Marily finished her counting and ran around to the few possible hiding places in the yard. When she couldn't find them, she started to blubber and pushed through the hedge to Ruth's back door. "They runned away from me again," she whined through the screen at Ruth. Jim and I stood staring out the window. I glanced at him. His face was set and pale, but probably no worse than my own. We saw the instant shimmer again. Star, and then immediately Robert, materialized from the air and ran up to the tree, shouting, "Safe! Safe!" Marily let out a bawl and ran home to her mother. * * * * * I called Star and Robert into the house. They came, still holding hands, a little shamefaced, a little defiant. How to begin? What in hell could I say? "It's not exactly fair," I told them. "Marily can't follow you there." I was shooting in the dark, but I had at least a glimmering to go by. Star turned pale enough for the freckles on her little nose to stand out under her tan. Robert blushed and turned to her fiercely. "I told you so, Star. I _told_ you so! I said it wasn't sporting," he accused. He turned to me. "Marily can't play good hide-and-seek anyway. She's only a Stupid." "Let's forget that for a minute, Robert." I turned to her. "Star, just where do you go?" "Oh, it's nothing, Daddy." She spoke defensively, belittling the whole thing. "We just go a little ways when we play with her. She ought to be able to find us a little ways." "That's evading the issue. _Where_ do you go--and _how_ do you go?" Jim stepped forward and showed her the bronze coin I'd sent him. "You see, Star," he said quietly. "We've found this." "I shouldn't have to tell you my game." She was almost in tears. "You're both just Tweens. You couldn't understand." Then, struck with contrition, she turned to me. "Daddy, I've tried and tried to ESP you. Truly I did. But you don't ESP worth anything." She slipped her hand through Robert's arm. "Robert does it very nicely," she said primly, as though she were complimenting him on using his fork the right way. "He must be better than I am, because I don't know how he finds me." "I'll tell you how I do it, Star," Robert exclaimed eagerly. It was as if he were trying to make amends now that grownups had caught on. "You don't use any imagination. I never saw anybody with so little imagination!" "I do, too, have imagination," she countered loudly. "I thought up the game, didn't I? I told you how to do it, didn't I?" "Yeah, yeah!" he shouted back. "But you always have to look at a book to ESP what's in it, so you leave an ESP smudge. I just go to the encyclopedia and ESP where you did--and I go to that place--and there you are. It's simple." Star's mouth dropped open in consternation. "I never thought of that," she said. Jim and I stood there, letting the meaning of what they were saying penetrate slowly into our incredulous minds.