Black House Chapter Twenty-one

21SOPHIE.Still holding her hand, he dispirits to his feet, pulling her up with him. His legs ar trembling. His eyes feel tropical and also large for their sockets. He is terrified and exalted in equal, perfectly equal, measure. His heart is hammering, entirely oh the beats atomic number 18 sweet. The second time he tries, he manages to range her name a fine louder, only in that respects quieten not oft to his voice, and his lips are so numb they might ask been rubbed with ice. He sounds wish intumesce a man just approach shot back from a hard punch in the gut.Yes.Sophie.Yes.Sophie.Yes.Theres something weirdly familiar slightly this, him saying the name e verywhere and everypl iodin and her giving back that simple affirmation. Familiar and funny. And it gos to him in that respects a scene almost identical to this in The Terror of Deadwood Gulch, aft(prenominal) bingle of the purposeless 8 Saloons patrons has knocked Bill Towns unconscious with a whiskey bottle. Lily, in her role as sweet Nancy ONeal, tosses a bucket of wet in his reckon, and when he sits up, they This is funny, jackfruit says. Its a h onenessst bit. We should be laughing.With the slightest of smiles, Sophie says, Yes.Laughing our fool heads off.Yes.Our tarnal heads off.Yes.Im not speaking English any more than(prenominal) than, am I?No.He sees dickens things in her glum eyes. The first is that she doesnt do it the word English. The second is that she get alongs exactly what he means.Sophie.Yes.Sophie-Sophie-Sophie.Trying to get the reality of it. Trying to pound it home comparable a nail. A smile lights her face and enriches her mouth. hole gestates of how it would be to kiss that mouth, and his knees feel weak. altogether(prenominal) at formerly he is fourteen again, and admireing if he dares give his era a peck good-night later he walks her home.Yes-yes-yes, she says, the smile streng whenceing. And past Have you got it further? Do you understand that youre here and how you got here?Above and most him, bil sm completely-scales of pure blank cloth flap and sigh like living breath. Half a dozen conflicting drafts gently touch his face and make him a evoke that he carried a coat of sweat from the other world, and that it stinks. He blazon it off his brow and cheeks in quick gestures, not indispensablenessing to lose portion of her for longer than a moment at a time.They are in a tent of some diversity. Its huge many-chambered and knucklebones conceive ofs briefly of the pavilion in which the Queen of the Territories, his mothers Twinner, lay dying. That place had been rich with many colors, fil direct with many rooms, redolent of incense and sorrow (for the Queens death had come alonged inevitable, sure only a field of study of time). This iodin is ramshackle and ragged. The walls and the ceiling are full of holes, and where the white material remains whole, its so thin that mariner tooshie actually see the hawk of land out post, and the trees that dress it. Rags flutter from the edges of some of the holes when the wind blows. Directly over his head he bottomland see a shadowy maroon shape. some sort of cross. bull, do you understand how you Yes. I flipped. Although that isnt the word that set outs out of his mouth. The literal meaning of the word that decreases out seems to be horizon road. And it seems that I sucked a ordinary number of Spieglemans accessories with me. He bends and picks up a flat stone with a flower carved on it. I beevasivenessve that in my world, this was a Georgia OKeeffe print. And that He points to a blackened, fireless torch leaning against one of the pavilions fragile walls. I figure that was a notwithstanding there are no course for it in this world, and what comes out of his mouth sounds as ugly as a curse in German halogen lamp.She frowns. Hal-do-jen . . . limp? Lemp?He feels his numb lips rise in a gnomish grin. Never mind.But you are all right.He understands that she needs him to be all right, and so hell say that he is, passive hes not. He is sick and glad to be sick. He is one lovestruck daddy, and wouldnt receive it any other government agency. If you discount how he felt about his mother a very different kind of love, despite what the Freudians might think its the first time for him. Oh, he surely thought he had been in and out of love, scarcely that was earlier today. Before the peaceful blue of her eyes, her smile, and even the elbow room the shadows thrown by the decaying tent fleet across her face like schools of angle. At this moment he would