He grimaces. “I can’t do that.”
“Why not?”
“You would frighten my wife. She’s not well. She wouldn’t . . .” He inches backward and surveys me from the roots of my midnight hair down to the toes of my borrowed boots. “You’re much more unsettling than I remember, Cassandra. Much more shrewish and appalling.”
I ball my hands into fists. “What do you expect when you push muses into fires?”
“I already apologized for my behavior.” He shoves his hat back on his head. “I’ll leave a poem for you later, but only if you inspire me, not him. Don’t you dare cast an eye toward that ill-tempered thorn in my side. He’s been nothing but a damn sulky nuisance for the past two years. I can’t wait to be rid of him.”
“Bring me one of his poems for dessert,” I say, and my mouth waters to such excess, a thread of drool spills down my chin.
John Allan winces. “I don’t need you badly enough to permit him to write. In fact, never mind about the poems. I want nothing more to do with you.”
“If that were true, if you didn’t crave poetical inspiration as much as you desire the air you breathe, you wouldn’t have groveled and sniveled when you first saw me just now”—I lean forward and deepen my voice to the depths of the lowest bass—“Jock.”
An audible gulp slides down his throat, and I witness the shine of horror in his eyes. He turns on his heel and hustles away into the fog as fast as he can, but, thank God, he does not kill me.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Edgar
I splash my hair with water from the ivory basin in my bedroom and attempt to tame my curls with a comb. I’m still breathless from my flight through the city; still dizzy from Lenore. My entire body trembles with a dire need to visit Elmira—to embrace life instead of shadows.
My mirror reflects my agitated state. The grayish eyes that women call “beautiful” and “stirring” strike me as pale and protruding this afternoon. They look like they’ve witnessed a murder.
“My God, you need to leave Richmond,” I whisper to myself, and I scoop water into my mouth to calm my parched throat.
I fetch my gift for Elmira—a purse that the clerk at the shop sealed up in brown wrapping paper and tied with a blue satin ribbon. After bidding Ma adieu, I cross the street to the Roysters’ residence—another brick behemoth that occupies an entire city block. Shutters as black and as glossy as granite frame the dozen windows monitoring my approach. Twin pairs of Ionic columns cast their shadows upon me during my climb up the steps to the mahogany front door.
I hold my breath and clang the iron knocker.
One of the Roysters’ house slaves, a fellow not much older than I named Arthur, allows me to enter, takes my hat, and escorts me to Elmira and her mother in the reception room with its scarlet walls that squeeze around me like the chambers of a heart. Oil lamps with crystal icicles flicker in silence against the blood-red paper, giving the distinct impression of pulsations. A fire roars in the hearth. Perspiration puddles on my forehead. My eyes stray to the windows, fearful of the return of Lenore, but I force myself to think of only love and goodness.
Elmira alleviates my anxiousness by saying in that rich voice of hers, “Good afternoon, Edgar.”
I sit down beside her on the sofa, cradling her gift in my lap. “Good afternoon, Elmira . . . and Mrs. Royster.”
Elmira’s mother—a paler, older, blond-haired version of her daughter—mutters a listless welcome from a high-backed chair across from us, the family terrier tucked beneath a tartan blanket in her lap. A red rug lies unfurled like a tongue between my shoes and Mrs. Royster’s slippers, and I notice that she slides her feet beneath her chair, pulling herself farther away from me.
This cold reception has nothing to do with the manifestation of Lenore in the city. I often find myself wondering, while seated in the houses of friends and sweethearts, if a low-born odor wafts off me, despite the expensive wool of my coat, the embroidered silk of my vest, the impeccable straightness of my posture. Pa paid for me to attend the finest schools for young gentlemen in both Richmond and London. I speak Latin and French, I’ve been celebrated for swimming six miles in the James River—against the tide—at the mere age of fifteen, and I live in a damned mansion, but nothing I do or say will ever erase the stink of poverty these people smell on me.
“So . . .” I clear my throat and hand Elmira the present. “As I mentioned before, I have a gift for you.”
“How thoughtful and sweet you are, Eddy.” Elmira smiles and shakes the package near her ear. “Hmm—it doesn’t rattle enough to sound like a box of candies, and yet it’s heavier than a garment . . .”
“Family will be arriving soon, Elmira,” says Mrs. Royster. “Please open the package without turning the process into a charade.” She pets the terrier’s head with firm strokes that stretch the poor dog’s eyes into the back of his head.
Elmira lowers the gift to her lap and unties the ribbon, her face bright with anticipation.
My chest suddenly tightens with a fit of panic and self-loathing. Just like at home, I’m surrounded by statues, tapestries, fabrics, fripperies, and furniture hauled out of chalets and castles halfway across the world—luxuries I’ll never be able to afford for a wife.
Elmira sets the ribbon aside and unpeels the brown paper. She doesn’t notice the way my breath catches in my throat.
I want to marry this girl, but, my God, Pa is right: I will struggle to pay bills if I pursue the life of a poet. I’ll drag her down into the mire of my abominable penury. Like the father who sired me, the two-bit actor David Poe, I’ll turn to drink to survive the pain of watching my life descend into squalor. I’ll abandon my darling to the clutches of death while offering my entire soul to my muse—while drowning myself in whiskey and wine until I die.
“Oh, how lovely,” says Elmira, and she lifts the mother-of-pearl purse out of the wrappings. “Oh, Eddy! It’s beautiful. And what is this?” She leans forward and reads the silver plate mounted on the front. “It’s engraved with our initials . . . or . . .”
I blush and squirm, for there’s been a mistake with the engraving.
Elmira lifts her face. “Why does it say ‘S.P.R.’ instead of ‘S.E.R.’?”
I fold my hands in my lap and fight off the urge to shrink down into the sofa’s velvet cushions. “The engraver made a mistake.”
“You weren’t intending to give this purse to another girl, were you?” asks Mrs. Royster.
“No! Of course not. He made a mistake. I specifically told him our initials were ‘S.E.R.’ and ‘E.A.P.’ I must beg your forgiveness, Elmira. Do you want me to return it?”
(I do not mention that Pa has already refused to pay for the remediation of the error.)
“No, it’s still beautiful,” says this charming angel. “I’ll just pretend it’s an E.”
Mrs. Royster lowers the dog to the floor. “As I said, the family will arrive for Sunday dinner soon. Time to see Edgar off.”
Elmira reaches her hand out to me across the sofa, but her mother’s gaze stops me from touching her fingers.