Disquiet Heart

by Randall Silvis

  “And do you recall meeting a Mr. Gatesford at the picnic?” Poe asked.

  “The elderly gentleman,” I said.

  “More important, the one who has consented to be the doctor’s first human subject, upon the man’s mortal demise, of course.”

  “Just like in The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar.”

  “I regret to say that the doctor claims my story as the source of his inspiration.”

  “He’s obsessed with you.”

  Poe nodded, but mournfully. “He confided in me that he considers me a scientist in the guise of a writer, my stories the theories upon which much of his research is applied. In which case, if your suspicions prove correct, Augie, then I must bear the ultimate responsibility for his actions.”

  After a moment’s silence, Buck put out a hand, laid his huge callused palm atop Poe’s, and patted it tenderly. Absolution.

  Poe continued, his throat a bit hoarser. “Next we come to the hanging at Mount Airy. You remember it, of course.”

  “Vividly,” I said.

  “Did you know,” he asked, “that Dr. Brunrichter was the individual responsible for plotting the table to determine the height of the man’s fall?”

  “I believe he told us that.”

  “Does it surprise you that a man so meticulous in his observance of details would make such a gross miscalculation?”

  “You think he did it on purpose.”

  “I recall how avidly he dragged me to the body afterward. How excited he was when he bade me press my ear to the man’s chest to hear a heart still beating.”

  “It seemed to me a cold thing to do.”

  “Cold indeed,” said Poe.

  He busied himself then with his writing. Afterward he looked up at me. “How many household servants does Dr. Brunrichter employ?”

  “Mrs. Dalrymple and Mr. Tevis.”

  “And they live at the estate?”

  “Mr. Tevis does.”

  Poe nodded. “On what day of the week is Mrs. Dalrymple given a rest from her duties?”

  “Let me think a minute.”

  “On Saturday,” he said. “She leaves the house after supper on Friday and resumes her duties first thing Sunday morning, preparing breakfast before she and Tevis and the doctor attend their worship services.”

  “I didn’t know that.”

  “And do you know on what day of the week each of the seven missing women have disappeared?”

  I did not know, but said nothing, and sat and waited.

  “On Friday evening!” cried Miss Jones. “Every one of them disappeared on a Friday night!”

  From the look she now exchanged with Poe, the nod he gave her, it was clear that this information had been pieced together earlier, at Poe’s request, by Miss Jones herself.

  “But not Susan,” I told them. “It was a Saturday night for Susan.”

  “Nor has Susan disappeared,” said Poe. “Her body was not removed.”

  “So are the two things related or not?”

  “Logically, the two cases are so dissimilar as to bear no relationship to one another. Howsoever … Let us consider a previous fact. The disappearances all took place on a Friday evening. Mrs. Dalrymple is absent from the mansion from earlier the same evening until nearly a day and a half later. Does this suggest anything to you?”

  “He wanted the house empty when he brought the women there.”

  “Now consider this: The doctor’s animosity toward you, which I am now prepared to accept as real. His infatuation, shall we call it, with my works and my physical appearance. His lies to the police concerning your behavior on the night of Susan’s death. What, if anything, does all this suggest?”

  “He killed her because he wanted rid of me.”

  “I vaguely remember his reaction when we learned of your escape. Even in my near-somnambulistic state, I was secretly gladdened by the news. But he. He ordered every door and window in the house bolted shut. He went so far as to arm himself with a pistol.”

  I seethed, but said nothing.

  “His mood was much improved when, not long after, we heard that you had stolen a boat and made good your escape from Pittsburgh.”

  Buck said, “That boat wasn’t stolen. I paid good money for it.”

  “I misspoke,” said Poe. “My apologies.”

  Buck gave his head a crisp nod.

  “As to Dr. Brunrichter, however. He was beside himself with relief. ‘The coward!’ he cried. ‘The coward runs from me!’ When I asked him, ‘From you, Alfred?’ he answered, ‘From the truth, of course. From the fate he so rightfully deserves.’”

