Imp: Being the Lost Notebooks of Rufus Wilmot Griswold in the Matter of the Death of Edgar Allan Poe

by Douglas Vincent Wesselmann

  “Join you in your madness?”

  “In my sanity. At last in my sanity.”

  “Jupiter doesn’t want me here. I overheard…”

  “Do you believe him that easily? Believe me, Griswold. That black giant lies for a purpose.” Poe spun on his heel with such force, I thought he would rip the room’s fine Persian carpet.

  “What is the Negro’s purpose?”

  “He uses us.”

  “For what purpose, Poe? Answer me.”

  “Jupiter is on a more desperate search. He seeks his wife.”

  “As you said. But how is that more desperate a quest?”

  “Ah, Griswold. Jupiter seeks his living wife.” Poe laughed, the dry, humorless laugh I had heard before. “The dead have eternity, Griswold. The living hear the beating heart. They sense the pendulum swinging – the clock prepared to strike midnight. He seeks a living woman, Griswold. His is the great peril. We merely seek the dead.” Again he laughed.

  A knock came at the door. Poe stopped suddenly at the far end of the room where his pacing had taken him. His head cocked, like a dog listening for rats in a wall. The knock was repeated. Tap. Tap. Tah-tap.

  Poe never took his wide eyes off the source of the sound. He flinched with the next repetition. Tap. Tap. Tah-tap.

  I stood up and went to the dark oak door. “Yes?”

  “Mr. Poe? Mr. Poe? I have a delivery for Mr. Poe. Mr. O’Hanlon’s my name.”

  “O’Hanlon?”

  “Yes, sir. I’ve been sent by his servant. Is Mr. Poe there? I’ve brought him a nice Chinee gift.”

  I turned to Poe. He had to have heard the man.

  “Tell Mr. Poe, that I’ve brought it straight over, just as his nigger asked. But I’ll need the money. Is Mr. Poe in there?”

  Poe picked up his angel-headed Malacca cane from where it was leaning against the wall under the window. He placed it next to the overstuffed chair. Then he nodded at me.

  “Open the door, Griswold. I wager this is a man to start our day with.”

  Puzzled by Poe’s cryptic remark, I nonetheless did as he asked. I hardly turned the knob before O’Hanlon pushed himself into the room. He was dressed in checked woolen pantaloons, a short brown waist jacket, and wore a planter’s hat with a feathered band. As he entered, he looked down at the vomit-filled chamber pot beside the bed and raised a scarred eyebrow. Then he took a glance or two around the room. His eye settled on a valuable object or two – my silver hair brush, an enameled cravat pin – then moved on.

  “Very nice. Very nice.” O’Hanlon was marking his targets.

  “Jupiter sent you, Mr. O’Hanlon?”

  “Aye.” O’Hanlon scratched his chin. “Don’t much pay attention to a slave’s name. But that was his name, if you say so. A big black buck.”

  “That was Jupiter,” I said. “And no slave.”

  “Slave, freeman, servant, shit, I don’t care. He came to me early this morning. Very impolite, he was. I’d a mind to beat him, waking me like he did,” O’Hanlon sniffed. “Except that I’m an understanding soul.”

  “How did he come to you, sir?” Poe walked next to O’Hanlon. He put his arm around the man. I remember noticing that Poe’s hip pressed against O’Hanlon’s right where the Irishman had a small scabbard hanging off his belt. “Did Jupiter know you?”

  “Said he’s talked to some folks on, ah, on Pratt. They’d put him on… er… recommended me to him. He asked that I bring you some… ah… some medicine you’d be needing, sir.”

  “Jupiter sent you with some medicine for me?” Poe’s left arm was over O’Hanlon’s shoulders. His right hand patted the rascal’s stomach.

  O’Hanlon tried to back away, but Poe shifted his weight and kept the man close. “Yes, sir. A fine Chinee remedy.”

  “And Jupiter? Where has he gone?”

  “Oh, he had business he said, Mr. Poe. Said he was heading down to Fell’s Point.”

  “I see.” Poe let go his grip and turned to directly face O’Hanlon. “So, you have it, O’Hanlon?” Poe asked.

  “No shit in my bucket, sir.” O’Hanlon’s personal odor gave lie to his assertion. Perhaps it was on his boots. They were worn and spattered with gray road mud and another rusty colored stain.

