Chapter 70

Hugo has to go see ALBERTA in Human Resources. She tells him that he is not an employee of Feddema Global anymore but now works at SAL'S FISH HOUSE and he is supposed to go report there to someone named HERMAN at the piers and to not come back here. She gives him this information by handing him pre-printed cards when she then burns up in a little incinerator. We also learn that Alberta also works at the library as a library clown.

Chapter 69

Hugo and Hogwild meet Glenndenning in his office. Glenndenning is still dealing with problems that Hugo caused the day before. Hogwild apologizes for the whole thing but Glenndenning says it's his fault and he never should have taken Hogwild's advice in the first place. Then he says he wanted Hugo to quietly look for the paper and not cause a big commotion, but now he sees that causing commotions is what Hugo is good at. So now that everyone is trying to find the Document because they know GLendenning wants it, Glenndenning wants Hugo to distract them by causing commotions while Glenndenning has another person quietly looking for the document. I think??? But then Glenndenning tells him he no longer works for Feddema Global??

Chapter 68

While on the train, somebody tries to pick Hugo's pocket. Hugo knows all the tricks and avoids losing anything, but when he tries to ID the pickpocket the man is too anonymous to remember, and he gets away. Meanwhile we hear about how Hugo's family was always traveling when he was little, and he learned all kinds of survival skills along the way. Then there is a little scene describing Hugo's family being trapped in a jungle pit but it is written like a Hardy Boys story?

Chapter 67

Hugo and Hogwild are taking the train to work. We get a lot of details about the train system, the murals painted on the trains, and how some trains are scheduled to be on the same track at around the same time, which scares the commuters.

Chapter 66

Back at Hogwild's apartment, Hugo explains that his dream vision was telling him to look for the person who threw the Document out the window instead of the actual document. Hugo asks Hogwild who it was that threw the paper but he doesn't want to talk about it. Finally Hugo wears him down and he says her name was MARGARET BALL.

Chapter 65

Now we're with Allison, who is on an airstrip in Texas. She has been chasing all over trying to find Hugo, and has been checking unidentified bodies because she figures he is dead by now. She followed a lead to this landing strip where a plane brings frozen dead bodies to be delivered to medical schools and whatnot. The men working there give her a hard time. She checks the bodies but does not find Hugo.

Chapter 64

Hugo wakes up in Hogwild's apartment. I think he and Hogwild got drunk again at The Embers the night before but this scene is not in the book or I missed it. We hear about Hugo's dream where he's listening to music with the topless girl-who-will-remain-nameless. He sees a woman's hand throwing the Document out the window and Hugo decides this dream was an important vision.

Chapter 63

It is the next morning, and Hogwild is waking up in his apartment. We hear about the dream he was having and his morning routine. Hugo is asleep on his floor and he thinks about how Hugo wasn't fired and regretting ever bringing Hugo to his job because he bets Glenndenning has something special for him to do.

Chapter 62

This whole chapter is just James GLenndenning ranting and raving about all the problems Hugo caused by going on the radio and putting the flyers up with the reward. And how nobody's found the Document yet and now the whole city knows that he's looking for something valuable. Hugo and Hogwild assume Hugo is fired, but then Glenndenning says that he'll see Hugo at work the next morning.

Chapter 61

There is chaos at Feddema Global, where a lot of people have shown up to claim the reward for finding the paper. Hugo comes in and Hogwild grabs him, taking him to see Mr. Glenndenning. Hugo wants to know if he is in trouble for causing a commotion and Hogwild says he's not sure but to be careful because he heard that Glenndenning shot the person who threw the file out the window.

Chapter 60

Hugo gets off the airship and heads back to Feddema Global. Then it starts raining at 4:30, like Birch predicted. A huge storm comes in and all of Hugo's flyers go flying everywhere and Hugo feels defeated.

Chapter 59

More airship touring. We learn a little about the city that was crushed when La Garra fell out of the sky on top of it. Hugo feels dumb because he thought getting a bird'seye-view of the city would help him find the Document. He is mad at himself for thinking he could find the paper, which is impossible to find.

