A young fellow, a tobacco-pedler by trade, was on his way from
Morristown, where he had dealt largely with the Deacon of the Shaker
settlement, to the village of Parker's Falls, on Salmon River. He
had a neat little cart, painted green, with a box of cigars depicted
on each side-panel, and an Indian chief, holding a pipe and a golden
tobacco-stalk, on the rear. The pedler drove a smart little mare,
and was a young man of excellent character, keen at a bargain, but
none the worse liked by the Yankees; who, as I have heard them say,
would rather be shaved with a sharp razor than a dull one.
Especially was he beloved by the pretty girls along the Connecticut,
whose favor he used to court by presents of the best smoking tobacco
in his stock; knowing well that the country lasses of New England are
generally great performers on pipes. Moreover, as will be seen in
the course of my story, the pedler was inquisitive, and something of
a tattler, always itching to hear the news, and anxious to tell it
again.
After an early breakfast at Morristown, the tobacco-pedler, whose
name was Dominicus Pike, had traveled seven miles through a solitary
piece of woods, without speaking a word to anybody but himself and
his little gray mare. It being nearly seven o'clock, he was as eager
to hold a morning gossip as a city shopkeeper to read the morning
paper. An opportunity seemed at hand, when, after lighting a cigar
with a sun-glass, he looked up and perceived a man coming over the
brow of the hill, at the foot of which the pedler had stopped his
green cart. Dominicus watched him as he descended, and noticed that
he carried a bundle over his shoulder on the end of a stick, and
traveled 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. What's the latest news at
Parker's Falls?"
The man pulled the broad brim of a gray hat over his eyes, and
answered, rather sullenly, that he did not come from Parker's Falls,
which, as being the limit of his own day's journey, the pedler had
naturally mentioned in his inquiry.
"Well, then," rejoined Dominicus Pike, "let's have the latest news
where you did come from. I'm not particular about Parker's Falls.
Any place will answer."
Being thus importuned, the traveler--who was as ill-looking a fellow
as one would desire to meet, in a solitary piece of woods--appeared
to hesitate a little, as if he was either searching his memory for
news or weighing the expediency of telling it. At last, mounting on
the step of the cart, he whispered in the ear of Dominicus, though he
might have shouted aloud and no other mortal would have heard him.
"I do remember one little trifle of news," said he. "Old Mr.
Higginbotham, of Kimballton, was murdered in his orchard, at eight
o'clock last night, by an Irishman and a nigger. They strung him up
to the branch of a St. Michael's pear-tree, where nobody would find
him till the morning."
As soon as this horrible intelligence was communicated the stranger
betook himself to his journey again, with more speed than ever, not
even turning his head when Dominicus invited him to smoke a Spanish
cigar and relate all the particulars. The pedler whistled to his
mare and went up the hill, pondering on the doleful fate of Mr.
Higginbotham, whom he had known in the way of trade, having sold him
many a bunch of long nines, and a great deal of pigtail, lady's
twist, and fig tobacco. He was rather astonished at the rapidity
with which the news had spread. Kimballton was nearly sixty miles
distant in a straight line; the murder had been perpetrated only at
eight o'clock the preceding night; yet Dominicus had heard of it at
seven in the morning, when, in all probability, poor Mr.
Higginbotham'a own family had but just discovered his corpse, hanging
on the St. Michael's pear-tree. The stranger on foot must have worn
seven-league boots, to travel at such a rate.
"Ill news flies fast, they say," thought Dominicus Pike; "but this
beats railroads. The fellow ought to be hired to go express with the
President's Message."
The difficulty was solved by supposing that the narrator had made a
mistake of one day in the date of the occurrence; so that our friend
did not hesitate to introduce the story at every tavern and country
store along the road, expending a whole bunch of Spanish wrappers
among at least twenty horrified audiences. He found himself
invariably the first bearer of the intelligence, and was so pestered
with questions that he could not avoid filling up the outline, till
it became quite a respectable narrative. He met with one piece of
corroborative evidence. Mr. Higginbotham was a trader; and a former
clerk of his, to whom Dominicus related the facts, testified that the
old gentleman was accustomed to return home through the orchard,
about nightfall, with the money and valuable papers of the store in
his pocket. The clerk manifested but little grief at Mr.
