The Girl Behind the Wall: Edgar Allan Poe, the Girl, and the Mysterious Raven Murders

By Bruce Wetterau

Did Edgar Allan Poe know more about murder than he revealed in his bizarre stories of murder and mayhem? Was he in fact guilty of killing a girlfriend in a fit of rage many years before he became famous?
Bruce Wetterau’s taut thriller weaves a murder mystery worthy of Poe himself as it follows Poe through actual events in the last months of his life. The year 1849 saw the real-life Poe dealing with his alcoholism, failing health, poverty, and painful memories of his recently deceased child-bride wife. His life had become a psychological pressure cooker, with severe anxiety attacks and bouts of strange hallucinations.
The Girl Behind the Wall opens in early 1849. Poe is being tormented by frightening visions about murdering Annabel Lee while he was a student at the University of Virginia. Afraid ofthe hangman’s noose, Poe knows he can never tell anyone about the repressed memories haunting him. But a newspaper reporter named Sam Reynolds has overheard him talking erratically about Annabel while in a drunken stupor. That a man as famous as Poe could be a murderer would be the scoop of a lifetime and Reynolds will do anything to get it.
Flash forward nearly two hundred years to the present. The book’s hero, Clay Cantrell, accidentally uncovers damning evidence--Annabel’s skeleton and a locket from Poe--behind an old brick wall at the university. While the mystery of Annabel’s murder and Poe’s strange visions unfolds in flashbacks, Cantrell and friends launch a search of their own for the truth about Annabel’s death. But another murder mystery much closer to home overtakes them when a cold-blooded serial killer named the Raven claims his first victim, a UVA coed.
Obsessed with Poe, the Raven stages his murders with clever ties to Poe’s works. Clay tries to stop the murders and soon winds up in the Raven’s cross hairs. Though this isn’t the first vicious killer Clay has fought, he doesn’t know the Raven has a diabolical plan to execute him.
Will Poe finally reveal the truth about Annabel, or will he take the secret to his grave? Can Clay escape the Raven’s plot, find what drives the Raven’s murderous obsession with Poe, and at last answer the question, who killed Annabel Lee?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Bruce Wetterau
• Release date: Oct 21, 2020
• ISBN: 9781005557720

Bruce Wetterau

Bruce Wetterau is the author of the Clay Cantrell Mystery series. Before turning to writing novels, he spent over twenty years as a freelance reference book editor and author. He published eleven reference books under his own name and contributed to many others. Among his reference books are World History, A Dictionary of Important People, Places, and Events, The New York Public Library Book of Chronologies, and The Presidential Medal of Freedom--The Winners and Their Achievements.He lives in Virginia, where he renovates houses, writes, and pursues his hobby of photography. For more on his biography and books, visit his website, www.brucewetterau.com.To read his recent Omnimystery News interview about the second book in his series, Killer Fog, and about his writing, click on this link: http://www.omnimysterynews.com/2015/12/a-conversation-with-mystery-author-bruce-wetterau-1512140800.html

Book preview

Advance praise for The Girl Behind the Wall

Edgar Allan Poe comes to life in this fast-moving, imaginative mystery that puts past and present on a collision course and brings them together with a satisfying impact.

William Martin, New York Times bestselling author of Back Bay

"Five Stars... If you enjoyed Lost Treasure or Killeer Fog (which I did), you will like The Girl Behind the Wall even more--because Wetterau manages to squeeze three terrific mystery stories into one connected narrative...This book is a gem..."

Bryan Bunch, author of Before Eureka

A wonderful blend of fact and fiction, The Girl Behind the Wall by Bruce Wetterau intertwines the known facts about Poe’s life with a fictional murder and puts a different spin on Poe’s final months...The writing was great. The first chapter, which takes place in the past, drew me in immediately with a chilling description of one of Poe’s hallucinations. The writing is just as engrossing in the rest of the book, and there were many scenes that had me holding my breath.

Post by Mbrooks, OnlineBookClub.org

THE GIRL BEHIND

THE WALL

Edgar Allan Poe, The Girl, And

the Mysterious Raven Murders

A novel, by Bruce Wetterau

Clay Cantrell Mysteries: Tales of the Unexpected

Copyright 2019 by Bruce Wetterau

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the author.

