over each tool with affection. Some of the little chisels and wood
gouges were gone. The bit box had opened, and most of the smaller bits
had been lost. He gathered up those that remained and replaced them
tenderly in the box. He took a key-hole saw down, and with an oil rag
wiped it carefully and replaced it.

Above the cart the sun rose slowly in the sky. Cole peered up, his
horny hand over his eyes. A big man, stoop-shouldered, his chin gray
and stubbled. His clothes wrinkled and dirty. But his eyes were clear,
a pale blue, and his hands were finely made.

He could not stay in the park. They had seen him ride that way; they
would be looking for him.

Far above something shot rapidly across the sky. A tiny black dot
moving with incredible haste. A second dot followed. The two dots were
gone almost before he saw them. They were utterly silent.

Cole frowned, perturbed. The dots made him uneasy. He would have to
keep moving--and looking for food. His stomach was already beginning
to rumble and groan.

Work. There was plenty he could do: gardening, sharpening, grinding,
repair work on machines and clocks, fixing all kinds of household
things. Even painting and odd jobs and carpentry and chores.

He could do anything. Anything people wanted done. For a meal and
pocket money.

Thomas Cole urged the team into life, moving forward. He sat hunched
over in the seat, watching intently, as the Fixit cart rolled slowly
across the tangled grass, through the jungle of trees and flowers.

* * * * *

Reinhart hurried, racing his cruiser at top speed, followed by a
second ship, a military escort. The ground sped by below him, a blur
of gray and green.

The remains of New York lay spread out, a twisted, blunted ruin
overgrown with weeds and grass. The great atomic wars of the twentieth
century had turned virtually the whole seaboard area into an endless
waste of slag.

Slag and weeds below him. And then the sudden tangle that had been
Central Park.

Histo-research came into sight. Reinhart swooped down, bringing his
cruiser to rest at the small supply field behind the main buildings.

Harper, the chief official of the department, came quickly over as
soon as Reinhart's ship landed.

"Frankly, we don't understand why you consider this matter important,"
Harper said uneasily.

Reinhart shot him a cold glance. "I'll be the judge of what's
important. Are you the one who gave the order to b