09/03/2026 08:16

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It was awkward--indeed, it seemed absurd--to have to tote a six-months-old corpse to Texas, but there it was. It twitched and jerked up and down erratically, so that looking at him was disconcerting: one minute he would be lo When he got back to town the undertaker had finished with Gus. The sight of the boys all sitting like statues made him want to laugh.

I wish you'd stop talking about that boy's death, Call said. It was only when he settled in a town to gamble that he liked a woman. No, but they ruint my Sunday shirt, Soupy said. At breakfast, sometimes, Call would catch him staring into the fire the way old animals stared before they died--as if looking across into the other place.