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, and places are used fictitiously or are products of the author's imagination. Some of the characters are inspired by historical figures; others are entirely im-aginary creations of the author's. Apart from the historical figures, any resemblance between the fictional characters and actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

Cover and book design by Bruce Wetterau

Independently Published

Printed in the United States of America

2020

EPUB ISBN: 97981005557720

Dedication

This work of fiction is dedicated to the memory of Thomas Jefferson and to the enduring Academical Village he envisioned and built. Over the past two hundred years that educational experiment has grown and matured into today's highly regarded University of Virginia. Jefferson--philosopher-statesman, scientist, architect, and, yes, slave owner--was a man born to another time who nevertheless rose above his times again and again, thanks to his keen intellect and foresight. We today can look backward at his life and times through the lens of our modern sensibilities and, should we choose to do so, could snipe at the man for his personal failings and for what he did not do to measure up to our expectations. But that is to forget all that he did accomplish; that he was after all a man; and that he lived in a time and culture that would be alien to us now, in part because of the ideals and institutions he helped establish. One has to hope that the ideal of education which Jefferson held so dear, in league with the University of Virginia, the institution of higher learning he established, will point the way toward a better understanding of our past and the uses to which history may be legitimately put.

Acknowledgements

While the success or failure of this novel rightly falls squarely on me, the author, I owe a heartfelt thanks to the people who gave generously of their time to read and comment on the manuscript while it was being prepared for publication. Alice DeWitt, David and Deborah Grimm, Michelle Rasheed, Charles Webster and his lovely wife, the actress Sarah Fallon, Eleanor Mantao, Robinson Mason, and Warner Granade offered fresh perspectives on the manuscript and helped iron out problems. A number of others helped with the inevitable research questions that arose while writing this novel. Among them are Tim and Carol Jarrell, Tim Fulk, George Walker, Ted Mason, and UVA Campus Police Officer Ben Rexrode. My friend Paul Fargis, who is still active as a publishing consultant, also deserves a special thanks for his candid advice and unflagging encouragement.

I should say for the record that I also owe a significant debt to two seminal biographies of Poe: Israfel, The Life and Times of Edgar Allan Poe, by Hervey Allen; and particularly, Edgar A. Poe, Mournful and Never Ending Remembrance, by Kenneth Silverman. Both works were extensively researched and so provided valuable insights into the last months of Poe's life, as well as his works and his times. My sincere thanks to both authors for providing me with a solid foundation for the mystery which unfolds in the following pages.

Table of Contents

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1

The Locket

A cold, dismal rain drenched Manhattan late this February night of 1849, driving most sensible people indoors in search of shelter and a warming fire. Samuel Reynolds, a reporter for The New York Morning Sun, was not destined to be among them, however. Instead, he gritted his teeth and cursed the vile weather under his breath as he wrestled with the nagging temptation of retreating indoors to McGinty's Tavern for a pint of golden ale. The rain drumming hard on his black umbrella weighed heavily in favor of retreat, while the turned-up collar of his caped overcoat offered only a small comfort against the wet and the cold. Still, he pushed on, all but alone on the city's dimly lighted, cobblestone streets, seemingly wandering from place to place with no apparent destination. In fact he was searching for someone, a man he was beginning to believe had simply been swallowed up by the night.

Soaking wet and chilled to the bone as the stroke of midnight approached, Samuel was about to yield to that pint of ale when he spotted the shadowy form of a man sprawled in a covered alley off Ninth Street. Will this be the twelfth or thirteenth wrong man? he asked himself. Times like these made him wonder if this story would wind up being worth all the trouble, but he couldn't let it go. He had to check. Consoling himself with the thought, In for a penny, in for a pound, Samuel stepped cautiously around fetid piles of garbage, broken barrels, and stacks of old crates to get a closer look in the dimly lighted alley.

Yes, finally! Samuel thought, relieved and silently rejoicing. No question, that's him.

The middle-aged man at Samuel's feet might well have been mistaken for a corpse, except that now he stirred and mumbled something incoherently. His appearance was not far off that mark, incoherence, that is: a wet, tangled mop of longish curly brown hair; broad forehead and sallow cheeks smudged with dirt; mustached mouth half agape; and shirt collar torn open. His black frock coat and trousers--threadbare at their best--had been reduced to a rumpled, soiled heap merely hinting at the form of a man.

