Being A Preparation For The End
The reader, doubtless, doth now partly understand what dark acts of conspiracy are
beginning to gather around Mr. Hayes; and possibly hath comprehended--
1. That if the rumour was universally credited which declared that Mrs. Catherine was
only Hayes's mistress, and not his wife,
She might, if she so inclined, marry another person; and thereby not injure her fame and
excite wonderment, but actually add to her reputation.
2. That if all the world did steadfastly believe that Mr. Hayes intended to desert this
woman, after having cruelly maltreated her,
The direction which his journey might take would be of no consequence; and he might
go to Highgate, to Edinburgh, to Constantinople, nay, down a well, and no soul would
care to ask whither he had gone.
These points Mr. Hayes had not considered duly. The latter case had been put to him,
and annoyed him, as we have seen; the former had actually been pressed upon him by
Mrs. Hayes herself; who, in almost the only communication she had had with him since
their last quarrel, had asked him, angrily, in the presence of Wood and her son, whether
he had dared to utter such lies, and how it came to pass that the neighbours looked
scornfully at her, and avoided her?
To this charge Mr. Hayes pleaded, very meekly, that he was not guilty; and young
Billings, taking him by the collar, and clinching his fist in his face, swore a dreadful oath
that he would have the life of him if he dared abuse his mother. Mrs. Hayes then spoke
of the general report abroad, that he was going to desert her; which, if he attempted to
do, Mr. Billings vowed that he would follow him to Jerusalem and have his blood. These
threats, and the insolent language of young Billings, rather calmed Hayes than agitated
him: he longed to be on his journey; but he began to hope that no obstacle would be
placed in the way of it. For the first time since many days, he began to enjoy a feeling
something akin to security, and could look with tolerable confidence towards a
comfortable completion of his own schemes of treason.
These points being duly settled, we are now arrived, O public, at a point for which the
author's soul hath been yearning ever since this history commenced. We are now come,
O critic, to a stage of the work when this tale begins to assume an appearance so
interestingly horrific, that you must have a heart of stone if you are not interested by it.
O candid and discerning reader, who art sick of the hideous scenes of brutal bloodshed
which have of late come forth from pens of certain eminent wits,* if you turn away
