The child was not there—not anywhere. Aunt Olivia sought for Thomas Jefferson to inquire of him, but Thomas Jefferson was missing too. She went the rounds again. Where could the child be? It was a hot, stinging day in late June when Aunt Olivia's suspicions awoke. They had been long in rousing, but, once alert, they developed rapidly into certainties. Her pale eyes glistened, her thin nostrils dilated—Aunt Olivia's whole lean, sharp, unemotional person put on suspicion. The child had gone to see the Tony Trumbullses. “My land!” ejaculated Aunt Olivia, “after all my forbidding! And she a Plummer!” She sat down suddenly as though a little faint. She had never known a Plummer to disobey before; it was a new experience. It took time to get used to it, and she sat still a long time, rigid and grim, on the edge of the chair. Then as suddenly as she had sat down she got up. It could not be—she refused to entertain the suspicion longer. Rebecca Mary had NOT gone there to that forbidden place; she was in the garden somewhere. Aunt Olivia, a little stiff as if from a chill, went once more in search of the child. “Rebecca! Rebecca Mary!” she called, at regular intervals. Then sharply, “Rebecca Mary Plummer!” Her voice had thin cadences of suspicion lurking in it against its will. But there seemed really no doubt. One by one incriminating circumstances occurred to Aunt Olivia. Rebecca Mary had longed to go so much; the Tony Trumbullses, one at a time or in a tumultuous body, had urged her so often; she herself had more than once caught the child gazing wistfully, in passing by, at the bewildering, deafening, frolics of the little Tony Trumbullses. Once Rebecca Mary had asked to go barefoot, as they went. Once she had let out the tight little braids in her neck and rumpled her thin little hair. Once Aunt Olivia had come upon her PLAYING. The remembrance of it now tightened the lines around Aunt Olivia's lips. The child had been running wildly about the yard, shouting in a strange, excited, ridiculous way. When Aunt Olivia in stern displeasure had demanded explanations, she had run on recklessly, calling back over her shoulder: “Don't stop me! I'm a Tony Trumbull!” “My land!” breathed Aunt Olivia, taking back the suspicion to her breast. “After all my forbidding she's gone down there. She's BEEN going down there dear knows how long. She's waited till I took my naps an' then went. A PLUMMER!” There was really nowhere else she could have gone. She had never wanted to go anywhere else, except to the minister's, and Rebecca Mary was punctilious and would not think of going THERE again till the minister's wife had returned her visit. But Aunt Olivia waited. As usual, she went to her room next day at nap time and closed the door behind her. But when a little figure slipped down the road towards the forbidden place a moment later, she was watching behind her blinds. She was groaning as if in pain.