He could not decide. He liked both. The colorful one won out.

He gathered up what courage still remained to him since fleeing home and rolled his yellow cap into the side pocket of his jacket. Without speaking he pointed out the desired article to the young salesman. The hat was put on, fit, and became his.

Happy again outside, he looked at himself for a long time in the mirror window of the shop. Finding himself handsome, he contentedly walked on.

This street really did seem to have no end. He walked and walked—stopped and walked on. Coming to a wide bridge on which work was being done, he saw black water under it and a huge train station stretching over the street. The street grew narrower and narrower, but then, quite suddenly, spread to the right and left, becoming very broad and open, with trees in the middle and tall buildings on either side. He was on Unter den Linden—under the linden trees.

*

It was still early in the evening, hardly six, and still quite light. The wide street was busy in its middle and especially on the south side, and all the benches among the trees were filled with people on this splendid spring afternoon.

The boy was able to find a place on the edge of a bench. He was tired from the long train trip, the walk through the strange streets to here, and all the new and unfamiliar things.

Between the cabs that stopped just in front of him, he could peer through to the incessant flood of automobiles that jammed up when the passage into Friedrichstrasse became closed for a moment. The cabs stopped and pushed on again, sliding through and disappearing, their horns sounding awful. Buses, heavily loaded with people, stopped and then rocked around the corner like monstrous animals making their way through the swarm of little creatures. But motorcycles and bicycles just darted through the throng, and the boy stared in amazement, marveling that the riders, plus the people who so carelessly walked through it all across the street, were not crushed under the thick wheels of iron and rubber.

When he had seen enough, he looked up. An immense yellow building was precisely opposite. As his eyes slid down it, he read over its entrance—an entrance to a high hallway, it appeared—on a semicircle, in black letters, the word: PASSAGE.

Passage! He had heard that word once; and it could have been none other than Max, Max Friedrichsen, who had named it for him (on that afternoon). He had repeatedly talked about Friedrichstrasse and the Passage, and had smiled so peculiarly.

He leaned over to see better. Yes, it was obviously the entrance to another street. People were streaming in and out of it in masses, and some were just standing around.

He wanted to see where it led to if you went inside.

He got up, had to wait until the traffic allowed him to cross, and then entered the hall. For it was a hall, as he now saw, very high and covered with a roof of glass. On both sides were shops.

He began to examine them. The first ones he saw did not interest him. Chocolate and cigarettes could be found elsewhere. But then, to the right, where some people were gathered in a knot, an unheard-of splendor opened up before him. There, behind high panes, were hanging and standing some wonderful pictures whose brilliancy of color blinded his eyes: pictures of beautiful women in sumptuous gowns, of proud men in colorful uniforms, of sweet children and lovely girls. Plus, far in the background—he had pushed his way through so as to see everything—there towered, magically lit, entirely in white and larger than life, the grand figure of a woman with blond hair, a crown on her head, shield and sword in her hands, gazing victoriously into the distance. He did not know what the picture was supposed to represent. But he did know that it was the most beautiful thing he had seen, today or ever, and he could not part from the enchanting sight.

Finally, he did tear himself away and walked on. After what he had just seen, the other shops didn’t attract him as much.

Only at one with odd tools, small machines, wires, and coils, with strange and unintelligible names on their tags did he again stand for a long time, perplexed about the instruments’ purposes.

Why were the people here pushing and shoving so? he wondered.