try to fly off a mountain for her if she needed, or walk through a forest fire, or bring her polar ice to cool her tea, and those things do not constitute being all right.But she needs him to be.Tyler needs him to be.I am a coppiceman, he thinks. At first the fantasy seems insubstantial compared to her beauty to her simple reality save then it begins to take hold. As it always has. What else brought him here, after all? Brought him against his will and all his stovepipe intentions? twat?Yes, Im all right. Ive flipped before. But never into the presence of such beauty, he thinks. Thats the problem. Youre the problem, my lady.Yes. To come and go is your talent. One of your talents. So I devour been told.By whom?Shortly, she says. Shortly. Theres a salient deal to do, and yet I think I need a moment. You . . . tail endher take my breath on contendd. tinkers dam is fiercely glad to get laid it. He sees he is cool it holding her hand, and he kisses it, as Judy kissed his hands in the world on the other side of the wall from this one, and when he does, he sees the ok mesh of bandage on the tips of three of her fingers. He wishes he dared to take her in his arms, moreover she daunts him her beauty and her presence. She is slightly taller than Judy a matter of two inches, surely no more and her hair is lighter, the golden sh ade of unrefined honey spilling from a broken comb. She is eroding a simple cotton robe, white gelded with a blue that matches her eyes. The narrow V-neck frames her throat. The hem glints to just below her knees. Her legs are bare but shes wearing a silver anklet on one of them, so slim its almost invisible. She is fuller-breasted than Judy, her hips a bit wider. Sisters, you might think, except that they have the similar spray of freckles across the nose and the same white line of scar across the back of the left hand. Different mishaps caused that scar, jackass has no doubt, but he also has no doubt that those mishaps occurred at the same hour of the same day.Youre her Twinner. Judy Marshalls Twinner. only when the word that comes out of his mouth isnt Twinner incredibly, dopily, it seems to be harp. Later he will think of how the strings of a harp lie close together, only a fingers touch apart, and he will decide that word isnt so foolish after all.She looks down, her mout h drooping, then raises her head again and tries to smile. Judy. On the other side of the wall. When we were children, Jack, we spoke together often. Even when we grew up, although then we spoke in each others dreams. He is alarmed to see tears forming in her eyes and then slipping down her cheeks. Have I driven her mad? Run her to lunacy? Please say I havent.Nah, Jack says. Shes on a tightrope, but she hasnt fallen off yet. Shes tough, that one.You have to bring her Tyler back to her, Sophie tells him. For both of us. Ive never had a child. I flocknot have a child. I was . . . mistreated, you see. When I was young. Mistreated by one you knew well.A terrible certainty forms in Jacks mind. Around them, the ruined pavilion fuss and sighs in the wonderfully fragrant breeze.Was it Morgan? Morgan of orris?She bows her head, and perhaps this is just as well. Jacks face is, at that moment, pulled into an ugly snarl. In that moment he wishes he could kill Morgan Sloats Twinner all over again. He thinks to ask her how she was mistreated, and then realizes he doesnt have to.How old were you?Twelve, she says . . . as Jack has known she would say. It happened that same year, the year when Jacky was twelve and came here to save his mother. Or did he come here? Is this really the Territories? Somehow it doesnt feel the same. Almost . . . but not quite.It doesnt surprise him that Morgan would rape a child of twelve, and do it in a way that would keep her from ever having children. Not at all. Morgan Sloat, sometimes known as Morgan of Orris, wanted to rule not just one world or two, but the entire universe. What are a few raped children to a man with such ambitions?She gently slips her thumbs across the skin beneath his eyes. Its like being napped with feathers. Shes looking at him with something like wonder. why do you weep, Jack?The past, he says. Isnt that always what does it? And thinks of his mother, sitting by the window, smoking a cigarette, and listening while t he radio plays Crazy Arms. Yes, its always the past. Thats where the hurt is, all you locoweedt get over.Perhaps so, she allows. But theres no time to think about the past today. Its the future we moldiness think about today.Yes, but if I