Some stories about missing kids and rescues have happy endings. This is one of them.

Christian Pfuhl, 4, was playing outside early Sunday evening. About 7:30 p.m., he evidently wandered from his townhouse complex to a neighboring one on the 6000 block of Candace Avenue in Inver Grove Heights.

To his mother, Jolene Nelson, the boy seemed to be missing forever. It was more like 20 minutes, but this mother had additional reason for worry: Christian suffers from autism, a neurological disorder that hinders his communication skills and development.With police called and the neighborhood alerted, a frantic search began.

Enter Rick Pedrow, 44, who had just arrived home with his wife. When he realized he had forgotten something in his car, Pedrow — dressed in boxer shorts and a T-shirt — went out to the driveway to retrieve it. It was then that a police officer alerted him that authorities were looking for a missing little boy in the area.

Pedrow joined the search. A couple of neighborhood kids told him they had seen a little boy, who was wet, playing near a deep ditch.

The ravine is about one-third of a mile in circumference, ringed by town homes and a parking lot. It has a steep bank on one side. Near the bottom is a marsh overgrown with cattails, weeds and brush tall enough to easily obscure a child. Because of the recent rains, the water was unusually deep in the gully.

Pedrow waded waist deep into the muck, saw ripples in the water and spotted a boy walking in shoulder-deep water toward an even deeper part of the pond.

Pedrow called out, but the boy didn't respond. He caught up to the child and carried him up the hill to safety.

While Christian couldn't articulate his fear or his thanks, his body language said it all.

The wide-eyed child wrapped his arms around his rescuer's neck and his legs around Pedrow's waist. His head rested on Pedrow's shoulder. The child clung tightly and wouldn't let go, even as officers and neighbors gathered around.

"I don't think he was coming out of there, unless somebody got him out of there. I think he would have drowned without making a single sound," Pedrow said. "The credit to all of this goes to God. I was just the vessel and the tool used to pull the boy out."

Karla Pedrow, who had joined the crowd of neighbors, said it was a proud sight: Her husband, standing there in his wet, dirty boxers and T-shirt, with a frightened but safe child clinging to him.

Next time, though, she might ask him to dress a little more substantially when he goes out to the car.