Angel Agnes | Page 5

find herself.
"Not far; right across the street there into that grocery store at the corner. We haven't been able to send any one there. Just been able to look in now and then and give them all their doses. Please give me your name, and don't leave there till I come, and I'll look after your baggage."
"My name, sir, is Agnes Arnold. I have no baggage except this one small trunk, and I would rather you let this young man bring it along directly with me."
"Very well, take it, Ned, and follow Miss Arnold, and see you don't ask anything for the job."
"Yes, sir," replied the negro porter, and shouldering the trunk he strode on hastily after Agnes. He would not go further into the house, however, than the little room immediately in the rear of the store.
"Surely you are not afraid, you who live here!" exclaimed Agnes.
"De Lor' bless your soul, missus. Youse couldn't haul dis yer niggah furder inter dis yallah house with an army muel team. Don't yer smell dat 'culiah scent. O, Lor', good-by missus. Dat's de rele Jack, suah!"
And without waiting for any further argument or remark upon the subject, the terrified fellow clapped his hand over his mouth and nose, and actually bounded out into the street to where some men were burning tar and pitch as a disinfectant. Nor did he seem to consider himself safe until he had nearly choked himself by thrusting his head into the dense black Fumes.
Agnes would have laughed at the silly man, but at this moment such violent and agonized groaning fell upon her ears, that she started and trembled. But it was only for a moment.
In an instant more she had thrown off her travelling costume and hat and bounded up stairs.
There such a sight met her gaze as would have chilled, the stoutest heart. In a narrow rear chamber were four living people and two corpses. The two dead ones were the father, a man of about forty, and a little girl of six years, his youngest child. The four living people were the mother, thirty years old, a little girl, and two boys, of the respective ages of nine, fourteen, and sixteen.
"Don't take us away to the cemetery yet! for God's sake, don't!" groaned the woman in agony. "We're not dead yet. It won't be long. But it won't be long. Leave us be a while, and then you can bury us all in one grave. For God's sake! please!"
"My dear woman, I've come to try and save your lives, not to bury you," replied Agnes in a low, kindly voice, patting the sick woman's forehead.
"They take plenty of them away and stick them in the ground while they are alive yet. Heaven help us, for we can't help ourselves."
These words were not spoken consecutively, but in fits and starts between paroxysms of dreadful physical suffering. Her racked mind and body prevented the mother from quickly comprehending Agnes. And it was not until the latter had talked to her soothingly and cheerfully for several minutes, that she began to perceive the real state of affairs.
And then the re-action from the depths of despair was like the infusion of new life and strength to the sick woman. She cried and sobbed as though her heart would break for several minutes, which excitement ended in a spasm.
Most women would have been terrified at such a scene as was at this moment presented to Miss Arnold. But she was not a mere fancy nurse. Far from it. Up went her sleeves, and for the next two hours she worked with her four patients like a Trojan, first with the mother, and next with the children. Her next care was to separate the living from the dead. The child she wrapped up in a small sheet quite neatly, and for the father she performed the same sad task, using a coverlet, so that when about three o'clock the dead wagon came around with the coffins, both bodies were decently prepared for interment.
"'Bout what time d'ye think I better git back fur t'others, nurse?" inquired the driver of the wagon, consulting a small pass-book that he carried in his side coat pocket.
Agnes was horrified to hear such a brutal question propounded to her in the coolest and most business-like manner.
"What do you mean?" asked she, indignantly.
"Mean jist wot I says! No time to fool round, nuther," was the answer. "This is the Burton fam'ly, aint it?" he asked, giving his book another glance, and then pitching his eye quickly up around the store, as though looking for a sign with which to compare the note book.
"Yes, Burton," answered Agnes.
"All right, then! They wuz tuk yisterday at noon. There's a man, a woman, four children!" [He tapped the tip of