My Clockwork Muse (14 page)

"Quiet!" I warned. It must have been after
midnight.

"Listen to him! 'Quiet,' he says. I had to
play dumb all day, Eddy, acting like a stupid bird. And now you
want me to be quiet?" Tap flapped across the room and alighted on
the bureau.

I rushed after him and opened the door a
crack, thrusting my head through. The hallway was empty and dark. I
heard nothing but the ticking of a clock. Satisfied that he had
disturbed no one, I closed the door softly.

I turned to Tap. "What do you mean?" I
asked.

"You left me alone with the cops, Eddy. It
was just me and them,
mano a mano
."

"
Mano
...?"

"...
a mano
, yes. The big cheese, he
tore off after you—"

"Gessler," I said.

"—but the rest of the cops wanted to go
through your stuff."

"My stuff? What did they find?"

"Nothing! Thanks to me, that is." Tap took a
moment to inspect his surroundings. He looked down at his feet,
scanned the top of the bureau and paused to cock his head at his
own reflection in the mirror. "Say, this is living! Is this where
we're staying?"

"For the time being. What happened?"

"What happened? I saved your ass, that's what
happened. Forced to humiliate myself—for your sake, Eddy. And not
for the first time, let me tell ya."

I felt my patience ebbing. "Damn you, Tap!
Out with it!"

"Okay, okay. Summary version: The cops wanted
to go through your desk. But I raised such a flirt and flutter, I
wouldn't let them get anywhere near your desk drawer. I knew what
you had in there—your laudan and your sheet of fancy
L
's and
whatever the hell else you keep in there. God knows! The cops were
busy chasing me all over the room."

"And they never got into my desk?" It was
more than I could have hoped for.

"Naw, they forgot all about it. I was
dive-bombing them. Anyway, just to make sure, I..."

"Yes?" I asked. I had no idea what
'dive-bombing' was, but with Tap you had to sift through lots of
mysterious phrases to get at the nub of his meaning.

"I..." Tap seemed hesitant to continue.

"You what?
What?
"

"I took a big bird dump right on the drawer
handle. None of the cops even tried to touch it after that."

"You did what?"

"I'm not proud of it."

"The police never searched my desk?" This
seemed to me the main point.

Tap shook his head. "Everything is just as
you left it. Laudan,
L
's, everything!"

"Tap, I love you!" I said.

"Well, just remember that when you go home
and find your desk drawer streaked with bird shit. That was me. But
it was out of love that I did it, Eddy. You said it yourself. It
was a love-dump."

I laughed and got back into bed, feeling
lighter than before. Tap continued talking, even after I had closed
my eyes.

"Not such a 'thing of evil' now, am I, Eddy?
By the way, 'evil' and 'devil' don't rhyme. Just so you
know..."

~ * * * ~

When I woke in the morning, Tap was gone. I
left the window open a crack in case he decided to return. Then I
put on my clothes from the previous day. My story, 'Berenice', was
still in my pocket where I had put it to keep it out of Gessler's
clutches. Briggs would have his original story, no reprints today.
I withdrew it and folded the pages neatly and replaced them in my
pocket. Then I had Mr. Dansby drive me to the train station where I
could make my way into the city to meet with Briggs.

It seemed to me that much had changed since I
had last seen him. Then, I had thought Burton's fate an odd sort of
mystery bearing little connection to me, and Gessler's fixation on
me a mere nuisance. Yet both had been enough to put me on edge and
we had parted—Briggs and I—with Briggs convinced that I was
mad.

Things had only grown more complicated since.
The Burton mystery had been compounded by both living and dead
versions of the same man, one of whom I had consumed in flames
along with the environs of his entombment while Gessler's interest
in me had become less the annoying infatuation of an admirer than
the scheming of a dangerous hunter—especially after I had led him
on a frantic chase through the streets of the city.

So I was not quite sure what to expect as I
turned the corner and approached the entrance to the offices of the
Journal
. One thing that did not surprise me was the
congregation of the Raven-boys outside the front door. After the
fright I had given them on Friday, they were not as bold as usual.
But once they saw that I had regained my customary cheerfulness,
they swarmed me as always with their cries of "Nevermore!
Nevermore!"