But the eyes! Dark and deep as the night, the man's eyes were open and strangely unfocused, as if looking inward. Framed by dark, bushy eyebrows and underhung by dark, puffy swellings, the windows to this soul spoke of a deep sadness, of torment. They were the eyes, Samuel thought, of a man who had seen and felt too much in life.

The living corpse stirred again and muttered what sounded like dear Annabel. Samuel, his interest suddenly piqued, knelt down close to the man, only to wince and turn away momentarily, put off by the foul smell of wine, tobacco, and God knows what else on his quarry's breath.

Edgar. Eddy! It's me, Samuel. He shook the man's shoulder and then patted his cheek in an effort to rouse him. What about Annabel, Eddy? Tell me about Annabel.

As Eddy's eyes rolled vaguely in Samuel's direction, the incoherent mumbling began again, only to trail off into alcoholic oblivion. This time Samuel shook him hard by the shoulders, but Eddy's head simply flopped back and forth like a rag doll's.

The great Edgar Allan Poe, drunk out of his mind, Samuel growled. Why does he do this? Samuel stood up and looked around at the trash piled high in the alley, trying to think what to do. He couldn't just leave Eddy here to sleep it off--Poe would surely die of exposure, if some half-drunk ruffian didn't kill him first. Samuel grabbed Poe's coat, determined now to drag him into the saloon next to the alley until he could figure out what else to do.

The clattering of a single horse's hooves on the cobblestones stopped Samuel in his tracks. Turning to look out of the alleyway, he saw the tall spoked wheels of a hansom cab roll past as it came to a stop in front of the saloon. Samuel sprinted out to the street in hopes of hiring the carriage, leaving Poe to fall back on the rubbish pile.

Poe's head came to rest unceremoniously upon a mass of wilted cabbage leaves, though he had no personal knowledge of that. The immediate goings on inside the kingdom of his highly regarded brain can only be described as wildly hallucinatory, another fit of the brain congestion, which in recent months had become truly severe. That the fits were inspired by demon alcohol, drugs, or both was beyond question, even to Poe himself. But the madness overcoming him at this instant might well be something straight out of the strangest of his works.

The visions consuming him now lay worlds apart from the gritty reality of the foul smelling alley where he lay. The girl was young, just seventeen or eighteen, beautiful, gaily alive in a white cotton hooped dress. Her long blonde hair was tied with a pretty blue bow and shimmered in the warm spring sunshine. Poe saw himself there with her--he could feel her nearness--on a grassy knoll overlooking the river. He remembered that day so clearly: the red and white blanket they sat on; the brown wicker hamper he'd carried there with their picnic lunch; how her beautiful smile and gay laughter had excited his passion; and how the sweet, exciting smells of springtime mingled with her perfume. Beautiful, dear Annabel.

Then the vision changed. They were at a party, surrounded by a dozen other couples, drinking wine and dancing to no music at all in some low-ceilinged room, a secret hideaway. During those joyful, playfully romantic hours he spent with her, he hadn't a care in the world.

He saw it, felt it, relived it each time. Then, inevitably, that awful jarring sound would begin, a rough, hollow, scraping as though some heavy tool were being dragged over a rough wooden surface. Suddenly a new vision appeared--a wide stone fireplace piled high with burning logs, flames leaping wildly above the pile. In the vision, he always found himself lying on a floor paved with brick, just beyond the hearth and looking directly into the blazing inferno. His skin burned in the intense heat, which he was sure came straight from the fires of hell.

Strangely, he could smell the fire's bitter, sulfurous smoke, but the burning made no sound. Only the slow, steady, hollow scraping came to him, each stroke adding to his mounting anxiety, clawing at his sanity. He never knew why he felt such foreboding, only that something horrible was about to happen and there was nothing he could do to stop it. Scrape...scrape. He felt his chest tightening with fear, so that he had to struggle for every breath. Scrape...scrape...scrape. A feeling of powerlessness swept over him and the trembling began anew. Scrape...scrape. He wanted to turn his head, avert his eyes so he would not see it, but now he was paralyzed with fear. Scrape...scrape...scrape. The pounding of his heart echoed inside his head until the throbbing pulse physically hurt. Still there was that awful scrape...scrape...scrape.

