Alien Accounts Read Online Free PDF Page A

blame the poor coloured. They see all this white pussy around, agitatin’, telling them they’re as good … Well, you can see what that’ll lead to, but what can I do? Live and let live, that’s my middle name. But you’ve got to admit the coloured and white used to get along just fine, just fine, without nooutside interference. Well, I’m not going to complain. I know God didn’t intend coloured and white to mix any more than a washer woman means to mix up coloured and white clothes – it’s the white ones get ruint. But who am I to make trouble?’
    He glanced around accusingly. A bitter, nagging note came into his voice. ‘I’m not complaining. To each their own, that’s my motto. I think birds of a feather
ought
to flock together. Why, when I used to pump gas …’
    Section XIX: Going out of style
     
    ‘The Southern coloured are just different, and if I sat around here explaining till Doomsday, you wouldn’t understand what I meant unless you lived down there. I mean
different
. Like they don’t know the value of a dollar. Soon as they get a nickel in their jeans, they just
got
to spend it, like it was burning a hole in their pocket.’
    Lazily, he unstraddled a chair to fish a five-dollar bill out of his watch pocket with two fingers. Willard was buying coffee for everyone. The deliveryman set down the box of lukewarm covered containers and reached for his change, but Willard waved it away. Before he could taste his own coffee, however, his name was called on the intercom.
    Section XX: Gone, but not forgot
     
    ‘Did you ever notice how Willard just throws money away?’ asked Karl when he had left. ‘Anyone who does that must have a bit tucked away. It wouldn’t surprise me to learn that his background is – Biblical, if you get my meaning.’
    ‘I had the same thought,’ said Harold. He took a reflective sip of the coffee Willard had bought him – black, for it was Advent – and asked, ‘What sort of name is Willard, anyway? Surely not a
Christian
name.’
    Ed Warner finished his own coffee and started on Willard’s untouched cup. ‘Well, he’s gone now. No use talking about the dead,’ he said firmly.
    ‘He’s not –!’
    Section XXI: Irregularities
     
    ‘He’s not!’ Karl screamed, his Michelin-tyre head inflating dangerously.
    Harold’s long celluloid teeth clicked on his paper cup. ‘Of course not. He’s been fired, I’m sure.’ He looked warningly at Ed. ‘Caught, I suppose, with his hand in the till.’
    ‘What till?’ Ed’s yellow cheeks turned the colour of pleasure.
    ‘HE’S NOT DEAD!’
    ‘Prove it.’
    Karl seemed about to collapse, but Harold shook his head. ‘You should know better than that, Ed. It’s up to you to prove that what’s-his-name is dead.’
    For answer, Ed clutched his chest and crumpled to the floor.
    Section XXII: Fake
     
    Karl crowed. ‘He’s faking! Knows he lost!’
    The old man’s lips turned blue. ‘He’s dying!’ Eddie snatched up the phone and dialled an emergency number. The number was printed in red ink on a card stuck to one corner of the bulletin board. Any user of the telephone confronted the bulletin board and read its notices without realizing it.
    ‘Join a bowling team now!’ ‘THIMK’, ‘THINK’, ‘We don’t make much money but then we don’t have ulcers, either.’ ‘Give generously to Univac.’ ‘Join and contribute now: AMERICANS FOR PRIVATE ENTERPRISE.’ ‘We are asking for flowers for Willard Bask, departed this afternoon. Please
sign
name and write amount
clearly
.’ ‘Good books for starving Asia.’
    ‘Forget it,’ said Karl, pressing down the phone cradle. ‘Do you want to get us all in trouble with the authorities? I told you, he’s faking. He’s not really turning blue.’
    Eddie flushed, and his chin, raw with fresh pustules, began to tremble. Shoving Karl aside, he began to dial again. At that moment, the intercom sputtered:
    ‘Edwin EEEEEEEEEEEEEEP! Futch.’
    He dropped the