“Hallo! where’s them dead ’uns? fetch ’em out!”

Agnes had not expected him to put his threat of coming the next morning into execution.  She was therefore somewhat taken aback on beholding him.

But she was a girl of steady, powerful nerves, and cool temper, and the instant she saw that the fellow had made up his mind to behave the way he did merely to vex and harass her, she made up her mind to “settle him off.”

Paying no heed therefore to what he said, Agnes quietly put on her hat and shawl took her umbrella in her hand, and stepping directly up to the brutal wretch said, in a determined tone of voice: 

“Come along with me; I intend to give you such a lesson that you will not forget in a hurry.  You have given me impudence enough for the rest of your life.  You have got to go back now with me to the office of the Superintendent, where I will have you discharged and then punished as you deserve.”

Perhaps thoughts of dark and cruel acts he had already been guilty of, flashed across his mind, and made him tremble for the consequences to himself.  He evidently believed that Agnes knew more about him than he thought.  Or perhaps it was that mysterious influence which a positive mind in motion—­like Miss Arnold’s—­wields over a vacillating temperament like the dead-wagon driver’s.

Whichever of these causes it was, could of course never be positively known, but, like a flash of lightning, the fellow changed his insolent, braggart manner to one of the most contemptible, cringing cowardice.

“Don’t, Missus, don’t!  Ef I’ve ’sulted yer, ’pon my dirty soul I’ll beg yer double-barrelled pardon.  Please don’t yer go to complainin’ on me.  For ef I’d lose my place, my wife and young ’uns ’ud starve to death in no time.  I oughter knowed better then to sass you anyhow, when I seed how good and purty ye wuz!”

“Please don’t leave us! don’t leave us, Miss Agnes, for you’ve been our Good Angel.  You have saved our lives!” piteously exclaimed Mrs. Burton and her children in chorus at this moment, fearful that their nurse was really going away, and dreading if she did, that they would all be carried off either to the cemetery or some other dreadful place.

“Now, please go back, and don’t go a tellin’ on me fur a sassin yer.  I oughter to be ashamed; and I am double-barrelled ashamed.  An’ ef you’ll jest say you’ll furgiv’ me, I’ll go down on my knees.  There now, Miss Agony, ain’t that ’nuff?  Ef it ain’t, why I’ll do whatever you say fur me to do.”

The fellow pulled off his hat, and set himself in such a ludicrously woebegone attitude, that Miss Arnold had great difficulty in restraining herself from laughing outright.  She managed, however, to keep a straight face, and replied: 

“Well, this time I will allow it to pass; but never let me hear of such conduct again, or I will not be so lenient.”

“Thank you, missus; and may I ask you a queshun?”