Again Phantom dog and coughing fit.

     This time it was my wifes turn to experience the strange effects in this house. My wife and I had spent most of the day at an auction, we had taken our dog with us. We returned to the house in the late afternoon, had supper, discussed our purchases for a bit when our dog informed he had to go out. The fact he was out most of the day was beside the point in his mental schedule; after supper you take the dog out for his walk and to do his necessary things. So I was out of the house, as was the dog. My wife said she was quietly doing some book work at the kitchen table when she distinctly heard a dog come running down the back stairs. For a moment she thought nothing about it and then suddenly realized the dog was out for his walk. Then before she could really react to that someone or something had a coughing fit that sounded like it was at the foot of the rear stairs. Now really unnerved she called my name thinking perhaps the dog and I had, for whatever reason, come in the front door, up the winding front staircase, through the upstairs and had come down the rear staircase. That wasn't the case and she could find nothing that could have made these sounds. A few minutes later my dog and I came back through the rear door into the kitchen (the same way we had left). My wife was quick to recite the episode. I mentioned to my wife that had a dog really ran down the rear staircase it would have run into the gate at the bottom of the stairs which was closed at the time. She said the coughing really didn't sound like me either. Old houses can be very entertaining.