Higginbotham's catastrophe, hinting, what the pedler had discovered
in his own dealings with him, that he was a crusty old fellow, as
close as a vise. His property would descend to a pretty niece who
was now keeping school in Kimballton.
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 barroom, and went through the story of the murder, which had
grown so fast that it took him a half hour to tell. There were as
many as twenty people in the room, nineteen of whom received it all
for gospel. But the twentieth was an elderly farmer, who had arrived
on horseback a short time before, and was now seated in a corner
smoking his pipe. 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
pedler had ever smelled.
"Will you make affidavit," demanded he in the tone of a country
justice taking an examination, "that old Squire Higginbotham of
Kimballton was murdered in his orchard the night before last, and
found hanging on his great pear-tree yesterday morning?"
"I tell the story as I heard it, mister," answered Dominicus,
dropping his half-burned cigar; "I don't say that I saw the thing
done. So I can't take my oath that he was murdered exactly in that
way."
"But I can take mine," said the farmer, "that if Squire Higginbotham
was murdered night before last, I drank a glass of bitters with his
ghost this morning. 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.
"I guess he'd have mentioned it, if it was," said the old farmer; and
he removed his chair back to the corner, leaving Dominicus quite down
in the mouth.
Here was a sad resurrection of old Mr. Higginbotham! The pedler had
no heart to mingle in the conversation any more, but comforted
himself with a glass of gin and water, and went to bed, where, all
night long, he dreamed of hanging on the St. Michael's pear-tree. To
avoid the old farmer (whom he so detested that his suspension would
have pleased him better than Mr. Higginbotham's), Dominicus rose in
the gray of the morning, put the little mare into the green cart, and
trotted swiftly away toward Parker's Falls. The fresh breeze, the
dewy road, and the pleasant summer dawn revived his spirits, and
might have encouraged him to repeat the old story had there been
anybody awake to hear it. But he met neither ox-team, light wagon,
chaise, horseman, nor foot-traveler, till, just as he crossed Salmon
River, a man came trudging down to the bridge with a bundle over his
shoulder, on the end of a stick.
"Good morning, mister," said the pedler, reining in his mare. "If
you come from Kimballton or that neighborhood maybe you can tell me
the real fact about this affair of old Mr. Higginbotham. Was the old
fellow actually murdered, two or three nights ago, by an Irishman and
a nigger?"
Dominicus had spoken in too great a hurry to observe, at first, that
the stranger himself had a deep tinge of negro blood. On hearing
this sudden question, the Ethiopian appeared to change his skin, its
yellow hue becoming a ghastly white, while, shaking and stammering,
he thus replied:
"No! no! There was no colored man! It was an Irishman that hanged
him last night, at eight o'clock. I came away at seven! His folks
can't have looked for him in the orchard yet."
Scarcely had the yellow man spoken, when he interrupted himself, and,
though he seemed weary enough before, continued his journey at a pace
which would have kept the pedler's mare on a smart trot. Dominicus
stared after him in great perplexity. If the murder had not been
committed till Tuesday night, who was the prophet that had foretold
it, in all its circumstances, on Tuesday morning? If Mr.
Higginbotham's corpse were not yet discovered by his own family, how
came the mulatto, at above thirty miles' distance, to know that he
was hanging in the orchard, especially as he had left Kimballton
before the unfortunate man was hanged at all? 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 pedler. "I don't want his
black blood on my head; and hanging the nigger wouldn't unhang Mr.
Higginbotham. Unhang the old gentleman! It's a sin, I know; but I
should hate to have him come to life a second time, and give me the
lie!"
With these meditations, Dominicus Pike drove into the street of
Parker's Falls, which, as everybody knows, is as thriving a village
as three cotton factories and a slitting mill can make it. The
machinery was not in motion, and but a few of the shop doors
unbarred, when he alighted in the stable-yard of the tavern, and made
it his first business to order the mare four quarts of oats. His
second duty, of course, was to impart Mr. Higginbotham's catastrophe
to the hostler. He deemed it advisable, however, not to be too
positive as to the date of the direful fact, and also to be uncertain
whether it were perpetrated by an Irishman and a mulatto, or by the
son of Erin alone. Neither did he profess to relate it on his own
authority, nor that of any one person; but mentioned it as a report
generally diffused.
