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.