Seeing that the children were really worried, Mrs. Brown and Aunt Lu said they would come out and help search. They looked in all the places they could think of, and called Bunny's name, as did the others, but the little fellow was not found.
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.