King Pest by Edgar Allan Poe. Short summary

5 seconds

Drunken sailors run away without paying. They find themselves in a plague-ridden part of London and enter the undertaker’s shop, where King Plague One sits. The inebriated heroes join his feast.

1 minute

Two sailors in port visit an inn where they drink alcohol. They don’t want to pay for the alcohol and decide to run away. Fearing pursuit, they climb over the fence of the outpost. It was built to fence off devastated plague-ridden neighborhoods from uncontaminated areas of London.

The sailors, trying to escape, run into the undertaker’s shop. They notice that King Plague One is sitting at a table there. Next to him is the queen and her retinue. In front of the reveling wicked men stood skullcaps that served as their bowls. Above the table itself hung a skeleton tied by the leg with coals of fire in its skull that lit up the entire room.

The tipsy men who entered were surprised, and then one of them laughed. They join in the feast and ask the unknown men who they are. King Plague says that he is the ruler of the land here and gives his name.