When he was about to burst, a horrible new vision imposed itself over the flames. Annabel sat in a chair, motionless, the skirt of her dress thrown up revealing her porcelain white legs. The sight of her naked flesh at once excited him and made him ashamed of his lust. His eyes swept upward, over her lovely, inviting bodice, to the awful dark bruises upon her exposed neck. Her head being thrown back, she appeared to be staring at the ceiling with a look of surprise frozen upon her lifeless face. Scrape...scrape...scrape. Anger, rage, grief washed over him in overwhelming waves of emotion. Still he could not move, or even look away. But he found his voice and full-throated cried out, Annabel!

Samuel was at that moment negotiating with the hackney driver. Both he and the driver jumped at Poe's sudden outburst, but when he again fell silent, they returned to their conversation.

No sir, you're not going to put that mess in my hack. Take a week to get his rank smell out, I'll warrant. Best call the dustman, he'll have a wagon worthy of that 'un.

Hold on! What if I wrap him in my coat? The man will die if we leave him out here all night.

The hackney driver paused, thinking over the proposition. Well, you cover him good and make sure his mop o' wet stinking hair don't lay on my upholstery. Where are we taking him?

St. Stephen's Hospital. That's closest.

Charity ward it is then.

* * * *

Ominous steel gray clouds scudded across an overcast sky this cold December day as Clay Cantrell drove his Ford pickup toward Charlottesville, Virginia, three-quarters of an hour due east from his hometown of Staunton. In the passenger seat was Clay's friend and business partner, Mac Harper, who was just finishing off his glazed doughnut. Clay swung off I-64 onto the exit ramp for Charlottesville as Mac downed the last bite with a swig of black coffee. Clay smiled as he sailed into the ramp's tight, curving turn well above the posted speed, forcing Mac to right his coffee mug quickly against the sudden strong pull of centrifugal force.

Wise guy, Mac grumbled and shot an annoyed look at Clay.

Clay returned it with a toothy, Cheshire cat grin, then said with feigned seriousness, Don't want to be late, Mac. We're supposed to be at the university by nine.

Mac looked at his watch. We're an hour early!

Clay just laughed and accelerated to merge onto the Route 29 bypass toward downtown Charlottesville.

You never did say why Buddy needed us to help out here, Mac said after the coffee stopped sloshing in his cup.

Buddy's stuck up in DC. His Dad's in the hospital and Buddy doesn't know yet for how long. These small jobs for the university are his bread and butter, so he didn't want to let this one slip.

Makes sense.

And we're the only guys he knows certified to work with the historic brick that they have at the university. Mac just nodded.

The university in question would be the University of Virginia, otherwise known as UVA, a quasi-public institution founded in Charlottesville some two hundred years ago by Thomas Jefferson, the third president of the United States and author of the Declaration of Independence. Steeped in history, the university gave Charlottesville a cachet other Virginia towns could only envy. More to the point, Clay well knew, with some twenty thousand students and endowments in the billions of dollars, Mr. Jefferson's university today was the economic engine driving Charlottesville's explosive growth. While UVA seemed to put up new buildings on a whim, new housing developments and shopping centers were also cropping up all over town. Clay was fine with that, except that along with all the growth came a near constant rush of traffic on the town's overburdened main roadways. Popularity has its price, Clay thought, as he negotiated snarled shopping center traffic along Barracks Road.

Traffic eased as Clay turned onto Rugby Road and drove past stately brick mansions and upscale homes on the street's upper end. Both he and Mac had a special appreciation for homes like these, their business being restoring historic houses. But today was to be something of a lark for them, the small repair job to help out Buddy. Just a few hours of work before driving back home to Staunton.

Mac stared out the passenger side window as the private homes gave way to a cluster of large, historic-looking fraternity houses and university buildings farther down Rugby. Wonder if any of these were built back in Jefferson's time? Mac said idly.

I don't know, but that one was, Clay answered, pointing at the Rotunda. At least the original Rotunda was. What's there now was put up after a fire in 1895, which destroyed the one Jefferson designed and built. The big red-brick and white-marble building with a domed roof loomed up ahead at the end of Rugby Road. Stopping for the red light at the tee intersection with University Avenue, Clay took in the imposing edifice that in Jefferson's day housed the university's classrooms. Situated on a small rise on the other side of University Avenue, the iconic Rotunda was and still is the architectural centerpiece of UVA's grounds as laid out by Jefferson. Clay's gaze followed the Rotunda's wide marble stairway up to a portico with six massive, two-story-high white columns and the gabled stone roof they supported. And high above that was the classical white-domed roof.