  “Then give it to me.” Poe’s manner was curt.

  “Money first, then the tar, sir. And…”

  “And?”

  “A little information, as well.”

  “What information, O’Hanlon?”

  “Why, the whereabouts of that juicy mulatto girl I hear tell you fancy.”

  “You heard tell, eh?”

  “Just so, sir.”

  “Such a delectable bit of news from the goodness of your heart, O’Hanlon?”

  “Well, the opium isn’t free, sir.”

  “Pay the gentleman, Griswold.” Poe became solicitous in the turn of his head. “Mr. O’Hanlon, would you care for a taste of Kentucky whiskey?”

  “Think I would, sir.” O’Hanlon smiled. His teeth were yellowed brass.

  Chapter 14

  September 29, 1849 2:15 p.m. - To Know Nothing is to Know All -

  I smiled at the clownish Irishman.

  Though usually not a man of such social artifice when confronted with an inferior, I felt the need to assure O’Hanlon of my goodwill. In my own Manhattan home, or in my circle of literary compatriots, there is always need to be on guard. The sharpest teeth are the words of a cornered writer, after all. So I had developed some level of competence in the art of self-preservation.

  Where this little fancy rattler was concerned, the threat was not that he might give birth to a damaging rumor or some fatal gossip. O’Hanlon wore a hawkbill knife on his belt that would cut much deeper than any salon prattle or critic’s scorn.

  And thus, I humored the man. Though he touched my thigh to impress a vulgar jest he had made or clapped me on the back as I joined him in another toast to some pagan Celtic saint or his lace-curtain mother, I gave no sign of the contempt I felt for him.

  Poe had left it to me to entertain our guest. While O’Hanlon and I drained the Kentucky whiskey from glass after glass, Poe had pulled the overstuffed chair up to a pietra dura inlaid pedestal table under the window. He had removed some glass tube-like device from his trunk and, after filling it with water from the pitcher near the basin, unwrapped the small round bundle O’Hanlon had given him.

  Within the butcher paper was a one-inch lumpish sphere of black tar – opium. Though as a faithful Christian man, I had no little disapproval for the Chinee narcotic, I made no move to stop my companion. O’Hanlon offered an endless series of salutations. I drank the whisky, and Poe hunched over the occasional table, using a taper to turn small black pellets of the poppy’s sap into curls of sugary smelling smoke. He would fill his lungs with the sweet smoke and then, as the tendrils of the narcotic slowly escaped his nose, he would take up the foolscap note and ponder it.

  I expected Poe would soon collapse into the dream world produced by the drug. But though he burnt at least five small balls of the opium tar and held the vapors in his lungs until I thought surely he must drown in the misty snake of smoke that circled his head, Poe seemed to gain energy.

  As for myself, the whiskey provided a sense of blessed ease that I had never experienced before in my life. The seductive power of the spirit spread through me in subtle degrees. I do believe I even became glad of O’Hanlon’s company. The horrors of the previous night and my resolution to keep to my hotel room were lost in some pleasant warm fog that enveloped me. Yet, paradoxically, I felt such clarity of thought in my mind. The sensation became exhilarating.

  I was not even surprised to find myself leaving the Barnum with my friends. I was not shocked, as I had been the previous day, by the noisome odors of Baltimore, even there on Calvert Street so close to the Monument Square. With a breeze that blew in off the estuary basin bringing the salted smell of decaying fish and bilge to the hill, perhaps the air was more breathable that day, being free
of the tinge of the pig lots on the west side of town. More likely, my near-intoxicated state dulled my nose while it sharpened my sense of wonder. Baltimore was a veritable carnival of novel sights.

  Pushcarts and carriages filled the street. Colorfully dressed women – and quite handsome women at that – filed by on the brick walks. Shops with bright signage and awnings were engaged in an active commerce. One fully seven-foot-tall carved Italian Harlequin clown clad in red and yellow motley with a conical hat bearing fashioned gold bells advertised a tobacconist’s stall. A splendid chestnut Morgan trotter clopped by drawing a jaunting car. The young passengers, perhaps courting, laughed gaily as they passed.

  At the corner on Calvert Street, we stopped to let an omnibus unload a dozen passengers. Thus emptied, the driver turned the conveyance southward. The driver yelled out, “Philadelphia Station! Philadelphia Station!”

  “But, Mr. Poe. This is not the right…” O’Hanlon was confused by Poe’s intent.

