you'll be nabbed.'--'Pay ye!' he yelled; 'do you think I'd
pay you anything for that little Jew?'--'She's just as much a Christian
as you are,' says I. 'Ain't you a Christian, little gal? and is'nt this
gentleman your father? and ain't you surprised that he wants to give you
back to be put in the bag?' I said this hopin' she'd have sense enough
to say he was her father so's to get rid of me.

"The wretched gal had been clean dumbfounded when she was took out of
the bag, and hadn't done nothin' so far but blubber and cry, and try to
get away, which she couldn't, because I held her frock; but now she ups
and screams he wasn't her father, and she'd never seen him before, and
then he storms and swears, and tells me to take her back where I got
her, and I tell him I'll see him hanged first, and what I want is my
money; she screams, and he swears he'll not pay me a cent, and I squares
off and says that I'll thrash him out of his skin, and then he calls in
his coachman, and they both make at me, and I backs out the door to get
my cabby to stand by me, and I found that he'd cut out, havin' most
likely got frightened, afraid of bein' mixed up in trouble. Then I seed
on the high road, some half a mile away, some men comin' gallopin', and
the gent he looked out and seed 'em, too, and then says he to me,
'You'll jist take that little Jew gal back where you got her from; she's
no use to me; I'm goin';' and at that I hollered for my money, and made
a grab at him, but the coachman he tripped me over backward, and before
I could git up again they was both off with the horses on a run.

"I was so mad I couldn't speak, but there wasn't no time for foolin',
and I hadn't made up my mind which door I should cut out of, when the
fellows on horseback went ridin' past as hard as they could go. They
must have seed the carriage drivin' away, and thought for sure it had
the gal in it, and they was after it, lickety-split.

"When they was clean gone I looked round for the little gal, but
couldn't see her, but all a-sudden she came out of the fireplace, where
she'd been hidin'. She'd got over her cryin', and over her scare, too,
judgin' from her looks. 'I'm glad he's gone,' says she, 'and I'm mighty
glad, too, that Mr. Haskins and them other men didn't see me.'--'Who's
they?' says I.--'They's neighbors,' says she;' if they knew I was here
they'd took me back.'--'Well, you little minx,' say I, 'isn't that what
you want?'--'No,' says she. 'I didn't