“Who’s Whitie?” Pee-wee asked.
“He’s Mr. Bungel’s little boy and he’s all white because he’s sick, and they can’t take him to a great big place in the city so they can make him all well again and it just serves him right and I’m glad they haven’t got any money. Everybody says he’s going to die and Licorice Stick knows he’s going to die in a rainstorm on a Friday, that’s what he said.”
This information about a little boy who was so pale that they called him Whitie, and who was going to die in a rainstorm on a Friday was all new to Pee-wee.
“Licorice Stick is crazy,” he said. “What does he know about dying? He never died, did he?” This brilliant argument appeared to impress Pepsy.
“If they took him to a hospital in New York then he wouldn’t have to die because they could fix him,” Pepsy said. “I heard Aunt Jamsiah say so. There are doctors there that can fix people all well again.”
“I bet I’m as good a fixer as they are,” Pee-wee said; “I fixed lots of people; I fixed a whole patrol once.”
“So they wouldn’t die?”
“They thought they were smart but I fixed them.”
“Fixing smarties is different,” said Pepsy. “If people have something the matter with their hips you can’t fix them. Because, anyway, if they’re going to die on a Friday even snail water won’t fix them.”
“Snail water, what’s that?”