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What with telling the news for the public good and driving bargains for his own, Dominicus was so much delayed on the road that he chose to put up at a tavern about five miles short of Parker's Falls. After supper, lighting one of his prime cigars, he seated himself in the bar-room and went through the story of the murder, which had grown so fast that it took him half an hour to tell.
The "Domestic Intelligence" of this number is as follows: "The lady of Dr. Winthrop Brown, a son and Heir. Mrs. Hathorne's cat, Seven Kittens. We hear that both of the above ladies are in a state of convalescence." Also, "Intentions of Marriage. The beautiful and accomplished Miss Keziah Dingley will shortly be united to Dominicus Jordan Esq." Dominicus Jordan is the pedler of the Raymond notes.
Dominicus watched him as he descended, and noticed that he carried a bundle over his shoulder on the end of a stick and travelled with a weary yet determined pace. He did not look as if he had started in the freshness of the morning, but had footed it all night, and meant to do the same all day. "Good-morning, mister," said Dominicus, when within speaking-distance. "You go a pretty good jog.
Certain it is, however, that he rushed forward, prostrated a sturdy Irishman with the butt end of his whip, and found not indeed hanging on the St. Michael's pear-tree, but trembling beneath it, with a halter round his neck the old, identical Mr. Higginbotham! "Mr. Higginbotham," said Dominicus tremulously, "you're an honest man, and I'll take your word for it. Have you been hanged or not?"
And after him, by many schoolmen, such as Aquinas, Alensis, Albertus, Bonaventura, Richardus, and Dominicus Soto, all mentioned by the Archbishop of Spalato, lib. 2, cap. 4, num. 25.
These ambiguous circumstances, with the stranger's surprise and terror, made Dominicus think of raising a hue and cry after him, as an accomplice in the murder; since a murder, it seemed, had really been perpetrated. "But let the poor devil go," thought the pedlar. "I don't want his black blood on my head; and hanging the nigger wouldn't unhang Mr. Higginbotham.
When the story was concluded, he rose up very deliberately, brought his chair right in front of Dominicus, and stared him full in the face, puffing out the vilest tobacco smoke the pedlar had ever smelt.
Being a neighbor of mine, he called me into his store as I was riding by, and treated me, and then asked me to do a little business for him on the road. He didn't seem to know any more about his own murder than I did." "Why, then it can't be a fact!" exclaimed Dominicus Pike.
Dominicus was acquainted with the tollman, and, while making change, the usual remarks on the weather passed between them. "I suppose," said the pedlar, throwing back his whiplash, to bring it down like a feather on the mare's flank, "you have not seen anything of old Mr. Higginbotham within a day or two?" "Yes," answered the toll-gatherer.
However, the sun shone bright on poor Dominicus, and the mud, an emblem of all stains of undeserved opprobrium, was easily brushed off when dry. Being a funny rogue, his heart soon cheered up; nor could he refrain from a hearty laugh at the uproar which his story had excited.
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