A lot of history around here, Mac offered.

And nice scenery too, Clay added as a clutch of attractive young coeds, bundled up against the cold, crossed the street in front of Clay's truck. In fact there seemed to be a steady stream of students, male and female, converging on this busy intersection by sidewalks from all directions.

Hey, you're engaged now, Mac joked.

I know. Clay laughed. But that doesn't mean I can't look.

The light changed, the stream of students parted briefly, and Clay got onto McCormick Road, a main street through the older section of UVA's grounds. On his left now was the West Range, a long row of one-story brick buildings fronted by distinctive brick archways. Clay slowed to find one of the narrow alleys between the buildings.

That's it, Poe Alley, Clay announced as he hit his blinker and came to a stop, waiting for oncoming traffic to pass before turning into the alley. That room over there in the West Range, he said, pointing to his left. Room number thirteen. That's set up as Edgar Allan Poe's room. But it's for the tourists. Clay wrapped up the steering wheel to the left and pulled into the alley, passing between walled gardens before coming to a stop a couple hundred feet ahead at a small parking area covered with pea gravel.

This is the first place he stayed, Clay said pointing to the back of a two-story building. Pavilion Five. It's one of the first structures built for the university. Poe moved on to the West Range later, to room thirteen, or maybe seventeen. Nobody knows for sure, because the room assignment records were lost in a fire.

You read that book on the history of the university grounds? Mac responded dryly in the face of Clay's tour guide monologue.

Yes, Clay said with a grin. Nothing in it about the tunnel though. Buddy told me the entrance is in the basement of Five. Guess we should get some eyes on the job before we lug the mortar mix in.

Both men, dressed in jeans, heavy Carhart work jackets, and baseball caps, slid out of their respective sides of the truck and stretched after their long ride from Staunton. Six-foot-something Clay had the broad shoulders, sturdy frame, and strong jaw of a man who looked as if he could do some serious damage. But Mac, big boned and thick necked, was the real bruiser. He was easily the taller and beefier of the two.

After grabbing flashlights and a few tools from the truck, they disappeared down the stairs to the basement door of Pavilion V. Inside the dimly lighted basement, Clay and Mac threaded their way to the right between stacks of tables and folding chairs.

The door to the tunnel is supposed to be all the way over on the far side, Clay said leading the way. Past the furnace...There it is.

While Mac put his flashlight beam on the door, Clay dug the key Buddy had given him out of his pocket, opened the padlock, and tugged on the old wood door. It wouldn't budge.

Stuck, Clay mumbled. He jerked it a couple of times, but only the upper part of the old door showed any sign of movement.

Let me try, Mac said, stepping up to the door and grabbing hold of the old-fashioned porcelain doorknob. Mac lifted up and then pulled with a short, sharp heave. The door swung open, bringing with it a beard of torn spider webs encircling the doorway.

Oh, great, grumbled Clay.

I got the door open. You can lead on, chief.

The things I do for history, Clay said with a laugh while contemplating the pitch dark, cobweb-lined opening. Other people might balk at walking into that strange, spider infested hole in the wall, but for Clay and Mac it amounted to a curiosity, a little sideshow of history to be explored. And they were getting paid to do it.

Holding out his hammer, Clay spun it around the doorway to clear a path through the spider webs, then flicked on his flashlight to illuminate the narrow, brick-lined tunnel. The arched brick ceiling seemed solid and the steam pipes and metal cable housings--additions during more modern times--only confirmed that others had come to the same conclusion.

This won't be too bad, Clay observed as his flashlight beam probed the darkness in the tunnel ahead. The ceiling was high enough that they were able to stand upright and the heat from the steam pipes felt good after coming in from the chill outside.

If you say so, Clay. But if you ask me, we're looking at Mr. Jefferson's university from the bottom up.

Yes, Clay agreed with a laugh. Definitely a different perspective.

