The wind whistled, was cool: it was an early autumn evening, no longer a late summer one.

‘Well,’ said Charlie, standing there, smiling shyly, looking up from under his eyebrows at Doug. ‘It sure was a farewell summer, huh?’

‘Sure was.’

‘Sure kept us busy.’

‘Sure did.’

‘Only thing is,’ said Tom, ‘it didn’t come out in the papers: Who won?’

Charlie and Douglas stared at the younger boy.

‘Who won? Don’t be silly!’ Douglas lapsed into silence, staring up into the sky. Then he fixed them with a stare. ‘I don’t know. Us, them.’

Charlie scratched inside his left ear. ‘Everybody. The first war in history where everybody won. I can’t figure it. So long.’ He went on up the sidewalk, crossed the front yard, opened the door of his house, waved, and was gone.

‘There goes Charlie,’ said Douglas.

‘Boy, am I sad!’ said Tom.

‘About what?’

‘I don’t know. I keep playin’ “Taps” inside my head. It’s a sad song, that’s all.’

‘Don’t start bawlin’ now!’

‘No, I’m just gonna be quiet. You know why? I guess I got it figured.’

‘Why?’

‘Ice cream cones don’t last.’

‘That’s a silly thing to say.’

‘Ice cream cones are always gettin’ done with. Seems I’m no sooner bitin’ the top than I’m eatin’ the tail. Seems I’m no sooner jumpin’ in the lake at the start of vacation than I’m creepin’ out the far side, on the way back to school. Boy, no wonder I feel bad.’

‘It’s all how you look at it,’ said Doug. ‘My gosh, think of all the things you haven’t even started yet. There’s a million ice cream cones up ahead and ten billion apple pies and hundreds of summer vacations. Billions of things waitin’ to be bit or swallowed or jumped in.’

‘Just once, though,’ said Tom, ‘I’d like one thing. An ice cream cone so big you could just keep eatin’ and there isn’t any end and you just go on bein’ happy with it forever. Wow!’

‘There’s no such ice cream cone.’

‘Just one thing like that is all I ask,’ said Tom. ‘One vacation that never has a last day. Or one matinee with Buck Jones, boy, just ridin’ along forever, bangin’, and Indians fallin’ like pop bottles. Gimme just one thing with no tail-end and I’d go crazy. Sometimes I just sit in the movie theater and cry when it says “The End” for Jack Hoxie or Ken Maynard. And there’s nothin’ so sad as the last piece of popcorn at the bottom of the box.’

‘You better watch out,’ said Doug. ‘You’ll be workin’ yourself into another fit any minute. Just remember, darn it, there’re ten thousand matinees waitin’ right on up ahead.’

‘Well, here we are, home. Did we do anything today we might get licked for?’

‘Nope.’