After that the principal demands were stovepipe and covering for the broken windows. They thought later of many other things that were sorely needed, but just now those wants took precedence. It was out of the question to find stovepipe nearer than town, unless, as June suggested, some rubbish dump supplied it, and so they tackled the matter of covering the windows. For that they needed boards, or some other material, and nails. And a hammer would have helped a lot, although the skillet did fairly well in the emergency. There was enough of the partition left to supply boards for one window, but they had no nails, and a search through the ash pile failed to provide more than four bent and rusted ones. So it was decided that June should walk back to the stamping works and see if he could find, beg, or borrow some. Also, he was to be on the lookout for anything that might be used in making the new home weather tight. In the meanwhile Wayne was to “projeck ’roun’,” as June phrased it, and collect anything useful that could be found. June went off, whistling blithely, and Wayne began his search. The new abode stood about two hundred yards from the railroad embankment, at this point a good eight feet above the meadow, and possibly half again as far from the nearest building which was the stamping works. Beyond the latter were a number of other factories, puffing steam or smoke into the afternoon sunlight, and beyond these began the town. Standing on the front porch, which was the term ultimately applied to the rear platform, the view to the left ended at the railroad embankment, but to the right Wayne could see for nearly a mile. A few scattered houses indicated the dirt road in that direction and beyond the houses was some tilled land, and, finally, a fringe of trees. In front lay the edge of the town, with the town itself, overhung by a haze of smoke, a good mile beyond. On the fourth side, visible when Wayne stepped off the “porch” to the soggy ground, the meadow continued for another hundred yards to a rail fence. Beyond the fence was a ploughed field which sloped off and up to meet the blue March sky. Between car and railroad a group of trees attracted Wayne’s attention, and he set out for it across the _squishy_ meadow. Half-way to it he caught sight of water and recalled June’s mention of a “branch.” It proved to be a tiny brook that, emerging from a culvert under the tracks, wandered as far as the tiny grove and then curved off to the rail fence and followed it across the fields in the direction of the road. The water was clear and cold and tasted very good to the boy. Just now the brook was overflowing its bed in places, but the little knoll on which the cluster of trees grew was high and dry underfoot.