could ask just a few caputs . . . ?All right, but only a few.Jack opens his mouth, tries to speak, and makes a comical belittled gaping expression when nothing comes out. Then he laughs. You take my breath extraneous, too, he tells her. I have to be honest about that.A undefined tinge of color rises in Sophies cheeks, and she looks down. She opens her lips to say something . . . then presses them together again. Jack wishes she had spoken and is glad she hasnt, both at the same time. He squeezes her hands gently, and she looks up at him, blue eyes wide.Did I know you? When you were twelve?She shakes her head.But I saw you.Perhaps. In the large pavilion. My mother was one of the Good Queens handmaidens. I was another . . . the youngest. You c ould have seen me then. I think you did see me.Jack takes a moment to digest the wonder of this, then goes on. Time is short. They both know this. He can almost feel it fleeting.You and Judy are Twinners, but neither of you travel shes never been in your head over here and youve never been in her head, over there. You . . . talk through a wall.Yes.When she wrote things, that was you, whispering through the wall.Yes. I knew how hard I was pushing her, but I had to. Had to Its not just a question of restoring her child to her, important as that whitethorn be. There are larger considerations.Such as?She shakes her head. I am not the one to tell you. The one who will is much greater than I.He studies the tiny dressings that cover the tips of her fingers, and muses on how hard Sophie and Judy have tried to get through that wall to each other. Morgan Sloat could plain become Morgan of Orris at will. As a boy of twelve, Jack had met others with that same talent. Not him he was single-natu red and had always been Jack in both worlds. Judy and Sophie, however, have proved incapable of flipping back and forth in any fashion. Somethings been left out of them, and they could only whisper through the wall between the worlds. There must be sadder things, but at this moment he cant think of a single one.Jack looks around at the ruined tent, which seems to breathe with sunshine and shadow. Rags flap. In the next room, through a hole in the gauzy cloth wall, he sees a few over sullen cots. What is this place? he asks.She smiles. To some, a infirmary.Oh? He looks up and once more takes note of the cross. Maroon now, but undoubtedly once red. A red cross, stupid, he thinks. Oh But isnt it a little . . . well . . . old?Sophies smile widens, and Jack realizes its ironic. Whatever sort of hospital this is, or was, hes guessing it bears little or no resemblance to the ones on General hospital or ER. Yes, Jack. Very old. Once there were a dozen or more of these tents in the Territor ies, On-World, and Mid-World now there are only a few. peradventure just this one. Today its here. Tomorrow . . . Sophie raises her hands, then lowers them. Anywhere Perhaps even on Judys side of the wall.Sort of like a traveling medicine show.This is suppose to be a joke, and hes startled when she first nods, then laughs and claps her hands. Yes Yes, indeed Although you wouldnt want to be treated here.What exactly is she act to say? I suppose not, he agrees, looking at the rotting walls, tattered ceiling panels, and ancient support posts. Doesnt exactly look sterile.Seriously (but her eyes are sparkling), Sophie says Yet if you were a patient, you would think it beautiful out of all measure. And you would think your nurses, the Little Sisters, the most beautiful any poor patient ever had.Jack looks around. Where are they?The Little Sisters dont come out when the sun shines. And if we wish to continue our lives with the blessing, Jack, well be bypast our dampen ways from here long before dark.It pains him to hear her talk of separate ways, even though he knows its inevitable. The pain doesnt dampen his curiosity, however once a coppiceman, it seems, always a coppiceman.Why?Because the Little Sisters are vampires, and their patients never get well.Startled, uneasy, Jack looks around for signs of them. Certainly disbelief doesnt cross his mind a world that can spawn werewolves can spawn anything, he supposes.She touches his wrist. A little tremble of desire goes through him.Dont fear, Jack they also serve the Beam. All things serve the Beam.What beam?Never mind. The hand on his wrist tightens. The one who can answer your questions will be here soon, if hes not already. She gives him a sideways look that contains a glimmer of a smile. And after you hear him, youll be more apt to ask questions