The story ran through the town like fire among girdled trees, and
became so much the universal talk that nobody could tell whence it
had originated. Mr. Higginbotham was as well known at Parker's Falls
as any citizen of the place, being part owner of the slitting mill,
and a considerable stockholder in the cotton factories. The
inhabitants felt their own prosperity interested in his fate. Such
was the excitement that the "Parker's Falls Gazette" anticipated its
regular day of publication, and came out with half a form of blank
paper and a column of double pica emphasized with capitals, and
headed "HORRID MURDER OF MR. HIGGINBOTHAM!" Among other dreadful
details, the printed account described the mark of the cord round the
dead man's neck, and stated the number of thousand dollars of which
he had been robbed; there was much pathos also about the affliction
of his niece, who had gone from one fainting fit to another, ever
since her uncle was found hanging on the St. Michael's pear-tree with
his pockets inside out. The village poet likewise commemorated the
young lady's grief in seventeen stanzas of a ballad. The selectmen
held a meeting, and, in consideration of Mr. Higginbotham's claims on
the town, determined to issue handbills, offering a reward of five
hundred dollars for the apprehension of his murderers, and the
recovery of the stolen property.
Meanwhile, the whole population of Parker's Falls, consisting of
shopkeepers, mistresses of boarding-houses, factory girls, mill men,
and schoolboys, rushed into the street, and kept up such a terrible
loquacity as more than compensated for the silence of the
cotton-machines which refrained from their usual din, out of respect
to the deceased. Had Mr. Higginbotham cared about posthumous renown,
his untimely ghost would have exulted in this tumult. Our friend
Dominicus, in his vanity of heart, forgot his intended precautions,
and, mounting on the town pump, announced himself as the bearer of
the authentic intelligence which had caused so wonderful a sensation.
He immediately became the great man of the moment, and had just begun
a new edition of the narrative, with a voice like a field preacher,
when the mail stage drove into the village street. It had traveled
all night, and must have shifted horses at Kimballton at three in the
morning.
"Now we shall hear all the particulars," shouted the crowd.
The coach rumbled up to the piazza of the tavern, followed by a
thousand people; for if any man had been minding his own business
till then, he now left it at sixes and sevens, to hear the news. The
pedler, foremost in the race, discovered two passengers, both of whom
had been startled from a comfortable nap to find themselves in the
centre of a mob. Every man assailing them with separate questions,
all propounded at once, the couple were struck speechless, though one
was a lawyer and the other a young lady.
"Mr. Higginbotham! Mr. Higginbotham! Tell us the particulars about
old Mr. Higginbotham!" bawled the mob. "What is the coroner's
verdict? Are the murderers apprehended? Is Mr. Higginbotham's niece
come out of her fainting fits? Mr. Higginbotham! Mr. Higginbotham!!"
The coachman said not a word, except to swear awfully at the hostler
for not bringing him a fresh team of horses. The lawyer inside had
generally his wits about him, even when asleep; the first thing he
did, after learning the cause of the excitement, was to produce a
large red pocketbook. Meantime, Dominicus Pike, being an extremely
polite young man, and also suspecting that a female tongue would tell
the story as glibly as a lawyer's, had handed the lady out of the
coach. She was a fine, smart girl, now wide-awake and bright as a
button, and had such a sweet, pretty mouth that Dominicus would
almost as lief have heard a love tale from it as a tale of murder.
"Gentlemen and ladies," said the lawyer, to the shopkeepers, the mill
men, and the factory girls, "I can assure you that some unaccountable
mistake, or, more probably, a wilful falsehood, maliciously contrived
to injure Mr. Higginbotham's credit, has excited this singular
uproar. We passed through Kimballton at three o'clock this morning,
and most certainly should have been informed of the murder had any
been perpetrated. But I have proof, nearly as strong as Mr.
Higginbotham's own oral testimony, in the negative. Here is a note,
relating to a suit of his in the Connecticut courts, which was
delivered me from that gentleman himself. I find it dated at ten
o'clock last evening."
