The Investigation Begins
Imagery accompanies Gus Landor on the walk which takes him into the investigation of the murder at the center of this story. “The leaves gave off an actual heat, even the dead ones, and this heat rose through my soles and gilded the mist that banded the farmhouses. I walked alone, threading along the ribbons of hills . . . the only noises were the scraping of my boots and the bark of Dolph van Corlaer’s dog and, I suppose, my own breathing. It is Indian summer in late October of 1830 and he is alone on the walk. The pages leading into this opening description of the next chapter have made it abundantly clear that on a larger scale, Gus is not just alone, but lonely in a way hinting at abandonment. That previous chapter is dated April of the next year, so this is a flashback, but the atmosphere of isolation and alienation fostered by the imagery of crunching of dead leaves and the sounds of near-silence serves as a sort of foreshadowing that looks backward to Gus’ future outlined in the opening.
Artemus Marquis
Artemus Landor has been singled out by Gus Landor as his prime suspect in the case for reasons unknown. He has enlisted Edgar Allan Poe to insinuate himself into the family manse to observe and report back to him. Poe’s reports, expectedly, read less like police reports than his short stories, especially when it comes to such things as describing Artemus. “He is perhaps five feet and ten inches, slender and well-knit, with hazel-green eyes and chestnut hair of such a curly disposition that the Academy barbers have yet to tame it…he has even begun to sport a mustache which he trims with great rigor. A smile seems always to play on his lips, which are full and warm. He is reckoned extremely handsome, I believe, and a more susceptible soul might suppose that Byron himself had been reborn in all his beauty.” Most of this descriptive imagery is of the composite sketch sort for which imagery is made. It is very easy to overlook the most significant aspect of this use of imagery: the allusion to the adjectivizing of the poet, Lord Byron. The term Byronic is not used, but this is far from the only time that his name will pop up in the text. Without understanding the allusion to the concept of “Byronic” the recurring appearance of Byron by name will not be fully comprehended.
Fairy Tales and Horror Stories
The book is presented from multiple perspectives, including straightforward reports written by Poe, a newspaper account, and a couple of letters. Gus Landor is the writer of those letters and his storytelling duties also include the bulk of the novel’s straightforward first-person narrative as well as his “Last Testament” which kicks off the book. Late in the story, his narrative approach takes a singularly unique turn for just one single chapter. In the Highlands, there dwelt a young maiden, no more than seventeen. Tall and lovely, graceful in line, sweet in repose. She had come to this remote clime to help her father live and had instead watched her mother die…Father and daughter read to each other and played at ciphers and puzzles and went for long walks in the hills…and led an altogether quiet life. Not too quiet for the maiden, who had in her pockets of hard silence, not to be penetrated by anyone.” The sudden shift in tone to something more consistent with a fairy tale than a crime thriller is jarring on its own, but it also feels out-of-sync with itself. The imagery engendered by the softness of language like “young maiden” in a “remote clime” doesn’t seem like it is leading to the harshness of “hard silence” and penetration. The story he goes on to take mirrors this approach and its relentless moves from its fairy tale beginning to horror story ending.
A Good Place to Sleep
It has been observed that the entire history of civilization has been directed toward the effort to find a more comfortable place to sleep. Gus Landor uses imagery to describe what seems to be the ultimate ideal of this search. “I was given a room overlooking Constitution Island. The shutters kept out nearly all the starlight and moonlight— sleeping was a dive into a pit, and the sound of reveille seemed to come from a distant star. I lay there, watching the red light steal through the bottom of the shutters. The darkness felt delicious.” What he is describing here may merely be on the surface a room in a hotel, but there is subtext buried within it. The reference to keeping out the light and diving into a pit may be a glimpse into the subconscious of the narrator. The darkness is described as delicious because a mystery is something he has been feeding on for some time now. In fact, he has been living in darkness not nearly as comfortable and sleep-inducing.
