The strange cough sounded again.
"SAY!" Penrod quavered. "What IS that?"
Then both boys uttered smothered exclamations and jumped, for the
long, gaunt head that appeared in the doorway was entirely
unexpected. It was the cavernous and melancholy head of an
incredibly thin, old, whitish horse. This head waggled slowly
from side to side; the nostrils vibrated; the mouth opened, and
the hollow cough sounded again.
Recovering themselves, Penrod and Sam underwent the customary
human reaction from alarm to indignation.
"What you want, you ole horse, you?" Penrod shouted. "Don't you
come coughin' around ME!"
And Sam, seizing a stick, hurled it at the intruder.
"Get out o' here!" he roared.
The aged horse nervously withdrew his head, turned tail, and made
a rickety flight up the alley, while Sam and Penrod, perfectly
obedient to inherited impulse, ran out into the drizzle and
uproariously pursued. They were but automatons of instinct,
meaning no evil. Certainly they did not know the singular and
pathetic history of the old horse who wandered into the alley and
ventured to look through the open door.
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