Edgar Allen Poo

Edgar was found, as all the great ones are, in a bathroom at midnight, composing. He has buried three quills, mourned each, and dug them up again to finish a couplet. His verse concerns the porcelain, the dark, the porcelain in the dark, and a raven who — he insists — was there first.

He reads slowly, because he believes every line deserves a funeral, and he pauses at the end of each stanza to listen for the plunger. He is the company’s most-requested performer and its least cheerful, which he considers the same accomplishment.

The fee, in his words“Quoth the narrator: “Ninety-nine cents more.””