Allen blinked his eyes.

He bought an ice cream on a stick from a vendor and started off, unwrapping it, but then he saw a little dirty-faced girl watching him.

“Jesus Christ,” he said, handing it to her. He was a sucker for kids, especially those with big hungry eyes.

He went back to the vendor. “Gimme another one.”

“Boy, you must be humgry.”

“Shut up and gimme the ice cream.”

As he walked, eating his ice cream, he decided he had to do something about letting kids get to him. What kind of con artist lets kids make a sucker of him?

He wandered around, looking at the big buildings of what he thought was Chicago, and then took a bus downtown. He knew it was too late to get down to O’Hare Airport tonight. He’d have to spend the night here in Chicago and take the plane to Columbus in the morning.

Suddenly he saw an electronic sign on a building that flashed: may 5, temperature 68°. May 5? He pulled out his wallet and looked through it. About five hundred dollars’ separation pay. His discharge was dated May 1. His plane ticket from Chicago to Columbus was dated May 1. What the hell? Here he’d been wandering around in Chicago for four days since his discharge without knowing it. Where was his duffel bag? He had an empty feeling in his stomach. He looked down at his dress blue uniform. It was filty. The elbows were ripped and his left arm was scraped.

All right. He’d get something to eat, get a night’s sleep and take the flight back to Columbus in the morning. He grabbed a couple of hamburgers, found a flophouse and spent nine dollars for a room.

The next morning he hailed a cab and told the driver to take him to the airport.

“La Guardia?”

He shook his head. He didn’t know there was a La Guardia in Chicago.

“Nah, the other one, the big one.”

All during the trip to the airport he tried to understand what had happened. He closed his eyes and tried to reach Arthur. Nothing. Ragen? Nowhere around. So it was another mix-up time.

At the airport, he went up to the United Airlines counter and handed the clerk his ticket.

“When can I get outta here?” he asked.

She looked at the ticket and then at him. “This is for a flight from Chicago to Columbus. You can’t go from here to Ohio on this.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Chicago,” she said.

“Yeah? So?”

A supervisor came over and examined the ticket. Allen didn’t understand what the problem was.

“You all right, sailor?” the man said. “You can’t fly from New York to Columbus on this.”

Allen rubbed his unshaven face. “New York?”

“That’s right, Kennedy Airport.”

“Oh God!”

Allen took a deep breath and started talking fast. “Well, look, what happened is somebody made a mistake. You see, I’ve been discharged.” He pulled out his papers. “I got on the wrong plane, you see. And it was supposed to take me to Columbus. Somebody must’ve slipped something in my coffee, because I was unconscious, and when I came to, I was here in New York. Left my bags on the plane and everything. You’ll have to do something about it. It’s the airline’s fault.” “It’s going to cost you a surcharge to change this ticket,” the woman said.