Seattle, Prince Prospero & Jim Cramer

Edgar Allen Poe set one of his stories in medieval Europe during the plague. The pneumonic form was so virulent that it could kill within a half-hour of the first symptoms showing themselves, often on the face as a sort of Masque of the Red Death.

THE "Red Death" had long devastated the country. No pestilence had ever been so fatal, or so hideous.

But there was a man with a castle, and he was immune.

The Prince Prospero was happy and dauntless and sagacious.

One night he threw a big party, as if to show the world how safe and clever he was.

The external world could take care of itself. In the meantime it was folly to grieve, or to think. The prince had provided all the appliances of pleasure. There were buffoons, there were improvisatori, there were ballet-dancers, there were musicians, there was Beauty, there was wine. All these and security were within. Without was the "Red Death."

Meanwhile, his lunatic of a brother, Jim Cramer, transported to the 21st century as if by magic, ran amok in the land, warning of the Red Death. He was both scorned and feted for his powers of observation. His shrieking candor was bracing, brave, and dangerous.

Don't you dare buy now. Don't you dare buy a home now. You will lose money.

Then he retreated to Prince Prospero's castle, where he had been invited to join the festivities. It was a rainy night in the Pacific Northwest, and the pestilence was nowhere to be noticed.

Bob Toll told me that Seattle was up. ... Seattle's okay.

Was all truly well? A letter arrived at a reveler's doorstep. It was from a real estate agent in Magnolia, one of the castle's finer neighborhoods. It showed that in July 2007, inventories had suddenly doubled while sales had not changed. A gasp was heard, quickly stifled.

When the echoes had fully ceased, a light laughter at once pervaded the assembly; the musicians looked at each other and smiled as if at their own nervousness and folly, and made whispering vows, each to the other, that the next chiming of the clock should produce in them no similar emotion; and then, after the lapse of sixty minutes, (which embrace three thousand and six hundred seconds of the Time that flies,) there came yet another chiming of the clock, and then were the same disconcert and tremulousness and meditation as before.

One Sunday, the reveler ventured forth to two open houses in his neighborhood. Welcome, one agent said. It's nice to have some company. He was showing a beautiful home, professionally staged by a professional staging company. The price had been cut twice, most recently from $750,000 to $700,000. Based on what similar houses rent for, it ought to sell for about $375,000. No one's even stopping to look, the agent said. Sales are down more than one-third. The market topped out right around Memorial Day. Magnolia is full of people with one-year ARMs ready to reset, he added. But maybe things will come back next spring.

The other house was advertised for $585,000, recently cut from $600,000. If it had been on the market last spring, its agent said, he'd have set the price at $625,000 and it would have sold immediately. But it's not spring. This year's pool of buyers is exhausted. Wait until January, and they'll start trickling back.

Both realtors were subdued but not depressed. Yes, things are slow. The outlying areas of Seattle will suffer the most, and California is getting what it had coming. The reveler agreed. Magnolia is forever, he said, but I hope you've saved some of the money you've been making. Yes, one agent said. I'll be able to put food on the table. People are always going to have to live somewhere. We have cycles, the other agent said, mentioning that he's been selling real estate for more than 30 years. We've had a good ten-year run here. It's not the end of the world.

The reveler recalled his friend from across town. The house across the street has been for sale all summer. Started at $350,000 and is now at $300,000. I wonder how low it will go, the friend said.

It was then, however, that the Prince Prospero, maddening with rage and the shame of his own momentary cowardice, rushed hurriedly through the six chambers, while none followed him on account of a deadly terror that had seized upon all. He bore aloft a drawn dagger, and had approached, in rapid impetuosity, to within three or four feet of the retreating figure, when the latter, having attained the extremity of the velvet apartment, turned suddenly and confronted his pursuer.

There was a sharp cry -- and the dagger dropped gleaming upon the sable carpet, upon which, instantly afterwards, fell prostrate in death the Prince Prospero. Then, summoning the wild courage of despair, a throng of the revellers at once threw themselves into the black apartment, and, seizing the mummer, whose tall figure stood erect and motionless within the shadow of the ebony clock, gasped in unutterable horror at finding the grave-cerements and corpse-like mask which they handled with so violent a rudeness, untenanted by any tangible form.

And now was acknowledged the presence of the Red Death. He had come like a thief in the night. And one by one dropped the revellers in the blood-bedewed halls of their revel, and died each in the despairing posture of his fall. And the life of the ebony clock went out with that of the last of the gay. And the flames of the tripods expired. And Darkness and Decay and the Red Death held illimitable dominion over all.