I reflected that Tap would love to see this
someday—and the boys Tap, too, no doubt.

I tucked my thumbs under my arms and gave
them a flap, whereupon, giggling, the boys dispersed to the four
winds like a flock of birds themselves.

Inside, I had expected to find Briggs at work
in his office. I instead found him busy in mine.

"Briggs! What is the meaning of this?"

He was dragging furniture and boxes out of my
office. There was my couch, my desk. When Briggs heard my voice, he
looked up from his labors. Rivulets of sweat streaked his face. He
looked like a man who had been caught in some devious undertaking,
and I concluded at once that indeed he had.

I wound my way through the rows of desks in
the front office, feeling my face growing hotter with each step.
The girls would not look at me as I passed.

"Edgar! What on earth are you doing here?"
Briggs asked. He was in the midst of filling a small trunk with my
personal effects. My pens ... an inkwell... He met my gaze only
briefly before going back to work. His shame would not allow him to
look me in the eye. "I thought I told you to go home and get some
rest."

"Why? So you could rob me?" I strode past him
and thrust my head into the door of my office. It was bare. Briggs
had opened the windows and the shutters. The room was filled with
fresh air and bright sunlight, making it almost unrecognizable to
me. Lately, I had used my office mostly for sleeping off my bouts
of melancholy. The darkness soothed me. When I worked, it was by
the light of a single guttering flame.

Briggs raised his head. "Rob you? I have bent
over backwards for you, Edgar." He jammed a few more items into the
trunk before looking up. "And this is how you thank me?"

Now I was confused. "What?" I asked. I spied
my winter scarf curled up like a snake and snatched it from the
trunk. I wondered where I had left it.

Briggs stood and strode briskly away towards
his own office. I blinked at his back in confusion and then
followed.

"What? 'What' is how I thank you?"

"You're finished here, that's 'what'," he
said, throwing up his hands.

"Briggs! Tell me what is happening. I demand
to know! Look!" I remembered
'
Berenice' and fished it from
my pocket. "I have finished a new story for publication."

Briggs took the pages and scanned the first
few lines quickly. "
'Misery is manifold'
," he read darkly.
"
'The wretchedness of earth...'
" He looked up at me from the
page. "This is what you do instead of resting? Look at you."

"But you said you wanted new material."

"It is too late for that." He thrust the
pages back into my hand, turned and opened the door to his office.
Letters on the frosted glass read "C.F. Briggs, Editor." I followed
him inside. He pulled the latest issue of the
Journal
from
his desktop, thumbed through it and handed it to me. I was
dumbfounded.

"Go ahead," he urged. "Read."

He had opened the issue to one of my latest
reviews. "It is the book review I wrote last month," I said.

"Your review of what? What book? Go ahead.
Tell me..."

"'Treatise on Corns, Bunions, the Diseases of
Nails—'"

Briggs pulled the magazine from my hands
before I could finish. "'—and the General Management of the Feet',"
he concluded. "And what do you say of it? Let's see here..." His
eyes darted over the printed page. "Oh, yes, here it is. In your
final analysis, you say that this work—how do you put
it?—
'cannot fail to do a great deal of good.'
" Briggs
slammed the magazine down on the desk and actually began to
laugh.

"It seemed to me a useful tome..." I said
sheepishly.

"We have become a laughing-stock, Edgar."

"A laughing-stock?" I could feel my temper
rising.

"'Treatise on Corns, Bunions—'"

"The magazine must be filled with something,
sir!"

"And your serious literary criticisms have
become mere reviews of proofreading. Don't think I have not had
complaints. Even a typographical error throws you into an ecstasy
of passion, while your own review of this—this toenail book is full
of them!"

"Is it your position that these errors are to
be overlooked?"

"You make quotations from the German, but
can't read a word of that language."

"I will be the judge of what languages I can
read."

