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Show 131 "I won't,* I said. "I was talkin to Crow." "Red knows," said Crow. "God-damn-it," said Karl. "How about a Corn Curl?" "You should stay away from Funster's or one of these days you going to get blown out of the sky," said Karl. "And I won't blame them. " "I need money," I said to Karl. "I can't wait till February." "Talk to your little nigger friends. Where do they get money for everything else they do?" I didn't say anything to him. Karl turned around XaxxxBxxxBXBXaxxixxkBikxkxxx and stood up. He had wrenches in both hands. He smiled his gapful mouth at me, his face just a blotch of red-gray beard. "Now Jarvis, do I look like God or Santee Claus?" Red had everybody saying Santee Claus. "A little," I said. Karl chuckled and shook his head. "Now listen to me," xx he said. "You go up there now, by yourself, and your going to ruin xxxx everything at best and get caught at worst. " "Okay," I said. Karl turned back to his Howitzer. "Okay. Right." Nobody hardly had presents for anybody that Christmas, which was better than the last Christmas when nobody had any presents for anybody, but it still felt dumb because what the hell else was xxxixi Christmas for if not for getting presents, though Helen knew it was for Church and Jesus and Red knew it was for visiting relatives, which he hated and so insisted upon. Helen was real apologetic about the present vacuum, she hugged everybody a lot and told them how soon she'd have a job and Red would be selling lots of toilet paper and the bills would get paid and next Christmas there »d be money for x presents. She'd even thought that maybe this Christmas something would work out through the Infant, but it xaa didn't, xkxxxxiiaaxai though the Infant had been good and you couldn't expect Him to come through for everything everytime. She gave me |