Chapter 58

Hugo takes an air tour around the city on an airship, which is a kind of boat attached to a blimp. The pilot is a girl named JUNIE WOOLFORD who is working on a comic book about a woman who has the power to kill everything on the planet in an instant, but chooses not to.

Chapter 57

Hugo talks to Tom Mott about making a flyer asking if people have seen the missing document. Tom Mott tells Hugo he better put a specific reward on the flyer or noone will care, so Hugo says the reward is $12,000. They make up a bunch of copies and Tom Mott shows Hugo the secret back exit. Hugo leaves. He puts his flyers all over town and we learn some more about the different parts of the city.

Chapter 56

Hugo comes running into a print shop, being chased by a local gang (did I miss a chapter???). The print shop is owned by TOM MOTT who stands up to the gang, led by a man named BOX. Tom Mott seems to know Box and has told him before to not come around here. Evidently Tom Mott slept with Box's ladyfriend and scared her off in the past?? So Box and his gang leave. This chapter is confusing.

Chapter 55

The police throw Hugo out of the radio building, and he takes a bus to the part of town where Birch thought the wind would blow the Document. This is a scary part of town called BUTTERFLY. Hugo walks around and checks every piece of paper he can find. A truck pulls over and a woman wearing a black mask talks to him. This is CHINA SWEET (who was mentioned before in the scene where Allison is attacked by throwing stars) who says if he's searching for something, she might be able to help because she searches for lost girls. Hugo says he is looking for a piece of paper and she says she'll look for it. Then she shows him how to make a deadly throwing star out of a piece of paper.

Chapter 54

Hugo goes back downstairs to where they broadcast the news over the radio. Hugo asks if he can make an announcement over the radio and the weatherman pins him down and calls for security. The weatherman gets in a fight with another radio announcer. In the commotion Hugo sneaks into the radio booth and makes his announcement about a document missing that is very important and everyone should keep an eye out for it because there is a big reward.

Chapter 53

Back to the scene with Hugo talking to the radio weather man, who tells him to talk to BIRCH if he wants to know about weather stuff. Hugo is directed to the roof of the radio building where he encounters Birch. Birch tells him it is going to rain at 4:30 but Hugo is more interested in the weather on the day when the file was thrown out of James Glendenning's window. Birch tells him what direction the wind would've blown the papers that day. The point (I think) is that Birch controls the weather? He again says that it's going to rain this afternoon because he doesn't want to go to his son's soccer game.

Chapter 52

There are several mentions of someone called "the girl who shall remain nameless" who is I think an old girlfriend of Hugo. This chapter is a conversation between them from a few years ago. He is talking about an album that he is making by recording all sorts of sounds and editing them together to tell a story about nomads looking for a sound they can't identify. But he has been working on it for two years and only has 10 minutes done so far.

Chapter 51

Hugo decides to listen to Hogwild and make a detailed plan for looking for the "document". He gets shoes and medication for his hand and face, and then makes phone calls. He wonders for a second if there was a funeral for him back in his hometown. Then he goes to the radio station to talk to a weatherman.

Chapter 50

This is a flashback to when Hugo and his sister Allison were six. They stay at their grandparents house which gets flooded all the time and the ocean is now right off the back porch. Offshore there is a big tree that seems mystical and unreachable. But Allison decides to swim out to it. Hugo tries to talk her out of it but she goes anyway, and then disappears under the water. Hugo swims after her but can't find her and decides to just float and let fate carry him where it will. He finds her and drags her back to the house. We hear some about the special twin language they speak in each otehr's minds.

Chapter 49

Hogwild and Hugo eat breakfast, and Hugo explains what happened at The Clutch. Hugo explains that he tried to let the universe guide him to the missing paper and that didn't work. Hogwild says you should always have a detailed plan and not let fate make decisions for you or else you will get beaten by life.

Chapter 48

It is morning. The city is described as looking ugly in the morning. We hear about CHA-CHA'S, the cafeteria in the building where Hogwild (and Hugo now?) work, and the owner PAULO BARRETTO and how Cha-Cha was the woman he loved back in Chile even though she was trouble for sleeping with prisoners and having some kind of surgical attachment installed on her private parts. Hogwild is in the restaurant eating breakfast when he sees Hugo come in, all beat up and bandaged.

