and hear
strange things in the darkness. Into his mind came the
conviction that he was walking and running in some
terrible void where no one had ever been before. The
darkness about him seemed limitless. The sound of the
wind blowing in trees was terrifying. When a team of
horses approached along the road in which he walked he
was frightened and climbed a fence. Through a field he
ran until he came into another road and getting upon
his knees felt of the soft ground with his fingers. But
for the figure of his grandfather, whom he was afraid
he would never find in the darkness, he thought the
world must be altogether empty. When his cries were
heard by a farmer who was walking home from town and he
was brought back to his father's house, he was so tired
and excited that he did not know what was happening to
him.

By chance David's father knew that he had disappeared.
On the street he had met the farm hand from the Bentley
place and knew of his son's return to town. When the
boy did not come home an alarm was set up and John
Hardy with several men of the town went to search the
country. The report that David had been kidnapped ran
about through the streets of Winesburg. When he came
home there were no lights in the house, but his mother
appeared and clutched him eagerly in her arms. David
thought she had suddenly become another woman. He could
not believe that so delightful a thing had happened.
With her own hands Louise Hardy bathed his tired young
body and cooked him food. She would not let him go to
bed but, when he had put on his nightgown, blew out the
lights and sat down in a chair to hold him in her arms.
For an hour the woman sat in the darkness and held her
boy. All the time she kept talking in a low voice.
David could not understand what had so changed her. Her
habitually dissatisfied face had become, he thought,
the most peaceful and lovely thing he had ever seen.
When he began to weep she held him more and more
tightly. On and on went her voice. It was not harsh or
shrill as when she talked to her husband, but was like
rain falling on trees. Presently men began coming to
the door to report that he had not been found, but she
made him hide and be silent until she had sent them
away. He thought it must be a game his mother and the
men of the town were playing with him and laughed
joyously. Into his mind came the thought that his
having been lost and frightened in the darkness was an
altogether unimpo