When they weren't speaking, the tunnel's tomblike silence somehow amplified the sound of their footsteps, the rustling of their clothes, and the metallic clink of their tools. Following directly behind Clay, Mac kept his flashlight pointed down so that he could see where he was putting his feet. This is a pretty long tunnel. What do you suppose they used it for? Mac's voice echoed off the brick walls now that they were in more than a hundred feet or so.

Buddy said it was for kitchen servants. It ran from an old basement kitchen at The Colonnade Club, Pavilion Seven, so they could serve food to the students staying at Five. I guess they used it for storage too, like maybe a wine cellar. Our repair job is pretty close to the old kitchen at Pavilion Seven.

Mac shined his flashlight on the arched brick ceiling. There were no signs of failing masonry or leaking water. In fact the tunnel seemed to be bone dry.

Everything looks pretty solid, considering this has been around for almost two hundred years, Mac said as they ducked around a junction of steam pipes. Wouldn't it have been easier to come in from Pavilion Seven's basement?

Can't get in that way. That part of the old kitchen was blocked off a long time ago during a remodeling. Clay shined his flashlight along the tunnel's right wall. Should be somewhere around here...Yes, there it is. Over there.

Both men came to a stop in front of a narrow section of brick obviously bulging outward from the normal run of the wall on either side. Clay played his flashlight on it.

Looks like an old doorway that's been bricked up. Must have been a long time ago. Clay ran the flat of his hand over the bricks. Soft mud bricks, the same site-made bricks they used for the rest of this tunnel. I don't see any water staining on the brick, so leaking water isn't what's caused it to fail.

Mac ran his finger along one of the mortar joints. The mortar's gone bad. It's just a dry powder now, where it hasn't already disappeared.

Maybe whoever did this patch didn't use the right mix for the mortar. Probably too much sand and not enough lime. But it's too far gone now to just repoint the joints. We'll have to pull the whole patch out, clean the bricks, and put them back in with the right mix of fresh mortar.

The old doorway only being about six feet high, Clay started with the bricks at about eye level. Mac held up his flashlight while Clay inserted the tip of his mason's trowel under the top brick. Working the tool up and down, he gradually levered the first one out. Mac stuck his thick fingers in the resulting hole and easily slid out the next one. The failed mortar made their job go quickly and after they pulled out the first few courses of brick, it became clear some sort of a void, or even possibly a room lay on the other side of the doorway.

Looks like it only goes back about ten feet, Clay said shining his flashlight through the narrow slot they'd opened up. Maybe a root cellar?

How about a room for storing ice? They did that back then. Cut it during the winter and stored it underground so they could use it during the summer.

That's right. I think I saw one of those at Monticello, Jefferson's mansion. Gee, if it's a wine cellar we might find some really old bottles from Jefferson's private stock.

Their curiosity aroused, the pair began racing to see who could pull bricks out the fastest. The bottom of the opening was about chest high when Mac suddenly jumped back.

Whoa! What the hell is that? Better take a look in there, Clay.

Clay flicked on his flashlight to reveal something so unexpected it took him a second or two to shake off the shock and realize what he was seeing. There, entombed in the small dark chamber was a woman, more precisely what was left of her, under a pale gray shroud of cobwebs and decades, if not a century or more of dust. The strange sight was at once disturbingly grotesque and yet so curiously mystifying that neither man could turn away. Clay could make out that she wore a full-length dress of an old-fashioned vintage. She appeared to be sitting in an old wooden chair, her head thrown back as though contemplating the ceiling.

This is weird, Mac. What is she doing just sitting there looking as calm as you please? She must have been dead before somebody walled her in.

Mac just muttered, What a way to go. The thought of it made him shudder. He'd seen death on the battlefield, but to be walled up and left where no one could find you, where no one would ever know, that seemed an even more horrible fate.

We'd better get the rest of these bricks out. I want a closer look, Clay said, his curiosity about this macabre scene getting the better of him. Clay and Mac began yanking out several bricks at a time without bothering to stack them. Soon they had opened the doorway down to just a foot or two off the floor. Clay, flashlight in hand, stepped inside the small room and played his flashlight beam around it. The tomb looked to be only about ten feet square with brick walls and an arched brick ceiling and, now at least, it was bone dry. The stale air had a strong earthy smell, but the stench of death had disappeared long ago. Wanting to get a better look, Clay moved closer to the skeleton.

