Chapter One

Crossing the River

Augie Boretski snuck out.

“Stay in,” Mom had said before leaving for work. “I’ll be home by six.”

Stay in? On a super muggy, one-hundred-degree day in August? Their second-floor apartment had to be at least one hundred and twenty, even with the rickety fan going full blast.

The old lady downstairs stopped him as he opened the front door.

“Your mama, she worry.”

Augie shrugged. What did Mrs. Lorentushki know, wearing her long-sleeved dress and flowery apron on a day like today?

“I’ll be okay,” he said before letting the screen door slam shut.

Besides, Mom didn’t have to worry. He wasn’t sticking around this neighborhood.

He counted the change in his bulging shorts pockets, checking one last time that he had enough to make it to Philly and back. He was getting out of here. Out of Camden. The armpit of the world, he thought, home to losers and drug dealers. Philadelphia sparkled across the Delaware River from the Camden waterfront. The buildings looked like castles, with spires and promise.

He walked the ten blocks to the Ferry Street station. At eleven in the morning, Augie didn’t fear the gangs. He fed his coins to the ticket machine and boarded the train. He had escaped! Within minutes, he climbed out of the 13th Street station, ready to explore the big city without his mom there, fussing.

Walking down Locust Street, Augie passed one tall building after another, each looming above him like a fortress with its drawbridge up. Cars zoomed past, but except for one man in a business suit and one woman in a crisp dress,