The Beautiful Cigar Girl

by Daniel Stashower

  There is no record of how Poe fastened on the Mary Rogers murder as a source of inspiration. Although he would have remembered the celebrated cigar girl from his days in New York, he had been obliged to follow the details of the murder investigation at a distance. The story had attracted wide attention in Philadelphia, however, with the city’s Saturday Evening Post reprinting nearly all of James Gordon Bennett’s coverage from the Herald. The editor of the Post was Charles Peterson, who also worked as an associate at Graham’s and had helped to spark Poe’s departure by assuming his duties. In August of 1841, during the first wave of press attention in New York, Peterson had called for an “analysis” of the crime in the pages of the Post. This was hardly a novel idea during the frantic early days of the coverage, but the fact that Poe knew Peterson personally may have planted a seed in his mind. The death of Daniel Payne later in the year would have brought the case back to Poe’s attention at a time when he was closely studying Barnaby Rudge, with a particular emphasis on the mechanics of the mystery. In the pages of Graham’s Poe had offered his readers a short tutorial on “the design of mystery,” and invited them to peruse the Dickens novel “with a pre-comprehension of the mystery,” so that “these points of which we speak break out in all directions like stars, and throw quadruple brilliance over the narrative.”

  Possibly the Daniel Payne suicide happened to cross Poe’s horizon at a time when he was especially susceptible to the idea of writing another crime story, having studied the works of Dickens and Simms so carefully. Or perhaps, as has often been suggested, the “pecuniary embarrassments” to which he was prone had forced him to make an attempt to repeat the success of “Rue Morgue.” Whatever the case, it is clear that the Mary Rogers saga came to occupy his full attention within days of his departure from Graham’s in April of 1842.

  Two months later, on June 4, Poe sent a letter to Joseph Evans Snodgrass, the Baltimore editor, with whom he maintained a friendly correspondence. Snodgrass had recently become the editor of the Baltimore Sunday Visiter, the journal that had awarded a fifty-dollar prize to “MS. Found in a Bottle” nearly ten years earlier. Poe now hoped to revive the association. He wrote:

  I have a proposition to make. You may remember a tale of mine published about a year ago in “Graham” and entitled the “Murders in the Rue Morgue.” Its theme was the exercise of ingenuity in detecting a murderer. I am just now putting the concluding touch to a similar article, which I shall entitle “The Mystery of Marie Rogêt—a Sequel to ‘The Murders in the Rue Morgue.”’ The story is based upon that of the real murder of Mary Cecilia Rogers, which created so vast an excitement some months ago in New-York. I have handled the entire design in a very singular and entirely novel manner. I imagine a series of nearly exact coincidences occurring in Paris. A young grisette, one Marie Rogêt, has been murdered under precisely similar circumstances with Mary Rogers. Thus under pretense of showing how Dupin (the hero of the Rue Morgue) unraveled the mystery of Marie’s assassination, I, in fact, enter into a very rigorous analysis of the real tragedy in New-York. No point is omitted. I examine, each by each, the opinions and arguments of our press on the subject, and show (I think satisfactorily) that this subject has never yet been approached. The press has been entirely on a wrong scent. In fact, I really believe, not only that I have demonstrated the falsity of the idea that the girl was the victim of a gang of ruffians, but have indicated the assassin. My main object, however, as you will readily understand, is the analysis of the principles of investigation in cases of like character. Dupin reasons the matter throughout.

  For all of Poe’s enthusiasm, the decision to revive Auguste Dupin for the new story probably had more to do with business than the principles of investigation. Because “Rue Morgue” had been widely praised on its publication the previous year, he undoubtedly hoped that presenting the new story as a sequel, rather than an original composition, would enhance its value and perhaps serve as a further enticement for a future collection of stories. At the same time, transferring the events of the Mary Rogers case to Dupin’s Paris afforded a safe remove from the rigid facts of the case, in spite of Poe’s insistence on the “nearly exact coincidences” of his story. If some of the details did not precisely match those of the New York drama, Poe could put it down to the change of venue.

