.

"She met some of the girls that she knew and went with them, maybe,"
he said, "and she'll be home before me."

But when he got home again and found that she was not there, and when
he told his mother that she was not at the Sullivans', they both began
to be a little worried. They told each other over and over that
Kathleen knew how to take care of herself and that no harm was likely
to come to her, but they both doubted their own words. Late at night
John went to the Sullivans' again, taking the way that he thought
Kathleen would be likely to take, and looking everywhere for her,
though he knew that to search for her in such a way as that was
nonsense.

The Sullivans had all gone to bed when he got there, but Peter got up
and walked back with him, by another way. They went to a police
station and asked if there had been any accident--if any girl had been
hurt and taken to a hospital. There had been no accident that night.
They went home and waited again. At last John could wait no longer. He
and Peter started out again and went different ways. They went to
other police stations and asked if there had been accidents. There had
been one or two, but nobody at all like Kathleen had had anything to
do with them. They went to hospitals and asked about all the new
patients. There was not one of them that was at all like Kathleen.

It does not belong to the story to tell how they went on searching.
All the next day they searched. They tried every way that they knew,
and every way that the police knew, and every way that anybody could
think of, to find her, and there was no trace. Late that day one of
the girls who had walked through the Park with Kathleen came to see
her, not knowing that she was lost. Then she told where she had seen
Kathleen last. She told how Kathleen had dropped behind the others,
though she had said that she wanted to get home early, how they had
called to her, how she had answered, and how they had gone on,
thinking that she would soon follow.

Then Mrs. O'Brien said to John: "You do not need to search for her any
longer. She is with the Good People. I have seen that place often, and
it always looked to me like a place where the Good People might be.
Last night was May Eve. There is no time in the whole year when the
Good People have more power, and especially to carry off young girls.
They have taken her with them. Some time she may come back, or some
time we may get her back, but it is of no us