may be able to understand the value of Poe through the great genius of his craft. This experience has taught me that destroying evil takes much more work than simply playing by the rules. I killed Reynolds, and he was evil incarnate. Poe was only a reflection of evil in the reader's own mind. Which man would you want to have lurking about on dark nights?" I made a sound that I believed was ghostly, but it probably sounded more like a cat being prepared for an Anderson stew.

"Poe, and his stories, of course!" Becky said.

I kissed her on the lips, and she squirmed inside the swing so that we began to tilt upward. I was happier than I had ever been on those long campaigns in my Army years, visiting Rebecca inside the cold and drafty cottages alongside the troopers' quarters.

"Please, Patrick. Before you go back to your investigations, could you read to me from Whitman once again?" Becky was adamant. She pushed me with her bare foot.

I got up and went back inside to retrieve the poetry of the master of eternal love. I would forever be grateful for the case of Edgar Allan Poe because I was able to become much more intuitive in my thinking, and I would, as a result, be able to utilize my subconscious powers of reflection simply by making love to my dear Rebecca Charming. My lease was up on Poe's Cottage at the end of the year, but my gratitude to the Divine Edgar would last forevermore.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Jim Musgrave's work has been recently featured in _Best New Writing 2011_ , Hopewell Press, Titusville, N.J. He was a recent semi-finalist in the Black River Chapbook Competition. He was also in a Bram Stoker Award Finalist volume of horror fiction, _Beneath the Surface, 13 Shocking Tales of Terror_ , Shroud Publishing, San Francisco, CA and _Thadd Presley's_ _Creature Feature_ and _Thadd Presley's Murder_. His short story, "Zeru," is published in _Mixer_. He has also published six novels and three collections of short stories at English Majors Publications. He is owner of English Majors Reviewers and Editors, LLC. He teaches college English composition in San Diego where he lives with his wife Ellen.
