Tattletown was disappointed in this rejoinder, and began to entertain its suspicions as to the truth of Fobb’s intimations. The old women of the place began to shake their heads and look wise, when the subject was broached. “They _must_ say they always thought there was something wrong—something not altogether _easy_ about Mr. Snobb. They hoped for the best, but there _were_ things—however murder will out.” The fate of the injured “Amanda” was a topic of endless speculation among the more youthful of the feminine inhabitants; and there was a delightful mystery about the “white crape scarf,” which afforded an exhaustless pabulum for curiosity. Snobb must certainly clear up his character. He must explain the circumstances in regard to that “ill-fated young lady.” He must tell the public what became of “that red silk handkerchief.” Above all, he must satisfactorily account for the horrible fact of the old pruning-knife being found under the cherry-tree. In the meantime Fobb declared that he was daily and hourly environed with the perils of assassination. He was obliged to go armed, to protect himself from the minions of the culprit Snobb. His fearless devotion to the cause of truth and justice had “sharpened daggers that were thirsting for his blood—but what was life compared with the proud satisfaction of having maintained the cause of the people, ‘Unmoved by flattery and unbribed by gain?’” In the midst of the excitement produced by this war of words, Tattletown was electrified one fine morning in December, by the report, that Snobb and Fobb had gone over to the neighboring village of Bungville to settle their differences by mortal combat. Two spruce young men from New York had arrived in the stage-coach the night before, and put up at the Tattletown house. _They had brought guns with them_; and early that morning the two editors, similarly armed and equipped, had started off with the strangers in a wagon belonging to the latter, in the direction of the village already named. As these facts became currently known among the Tattletonians the sensation was prodigious. A meeting of the “select men” was instantly called, and a committee of five, consisting of Mr. Fuzz, the retired “squire of the village,” Mr. Rattle, the tinman, Mr. Ponder, the celebrated lecturer on matters and things in general, Mr. Rumble the auctioneer, and Mr. Blister the apothecary, were appointed to proceed on horseback to Bungville, and prevent if possible the duel—or, if that had transpired, to arrest the survivor and the seconds.