  “Ah, Mr. O’Hanlon, it’s a nice day for a ride in the omnibus. Come along.”

  We paid our penny fare and boarded. Save for a man engrossed in some black-bound book near the front, we were the only passengers, and hence I was able to sit on the rough bench with some distance between myself and my fellows.

  “Should we not have waited for Jupiter?” I asked Poe.

  “There was no use in that,” he replied in an off-handed way, staring back over his shoulder, out into the bustling street, as the omnibus crept along at its miserly pace.

  “No use?”

  “I am afraid that Jupiter is engaged in some business.” Poe was scanning the crowds, looking for something or someone.

  “Jupiter is your nigger’s name, right?” O’Hanlon leaned his head in to interrupt. “Biggest mule-ass blackie I’ve seen in a while.”

  “Our friend.” I said it without thinking. Though, of course, the idea that a black man would be my friend was absurd. I turned back to Poe. “Business? What business could Jupiter have?” For all the confusion and unnatural nature of my relationship with the Negro, I was greatly concerned. I remembered the measure of protection Jupiter had provided us.

  O’Hanlon spat on the omnibus floor. “You know niggers. No telling what they’ll be up to on their own time.”

  Poe looked down at O’Hanlon’s rust-stained boots and the tobacco juice he’d deposited not three inches from the toe. “Careful, man, wouldn’t want to mark such fine Brogans with plug.”

  “Never miss, sir. Never miss.” O’Hanlon laughed.

  Poe looked up from the floor. “No, I wager you never do.”

  “Sure do hold up to the opium, sir. Never seen a man smoke so much and still be up for an afternoon go.”

  “Always up for some fun, O’Hanlon. So this mulatto whore, where is she?”

  “Works at the Odalisk, sir – quite an exotic little establishment. Unusual possibilities, if you get my drift, sir.” O’Hanlon emphasized his point with a hard slap on my leg and a spittle-tinged sneer. I moved away from him on the bench.

  “And you’ll take us there?” Poe leaned in close to the man. “To the Odalese?”

  “The Odalisk?”

  “Of course, I meant the Odalisk.” Poe raised an eyebrow.

  O’Hanlon just barreled on, looking about, as if there were some menace in the nearly empty wagon. “Oh, we can’t go there until after the sale… ‘er… after the sun goes down. But I can show you a fine time in the Tenth Ward’s finest tap house until then.”

  “I don’t think I want anymore to drink,” I said. The closeness of the air in the slowly moving omnibus, plus the smell of old tobacco juice, had soured my stomach, and the effects of the whiskey were wearing thin.

  “Nonsense, Griswold. Well past noon now. Nunc est Bibendum.” Poe shouted, and though his words sounded slurred and abandoned, his face was intense and focused on O’Hanlon.

  “Noonk?” O’Hanlon was not a Latin scholar.

  “Nunc,” repeated Poe, “Nunc est Bibendum. Now is the time for drink.”

  “Oh, right. Got you, sir.”

  “I’d as soon go back to the Barnum and wait for Jupiter,” I said.

  “Nonsense, Griswold. The fun’s only starting.”

  “That’s it, sir. Fun.” O’Hanlon’s grin was less than friendly.

  The horses hauling the omnibus advanced at their glacial pace, but there were few stops for additional passengers, and after turning east and then south again in a neighborhood of singularly disreputable-appearing warehouses and thin-framed tenements, Poe leapt to his feet and headed towards the rear door.

  “Here we are, gentlemen.”

  “But, Mr. Poe. The Three Tun Tavern is to the west. You’ve put us on the wrong route, sir.” O’Hanlon was surprised by Poe’s exit. The poet didn’t even wait for the wagon to stop, but jumped out onto the pavement. “Sir?” O’Hanlon had no choice but to follow.

  “Poe?” I had almost nodded to sleep with the rhythm of the wheels on the macadam. I went along as best I could. When my feet hit the cobblestones, I near lost my footing.

  “But the Three Tun…” O’Hanlon began.

  “Dash the Three Tun,” Poe shouted. “Thought you were up for some real amusement, O’Hanlon. Drinks are on me.”

  “But…”

  “Right here. Right here at Ryan’s Tavern. We’ll have a few at Ryan’s barroom.” Poe staggered off towards a brick building on the corner. Though only moments before he had moved like a cat leaping off the moving omnibus. “Ryan’s it is,” he shouted.