  “He wanted me jailed. And hanged for murder.”

  Nobody moved or so much as nodded. I could not bring myself to look at Buck except out the corner of my eye. He was sitting there now with head bowed, the tears falling unrestrained onto the tabletop, between two fists clenched harder than marble. His daughter had died only because her death provided a convenient opportunity for Brunrichter to remove me from his life.

  Poe said, “Two different crimes with two different motives. But related, perhaps, by the proclivities of one individual.”

  Miss Jones said, “A problem arises. Each of the people with whom I spoke assured me that Dr. Brunrichter never left the house on the evening of Susan’s death.”

  Poe said, “We know that Mrs. Dalrymple was never about the house on a Saturday. The same does not hold true, however, for Mr. Tevis.”

  “You’re sure of this?” I asked.

  “I am indeed. On the Saturday before the picnic, for example, my morning tea was brought to my room by Mr. Tevis. When I inquired after Mrs. Dalrymple’s health, Tevis answered that she’d spent Saturdays at her own home. ‘She,’ he said. Not ‘we.’

  “And this is also of interest. On the Saturday following the most recent disappearance, the doctor spoke with me briefly that morning, but only to apologize that he would not be able to keep me company throughout the day, for Saturday was his reading day, as he called it, devoted to those journals that would keep him abreast of the latest medical and scientific advances.”

  “Reading, my foot,” said Miss Jones. It was as close to a profanity as she was likely to mutter.

  “So it was that fella Tevis then,” Buck said. “Doing what Brunrichter told him to do.”

  “But wait,” said Miss Jones. “I was told that Mr. Tevis was stationed outside the library all through the night in question.”

  Poe said, “No doubt the doctor loudly issued that order. But can any of the evening’s celebrants say with certainty that Tevis did not then sneak away from his post, as he had secretly been instructed to do?”

  And the rage ballooned inside me again, just as, I’m sure, it was swelling in Susan’s father. “What now?” I asked. “What do we do about it?”

  Poe said, “I return to the mansion.”

  My jaw dropped.

  “Only briefly,” he explained. “To gather up my things. And to look, if the opportunity presents itself, for the book I inscribed to Susan. To find that book would be evidence conclusive.”

  “You know he has it,” I said. “He knew I took it from your room. And Tevis would know how obsessed Brunrichter is with you, and would have grabbed it for him.”

  “The logic of this particular is weak,” said Poe. “I could have inscribed a hundred copies to the doctor personally. Why would he risk discovery of the book by having it stolen? Or by accepting and retaining it even if he did not instruct that it be stolen?”

  But I was working on a logic of my own. “The mind of a madman,” I said.

  “Sadly,” said Poe, “that is what makes it impossible to fathom.”

  Miss Jones told him, “You have been doing a fine job so far.”

  And Poe answered, “It is hardly a virtue, Miss Jones, to know too much of the way a madman thinks.”

  SOON AFTER, Poe was on his way to Ridge Avenue. As he told us later, he hid himself in the bushes beyond Brunrichter’s front gate and there wai
ted until the doctor came down the lane in his phaeton and set off for the hospital. Poe then crossed briskly to the house and entered through the front hall without knocking. He found Mrs. Dalrymple in the kitchen, cleaning up after the doctor’s breakfast. She was startled by his unannounced arrival.

  “Mr. Poe! Well my goodness gracious—where have you been all night?”

  “My apologies,” he said. “The meeting with my friend lasted much longer than either of us expected. It did not seem fitting to return at so late an hour.”

  “Have you had your breakfast?” she asked.

  “Not one so good as yours, but yes, thank you, I have eaten.”

  “I should send word to Dr. Brunrichter that you’ve returned. He went off to his duties just a few minutes ago. I’m surprised you didn’t pass him on the street.”

  “Yes, how unfortunate,” said Poe.

  “He told me that he paced half the night waiting for you to come home.”

  “My regret is inexpressible.”

  “In any case you’re back again, none the worse for wear as far as I can see.”

