Even Mrs. Brown was beginning to get a little anxious now, and she was thinking of telephoning for Mr. Brown to come home, when Bunny was suddenly found.  And it was the cook who found him.

The cook came out to the back door, near which stood the empty rain-water barrel, into which Bunny had climbed to hide.  She took from the open top a large towel which, a little while before, she had thrown over the barrel to dry, and, looking down in, she cried out: 

“Why here he is!  Here’s Bunny now!”

And so he was!  Curled up on the bottom of the barrel, in a little round ball, and fast asleep, was Bunny Brown.

“Oh, we never looked in there!” exclaimed Sadie West.

“I thought of it,” said Helen, “but I saw the towel spread over the top of the barrel, and I didn’t see how Bunny could be under it, so I didn’t look”

“Well, he’s found, anyhow,” said his mother, smiling.

They had all gathered around the barrel to look into it, the littler ones standing up on the box, by which Bunny had climbed in.  Then Bunny, suddenly awakened, opened his eyes and saw his mother, his Aunt Lu, the cook and his playmates staring down at him.

“Why—­why what’s the matter?” he asked, rubbing his eyes.

“Oh, Bunny, we couldn’t find you!” cried Sue.

“Why, I was right here all the while,” Bunny answered.  “I climbed in the barrel to hide.”

“And didn’t you hear us calling that you could come in free?” asked Sadie.

Bunny shook his head.

“He was asleep,” said Aunt Lu.  “He must have fallen asleep as soon as he curled up inside the barrel.  That’s why he didn’t hear.  Oh, you funny Bunny boy!” and she laughed and hugged Bunny, who was helped out of the barrel by his mother.

“I never saw him down in there when I came to the door a while ago, and threw the cloth over the barrel,” explained the cook.  “I thought the barrel would be a good place to dry the towel.  And to think I covered Bunny up with it!”

“If it hadn’t been for the towel we’d have looked in the barrel ourselves,” said Charlie Star.

“I guess it was so nice and quiet and warm in the barrel that I went to sleep before I knew it,” Bunny remarked.

“I guess you did,” laughed his mother.

“Shall we play some more?” asked Helen.

“Oh, yes!” cried Bunny.  “And I won’t hide in the barrel again.”

So the game went on, the children hiding in different places, some of which were easily found, while others were so well hidden that it was a long while before the one who “blinded” discovered them.

“Now let’s play tag!” cried Sue, after a while.  She liked this game very much, though her legs were so short that she could not run very fast, and she was often “tagged” and made “it.”

“No, don’t play any more just now,” called Aunt Lu, coming down to the yard where the children were.  “Come up on the porch.  I have a little treat for you.”