The American Mystery | Part Two
By J. L. Thurston
Part Two: a Murder Solved
WE LEFT IMMEDIATELY TO EXAMINE THE SITE POE WAS DISCOVERED. Attending us was Constable Jacobs and a man named Walker, who had been the one to find Poe in a gutter outside the polling house.
It had been raining heavily for days, and the road was rutted and pocked. During our inspection of the site, Scott casually questioned Jacobs and Walker.
“What do you say, Scott?” I asked after a quarter-hour. “Was he beaten? Alcohol? Opium?”
“I have a theory, Inspector.”
Jacobs spit upon the muddy road. “Nah, it was cooping, boys.”
I furrowed my brow. “Cooping, you say?”
Just as Jacobs took a breath to explain, Scott gave a thorough definition as he leaned over random tracks in the mud.
“Cooping, dear Inspector, is a voting scheme that is running rampant in eastern America. Citizens are kidnapped, changed into disguises, and made to vote a certain way. After each vote, the victim is given alcohol as a favor in the poll house, then they are cooped again into voting under a new disguise. If done often enough, the victim will suffer extreme alcohol poisoning, let alone any physical altercation — such as a blow or two to the head — sometimes resulting in the person’s death. Poe did, in fact, disappear during the vote for sheriff, and I overheard at the train station that the debates had been heated as of late. However, I am developing a theory of my own, gentlemen.”
At Scott’s request, we sent out another telegram, this time to Richmond, Virginia, to a Mrs. St. Leon Loud. I regret to admit that I was utterly baffled by the matter, but at which point I was far too engrossed in admiring the way Scott worked. Even dear Hamish, who had been Scott’s companion for years, seemed just as fascinated as I.
We remained at the house for the evening, while Poe’s body was being prepared for the coroner and given final rights. Hamish, Walker, Jacobs, and I sat silently beside the fire, sipping tea and fidgeting. But not Mr. Scott. He remained stock-still by the window, gazing into the evening drizzle with hardly a fluttering eyelash.
Within the hour, a final telegram was to arrive. Scott gave it only the slimmest glance and released a shout of victory.
“Aha!” By the light of the gas lamps and the flickering fireplace, Scott bore a devilish mask of shadows. “Here is confirmation to my theory of the kidnap and murder of Edgar Allen Poe.”
“Murder, you say?” gasped Jacobs. “Why, his physician is swearing Poe died of brain swelling!”
Scott rose his fist in the air, clutching tight the telegram. “All I needed was a name, Constable Jacobs. And a name I have received. Poe was kidnapped and killed by failed writer Park Benjamin.”
The room seemed to shrink as Scott spoke his revealing conclusion. “I knew Poe was on his way to Richmond to visit a struggling poet, Mrs. St. Leon Loud, and assist her in editing her latest works. It is well-known that Poe is a shut-in and speaks of his comings and goings to almost no one. So, the question remains, who knew where Poe was and where to intercept him? Mrs. St. Leon Loud knew, of course, and would likely have all but bragged about the honor. Now the question is, who would want Poe dead? What is the motive?” Scott’s voice carried with it now feverish elation. “This person had to have been in Mrs. St. Leon Loud’s inner circle, be a person of marketability in the literary world, and travels between Richmond and Baltimore often enough that no suspicion would arise. This person likely rides in a carriage with wheels set wider than a typical handsome, giving the impression of a private cab. This person walked with a limp and carried a short staff, and depended on Poe’s long history of drug and alcohol addiction to cover his tracks, which makes me believe he has a history of some medical training. Possibly a former military man.”
“How? How could you possibly have obtained all that information in a single day with no resources to speak of?” breathed Jacobs. The grin on Hamish’s face was remarkably proud.
Scott straightened himself. “Common sense, common knowledge, and precise observation are my only tools. With the voting at the poll house long over by the time Poe’s body was found, I could safely assume he was abandoned there after all potential witnesses were long gone. With the heavy rain and low temperatures, traffic by the poll house is at a lull, this I confirmed with the dear Constable on our visit to the site. Thus, the tracks of the suspect carriage were still somewhat discernible in the road, along with a set of shoe prints and the imprint of a short staff that went to the exact spot Poe was found, turned and disappeared exactly where his private cab would have been waiting for him. Though his prints were filled with water, I could see that he was a heavyset man, older, limped, and suffers from arthritis in his right thumb and index finger.”