  The signs on the building read “Ryan’s Tavern – Rooms and Purveyances” and above that, “Gunner’s Hall.” Poe staggered on.

  “But, sir.” O’Hanlon was objecting, but followed Poe for fear of losing his patron. After all, Poe had offered to stand for the tab. “Sir.”

  I rubbed at my ankle where I had twisted it, but threatened by a speeding gig, made a quick dash to catch up.

  Poe was already in through the double door entrance to Ryan’s Tavern, past the stairs to the rooms, and through another swinging door into the barroom.

  A burly mustachioed barman shouted, “Hey now! Who’s this?”

  Poe turned, grabbed me by the lapels drunkenly, and whispered in my ear very plainly, “Do exactly as I say, Griswold. Exactly as I say.” He pushed me away and staggered into O’Hanlon, nearly knocking the Irishman over. The two tangled for a moment with coats and collars mussed by the collision.

  “Hey, easy gentlemen. Easy.” The barman had a booming voice and in his hands, a large axe handle. Three other patrons were playing a card game at a table back in the far corner of the room. If they were paying any attention to the scene Poe was creating, they showed no sign of it.

  Poe straightened his cravat and marched up to the long oak bar. “Barman, we would like to rent the back room for a little serious drinking.”

  “Back room, is it?” He stared hard into Poe’s face. “Do I know you, sir?”

  “Such a philosophical conundrum, sir.” Poe took on the air of a lecturer. “Do you know me? Do any of us know anything? Well, I tell you now, sir. I know nothing!”

  At that the barkeep cocked his head. “Know nothing, sir? Why you’re right. For I, too, know nothing.”

  It was a curious little exchange. But it seemed to me that the two had communicated some secret meaning to one another. O’Hanlon, for his part, seemed unaware of what was transpiring. The Irishman tugged his hat down and pulled his collar up, looking nervously all about himself like a mangy bear fresh to the pit waiting for the dogs.

  “Still, I think I do know you sir. You have a familiar face.” The bartender’s face had a hint of hospitality – just a hint.

  “Well you should. I am Edgar Allan Poe. Great American poet and critic. Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered weak and weary…”

  “Well I’ll be, the Raven himself.” The barman’s face brightened, or such as it could in the dim environs of the pub. “I’ve heard of you. You used to live u
p on Amity Street with the Clemms.”

  “I am flattered, sir,” Poe mumbled in an affect of assumed humility.

  “Well, I do a bit of reading, sir. Besides, I knew your brother Henry. Sailed with him once, I did. The name is Timothy Screed.”

  “Old Screed, yes. Henry often spoke of you.” Poe had turned towards me and made a comedic face. It was obvious he had no idea who the barman was. “Griswold, give Mr. Screed here a twenty.”

  I moved quickly to do as Poe said. The coin was no sooner placed onto the bar before Screed’s hand covered it with a slap. “You’d like the back parlor, Mr. Poe?”

  “Yes, that will do nicely. And some cognac – two bottles.” Poe looked at me and added, “Two bottles of whisky. Do you have Kentucky?”

  “No sir, just the Cumberland.”

  “That will do as well. This is my friend, Mr. Griswold of New York City, who will be joining me. And my compatriot, Mr. O’Hanlon.”

  “O’Hanlon?” Screed bent over the bar looking hard in the Irishman’s direction. Our new friend had pulled his Planter’s hat low over his eyes. “Not, Sean O’Hanlon, the ghoul. I’ll not have him here. Besides he’s a Butcher’s Hill boy.”

  “Give Mr. Screed another twenty, Griswold.”

  I did as I was told, though I must admit that I did a quick accounting in my head and worried myself some small measure over the depletion of my funds. This time when the barman covered the coin, Poe stepped up onto the brass bar rail. Being a somewhat short man, this raised him up closer to level with Screed. Poe leaned forward, placed one hand on the barman’s hand and the other on the axe handle that sat flat on the counter. Poe tapped the barman’s hand and motioned for him to lean close. Screed bent his thick neck and lowered his leonine head close to the poet, who whispered something in his ear.

  “Well… I still don’t…”

  Poe looked at me, and I put another gold piece on the oak.

  “And you’ll take care to clean up?”

  “I assure you,” said Poe. “We are fastidious men.”