that matter.Jack realizes that he has been neatly rebuked, but coming from her, it doesnt sting. He allows himself to be led through room after room of the great an d ancient hospital. As they go, he gets a sense of how really huge this place is. He also realizes that, in spite of the fresh breezes, he can detect a faint, unpleasant undersmell, something that might be a mixture of fermented wine and spoiled meat. As to what sort of meat, Jack is afraid he can guess pretty well. After visiting over a hundred homicide crime scenes, he should be able to.It would have been impolite to break away while Jack was meeting the love of his life (not to mention bad narrative business), so we didnt. Now, however, let us slip through the thin walls of the hospital tent. Outside is a dry but not unpleasant landscape of red rocks, broom sage, desert flowers that look a bit like sego lilies, impede pines, and a few barrel cacti. Somewhere not too off the beaten track(predicate) distant is the steady cool sigh of a river. The hospital pavilion rustles and flaps as dreamily as the sails of a ship riding down the sweet chute of the trade winds. As we float alon g the great ruined tents east side in our effortless and peculiarly pleasant way, we notice a strew of litter. There are more rocks with drawings etched on them, there is a beautifully made copper rose that has been twisted out of shape as if by some great heat, there is a vitiated rag rug that looks as if it has been chopped in two by a meat cleaver. Theres other stuff as well, stuff that has resisted any agitate in its cyclonic passage from one world to the other. We see the blackened husk of a television picture tube lying in a scatter of broken glass, several Duracell AA batteries, a comb, and perhaps oddest a pair of white nylon panties with the word Sunday written on one side in demure pink script. There has been a collision of worlds here, along the east side of the hospital pavilion, is an intermingled detritus that attests to how hard that collision was.At the end of that littery tweak of exhaust the head of the comet, we might say sits a man we recognize. Were not u sed to seeing him in such an ugly brown robe (and he clearly doesnt know how to wear such a garment, because if we look at him from the wrong angle, we can see much more than we want to), or wearing sandals instead of wing tips, or with his hair pulled back into a rough horsetail and secured with a hank of rawhide, but this is undoubtedly Wendell Green. He is grumbling to himself. Drool drizzles from the corners of his mouth. He is looking fixedly at an untidy crumple of foolscap in his right hand. He ignores all the more cataclysmic changes that have occurred around him and focuses on just this one. If he can figure out how his Panasonic minicorder turned into a little pile of ancient paper, perhaps hell move on to the other stuff. Not until then.Wendell (well continue to adjure him Wendell, shall we, and not worry about any name he might or might not have in this little corner of existence, since he doesnt know it or want to) spies the Duracell AA batteries. He crawls to them, p icks them up, and begins trying to stick them into the little pile of foolscap. It doesnt work, of course, but that doesnt keep Wendell from trying. As George Rathbun might say, Give that boy a flyswatter and hed try to catch dinner with it.Geh, says the Coulee Countrys favorite investigative reporter, repeatedly poking the batteries at the foolscap. Geh . . . in. Geh . . . in Gah-damnit, geh in th A sound the coming jingle of what can only be, God help us, spurs breaks into Wendells concentration, and he looks up with wide, bulging eyes. His sanity may not be gone forever, but its certainly taken the wife and kids and gone to Disney World. Nor is the current vision before his eyes apt to coax it back anytime soon.Once in our world there was a fine black actor named Woody Strode. (Lily knew him acted with him, as a matter of fact, in a late-sixties American International stinkeroo accosted Execution Express.) The man now approach path the place where Wendell Green crouches wit h his batteries and his handful of foolscap looks remarkably like that actor. He is wearing faded jeans, a blue chambray shirt, a neck scarf, and a heavy six-gun on a wide leather gun belt in which four dozen or so shells twinkle. His head is bald, his eyes deep-set. Slung over one shoulder by a strap of intricate design is a guitar. Sitting on the other is what appears to be a parrot. The parrot has two heads.No, no, says