  “Unfortunately I cannot stay. My friend Mr. Griswold and I have not yet concluded our business.”

  “I thought he was leaving at noon yesterday.”

  “That was his intention, yes. But, as I said, our business is not yet concluded and he has decided to stay over. But he must leave today, and very soon. I have agreed to accompany him part of the way, and then, in Cincinnati perhaps, I will disembark and return.”

  “We can expect you back tomorrow?”

  “Let us say, instead, on Saturday. Though I would not be surprised to be gone until the day after.”

  “On Saturday or Easter Sunday then. I’ll be sure to let the doctor know.”

  “Easter already! How quickly the days have gone by.”

  “I must say that you’re looking fitter than ever I’ve seen you,” said Mrs. Dalrymple. “You’ve got some color in your cheeks.”

  “I am feeling much better, thank you.”

  “It did you good to see your friend.”

  “It did indeed. And now, if you don’t mind, I will fetch my bag and be off again.”

  “You go right ahead. Are you sure you wouldn’t like some breakfast first?”

  “I regret that I cannot spare the time.”

  “A cup of tea? The doctor left your powders should you return.”

  “Today,” said Poe, “I am going to do without my medicine.”

  He went to his room and quickly stuffed all his belongings into his bag. Then, after making sure that the way was clear, he stole into the doctor’s room and raked his eyes over the hundred or so books shelved against the wall. There was no sign of the one he had inscribed to Susan.

  He had only begun to ransack the dresser drawers when Mrs. Dalrymple came thudding up the stairs, crying out, “Mr. Poe! Oh Mr. Poe!”

  He froze at the sound of her voice, his hand poised beneath a pile of boiled shirts.

  She paused near the top of the stairs to catch her breath. Then called to him, gasping every third word or so, “I’ve sent the boy from the stable to the hospital with your message. I’m sure the doctor will return at once if he can do so. He was so distressed by your absence when he went off this morning.”

  Poe withdrew his hand and eased the drawer shut. He crossed to the threshold and smiled at Mrs. Dalrymple. “I had planned to leave a note for Alfred on his nightstand. But you have saved me the trouble. Thank you.”

  She beamed. “You might as well have a bite of breakfast now. The doctor won’t be long.”

  Poe responded with a deferential smile, he said, which sent Mrs. Dalrymple back down the stairs and waddling happily to her kitchen.

  Poe did not dare linger. He returned for his bag, then to the kitchen where he made a quick apology, and all but raced out the door with Mrs. Dalrymple following behind, waving her hands and imploring him to reconsider.

  Out the gate and finally out of Mrs. Dalrymple’s view, Poe hurried back to Miss Jones’s School for Young Ladies, staying well away from the most direct path between the hospital and the mansion. He came straightaway to Miss Jones’s basement but found the room dark and empty. We heard him fumbling his way through the basement and up the stairs. A few moments later he emerged into the kitchen, thence to a small room off the main parlor, where Miss Jones and I were playing a game of cribbage.

  “She’s allowing you to stay upstairs now?” he asked.

  I grinned. “Unable to resist my manly charms.”

  “Any more talk like that,” said Miss Jones, “and you and your charms will march right back down into the cellar.”

  31

  A CHILL gray morning. I had begun to detest the weather of Pittsburgh, the adumbrating smoke that never allowed an unfiltered blue to shine through. To wake to the scent of smoke every morning, to inhale it in your sleep—such a fragrance does not fill the mind with thoughts of goodness and purity.

  Because we had no specific plans for the day, Buck had gone off to find some work. I envied him the routine of labor, of bucking crates and kegs and barrels, channeling all of his restlessness out of the mind and into the muscles.

  Poe assumed that Dr. Brunrichter might try to catch up with him on the docks, might go so far as to check the manifest of all steamboats scheduled to depart that morning. Poe, of course, had been deliberately vague in the information doled out to Mrs. Dalrymple, and was confident he had given the doctor no cause for alarm or suspicion. Still we thought it best to lay low for an hour or so, until Dr. Brunrichter, if he did go looking, had exhausted his hopes of deterring Poe and had returned to the hospital.

