The Poe Shadow

Duponte squared his body to his confronter and spoke two words.

'Rosy God.'

13

EVEN WITH MY unshakable faith in Duponte's analytic talents; even with the breathless tales I had heard of his achievements from newspapers, commissionnaires, and policemen in Paris; even remembering what I had witnessed in the Parisian gardens and in the revelation of the stowaway on the steamship; even remembering that Poe himself had pointed in his direction through his tales as a genius separate from all others; even with all this, still I could not believe what happened in the damp corridor of this building. The doorkeeper glared, stepped aside, then motioned us forward to the threshold behind him…

The signal that had admitted us-as in some nursery tale of magic-this 'Rosy God,' I had heard occasionally on the street as a low phrase for red wine. What extraordinary cipher could have been seen in the floors, in the walls, in the stairs, in the doorkeeper's countenance or dress, that had led Duponte to decipher the code of entrance-a password that might change with the season or every hour-into this private and well-guarded den?

'How did you,' I said, stopping midway on the creaking stairs. 'Monsieur, the pass-word-'

'Aside! Aside!' A man lurching over the stairs from above squeezed past us. Duponte accelerated our climb. The raucous shouts from above became clearer.

The upper floor was a small room filled with smoke and noise. Firemen and tottering rowdies sat at gaming tables and called for more drinks from thinly clad bargirls, dresses only barely covering the milky white of their necks. One rogue sprawled out flat on a bed of sharp oyster shells, while one of his comrades kicked him over to the left for a better place to stand for a billiards game.

Duponte found a small, broken table more or less right at the center, where we were conspicuous. Heated stares followed us into our rickety chairs. Duponte sat and nodded to a waitress as though entering a respectable cafe on the sidewalks of Paris.

'Monsieur,' I whispered, taking a seat, 'you must tell me directly-how is it you knew the pass-word to admit us?'

'The explanation is rather simple. I did not give the pass-word.'

'My dear Duponte! It was like an ‘open sesame'! If this were two centuries earlier, you would have burned as a witch. I cannot stand to continue without being enlightened as to this point!'

Duponte rubbed one of his eyes as though just waking up. 'Monsieur Clark. Why have we come here to this building?' he asked.

I did not mind playing the student if it would provide answers. 'To see if Baron Dupin had also come in here, and if so what he was looking for tonight before we happened upon him.'

'You are right-all right. Now, if you were the proprietor of a secret or private association, would you be most interested in talking with a visitor who gave the correct pass-word, as was given by every simpleton and sot you see in this rum-hole'-this he said without lowering his voice, causing some heads to swivel-'or talking with that one peculiar person who arrives out of place and, quite brashly, provides an absolutely incorrect pass-word?'

I paused. 'I suppose the latter,' I admitted. 'Do you mean to say that you invented a phrase, knowing plainly it was wrong; and that because it was wrong we would be as readily admitted?'

'Exactly. ‘Rosy God' was as good as another. We could have chosen almost any word, as long as our demeanor was equally interested. They would know we were not part of their usual community, and yet be aware that we seriously desired entrance. Now, these suppositions accepted, if our intent was thought to be possibly aggressive, even violent, as they must initially consider, they would rather us inside here, surrounded by their rather large-sized allies and whatever weapons are kept here, than downstairs, where, they might imagine, our own friends could be hiding outside the street door. Would you not think in the same way? Of course, we seek no violent confrontation. Our time here will be brief, and we need no more than a few moments to begin to understand the Baron's interest.'

'But how shall you be led to the proprietor here?'

'He shall approach us, if I am right,' Duponte answered.

After a few minutes, a paternal man with a white beard stood before us. The menacing doorkeeper lumbered to our other side, closing us in. We rose from the table. The first man, in tones harsher than seemed possible from his looks, introduced himself only as the president of the Whigs of the Fourth Ward and asked why we were there.

'Only to aid you, sir.' Duponte bowed. 'I believe there was a gentleman trying to enter here in the last hour, probably offering money to your doorkeeper for information.'

The proprietor turned to his doorkeeper. 'Is it true, Tindley?'

'He waved some hard cash, Mr. George.' The doorkeeper nodded sheepishly. 'I turned the blockhead away, sir.'

'What was it he was asking?' Duponte inquired. Though my companion had no authority here, the doorkeeper seemed to forget that and answered.

'He was all agog to know if we had been interfering in the elections in October of two years ago, laying pipe with voters and such. I told him we were a private Whig club and he would do well to give the pass-word or lope.'

'Did you take his money?' asked his chief sternly.

'Course not! I was on the sharp, Mr. George!'

Mr. George glanced peevishly at the doorkeeper at the use of his name. 'What do you two have to do with this? Are you sent by the Democrats?'

I could see Duponte was satisfied with what had been so readily revealed: what sort of club this was, what the Baron had wanted, and the name of the leader of this society. Now Duponte's face lit up with a new idea.

'I live far from America, and could not tell a Whig from a Democrat. We have come merely to proffer a friendly caution,' said Duponte reassuringly. 'That gentleman who called earlier tonight will not be satisfied with your doorkeeper's answer. I think I can put you in the way of detecting the villain of this rascality. He means to quarrel with you over the moral principles of your club.'

'That so?' the proprietor said, contemplating this. 'Well, thank you kindly for your concern. Now you two cap your luck before there are any more quarrels here.'

'Your servant, Mr. George,' Duponte said with a bow.

14

THE NEXT DAY, I pressed Duponte on why he had so easily agreed to the Baron Dupin's demand that he refrain from talking to witnesses. It would now be a race to gather information, and we could afford no encumbrance. I was anxious to know Duponte's plans to combat the Baron.

'You intend to deceive him, I suppose? You will, of course, speak to persons who know something of Poe's last visit?'

'I shall remain quite faithful to my pledge. No, I will not interview his witnesses.'

'Why? Baron Dupin has done nothing to merit your pledge. He has certainly done nothing to claim any witnesses as his alone. How shall we possibly understand what happened to Poe if we cannot speak to those who saw him personally?'

'They will be useless.'

'But would their memories not be fresh from the time of Poe's death, which was but two years ago?'

'Their memories, monsieur, hardly exist at present, but are subsumed by the Baron's tales. The Baron has infected the newspapers and the whispers of Baltimore with his sophistry and craft. All actual witnesses will have become tainted, if they are not already, by the time we would be able to locate them.'

'Do you believe they would lie?'