Chapter 47

Hugo stays the night in The Clutch, taken care of by the woman with the slow talk who is DELFINA. They are staying in "The Holler" where they keep a mechanical bull-type machine which has some sort of sexual function for the patrons. Delfina tells Hugo that it's not good being in debt to Son Hillers, and that Son Hillers knew Hugo was coming today. Then someone named SENOR DEUCE comes in and has sex with the machine.

Chapter 46

Hugo comes to on the card table. Everyone is gone but the hand, who talks to him through Morse code. Hugo finds he can't see. The hand tells him he took all of Hugo's debts from the card game and now Hugo owes him $12,000. Hugo panics because he doesn't have any money but the hand says it is OK, he just wants Hugo in his debt. The hand says that he is from "Fort Black" and that Hugo will help save Fort Black.

Chapter 45

Hugo is playing cards at random and somehow winning money. Blue Eye gets mad and stabs a knife down between Hugo's fingers. Blue Eye says he has the "garrotte" card. Hugo doesn't know what that means and Blue Eye sees that as Hugo challenging him. Blue Eye tells a story about another game when someone challenged his garrotte card and he stabbed him with broken glass and then showed him a picture of his son with his eyes cut up. Then he cuts up Hugo's hand and jumps on him and punches him in the eyes.

Chapter 44

Finally we are back to the card game. Hugo is given $500 to play with by Son Hillers. Hugo tries to explain that he doesn't know how to play but everyone thinks he is trying to trick them. THe players threaten each other. It is revealed that Blue Eye had a detective follow Malquiades to learn about her weaknesses so he could beat her at the card game. But it turns out that Malquiades knew about it and threatened him and told him to tell Blue Eye bad information. Hugo tries to lose the game so he can leave.

Chapter 43

More about the card game, this time talking about a special card called the "garrotte card". This card is a wild card that lets you change any rule in the game. But the card is only imaginary and if you play it, you have to convince the other players that you really have it. In olden days this meant telling a nice story about where you got it, but nowadays is about scaring the other players with violence. The invention of this card is told in a pirate flashback.

Chapter 42

This chapter goes over all the details of how to play Carrick. It is extremely complicated because the rules are always changing depending on the time of day or the season or the like.

Chapter 41

In the back room a card game is going on. There is a bald black man and a busty lady at the table. And at the head of the table is a severed hand in a kind of glass case. The hand taps against the glass in Morse Code to communicate. The hand taps against the glass and tells the black man to leave so Hugo can take his place at the game. We learn about the black man who is called THE BORING KID. BLUE EYE (the man with the sapphire in his eye) also sits at the table. MALQUIADES is the busty woman. Hugo calls himself ICEWATER HULL (I think Hull is his real last name). The slow talking woman turns on a machine so when the hand taps Morse Code what he's saying is typed out on a machine (for people who do not know Morse Code I guess??) The hand is called SON HILLERS. He greets Hugo and says they're going to play a card game called CARRICK.

Chapter 40

They go inside the building which is dark and small. Hugo meets a man with a sapphire in his eye socket. He talks about losing his eye and other things. Hugo doesn't know what he is talking about and neither do I. He shows Hugo a picture of something and Hugo throws up because it shows something so terrible. Then there is a flash-forward (?) where Hugo is talking to Little Vickers (the baby from the first chapter??) and talking about the worst thing he ever saw. Then in the present-day the slow talking woman brings Hugo into a back room.

Chapter 39

Hugo goes to the address on the flyer. SIDE NOTE: We hear about "Old La Garra" which is also known as FORT BLACK and also known as CHOKEVILLE. This is the only time I remember seeing either of those names so far. Anyway Hugo goes to THE CLUTCH which is in a bad neighborhood. He is greeted by a woman who talks slow and she invites him into the shop (?).

Chapter 38

Hugo goes out of the building and looks at all the paper that's in the city. He is looking for something on Feddema Global stationery but does not know exactly what. He worries that he'll never find the paper. He thinks his sister would be very technical and methodical about it but that is not his style. He remembers a kid he knew who did a kind of meditation that connects you to "the universe". Hugo does this and breathes and opens his eyes and sees a paper on the ground but it is not the paper he wants but a flyer for something called "The Clutch".

