The White Elephant Mystery

Once upon a time, there was a tiny glass elephant at a garage sale. A lady bought him for 25 cents, and the lucky guy went to live in a private bonsai forest in West Seattle.  

When little Nova came to visit her Nana and Grandpa, she would always run outside to find her white elephant.  The elephant would get carried all around the yard, but when Nova left again, he went back to his home under the trees. 

One morning about two years ago, the elephant just vanished. Nana looked everywhere-- surely he had only fallen down.  Glass elephants do not walk away. But the elephant was never found. Each time Nova came over, she asked about her elephant. Finally, Nana told Nova that the bad raccoons might have carried him off-- they get into strange mischief at night. (It was as good a theory as any.)

Now, Nana knows every inch of her garden, and so she always kept an eye out, but as the seasons passed it seemed hopeless she would ever find the white elephant.

This very week, when Grandpa was mowing the lawn, he noticed something white laying right on top of the grass.  In fact, he stepped on it. Then he came in the house and told Nana to come out right away and look. 

There was the elephant, in a place where Nana and Grandpa walk several times a day on their way to the recycle bin. Little elephant could never have "hidden" there for over a year.  And he looked as shiny and good as ever.

So the mystery is, where was he all that time? 

Did the raccoons finally get tired of their toy?