sum of money.  About ten months before the murder they removed a little lower to the house of Mr. Whinyard, where the murder was committed, taking lodgings up two pairs of stairs.  There it was that Thomas Billings, by trade a tailor, who wrought journey-work in and about Monmouth Street; under pretence of being Mrs. Hayes’s countryman came to see them.  He did so, and continued in the house about six weeks before the death of Mr. Hayes.

He (Mr. Hayes) had occasion to go a little way out of town, of which his wife gave her associates immediate notice, and they thereupon flocked thither to junket with her until the time they expected his return.  Some of the neighbours out of ill-will which they bore the woman, gave him intelligence of it as soon as he came back, upon which they had abundance of high words, and at last Mr. Hayes gave her a blow or two.  Maybe this difference was in some degree the source of that malice which she afterwards vented upon him.

About this time Thomas Wood, who was a neighbour’s son in the country, and an intimate acquaintance both of Mr. Hayes and his wife, came to town, and pressing being at that time very hot he was obliged to quit his lodgings; and thereupon Mr. Hayes very kindly invited him to accept of the convenience of theirs, promising him moreover, that as he was out of business, he would recommend him to his friends, and acquaintances.  Wood accepted the offer, and lay with Billings.  In three or four days’ time, Mrs. Hayes having taken every opportunity to caress him, opened to him a desire of being rid of her husband, at which Wood, as he very well might, was exceedingly surprised, and demonstrated the business as well as cruelty there would be in such an action, if committed by him, who besides the general ties of humanity, stood particularly obliged to him as his neighbour and his friend.  Mrs. Hayes did not desist upon this, but in order to hush his scruples would fain have persuaded him that there was no more sin in killing Hayes than in killing a brute-beast for that he was void of all religion and goodness, an enemy to God, and therefore unworthy of his protection; that he had killed a man in the country, and destroyed two of his and her children, one of which was buried under an apple tree, the other under a pear tree, in the country.  To these fictitious tales she added another, which perhaps had the greatest weight, viz., that if he were dead, she should be the mistress of fifteen hundred pounds. And then, says she, you may be master thereof, if you will help to get him out of the way.  Billings has agreed too, if you’ll make a third, and so all may be finished without danger.