Upon a midnight dreary

EVERY YEAR, in the early hours of Jan. 19, a crowd gathers along the tall iron gate surrounding Westminster Cemetery in downtown Baltimore to witness a mysterious tradition. Sometime after midnight but before dawn a figure clothed in black slips into the cemetery. Making his way to the grave of Edgar Allan Poe, he lays down a bottle of Martell cognac and three red roses. After silently toasting the author with a sip from the bottle, he disappears again into the night.

To date, no one has discovered the identity of the man known affectionately as the "Poe Toaster," though he's been appearing since 1949, according to Jeff Jerome, the curator of Baltimore's Edgar Allan Poe House and Museum.

Jerome has witnessed the event every year since 1977, long enough to observe that there's been at least one changing of the guard. A note left at the grave a decade ago mentioned that "the torch would be passed."

"My guess is the father died and passed the torch to his sons," says Jerome.

But the tradition remains unchanged -- and unexplained. Poe never mentioned cognac in any of his works. As for the roses, it's believed that they might be designated for each of the three people buried at the grave site: Poe, his wife Virginia, and his aunt Maria Clemm.

Born in 1809 in Boston, Poe considered himself a Virginian, though he spent most of his early 20s in Baltimore, where he struggled to establish himself as a writer and poet. He penned his first horror story, "Berenice," in Baltimore, and died there under mysterious circumstances during a visit in 1849. (Some say he died of tuberculosis, others rabies; still others believe he was the victim of foul play.) The city has long embraced him as its literary mascot, going so far as to name its football team, the Ravens, after Poe's celebrated poem.

This year's birthday vigil saw an increase in spectators, some of them no doubt having heard about it after the drama surrounding last year's event, when spectators broke with tradition and tried to catch the secret grave caller. Jerome criticized the crowd's behavior in numerous interviews, in The Baltimore Sun and elsewhere. This year's crowd of 50 or so people was the largest ever.

"It's nice that people are there and try to witness the event," said Jerome. "But in doing that, they're also making it difficult for the guy to get in."

As the night rolled on, the crowd lost some spectators to the call of warm beds.

"I'll give you $20 if you show up now!" yelled Jay Steinmetz around 1:30 a.m.

After his proposal went unanswered, Steinmetz, who owns an automation company in Baltimore, upped the ante to $40.

"I gotta go, I told my wife I was going out to get milk!" he said.

Then, suddenly, at 2:10 a.m., a dark figure darted into the cemetery and toward Poe's grave.

"He went back there!" said Ethan Nadorlik, pointing to the far side of the cemetery where Poe's grave is located.

But within moments, the man was gone. A spectator who would identify himself only as Raven -- he said he works as a DJ in Las Vegas -- was one of the few people who happened to be near the gate opening that the Poe Toaster slipped out of and into a waiting car. A crowd quickly formed around the DJ, peppering him with questions.

"Did he seem literary?" someone inquired.

Raven, alas, had barely caught a glimpse of the man.

"All I remember is a white scarf," he said.

Jerome, who watched the event from a window of the cemetery's church, later offered his customary denial of knowing the identity of the mystery visitor. It's been suggested that Jerome himself is the toaster, but he was spotted several times in the cemetery with a flashlight, making sure that no one was waiting to ambush the visitor this year. He guards the mystery carefully as well, confirming only that for the 58th year in a row, three roses and a bottle of cognac had been left at Poe's grave site.

"Baltimore has its fair share of legends and ghost stories, and I think this fits right in with the quirkiness of Baltimore," said Jerome. "It's unique, different, theatrical -- it's Poe-ish."

Sarah Richards is a writer and radio producer living in Baltimore.