"I have had enough of this, Edgar. I tell you
on Friday to take time off and rest, and you come back on Monday
with some grim tale of misery and wretchedness. I have done all I
can for you. I wash my hands—"

"All you can?"

"Yes! All I can—to compassionately conceal
your ill habits from others. I have loaned you money—and I am
repaid only with contempt."

"Contempt?"

"For the crime, I daresay, of knowing your
true character."

"Crimes! Now we get to the nub of it. I
should have known."

Briggs strode past me and went back to the
pile of my displaced belongings. The girls at their desks, who had
obviously been watching us, averted their eyes when they saw
me.

"You are free to take as much of this with
you when you go, " Briggs said. "But you
will
go. I will not
have the police—"

"Gessler!" I spat as one would a curse. I
knew it!

"I run a reputable business here, Mr. Poe. I
do not employ suspected criminals, nor do I wish to be privy to
their ugly crimes."

"But the accusations are lies, sir!"

"Is that why you led the police on some mad
chase through the streets? Oh, yes! I know all about it. This
business with Burton—"

"Lies, I tell you!"

"—the burning of the building. My God, Edgar!
You
have
gone mad. There have always been those who said so,
and I have always defended you. But this! You have gone too far. I
can defend you no longer."

"Defend me? But I am the victim here, not the
perpetrator. You must believe me." I realized that by requiring his
belief in my innocence, I was asking of him something I myself
could not have given. But I suddenly felt desperate, knowing that
Gessler had turned my friend—my
only
friend—against me. "It
is now incumbent upon me to prove my innocence."

"As I have heard it, you have endeavored only
to conceal your guilt."

"Someone has tried to kill me. And for that
you say
I
am guilty?"

"
Who
has tried to kill you?" Briggs
asked incredulously.

"Burton" I began, but Gessler had so
corrupted his mind against me that Briggs would not even allow me
to explain.

"Burton! By God, Edgar, you
are
mad!
The very man you are suspected of—2"

"You have it all wrong, Briggs. Listen to me.
I need your help if I am to prove my innocence. I need you to
accompany me to the Rue Morgue—"

I had reached out to grasp his lapel, but he
jerked back in horror. "You are beyond
my
help, Edgar."

"Will you listen to me, at least?" I
cried.

Briggs looked around himself like a trapped
animal. His eye alighted on the crumpled
Gentleman's
Magazine
that lay in my half-opened desk drawer. He grabbed it
and thrust it under my nose as if it were a piece of raw meat and I
a menacing dog.

"Here! Here is your precious
'
Pym'
review. Now, take it and go!"

I whisked it from his hand, if only to get it
out of my face, and in so doing caught a glimpse of the familiar
woodcut of William E. Burton on the frontispiece. Whether oozing
putrescence or spewing insults, the very visage of the man had
become detestable to me. I was afraid the hated image might have
burned itself into my retinas, for when I looked up from the page,
I saw him still, only this time framed in the windows that fronted
the street. I had to blink to make sure I was not seeing double.
But, sure enough, there was Burton's head bobbing obliviously in
the windows as the man himself walked past on the sidewalk
outside.

I did not detest the sight of him now. Now, I
saw in him the hand of my deliverance.

"It is the man himself!" I cried. "Look!"

"Who?" Briggs asked in near panic.

"Billy Burton, you fool! Don't you see him?"
My impulse was to dash after him and I took a step in that
direction. But I paused, turning my gaze from the windows to
Briggs' bewildered face and back to the windows again.

"You saw Burton? Just now?"

Burton's head disappeared past the window
frame. But how could Briggs have missed it? The man I had
supposedly murdered passed right under his nose—and he claimed not
to have noticed? I was not so easily fooled.

"Ha!" I exclaimed in triumph, hurling the
magazine back in Briggs' face. Burton, walking the streets! Oh, to
see Gessler's face when I showed him. "You still think I killed
him?" I dashed across the office, threading my way between desks.
"Who's mad now, Briggs?" I cried.

"Edgar! Where are you going? Come back here
at once!"

I had taken my last order from Briggs. "I
quit!" I cried and dashed out into the street.