So saying, the lawyer exhibited the date and signature of the note,
which irrefragably proved, either that this perverse Mr. Higginbotham
was alive when he wrote it, or--as some deemed the more probable case
of two doubtful ones--that he was so absorbed in worldly business as
to continue to transact it, even after his death. But unexpected
evidence was forthcoming. The young lady, after listening to the
pedler's explanation, merely seized a moment to smooth her gown and
put her curls in order, and then appeared at the tavern-door, making
a modest signal to be heard.
"Good people," said she, "I am Mr. Higginbotham's niece."
A wondering murmur passed through the crowd, on beholding her so rosy
and bright; that same unhappy niece whom they had supposed, on the
authority of the "Parker's Falls Gazette," to be lying at death's
door in a fainting fit. But some shrewd fellows had doubted, all
along, whether a young lady would be quite so desperate at the
hanging of a rich old uncle.
"You see," continued Miss Higginbotham, with a smile, "that this
strange story is quite unfounded, as to myself; and I believe I may
affirm it to be equally so in regard to my dear uncle Higginbotham.
He has the kindness to give me a home in his house, though I
contribute to my own support by teaching a school. I left Kimballton
this morning to spend the vacation of commencement week with a
friend, about five miles from Parker's Falls. My generous uncle,
when he heard me on the stairs, called me to his bedside, and gave me
two dollars and fifty cents, to pay my stage fare, and another dollar
for my extra expenses. He then laid his pocketbook under his pillow,
shook hands with me, and advised me to take some biscuit in my bag,
instead of breakfasting on the road. I feel confident, therefore,
that I left my beloved relative alive, and trust that I shall find
him so on my return."
The young lady courtesied at the close of her speech, which was so
sensible and well-worded, and delivered with such grace and
propriety, that everybody thought her fit to be Preceptress of the
best Academy in the State. But a stranger would have supposed that
Mr. Higginbotham was an object of abhorrence at Parker's Falls, and
that a thanksgiving had been proclaimed for his murder, so excessive
was the wrath of the inhabitants on learning their mistake. The mill
men resolved to bestow public honors on Dominicus Pike, only
hesitating whether to tar and feather him, ride him on a rail, or
refresh him with an ablution at the town-pump on the top of which he
had declared himself the bearer of the news. The selectmen, by
advice of the lawyer, spoke of prosecuting him for a misdemeanor, in
circulating unfounded reports, to the great disturbance of the peace
of the commonwealth. Nothing saved Dominicus, either from mob law or
a court of justice, but an eloquent appeal made by the young lady in
his behalf. Addressing a few words of heartfelt gratitude to his
benefactress, he mounted the green cart and rode out of town, under a
discharge of artillery from the schoolboys, who found plenty of
ammunition in the neighboring clay-pits and mud-holes. As he turned
his head, to exchange a farewell glance with Mr. Higginbotham's
niece, a ball, of the consistence of hasty-pudding, hit him slap in
the mouth, giving him a most grim aspect. His whole person was so
bespattered with the like filthy missiles, that he had almost a mind
to ride back and supplicate for the threatened ablution at the
town-pump; for, though not meant in kindness, it would now have been
a deed of charity.
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. The hand-bills of the selectmen would cause the commitment
of all the vagabonds in the State; the paragraph in the "Parker's
Falls Gazette" would be reprinted from Maine to Florida, and perhaps
form an item in the London newspapers; and many a miser would tremble
for his money-bags and life, on learning the catastrophe of Mr.
Higginbotham. The pedler meditated with much fervor on the charms of
the young schoolmistress, and swore that Daniel Webster never spoke
nor looked so like an angel as Miss Higginbotham, while defending him
from the wrathful populace at Parker's Falls.
Dominicus was now on the Kimballton Turnpike, having all along
determined to visit that place, though business had drawn him out of
the most direct road from Morristown. As he approached the scene of
the supposed murder, he continued to revolve the circumstances in his
mind, and was astonished at the aspect which the whole case assumed.
Had nothing occurred to corroborate the story of the first traveler,
it might now have been considered as a hoax; but the yellow man was
evidently acquainted either with the report or the fact; and there
was a mystery in his dismayed and guilty look on being abruptly
questioned. When, to this singular combination of incidents, it was
added that the rumor tallied exactly with Mr. Higginbotham's
character and habits of life; and that he had an orchard, and a St.
