Poe must die

Prophet John. I seek no further involvement in this business-”

He thought of Rachel Coltman. “I seek no further involvement than I have already incurred and this is nothing I care to discuss with you.” Why hadn’t this Figg rushed out into the wintery gusts like the other animals?

Figg took one step towards him and Poe stepped back. Figg made him uneasy.

“You will help me, Mr. Poe. You will.”

“I have refused you, sir.”

“I have just killed two men.”

“Are you threatening me?”

Figg’s voice was that of a man with a dusty throat. Figg’s smile was the size of a sixpenny piece and lasted no longer than a drop of water in the fires of hell. “Threatenin’ you, Mr. Poe. Go on. Now why would I indulge in such practices, me an Englishman and all.”

“You have threatened me, sir. I know it.”

“Then know that I mean to have your help, Mr. Poe, and consider us joined by God until I completes me business or until God puts us asunder.”

“You mean until you kill whom you seek or until he kills us both?”

Figg placed an arm around Poe’s small shoulders, forcing him to walk with him towards the front door of the stable. “I am newly arrived in your country and I am sure you will be of some small assistance to me.”

Poe watched Figg reach inside his long, black coat. “I have here in me possession, a letter of introduction-”

Poe felt Figg’s fingers dig into his shoulder, keeping the two of them joined and in step.

Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing/Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before.

TWELVE

Flgg cleaned his two pistols while speaking.

“Me and Mr. Bootham here, we was followin’ you, Mrs. Coltman, us havin’ come upon you at the American Museum of Master Phineas Taylor Barnum. We comes near yer ‘ouse and we spies Mr. Poe a-strollin’ ’bout his business and we sees three gents leave a carriage and drag him from public view. These gents did not seem to be clergymen. I finds me way into the stable and-”

Figg stopped talking but kept working on the pistols. He sat behind the large oak desk in Rachel Coltman’s library. Mrs. Coltman, Titus Bootham and Poe sat in front of him; Figg could feel the little poet’s hostility towards him, not that it mattered a rat’s ass. Figg was going to squeeze assistance from Edgar Allan if he had to knuckle him a time or two to put him in a warmer frame of mind.

He looked up to see Poe glaring at him. Figg returned to his guns.

Poe’s soft, southern voice dripped malice. He hadn’t forgotten Figg’s implied threat if Poe didn’t help him to find this Jonathan. “Were you busy with cleaning rags when you first made the acquaintance of Charles Dickens?”

Figg didn’t look up. “Mr. Poe, had these pistols failed to perform properly, you would now resemble a gutted hog danglin’ from a slaughterhouse hook. I takes care of me firearms and they takes care of me.”

Poe crossed his legs, then turned his head so that he stared at Figg from the corner of his left eye. “You seem to have a way of convincing people, no matter how reluctant they may be, to do your bidding. Why not converse with the pistols and make them aware of the consequences of disobeying you.”

“Mr. Poe, allow me to tell you a wee bit about these particular pistols. They were handmade especially for me by the Reverend Alexander John Forsyth.”

Titus Bootham sat up in his chair, impressed. “Oh, I say! Were they really?”

Figg placed both pistols in a flat black wooden box containing bullet mould, powder flask, rammer and other accessories. Closing the top of the box, he set it to one side and folded his hands. “Reverend Forsyth was a man of the cloth in Aberdeenshire, which task did not prevent him from bein’ a right fine chemist and huntsman. In usin’ flintlocks, he learned that the powder flashed in the pan seconds before the weapon actually fired. This gave the birds and other game a right amount of time to escape. It was the Reverend Forsyth who designed a different sort of magazine and powder which stopped the flame from goin’ outside. He made the flame go directly down into the weapon.”

Poe rolled his eyes up to the ceiling.

“Figg said, The Reverend Forsyth became very famous in England for his work with firearms. Napoleon Bonaparte offered him twenty thousand pounds for the secret of his special gunpowder but the Reverend bein’ a good Englishman, he said no to the Frenchie. Now the Frenchie he does not take no for an answer. He lets out that he was goin’ to have Forsyth’s secret one way or the other, this bein’ more than twenty years ago and the war bein’ on. So the Duke of Wellington he comes to me dad and he asks him to be protector for the Reverend Forsyth, to be his bodyguard. Me dad agrees, me dad bein’ in the trade like I am now and he stays with the Reverend.”

Figg stroked a scar that divided his left eyebrow. “Some Frenchies come for the Reverend one night, but me dad was a good man in a fight so he kills three of ’em and drives off the rest.”

Poe covered his mouth with a small, white hand. “Did he trample the roses as well?”

“Sad to say, me dad took a ball in the leg that night and he died of gangrene.” He looked at Poe. “The Reverend he made me these here pistols out of gratitude. His grace the Duke of Wellington, he taught me how to use ’em.”

Titus Bootham’s eyes were misty behind his steel-rimmed glasses. “Oh I say, jolly good. Jolly, jolly good.”

Poe, eyes on the carpet, combed his forehead with his fingers. He wasn’t going to apologize for what he’d just said, but he did feel uncomfortable. “I still desire to know why you followed Mrs. Coltman through the streets. There is nothing in Mr. Dickens’ letter of introduction encouraging you to do such a thing.”

“Granted. I was at the museum of Mr. Barnum in order to locate some of Jonathan’s associates who’d come here from England. I saw Mrs. Coltman havin’ a chat with one or two of them and-”

Rachel pulled nervously on a small, lace handkerchief. “Mr. Figg, I too would like to know your role in my life.”

“Yes, mum. A month ago, Jonathan killed my wife, Althea. She was young, mum, pretty like yourself and she had no experience of the world. Maybe I was too old for her, but she and I, we had some little happiness until-”

Figg closed his eyes, then opened them. “She was an actress and that went against the teachings of her father, the Archbishop Claridge. When she went upon the stage, he asked her to leave his home and she had no place to go. I give her a home and in time, we married. In a church I’m proud to say. But the people she was play actin’ with, they was bad people, odd people and Jonathan was their leader. He and Althea soon became, they became …”

Rachel flushed. “I understand, Mr. Figg.”

“Thankin’ you, mum. It is a hurtin’ thing to speak of, so I thank you for understandin’. Now Jonathan, he is a man what worships demons. He has given himself to the powers of darkness. Oh he is clever, I will allow that. But he is more, mum. Special powers he has and all of them given him by evil bein’s. For years, he has been searchin’ for the Throne of Solomon-”

Rachel inhaled sharply, both hands going to her mouth.

Figg noticed, but made no comment. “Althea told me of these things. Towards the end, she had to talk to someone. She said this here throne, it has got a special magic it does. Can make a man wealthy and more powerful than Satan himself. Jonathan has been after it for a long time.”

Figg looked at Rachel Coltman. “Same as yer husband, mum. Mr. Justin wanted that throne, did he not?”

He saw her nod, then pull hard on the handkerchief as if trying to shred it. Figg didn’t want to upset the lady but the truth had to be told. “Mum, if you have anythin’ to do with Jonathan, I beg you do no more deals from this