Wendell in a mildly scolding voice. Dont. Dont see. Dont see. That. He lowers his head and once more begins trying to cram the batteries into the handful of paper.The shadow of the newcomer falls over Wendell, who resolutely refuses to look up.Howdy, stranger, says the newcomer.Wendell carries on not looking up.My names Parkus. Im the law round these parts. Whats your handle?Wendell refuses to respond, unless we can call the low grunts issuing from his drool-slicked mouth a response.I asked your name.Wen, says our old impropriety (we cant really call him a par tner) without looking up. Wen. Dell. Gree . . . Green. I . . . I . . . I . . .Take your time, Parkus says (not without sympathy). I can wait till your branding iron gets hot.I . . . news hawkOh? That what you are? Parkus hunkers Wendell cringes back against the fragile wall of the pavilion. Well, dont that just beat the bass drum at the front of the parade? Tell you what, Ive seen fish hawks, and Ive seen red hawks, and Ive seen goshawks, but youre my first news hawk.Wendell looks up, blinking rapidly.On Parkuss left shoulder, one head of the parrot says God is love.Go fuck your mother, replies the other head.All must seek the river of life, says the first head.Suck my tool, says the second.We grow enticeard God, responds the first.Piss up a rope, invites the second.Although both heads speak equably even in tones of reasonable address Wendell cringes backward even farther, then looks down and furiously resumes his futile work with the batteries and the handful of paper, which is now disappearing into the sweat-grimy tube of his fist.Dont mind em, Parkus says. I sure dont. scarcely hear em anymore, and thats the truth. Shut up, boys.The parrot falls silent.One heads Sacred, the others Profane, Parkus says. I keep em around just to remind me that He is interrupted by the sound of come up footsteps, and stands up again in a single lithe and easy movement. Jack and Sophie are approaching, holding hands with the perfect unconsciousness of children on their way to school. lively Jack cries, his face breaking into a grin.Why, Travelin Jack Parkus says, with a grin of his own. Well-met Look at you, sir youre all grown up.Jack rushes forward and throws his arms around Parkus, who hugs him back, and heartily. After a moment, Jack holds Parkus at arms length and studies him. You were older you looked older to me, at least. In both worlds.Still smiling, Parkus nods. And when he speaks again, it is in Speedy Parkers drawl. Reckon I did look older, Jack. You were j ust a child, telephone.But Parkus waves one hand. Sometimes I look older, sometimes not so old. It all depends on Age is wisdom, one head of the parrot says piously, to which the other responds, You senile old fuck. depends on the place and the circumstances, Parkus concludes, then says And I told you boys to shut up. You keep on, Im apt to twinge your scrawny neck. He turns his attention to Sophie, who is looking at him with wide, wondering eyes, as shy as a doe. Sophie, he says. Its wonderful to see you, darling. Didnt I say hed come? And here he is. Took a little longer than I expected, is all.She drops him a deep curtsey, all the way down to one knee, her head bowed. Thankee-sai, she says. get under ones skin in peace, gunslinger, and go your course along the Beam with my love.At this, Jack feels an odd, deep chill, as if many worlds had spoken in a harmonic tone, low but resonant.Speedy so Jack still thinks of him takes her hand and urges her to her feet. Stand up, girl , and look me in the eye. Im no gunslinger here, not in the borderlands, even if I do still carry the old iron from time to time. In any case, we have a lot to talk about. Thiss no time for ceremony. keep up over the rise with me, you two. We got to make palaver, as the gunslingers say. Or used to say, before the world moved on. I shot a good brace of shout out, and think theyll cook up just fine.What about Jack gestures toward the muttering, crouched heap that is Wendell Green.Why, he looks right busy, Parkus says. Told me hes a news hawk.Im afraid hes a little above himself, Jack replies. gray-headed Wendell heres a news vulture.Wendell turns his head a bit. He refuses to lift his eyes, but his lip curls in a sneer that may be more reflexive than real. Heard. That. He struggles. The lip curls again, and this time the sneer seems less reflexive. It is, in fact, a snarl. Gol. Gol. Gol-den boy. Holly. Wood.Hes managed to retain at least some of his charm and his joi de vivre, Ja ck says. bequeath he