and unseen. For months a yearning had grown more and more
poignant in his vitals, and this yearning was symbolized by one of his
most profound secrets. In the inner pocket of his jacket, he carried a
bit of wood whittled into the distant likeness of a pistol, but not even
Sam Williams had seen it. The wooden pistol never knew the light of day,
save when Penrod was in solitude; and yet it never left his side
except at night, when it was placed under his pillow. Still, it did not
satisfy; it was but the token of his yearning and his dream. With all
his might and main Penrod longed for one thing beyond all others. He
wanted a Real Pistol!

That was natural. Pictures of real pistols being used to magnificently
romantic effect were upon almost all the billboards in town, the year
round, and as for the "movie" shows, they could not have lived an hour
unpistoled. In the drug store, where Penrod bought his candy and soda
when he was in funds, he would linger to turn the pages of periodicals
whose illustrations were fascinatingly pistolic. Some of the magazines
upon the very library table at home were sprinkled with pictures of
people (usually in evening clothes) pointing pistols at other people.
Nay, the Library Board of the town had emitted a "Selected List of
Fifteen Books for Boys," and Penrod had read fourteen of them with
pleasure, but as the fifteenth contained no weapons in the earlier
chapters and held forth little prospect of any shooting at all, he
abandoned it halfway, and read the most sanguinary of the other fourteen
over again. So, the daily food of his imagination being gun, what wonder
that he thirsted for the Real!

He passed from the sidewalk into his own yard, with a subdued "Bing!"
inflicted upon the stolid person of a gatepost, and, entering the house
through the kitchen, ceased to bing for a time. However, driven back
from the fore part of the house by a dismal sound of callers, he
returned to the kitchen and sat down.

"Della," he said to the cook, "do you know what I'd do if you was a
crook and I had my ottomatic with me?"

Della was industrious and preoccupied. "If I was a cook!" she repeated
ignorantly, and with no cordiality. "Well, I AM a cook. I'm a-cookin'
right now. Either g'wan in the house where y'b'long, or git out in th'
yard!"

Penrod chose the latter, and betook himself slowly to the back fence,
where he was greeted in a boisterous manner by his wistful little old
dog, Duke, returning