Chapter 37

I guess the point of KLF Manz is that he knows Hugo (or will meet him in the future??) and did one of his memory experiments on Hugo? So, this chapter shows what Hugo was thinking about after his interview with James Glenndenning in the bathroom??? Hugo thinks about getting this new job and feeling important and being an adult. In high school he would make money by tape-recording things secretly and selling the tapes. He wants to find the paper and impress the boss. Then Hugo fantasizes about going to college?? And I think jerks off in the bathroom???

Chapter 36

Now for some reason we hear all about someone named K.L.F. MANZ. He lives in a mansion and has robots for friends. A long time ago he discovered his little daughter had killed herself with arsenic and went crazy and burned down his house. Then he was crazy for a while, then he had his mansion built. THen he invents some kind of machine that lets him experience other people's memories. He experience's his daughter's memories and learns that she killed herself so she could be with her mother, who died while giving birth to her.

Chapter 35

More interview. Hugo talks about his sound machine that drove everyone crazy at his high school. He got the idea from a government test in Viet Nam (?) where soldiers went crazy killing each other. Glenndenning mentions that ever since the paper problem he's had all paper removed from his office and now just talks to hidden microphones to remember things or give messages. Hugo gets excited by this because he loved recording thigns and wants to get involved but Glenndenning says just go and find "The Document". I guess Hugo is hired to work there now?

Chapter 34

The interview goes on. Glenndenning tries to give Hugo a quiz or test but Hugo instead tries to get into the head of the missing document. He says he will find it and he likes taking on projects that other people have failed to accomplish.

Chapter 33

Glenndenning interviews Hugo, trying to see if he is a troublemaker. Then he talks about "The Document". An employee got in a fight with Glenndenning and then threw a very important file out the window. Glenndenning had task forces run around the city to find the missing papers and they were all found but for one. This is "The Document" which is very important to Glenndenning but he does not say why or what it is. But he wants someone to keep looking for it who is cheap, and this is why Hogwild brought Hugo in to his office today.

Chapter 32

We are introduced to Hogwild's boss JAMES GLENNDENNING. His office doesn't have much in it. He has white hair and a big chest (man chest). Hogwild again says Hugo is the answer to their problems, and they talk about the problem being "The Document" which is missing. Glenndenning wants to know if Hugo is good at finding missing documents and he says yes. Glenndenning tells Hogwild to leave while he talks to Hugo and Hogwild is disappointed that he has to leave.

Chapter 31

Hugo is waiting outside to meet Hogwild's big boss. He thinks about giving himself a new name. MEANWHILE: This is a scene with Hugo's sister Allison. She is at a motel and gets a phone number from a carrier pigeon, and is then attacked with throwing stars by someone named CHINA SWEET.

Back to Hugo and Hogwild, HOgwild goes into the boss's office and tries to give his speech but the boss keeps interrupting. Finally Hugo just goes right into the office and introduces himself as RED.

Chapter 30

I think this chapter is a quote from Hogwild's notes where he is writing a speech for how he's going to introduce Hugo to someone named MR. GLENDENNING. He talks about some problem the company is having and that Hugo may be able to solve it. When did he write this speech???

Chapter 29

Now we're on the top floor of the building. There is a courtyard there but it is closed off by bulletproof glass. The employees don't know how to get in there but everyone has theories about why it was there or what they should do about it. We hear about all the different theories.

Chapter 28

Howgild's company is called FEDDEMA GLOBAL and is in the CRITERION BUILDING. Hogwild brings Hugo up to where he works, which is a room full of booths and cables. Inside the booth is a desk and chair and a large phone. You can turn on fake sound effects to pretend you are calling from somewhere else but what Hogwild does or Feddema Global does isn't clear.

Chapter 27

Hugo is waiting at Hogwild's office the next morning. Before this he cleaned up at the train station and was threatened by someone in the bathroom with a musket. He is homesick for the first time. Hogwild comes in and flirts with the receptionist. Hogwild is surprised to see Hugo since he had forgotten all about the night before. Then he remembers and tells Hugo to be at his best because Hogwild is vouching for him and Hugo gets mad at his attitude.