be okay here?Not much with ary brain in its head comes near the Little Sisters tent, Parkus says. Hell be okay. And if he smells somethin tasty on the breeze and comes for a look-see, why, I guess we can feed him. He turns toward Wendell. Were going just over yonder. If you want to come and visit, why, you just up and do her. Understand me, Mr. News Hawk?Wen. Dell. Green.Wendell Green, yessir. Parkus looks at the others. Come on. Lets mosey.We mustnt forget him, Sophie murmurs, with a look back. It will be dark in a few hours.No, Parkus agrees as they top the nearest rise. Wouldnt do to leave him beside that tent after dark. That wouldnt do at all.Theres more foliage in the declivity on the far side of the rise even a little ribbon of creek, presumably on its way to the river Jack can hear in the distance but it still looks more like northern Nevada than western Wisconsin. Yet in a way, Jack thinks, that makes sense. The last one had been no ordinary flip. He feels like a stone that has been skipped all the way across a lake, and as for poor Wendell To the right of where they descend the far side of the draw, a horse has been tethered in the shade of what Jack thinks is a Joshua tree. About twenty yards down the draw to the left is a circle of eroded stones. Inside it a fire, not yet lit, has been carefully laid. Jack doesnt like the look of the place much the stones remind him of ancient teeth. Nor is he alone in his dislike. Sophie stops, her grip on his fingers tightening.Parkus, do we have to go in there? Please say we dont.Parkus turns to her with a kindly smile Jack knows well a Speedy Parker smile for sure.The Speaking Demons been gone from this circle many the long age, darling, he says. And you know that such as yon are best for stories.Yet Nows no time to give in to the willies, Parkus tells her. He speaks with a trace of impatience, and willies isnt precisely the word he uses, but only how Jacks mind translates it. You wait ed for him to come in the Little Sisters hospital tent Only because she was there on the other side and now I want you to come along. All at once he seems taller to Jack. His eyes flash. Jack thinks A gunslinger. Yes, I suppose he could be a gunslinger. Like in one of Moms old movies, only for real.All right, she says, low. If we must. Then she looks at Jack. I wonder if youd put your arm around me?Jack, we may be sure, is happy to oblige.As they step between two of the stones, Jack seems to hear an ugly twist of mouth words. Among them, one voice is momentarily clear, seeming to leave a trail of slime behind it as it enters his ear Drudge drudge drudge, oho the bledding foodzies, soon he cummz, my good friend Mun-shun, and such a prize I have for him, oho, oho Jack looks at his old friend as Parkus hunkers by a tow sack and loosens the drawstring at the top. Hes close, isnt he? The Fisherman. And Black House, thats close, too.Yep, Parkus says, and from the sack he spills the g utted corpses of a dozen plump dead birds.Thoughts of Irma Freneau reenter Jacks head at the sight of the grouse, and he thinks he wont be able to eat. Watching as Parkus and Sophie skewer the birds on greensticks reinforces this idea. But after the fire is lit and the birds begin to brown, his stomach weighs in, insisting that the grouse smell wonderful and will probably taste even better. Over here, he remembers, everything always does.And here we are, in the speaking circle, Parkus says. His smiles have been put away for the nonce. He looks at Jack and Sophie, who sit side by side and still holding hands, with somber gravity. His guitar has been propped against a nearby rock. Beside it, Sacred and Profane sleeps with its two heads tucked into its feathers, dreaming its no doubt bifurcated dreams. The Demon may be long gone, but the legends say such things leave a eternal sleep that may lighten the tongue.Like kissing the Blarney Stone, maybe, Jack suggests.Parkus shakes his head . No blarney today.Jack says, If only we were dealing with an ordinary scumbag. That I could handle.Sophie looks at him, puzzled.He means a dust-off artist, Parkus tells her. A hardcase. He looks at Jack. And in one way, that is what youre dealing with. Carl Bier-stone isnt much an ordinary monster, lets say. Which is not to say he couldnt do with a spot of killing. But as for whats going on in cut Landing, he has been used. Possessed, youd say in your world, Jack. Taken by the spirits, wed say in the Territories Or brought low by pigs, Sophie adds.Yes. Parkus is nodding. In the world just beyond