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MacDonald, George

"At The Back Of The North Wind"


Neither now was he to see her. When he got out, a great puff of
wind came against him, and in obedience to it he turned his
back, and went as it blew. It blew him right up to the
stable-door, and went on blowing.
"She wants me to go into the stable," said Diamond to
himself. "but the door is locked."
He knew where the key was, in a certain hole in the wall --
far too high for him to get at. He ran to the place, however:
just as he reached it there came a wild blast, and down fell the
key clanging on the stones at his feet. He picked it up, and ran
back and opened the stable-door, and went in. And what do you
think he saw?
A little light came through the dusty window from a
gas-lamp, sufficient to show him Diamond and Ruby with their two
heads up, looking at each other across the partition of their
stalls. The light showed the white mark on Diamond's forehead,
but Ruby's eye shone so bright, that he thought more light came
out of it than went in. This is what he saw.
But what do you think he heard?
He heard the two horses talking to each other -- in a strange
language, which yet, somehow or other, he could understand, and
turn over in his mind in English. The first words he heard were
from Diamond, who apparently had been already quarrelling with
Ruby.


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