  Poe’s letter to Snodgrass, however, showed no sign of a man hedging his bets. Poe clearly implied that he had not only examined the case but solved it—“indicated the assassin,” as he wrote, “in a manner which will give renewed impetus to investigation.” Having set out this tantalizing précis, Poe turned to the matter of finances, treading delicately so as to avoid revealing the extent of his desperation. “The article, I feel convinced, will be one of general interest, from the nature of its subject. For reasons which I may mention to you hereafter, I am desirous of publishing it in Baltimore, and there would be no channel so proper as the paper under your control. Now the tale is a long one—it would occupy twenty-five pages of Graham’s Magazine—and is worth to me a hundred dollars at the usual Magazine price. Of course I could not afford to make you an absolute present of it—but if you are willing to take it, I will say $40. Will you please write me upon this point?—by return mail, if possible.”

  By raising the specter of Graham’s, Poe meant to suggest that he could easily place the story elsewhere at a higher price. Snodgrass, he implied, would be foolish not to snatch up this bargain, taking advantage of the author’s curious whim to have the story published in Baltimore. For all of that, Poe’s unstated reasons for wishing to publish in the Visiter cannot have been inviolate. That same day, he sent a nearly identical letter to George Roberts, editor of the Boston Notion, stating that he was desirous of having the story published in Boston, and raising the price to fifty dollars.

  Neither Roberts nor Snodgrass rose to the bait, possibly because the price, modest as it was, appeared excessive compared to the alternatives available to them. At the time, magazine editors could take advantage of the total absence of international copyright restrictions to publish foreign authors—such as Dickens—without payment of any kind. Although many editors, like George Graham, made an effort to give preference to American authors, there were always less expensive options to be had. Poe’s bargain price for “Marie Rogêt,” reasonable as it was, could not compete with the flood of free material from abroad.

  In despair, Poe turned to William Snowden of the Ladies’ Companion of New York. It was not a particularly good match. Earlier that year, Poe had complained about the “contemptible pictures, fashion-plates, music and love tales” crowding the pages of Graham’s. The Ladies’ Companion offered these same features in abundance, but, as the title clearly indicated, with the sensibilities of the female reader foremost in mind. Snowden sought to attract women of “exquisite refinement and taste,” though Poe would later deride the magazine as “the ne plus ultra of ill-taste and humbuggery.” A typical issue from 1842 featured poems and stories with titles such as “The Smile of Love” and “Birth-Night Reveries,” along with comment on the latest “quietly appointed” walking dresses and the sheet music for an “original ditty” entitled “When Time Hath Bereft Thee.” In this context, Poe’s story, with its lengthy descriptions of the gases produced by decaying corpses, would likely have seemed out of place.

  Behind the scenes, however, William Snowden had good reasons for wanting to publish Poe’s story. Snowden had been a member of the Committee of Safety, the group of concerned New Yorkers who met at the home of James Stoneall in days following the murder. Snowden had subscribed five dollars to the reward money, making him one of the more generous contributors, ahead of Horace Greeley and Park Benjamin. Like many others at that meeting, Snowden had been disappointed that the efforts of the committee had produced no appreciable results. Nearly a year had passed, and in spite of the flurry of activity surrounding the discovery of the murder thicket and the death of Daniel Payne, Mary Rogers’s killer remained at large. In accepting Poe’s sto
ry for publication, Snowden may have hoped to revive interest in the case and provide, as Poe had suggested, “renewed impetus to investigation.”

  Having completed the sale to the Ladies’ Companion, Poe sank into a creative lethargy, hastened by a further deterioration of the conditions at home. “The state of my mind has, in fact, forced me to abandon all mental exertion,” he confessed to a friend. “The renewed and hopeless illness of my wife, ill health on my own part, and pecuniary embarrassments have nearly driven me to distraction.”

  There were greater embarrassments to come.