You sure you want to do that? I mean that looks like it's for real.

Yes, it does, doesn't it? I wonder, they used to dig up corpses for medical students to practice dissecting back then. Could be some smart aleck med students put one in here as a joke and walled it up.

Or somebody wanted to cover up a murder, Mac added. They did that back then too.

Clay moved in close to the skeleton and ran his flashlight beam over the length of it, revealing at long last a grim secret hidden from the prying eyes of the living for almost two hundred years. He too had seen his share of men killed on the battlefield, their bodies grossly bloodied and torn, but this was a side of death he hadn't encountered before. There was something curiously repulsive about seeing a person reduced to this boney aftermath of life, an unwelcome reminder of what awaits us all. The tattered, dust-covered remains of a full-length brown satin dress covered much of the woman's skeleton up to what had been her neck. The skirt was oddly pulled up revealing the bare, gray bones of her legs. She sat almost placidly in an old wooden high-backed chair. The bones of her hands protruded from inside the sleeves of her dress and were crossed demurely in what was once her lap.

Clay played his flashlight on the mass of cobwebs surrounding the skull. Bits of black desiccated skin and long strands of her hair still clung to the bone. Her jaw was part way open in a macabre imitation of a smile, while the dark hollows where her eyes should have been stared blankly back at him. He could not shake the realization that this once had been a living, breathing young woman. Who was she? Clay wondered. Why had she been left like this?

Hey Clay. Maybe we'd better just leave it. Could be a crime scene, you know. Besides, messing with dead people is bad luck.

Clay was about to leave when his curiosity drew him back for a closer look at the skeleton. Wait a minute. I think I saw the glint of something metal in there. Clay slowly extended his hand toward the skeleton's neck.

Mac couldn't help himself. Gross, Clay. You're not really going to touch that, are you?

The delicate veil of cobwebs felt soft and fibrous like some sort of morbid cotton candy. Clay gently parted it at the neckline of the woman's dress, probing carefully with his finger. There, it's a gold chain and there's a locket attached, he announced, his voice rising with excitement. Might this at least tell them who she was? Trying not to disturb the skeleton's bones, Clay gradually slid the chain around until he had the little heart-shaped locket in his hand. Rubbing it between his thumb and forefinger, he cleaned off the dust and revealed the locket's little catch. What secret, he wondered, did it hold? A picture, a lock of hair? He pressed the catch and the heart fell open.

What are you doing? Mac asked with some irritation.

Hang on, I'm trying to read the inscription. Clay worked the flashlight closer and turned the locket on an angle to get a better look at the engraving inside. Clay's voice echoed in the tunnel as he read aloud, It says, 'My beloved Annabel. Your devoted Eddy. Oct. 1826'. Then he muttered, more to himself than to Mac, Eddy? Could that be...

What?

The locket. I wonder if it could be from Edgar Allan Poe. Maybe she was his girlfriend when he was a student here. It says 1826, so she must have been put in here around then.

What a God awful way to go. You don't really think Poe put her in there, do you?

Well, it looks like he knew her. If this Eddy is really Poe. Even so, it doesn't mean he did this.

Sure. But in high school, didn't we have to read his story about a guy getting revenge by walling somebody up and leaving him to die?

Yes, The Cask--The Cask of something or other. He didn't write that while he was a student here. Not until long after, I think.

Well, maybe this was where he got the idea for the story.

Could be. Clay stepped back out into the tunnel. But any way you cut it, we'd better get the police down here.

Back above ground somewhat later, two University Police cars, their blue lights still flashing, crowded the narrow deadend alley behind Clay's truck. University Police Lieutenant Al DeMarco, a ruddy faced, middle-aged man of Italian descent, finished grilling Clay and Mac in short order. Meanwhile, his partner put in calls to the Albemarle County medical examiner and to the university Provost's Office. Then they checked Clay's story by calling Buddy's boss at the university's Facilities Management Office.

Before long, DeMarco, as the lead investigator, found himself surrounded by two other University Police officers and some low-level university staffers. With their help he sorted out how to proceed in this thoroughly unorthodox case, while a small knot of curious onlookers, students mostly, braved the chilly gray weather to gather in the small spaces the narrow alleyway afforded.