  Shortly after Poe’s return to Miss Jones’s place, she excused herself to leave Poe and me alone. I fiddled with the cribbage board while he fiddled with his thoughts.

  After a quarter hour of cerebration, he finally spoke. “A realization of some importance has occurred to me,” he said. “Do you recall having ever witnessed Mr. Tevis at the mansion when the doctor himself was not present?”

  I thought about it for a moment. “Brunrichter was always somewhere in the house,” I said.

  “But Tevis lives there, does he not?”

  “So I was told.”

  “Surely he doesn’t spend his day at the hospital with the doctor.”

  “I wouldn’t think so.”

  “Yet Alfred drives himself each morning.” He stroked his cheek. “I myself never once left the house unless accompanied by the doctor. If Mr. Tevis had been about during the day, I certainly would have noticed him.”

  “Remember, though, that you’ve been half asleep most of that time. Seems that whatever was put in your tea every morning it was meant to last till midafternoon or so.”

  “It dulled my senses, yes, and slowed all movements. But it did not render me unconscious. At midday Mrs. Dalrymple would ring a bell to announce mealtime, and I would rise and dress and make my way downstairs.”

  “And afterward? Until the doctor came home?”

  “The effects of the drug would gradually diminish.”

  “How did you spend your time while you waited for the doctor?”

  He smiled sheepishly and shook his head in self-abnegation. “Sitting on the front veranda, staring into the distance like an opium fiend.”

  “Just the way he wanted you,” I said.

  “One thing I am certain of, however. Throughout the day, the house was empty but for Mrs. Dalrymple and myself. I would sometimes hear a man working in the yard, at the forge or stable—”

  “That would be Mr. Keesling,” I told him. “He and his boy manage the outbuildings.”

  “A boy, yes. I once watched the two of them rounding up the goats from the side yard.” He paused then, having lost the train of his thought.

  “You were saying something about the house being empty?”

  “Yes! Yes, all day long there was no one in the house but for Mrs. Dalrymple and myself. Tevis would appear perhaps a quarter hour befor
e the doctor’s return each evening, always with a glass of claret in hand for me. An aperitif, he said. Which I, alas, never refused.”

  Again Poe shook his head. But I would not allow him to lapse into the despair of self-criticism. “Brunrichter enjoyed telling you about his research, did he?” I asked.

  “It entered our conversations regularly.”

  “Where does he practice his research?”

  “Where?” Poe repeated.

  “Did you never ask?”

  “My curiosity, if you recall, had been blunted. But I assumed, I suppose, that there were appropriate facilities at the hospital.”

  “Yet I remember his statement that, while at the hospital, his day was—what did he call it?—an uninspiring routine of setting broken bones, lancing boils, treating burns and cuts, and so forth. If the day was particularly exciting, he said, he might get to amputate a finger or two.”

  Poe was nodding slowly. “He spoke of his work and his research as if they were separate endeavors. Unrelated.”

  “But you know of no facilities for research in the mansion?”

  “I never felt compelled to investigate.”

  We contemplated this information in silence. But I, unlike Poe, think more clearly when my thoughts are allowed to unravel through audible speech. “So what does this mean?” I finally asked.

  “It is a clear case of something or other,” said Poe with his lopsided smile.

  “If Brunrichter doesn’t conduct his research at the hospital or at the mansion, he must do it somewhere else. Maybe that’s where Tevis is all day.”

  “Alfred leaves the house at seven each morning,” Poe said. “He returns shortly after five each evening. Which leads me to wonder not only where but when he conducts his research?”

  “His reading day,” I said. “When Mrs. Dalrymple is not around.”

  Poe’s head began to nod. “And on that day he remains in the mansion. Somewhere in the mansion. On the one day when Mrs. Dalrymple and all other servants are given the day off. All save Tevis.”

  “Do you think Mr. Keesling might be able to tell us anything? Or the Negro, Raymund?”

  “Even if they could, neither of us can chance going there to ask.”