“You haven’t seen Stephen, have you, Mrs. Anderson?” called Stephen’s mother. “No, I haven’t see him, Mrs. Knapp. I don’t believe he’d go out this cold day. He’s just hiding on you somewhere. Children will do that, if you let them. If he were _my_ child, Mrs. Knapp, I’d cure him of that trick before he so much as started it--by the shingle method too! I never used to let _my_ children get ahead of me. Once you let them get the start on you with some....” Mrs. Knapp’s anxious face reddened with resentment. She went back to her own house and shut the door behind her hard. Inside she began a systematic search of every possible hiding place, racing from one to another, now hot with anger, now cold with fear, sick, sick with uncertainty. She did not call the child now. She hunted him out silently and swiftly. But there was no Stephen in the house. He _must_ have gone out! Even if he were safe, he would be chilled to the bone by this time! And suppose he were not safe! If only they didn’t live in such an abominable part of the town, so near the railroad yards and the slums! Her anger dropped away. She forgot the barb planted in her vanity by old Mrs. Anderson. As she flung on her wraps, she was shivering from head to foot; she was nothing but loving, suffering, fearing motherhood. If she had seen her Stephen struggling in the arms of a dozen big hoodlums, she would have flown at them like a tigress, armed only with teeth and claws and her passionate heart. Her hand on the doorknob, she thought of one last place she had not searched. The dark hole under the stairs. She turned to that and flung back the curtain. * * * * * Stephen was there, his Teddy-bear clutched in his arms, silent, his round face grim and hard, scowling defiantly at her. II When Mother was scrubbing a floor was always a good time for Stephen. She forgot all about you for a while. Oh, what a weight fell off from your shoulders when Mother forgot about you for a while! How perfectly lovely it was just to walk around in the bedroom and know she wouldn’t come to the door any minute and look at you hard and say, “What are you doing, Stephen?” and add, “How _did_ you get your rompers so dirty?” Stephen stepped about and about in the room, silently, drawing long breaths. The bed, the floor, the bureau, everything looked different to you in the times when Mother forgot about you for a minute. It occurred to Stephen that maybe it was a rest to them, too, to have Mother forget about them and stop dusting and polishing and pushing them around. They _looked_ sort of peaceful, the way he felt. He nodded his head to the bed and looked with sympathy at the bureau. The lower drawer was a little open. There was something white showing.... Mother didn’t allow you to open her bureau drawers, but that looked like ... it _was_! He pulled the drawer open and snatched out his Teddy-bear ... his dear, dear Teddy-bear. So _that_ was where she had hidden it!