Police in Gloversville are investigating a reported child abduction attempt. Investigators say a man allegedly threatened a group of children after they refused to get in his car.

“She said ‘no’ and he said, ‘Well, I have a gun, so if you don’t get in, then I am going to shoot you,’ ” said Brandie Johnson.

Johnson says she is in shock after learning her 8-year-old daughter was part of group of children approached by the man around 6 p.m. Monday.

The children, two 8-year-olds and an 11-year-old, told police a man with a grey beard in his 40s or 50s pulled up at the intersection of North Clark Avenue and Summer Street and asked for directions to the middle school.

“The gentleman asked her to get in the car with him because he forgot everything she had just told him about how to get to the middle school. She said ‘no’ and he said he had a gun,” said Johnson.

Johnson says her daughter was playing with the other 8-year-old at that time and didn’t hear the threat allegedly made to the 11-year-old.

“I believe the man drove away after she took the younger ones,” Johnson said.

Gloversville Police say they’ve increased their presence around schools. They did not provide an update on the investigation Thursday. Police are asking anyone with information to contact them.

Johnson says she hopes the incident was all a misunderstanding but the uncertainty over what happened has rattled her sense of peace in neighborhood that, before this, never felt unsafe.