  XV

  A Series of Coincidences

  THE NOVEMBER 1842 ISSUE of Snowden’s Ladies’ Companion, featuring “The Mystery of Marie Rogêt,” rolled off the presses slightly ahead of schedule, appearing in the third week of October. Nearly 20,000 words in length, Poe’s story was far too long to be published in a single issue, so editor William Snowden divided it into three installments for publication in three successive issues. Billed as “A Sequel to ‘The Murders in the Rue Morgue,’” the opening pages were tucked between an article entitled “The Bible: Its Description of the Character and Attributes of God” and a story entitled “The Old Oak Chest,” by Mrs. Caroline Orne.

  Snowden’s readers were accustomed to a sedate and morally uplifting tone in the pages of the magazine—“healthful and improving,” in the phrase of the time—and the editor likely hesitated before unleashing Poe’s graphic, blood-drenched tale. Still, though more than a year had passed since the death of Mary Rogers, Snowden knew that the cigar girl still cast a powerful spell. All but a handful of readers of the Ladies’ Companion, even those of the most “exquisite refinement and taste,” would have been familiar with the saga, and perhaps even walked the grounds at Elysian Fields where the body had come to rest. Many would also have been acquainted with the various conflicting theories of the case, especially those of James Gordon Bennett and Benjamin Day. Poe’s story, however unseemly in its details, would have been a return to familiar ground, in spite of the transfer of the action from New York to Paris.

  Lest there be any doubt as to the inspiration of the story, Poe’s unnamed narrator, the companion of C. Auguste Dupin, offered a clear statement of intent in the opening pages of the story, echoing the words Poe had used in his letters to prospective publishers: “The extraordinary details which I am now called upon to make public, will be found to form, as regards sequence of time, the primary branch of a series of scarcely intelligible coincidences, whose secondary or concluding branch will be recognized by all readers in the late murder of MARY CECILIA ROGERS, at New York.”

  In reading the story, these coincidences (a term Poe uses to indicate a calculated design, rather than happenstance) soon become readily apparent. Poe introduces a beautiful grisette, or young working-class woman, named Marie Rogêt, the daughter of Mme. Estelle Rogêt, who keeps a pension in the Rue Pavée St. Andrée. Marie, the readers are told, had worked in the shop of a parfumier, Monsieur Le Blanc, whose establishment “became notorious through the charms” of the lovely young woman. Readers soon learn that the courtly Monsieur Beauvais wished to marry her, but Marie instead had become engaged to the dissipated Monsieur St. Eustache.

  After Marie has spent roughly a year behind the counter of the perfume shop, her admirers are “thrown into confusion by her sudden disappearance from the shop.” Monsieur Le Blanc is unable to account for her absence, and Mme. Rogêt is “distracted with anxiety and terror.” With the newspapers calling for action, the police are preparing to launch an investigation when suddenly Marie reappears—“in good health, but with a somewhat saddened air.” No explanation of her absence is offered, and all inquiry, “except that of a private character, was of course immediately hushed.”

  Five months later, on a sunny morning in June, Marie leaves home to visit an aunt on the Rue des DrÔmes, but she never arrives. After four days, her battered corpse is found floating in the Seine. “The atrocity of this murder,” Poe writes, together with “the youth and beauty of the victim, and, above all, her previous notoriety, conspired to produce intense excitement in the minds of the sensitive Parisians.” Poe is careful to insert a number of details culled from the official accounts of the Mary Rogers investigation, drawing in particular on the statements of Daniel Payne and Alfred Crommelin, who are represented as St. Eustache and Beauvais. Poe relates a conversation between Marie and St. Eustache, her “accepted suitor,” in which she declares her intention to visit her aunt, but he takes pains to say that the information was conveyed “to him only,” implying that it may not be trustworthy. Similarly, Poe describes the manner in which St. Eustache “was to have gone for his betrothed at dusk,” only to break his promise at the prospect of a heavy rain. Monsieur Beauvais, too, comes in for “some color” of suspicion, in spite of his heroic efforts to locate the missing woman: “A visiter at his office, a few days prior to the disappearance, and during the absence of its occupant, had observed a rose in the keyhole of the door, and the name ‘Marie’ inscribed upon a slate which hung near at hand.”