Clay and Mac stood off to one side, unsure whether they should stay or go, but frankly still curious about what would happen next. The arrival of the County ME's van created some complicated juggling of vehicles before it came to rest where Clay's pickup had been. Hard on the heels of the ME, a reporter and photographer for the Charlottesville Daily Enterprise showed up and began making a beeline toward DeMarco. The two ME staffers and a camera-wielding policeman, having received directions from DeMarco, set off for the steam tunnel.

That's when a thirty-something, casually dressed university instructor in a deep purple ski jacket and black knit cap approached Clay and Mac, introducing himself as Adjunct Professor Carlos Rivera. Carlos looked on the small side next to Clay and Mac, but then anybody of average build did. Carlos came across as mild mannered, tentative, almost too polite. At first Clay thought the olive-skinned professor actually might be a foreigner. His slight smile was disarming though, and Clay couldn't help noticing the way the man held his head downward and to the right in an almost defensive way. It was as if the man was afraid of being hit, or of looking at anybody directly in the eyes.

Are you the ones who found her?

Yes, Mac here and I. How did you know? Was she a student of yours? he asked with a wry grin.

Taken aback, Carlos blinked, or rather his whole face seemed to convulse in a momentary spasm as his eyes shut tight and his head dipped farther down in a vain attempt to hide the severe facial tic. Recovering, he laughed and said in an almost apologetic tone, Oh, a joke. Not likely. I was just leaving a class when I saw the alert on my phone. He looked up directly at Clay with soft black eyes and as if asserting himself, winked with one. Big campus, fast grapevine. Do they know who the girl is?

Carlos seemed harmless enough, if not a little odd. Maybe a reclusive academic type, Clay decided. But he saw no reason why he shouldn't talk with the man about what he and Mac had found.

Not really. She was wearing a locket though. It's inscribed with 'My beloved Annabel. Your devoted Eddy. Oct. 1826'.

Really? That's very interesting. You see, the class I teach is Nineteenth Century American Lit, and Edgar Allan Poe, naturally, is one of the major writers we study. Oct. 1826, he mused. Oh boy. That would be while he was a student here. Just before he left.

He left?

Yes, his stepfather refused to pay any more for his studies here. It was all very tawdry. Poe got into debt because of gambling so his stepfather cut him off. The man was very strict and stiff-necked, you see, a Calvinist through and through. Poe always claimed he had had to gamble because the stipend his father gave him was too little to pay his expenses. But as far as his father was concerned, Poe's drinking and partying were the problem.

So he wasn't exactly a credit to the university? Clay asked idly as his attention drifted momentarily back to Lt. DeMarco and the knot of people surrounding him. A TV cameraman and a reporter who Clay remembered from his treasure-hunt days were setting up to interview DeMarco. The camera's lamp flashed on, bathing DeMarco and the reporter in a pool of bright light that seemed out of place on this gray day. The reporter introduced himself as Cliff Weston, WCRTV Channel 17, Charlottesville.

Not then, no, Carlos answered, drawing Clay's attention back to him. He did well academically, but in those first years of the university's existence, students as a whole were a very rowdy bunch. Poe had plenty of problems later in his life too. Carlos smiled politely, then continued in a flat uninterested tone as though repeating by rote a line from his lecture. But he was without a doubt a great writer. Then he almost conceded, A genius. It seemed to Clay that Poe the person probably was a difficult subject Carlos had dealt with far too many times before. But the administration definitely isn't going to like Poe's being connected with a young girl's murder, if that's what this is.

We were wondering, Mac interjected, about that story he wrote about walling a man up. Kind of a coincidence...

That's what I thought, Carlos answered. "The Cask of Amontillado. The story was about revenge, revenge for 'a thousand injuries' by an offensive wine connoisseur named Fortunato. His former friend, Montresor, tricks Fortunato into sampling some wine in his cellar, shackles him to a wall, and walls him in. Was this Annabel shackled to the wall?"

She was just sitting there in a chair. Probably already dead when she was walled in, because it looked to me like she hadn't even tried to get out, Clay answered.

So do you think Poe could have done it? Mac asked. Despite his reticence about corpses, he was nevertheless curious about the Poe angle. Like killing her was some sort of acting out for real that became a story, instead of the other way around?

"You mean, as in 'could his art be imitating real life, his