cks, so we get up and
start exploring.

We find a few places that you might conceivably call caves, but they've
been well picked over for arrowheads, if there ever were any. That's the
trouble in the city: anytime you have an idea, you find out a million
other people had the same idea first. Along in mid-afternoon, we drift
down toward the subway and get cokes and ice cream before we start back.

I don't really feel like going home yet, so I think a minute and study the
subway map inside the car. "Hey, as long as we're on the subway anyway, we
could go on down to Cortlandt Street to the Army-Navy surplus store. I got
to get a knapsack before summer."

"O.K." Tom shrugs. He's staring out the window and doesn't seem to care
where he goes.

"I got a great first-aid survival kit there. Disinfectant and burn
ointment and bug dope and bandages, in a khaki metal box that's
waterproof, and it was only sixty-five cents."

"Hmm. Just what I need for survival on the sidewalks of New York," says
Tom. I guess he's kidding, in a sour sort of way. If you haven't got a
family around, though, survival must take more than a sixty-five-cent kit.

The store is a little way from the nearest subway stop, and we walk along
not saying much. Tom looks alive when he gets into the store, though,
because it really is a great place. They've got arctic explorers' suits
and old hand grenades and shells and all kinds of rifles, as well as some
really cheap, useful clothing. They don't mind how long you mosey around.
In the end I buy a belt pack and canteen, and Tom picks up some skivvy
shirts and socks that are only ten cents each. They're secondhand, I
guess, but they look all right.

We walk over to the East Side subway, which is only a few blocks away down
here because the island gets so narrow. Tom says he's never seen Wall
Street, where all the tycoons grind their money machines. The place is
practically deserted now, being late Saturday afternoon, and it's like
walking through an empty cathedral. You can make echoes.

We take the subway, and Tom walks along home with me. It seems too bad the
day's over. It was a pretty good day, after all.

"So long, kid," Tom says. "I'll send you a card from Beautiful Brooklyn!"

"So long." I wave, and he starts off. I wish he didn't have to go live in
Brooklyn.

6

[Illustration: Dave wheeling his bike across