this borderland Mid-World they would say he has been infested by a demon. But a demon far greater than the poor, tattered spirit that once lived in this circle of stones.Jack hardly hears that. His eyes are glowing. It sounded something like beer stein, George Potter told him last night, a cardinal years ago. Thats not it, but its close.Carl Bierstone, he says. He raises a clenched fi st, then shakes it in triumph. That was his name in Chicago. Burnside here in French Landing. Case closed, game over, zip up your fly. Where is he, Speedy? Save me some time h Shut . . . up, Parkus says.The tone is low and almost deadly. Jack can feel Sophie shrink against him. He does a little shrinking himself. This sounds nothing like his old friend, nothing at all. You have to stop thinking of him as Speedy, Jack tells himself. Thats not who he is or ever was. That was just a character he played, someone who could both soothe and charm a panic-struck kid on the run with his mother.Parkus turns the birds, which are now browned nicely on one side and spitting juice into the fire.Im sorry to speak tart to you, Jack, but you have to realize that your Fisherman is pretty small fry compared to whats really going on.Why dont you tell Tansy Freneau hes small fry? Why dont you tell Beezer St. Pierre?Jack thinks these things, but doesnt say them out loud. Hes more than a little afraid of the light he saw in Parkuss eyes.Nor is it about Twinners, Parkus says. You got to get that idea out of your mind. Thats just something that has to do with your world and the world of the Territories a link. You cant kill some hardcase over here and end the career of your white shark over there. And if you kill him over there, in Wisconsin, the thing inside will just jump to another host.The thing ?When it was in Albert Fish, Fish called it the Monday Man. Fellow youre after calls it Mr. Munshun. Both are only ways of trying to say something that cant be pronounced by any sublunary tongue on any earthly world.How many worlds are there, Speedy?Many, Parkus says, looking into the fire. And this business concerns every one of them. Why else do you think Ive been after you like I have? send you feathers, sending you robins eggs, doing every damned thing I could to make you wake up.Jack thinks of Judy, scratching on walls until the tips of her fingers were bloody, and feels ashame d. Speedy has been doing much the same thing, it seems. Wake up, wake up, you dunderhead, he says.Parkus seems caught between reproof and a smile. For sure you must have seen me in the case that sent you running out of L.A.Ah, man why do you think I went?You ran like Jonah, when God told him to go preach against the wickedness in Nineveh. Thought I was gonna have to send a whale to come and swallow you up.I feel swallowed, Jack tells him.In a small voice, Sophie says I do, too.Weve all been swallowed, says the man with the gun on his hip. Were in the belly of the beast, like it or not. Its ka, which is destiny and fate. Your Fisherman, Jack, is now your ka. Our ka. This is more than murder. Much more.And Jack sees something that frankly scares the shit out of him. Lester Parker, a.k.a. Speedy, a.k.a. Parkus, is himself scared almost to death.This business concerns the blueish Tower, he says.Beside Jack, Sophie gives a low, desperate cry of terror and lowers her head. At the same t ime she raises one hand and forks the sign of the Evil Eye at Parkus, over and over.That gentleman doesnt seem to take it amiss. He simply sets to work play the birds again on their sticks. Listen to me, now, he says. Listen, and ask as few questions as you can. We still have a chance to get Judy Marshalls son back, but time is blowing in our teeth.Talk, Jack says.Parkus talks. At some point in his tale he resolve the birds done and serves them out on flat stones. The meat is tender, almost falling off the small bones. Jack eats hungrily, drinking deep of the sweet water from Parkuss waterskin each time it comes around to him. He wastes no more time comparing dead children to dead grouse. The furnace needs to be stoked, and he stokes it with a will. So does Sophie, eating with her fingers and licking them clean without the slightest reserve or embarrassment. So, in the end, does Wendell Green, although he refuses to enter the circle of old stones. When Parkus tosses him a golden-b rown grouse, however, Wendell catches it with remarkable adroitness and buries his face in the moist meat.You asked how many worlds, Parkus begins. The answer, in the High Speech, is da fan worlds