Michael's pear-tree, near which he always passed at nightfall; the
circumstantial evidence appeared so strong that Dominicus doubted
whether the autograph produced by the lawyer, or even the niece's
direct testimony, ought to be equivalent. Making cautious inquiries
along the road, the pedler further learned that Mr. Higginbotham had
in his service an Irishman of doubtful character, whom he had hired
without a recommendation, on the score of economy.
"May I be hanged myself," exclaimed Dominicus Pike aloud, on reaching
the top of a lonely hill, "if I'll believe old Higginbotham is
unhanged till I see him with my own eyes and hear it from his own
mouth? And as he's a real shaver, I'll have the minister or some
other responsible man for an endorser."
It was growing dusk when he reached the toll-house on Kimballton
Turnpike, about a quarter of a mile from the village of this name.
His little mare was fast bringing him up with a man on horseback, who
trotted through the gate a few rods in advance of him, nodded to the
toll-gatherer, and kept on toward the village. Dominicus was
acquainted with the toll-man, and while making change the usual
remarks on the weather passed between them.
"I suppose," said the pedler, throwing back his whip-lash, 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. "He passed the gate just before
you drove up, and yonder he rides now, if you can see him through the
dusk. He's been to Woodfield this afternoon, attending a sheriff's
sale there. The old man generally shakes hands and has a little chat
with me; but to-night he nodded--as if to say, 'Charge my toll'--and
jogged on; for wherever he goes, he must always be home at eight
o'clock."
"So they tell me," said Dominicus.
"I never saw a man look so yellow and thin as the squire does,"
continued the toll-gatherer. "Says I to myself, to-night, 'He's more
like a ghost or an old mummy than good flesh and blood.'"
The pedler strained his eyes through the twilight, and could just
discern the horseman, now far ahead on the village road. He seemed
to recognize the rear of Mr. Higginbotham; but through the evening
shadows, and amid the dust from the horse's feet, the figure appeared
dim and unsubstantial; as if the shape of the mysterious old man were
faintly molded of darkness and gray light. Dominicus shivered.
"Mr. Higginbotham has come back from the other world, by way of the
Kimballton Turnpike," thought he.
He shook the reins and rode forward, keeping about the same distance
in the rear of the gray old shadow, till the latter was concealed by
a bend of the road. On reaching this point, the pedler no longer saw
the man on horseback, but found himself at the head of the village
street, not far from a number of stores and two taverns, clustered
round the meeting-house steeple. On his left was a stone wall and a
gate, the boundary of a wood-lot, beyond which lay an orchard,
further still a mowing field, and last of all a house. These were
the premises of Mr. Higginbotham, whose dwelling stood beside the old
highway, but had been left in the background by the Kimballton
Turnpike. Dominicus knew the place; and the little mare stopped
short by instinct; for he was not conscious of tightening the reins.
"For the soul of me, I can not get by this gate!" said he, trembling.
"I never shall be my own again, till I see whether Mr. Higginbotham
is hanging on the St. Michael's pear-tree!"
He leaped from the cart, gave the rein a turn around the gate-post,
and ran along the green path of the wood-lot, as if Old Nick were
chasing behind. Just then the village clock tolled eight, and as
each deep stroke fell, Dominicus gave a fresh bound and flew faster
than before, till, dim in the solitary centre of the orchard, he saw
the fated pear-tree. One great branch stretched from the old
contorted trunk across the path, and threw the darkest shadow on that
one spot. But something seemed to struggle beneath the branch!
The pedler had never pretended to more courage than befits a man of
peaceable occupation, nor could he account for his valor on this
awful emergency. 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?"
If the riddle be not already guessed, a few words will explain the
simple machinery by which this "coming event" was made to "cast its
shadow before." Three men had plotted the robbery and murder of Mr.
Higginbotham; two of them, successively, lost courage and fled, each
delaying the crime one night by their disappearance; the third was in
the act of perpetration, when a champion, blindly obeying the call of
fate, like the heroes of old romance, appeared in the person of
Dominicus Pike.
It only remains to say that Mr. Higginbotham took the pedler into
high favor, sanctioned his addresses to the pretty schoolmistress,
and settled his whole property on their children, allowing themselves
the interest. In due time, the old gentleman capped the climax of
his favors by dying a Christian death, in bed, since which melancholy
event Dominicus Pike has removed from Kimballton, and established a
large tobacco manufactory in my native village.