  The behavior of Marie’s mother is also scrutinized. In the early hours of Marie’s disappearance, Mme. Rogêt is heard to express a fear that “she should never see Marie again,” and when the unhappy news is received at the pension, an “impression of apathy” is noted. Although Mme. Rogêt’s behavior is considered odd, allowances are made for her “age and grief.”

  In describing the condition of Marie Rogêt’s corpse, Poe employs language and details that would not have been customary in the pages of the Ladies’ Companion:

  The face was suffused with dark blood, some of which issued from the mouth. No foam was seen, as in the case of the merely drowned. There was no discoloration of the cellular tissue. About the throat were bruises and impressions of fingers. The arms were bent over on the chest and were rigid. The right hand was clenched; the left partially open. On the left wrist were two circular excoriations, apparently the effect of ropes, or of a rope in more than one volution. A part of the right wrist, also, was much chafed, as well as the back throughout its extent, but more especially at the shoulder-blades.…The flesh of the neck was much swollen. There were no cuts apparent, or bruises which appeared the effect of blows. A piece of lace was found tied so tightly round the neck as to be hidden from sight; it was completely buried in the flesh, and was fastened by a knot which lay just under the left ear. This alone would have sufficed to produce death. The medical testimony spoke confidently of the virtuous character of the deceased. She had been subjected, it said, to brutal violence.

  Clearly Poe had availed himself of the testimony of Dr. Cook, the Hoboken coroner, indicating the degree to which he intended his story to mirror the actual murder. Several other crucial details follow, such as the strip of fabric wound at the waist and tied in a “sort of hitch” at the back, and the loop of “fine muslin” found hanging at the neck. Readers are also told that the strings of Marie’s bonnet had been fastened in a knot that “was not a lady’s, but a slip or sailor’s knot.”

  As the story progresses, the details continue to run in close parallel with the events of the New York investigation. Although a speedy solution to the murder is expected, the police soon founder. False arrests are made, and rumors fly. A committee of concerned citizens gathers to tender a reward for the capture of the killers. A full pardon is offered to any accomplice who might come forward to inform on the murderer or murderers. The corpse is disinterred and subjected to a second postmortem examination. The scene of the murder is discovered in the woods of the Barrière du Roule, near the public house of a Mme. Deluc, who claims to have seen the victim in the company of a “young man of dark complexion.” Finally, Monsieur St. Eustache is found dead with a vial of laudanum close at hand. In spite of all this, the French police make no progress in solving the case. At the end of several weeks, a mood of grim frustration has settled over the city.

  In desperation, and with “the eyes of the public upon him,” Prefec
t G—— of the police resolves to consult with Auguste Dupin, whose earlier conduct in the drama of the Rue Morgue had made a considerable “impression upon the fancies of the Parisian police.” As it happens, Dupin and his unnamed companion have heard nothing of the murder of the young grisette. After the excitement of the Rue Morgue, they have once again withdrawn into their monastic habits. “Engaged in researches which had absorbed our whole attention, it had been nearly a month since either of us had gone abroad, or received a visiter, or more than glanced at the leading political articles in one of the daily papers,” writes the narrator. “The first intelligence of the murder was brought us by G——, in person.”

  The prefect arrives at Dupin’s lodgings in a state of high agitation, believing that both his reputation and honor are at stake—“so he said with a peculiarly Parisian air.” The prefect pleads with Dupin to turn his mind to the mystery, offering him a “liberal proposition” if he will undertake its solution. At length Dupin gives his assent and the prefect settles in to give a lengthy discourse on the case and its many challenges. “Dupin, sitting steadily in his accustomed armchair, was the embodiment of respectful attention,” the narrator records. “He wore spectacles during the whole interview, and an occasional glance beneath their green glasses sufficed to convince me that he slept not the less soundly, because silently, throughout the seven or eight leaden-footed hours which immediately preceded the departure of the Prefect.”