For a minute he looked contemptuously at his rags, lying there on the
edge of the pool. Then with a grunt he kicked them aside.

"I guess we'll dispense with those," judged he. "The bear-skin, back
in the building, there, will be enough." He picked up his sledge, and,
heaving a mighty breath of comfort, set out for the tower again.

"Ah, but that was certainly fine!" he exclaimed. "I feel ten years
younger, already. Ten, from what? X minus ten, equals--?"

Thoughtfully, as he walked across the elastic moss and over the
pine-needles, he stroked his beard.

"Now, if I could only get a hair-cut and shave!" said he. "Well, why
not? Wouldn't that surprise _her_, though?"

The idea strong upon him, he hastened his steps, and soon was back at
the door close to the huge Norway pine. But here he did not enter.
Instead, he turned to the right.

Plowing through the woods, climbing over fallen columns and shattered
building-stones, flushing a covey of loud-winged partridges, parting
the bushes that grew thickly along the base of the wall, he now found
himself in what had long ago been Twenty-Third Street.

No sign, now of paving or car-tracks--nothing save, on the other side
of the way, crumbling lines of ruin. As he worked his way among the
detritus of the Metropolitan, he kept sharp watch for the wreckage of
a hardware store.