It was just a dog." "You poor boy! Your mother must have been dreadfully frightened when you came home and she saw--" She was interrupted by the entrance of a middle-aged coloured woman.
"Miz Williams," she began, and then, as she caught sight of Penrod, she addressed him directly, "You' ma telefoam if you here, send you home right away, 'cause they waitin' dinner on you." "Run along, then," said Mrs.Williams, patting the visitor lightly upon his shoulder; and she accompanied him to the front door.

"Tell your mother I'm so sorry about your getting bitten, and you must take good care of it, Penrod." "Yes'm." Penrod lingered helplessly outside the doorway, looking at Sam, who stood partially obscured in the hall, behind Mrs.Williams.

Penrod's eyes, with veiled anguish, conveyed a pleading for help as well as a horror of the position in which he found himself.

Sam, however, pale and determined, seemed to have assumed a stony attitude of detachment, as if it were well understood between them that his own comparative innocence was established, and that whatever catastrophe ensued, Penrod had brought it on and must bear the brunt of it alone.
"Well, you'd better run along, since they're waiting for you at home," said Mrs.Williams, closing the door.

"Good-night, Penrod." ...