“Incredible,” I uttered, unable to contain my admiration.
“I sent an urgent telegram to Mrs. St. Leon Loud and requested that she give me the name of anyone she knew who would fit that description. Someone who worked in the writing community. Someone who had just returned from Baltimore. Dutifully, Mrs. St. Leon Loud responded with a name. Park Benjamin, the editor and failed poet of Baltimore. He had arrived in Richmond three days ago and offered to edit her works instead.”
“Three days,” conjectured Jacobs. “He arrived in Richmond the day after Poe had been found.”
“Sorry,” said I. “But what, do you think, could be the motive?”
Jacobs heaved a weary sigh. “I’m sure we won’t know until we interview Mr. Benjamin.”
Scott gave a grim nod. “Many believe Loud could be the next big name in poetry, and I’m sure Park Benjamin would agree. She has many wealthy contacts assisting her, and a chance to cozy up to her should not go amiss. But more so than that, a man who has worked hard for his dreams only to have fame avert him is not a man with much to lose. And Mr. Walker, do share what you told me earlier by the poll house.”
All eyes turned to the ever-quiet Mr. Walker, the man who had found Poe. He unclasped his hands and spoke in a halting voice. “Well, I, only that I follow literature quite fervently, and Mr. Scott had asked me if I knew of anyone who would wish harm upon Mr. Poe. I said no one, but Mr. Poe did write something of a scathing review about an amateur poet quite recently.”
“The poet’s name?” asked Scott.
Walker cleared his throat. “Park Benjamin.”
I resisted the urge to applaud the genius mind of William Scott, but he was not done thrilling us with his knowledge.
“I’m afraid you will find that Park Benjamin had been in Baltimore just long enough to drop Poe’s body off at the poll house to make it seem just another cooping scheme gone wrong. When, in fact, Poe had been kidnapped, tortured, and given an overdose of heroin to send him through the veil.”
“Heroin?”
Scott held his hand up and pointed between his index and middle fingers. “If you examine the body, you notice semi-fresh puncture wounds here on the victim’s hand. Though Mr. Poe was no stranger to drug abuse, he had no reason I can think of to go on a bender while traveling to a friend’s to edit poetry, and so close to his wedding date.”
Having been unaware of this fact, I hung my head in shame. Most of the room silenced at this juncture. Even Scott, who had worked the case with all the emotion of a streamliner, swallowed hard and clasped his hands behind his back.
“Good luck, gentlemen, on finding Park Benjamin, and bringing him to justice. I must now bid you all a fond farewell.”
There was a collective confusion in the room, mine included. “You’re leaving? Now?”
Scott’s eyes turned to me. “Yes, Inspector. My deductive skills have brought you to the threshold of the case, and I will no longer be necessary. You may carry this out to its grim conclusion without my further guidance.”
I almost watched him turn and walk away before I remembered something quite important to the case Scott had not yet explained.
“Wait! And what of Reynolds?” I asked. “The name Poe said before he died.”
Scott’s eyes shimmered and I could see it was a good question to ask. “Ah, yes. That is why I needed a name from Loud. I was expecting to find our murderer’s name was Reynolds, as that makes sense emotionally. But Poe was not just a man of great feeling, he was a man of great intelligence. Reynolds is not the name of his killer, but of the law firm Park Benjamin owns. It seems he was warning us of the kind of man we were hunting down. The kind of man with a swarm of lawyers in his pocket. Poe dreaded, in his last hours, that justice would not come for him, no matter our efforts. And in a way, so far, he was correct. None of this has saved him, and now a great man lies dead. I must take my leave and turn to matters of importance in my homeland. Godspeed, good sirs.”
Just as Poe, in his dying breath, predicted, an arrest and trial never came of the case following the detective’s leave. I was but a spectator on the matter, and I had dubbed it all a failure within hours of my arrival to Baltimore.
I feel that Scott took the case to heart. He, along with the world, was a fan of the writer, and no doubt felt partly responsible for his tragic end. I spent much of my journey home in pity, some for myself, some for Poe, but most for the complex and restless mind of William Scott who must have never known a still moment.
