On an icy afternoon last week a small boy in a snowsuit stepped into the vestibule of an apartment house in the East Seventies. He struggled out of his mittens & unzipped his jacket. Then he took a key that was hanging around his neck & unlocked a letter box. He withdrew a thermos bottle. He unscrewed the cap & tilted the bottle to his lips & the smell of hot cocoa filled the vestibule. He drank with little enthusiasm & possibly out of a sense of duty. Then he returned the thermos to its repository, zipped up his jacket, put on his mittens & waddled forth again.
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