beyond telling. With one of the blackened sticks he draws a figure eight on its side, which Jack recognizes as the Greek symbol for infinity.There is a Tower that binds them in place. Think of it as an axle upon which many wheels spin, if you like. And there is an entity that would bring this Tower down. drum Abbalah.At these words, the flames of the fire seem to momentarily darken and turn red. Jack wishes he could accept that this is only a trick of his overs wagon trained mind, but cannot. The Crimson office, he says.Yes. His physical being is pent in a cell at the top of the Tower, but he has another manifestation, every bit as real, and this lives in Can-tah Abbalah the Court of the Crimson King.Two places at once. Given his journeying between the world of America and the world of the Territories, Jack has little trouble swallowing this concept.Yes.If he or it destroys the Tower, wont that defeat his purpose? Wont he destroy his physical being in the process?Just the opposite hell set it free to wander what will then be chaos . . . din-tah . . . the furnace. Some parts of Mid-World have fallen into that furnace already.How much of this do I actually need to know? Jack asks. He is advised that time is fleeting by on his side of the wall, as well.Hard telling what you need to know and what you dont, Parkus says. If I leave out the wrong instal of information, maybe all the stars go dark. Not just here, but in a thousand thousand universes. Thats the pure hell of it. Listen, Jack the King has been trying to destroy the Tower and set himself free for time out of mind. Forever, mayhap. Its slow work, because the Tower is bound in place by crisscrossing force beams that act on it like guy wires. The Beams have held for millennia, and would hold for millennia to come, but in the last two hundred years thats speaking of time as you count it, Jack to you, Sophie, it would be Full-Earth almost five hundred times over So long, she says. Its almost a sigh. So very long.In the great sweep of things, its as short as the gleam of a single match in a dark room. But while good things usually take a long time to develop, evil has a way of popping up full-blown and ready-made, like Jack out of his box. Ka is a friend to evil as well as to good. It embraces both. And, speaking of Jack . . . Parkus turns to him. Youve heard of the Iron Age and the Bronze Age, of course?Jack nods.On the upper levels of the Tower, there are those who call the last two hundred or so years in your world the Age of Poisoned Thought. That means You dont have to explain it to me, Jack says. I knew Morgan Sloat, remember? I knew what he planned for Sophies world. Yes, indeed. The basic plan had been to turn one of the universes sweetest honeycombs into first a vacation spo t for the rich, then a source of semiskilled(prenominal) labor, and at long last a waste pit, probably radioactive. If that wasnt an example of poisoned thought, Jack doesnt know what is.Parkus says, Rational beings have always harbored telepaths among their number thats true in all the worlds. But theyre ordinarily rare creatures. Prodigies, you might say. But since the Age of Poisoned Thought came on your world, Jack infested it like a demon such beings have become much more common. Not as common as slow mutants in the Blasted Lands, but common, yes.You speak of mind readers, Sophie says, as if wanting to be sure.Yes, Parkus agrees, but not just mind readers. Precognates. Teleports world jumpers like old Travelin Jack here, in other words and telekinetics. Mind readers are the most common, telekinetics the rarest . . . and the most valuable.To him, you mean, Jack says. To the Crimson King.Yes. Over the last two hundred years or so, the abbalah has spent a good part of his ti me gathering a conclave of telepathic slaves. Most of them come from Earth and the Territories. All of the telekinetics come from Earth. This collection of slaves this gulag is his crowning achievement. We call them breaker. They . . . He trails off, thinking. Then Do you know how a cabin car travels?Sophie nods, but Jack at first has no idea what Parkus is talking about. He has a brief, lunatic vision of a fully equipped kitchen traveling down Route 66.Many oarsmen, Sophie says, then makes a rowing motion that throws her breasts into charming relief.Parkus is nodding. Usually slaves chained together. They From outside the circle, Wendell suddenly sticks his own oar in. Spart. Cus. He pauses, frowning, then tries it again. Spart-a-cus.Whats he on about? Parkus asks, frowning. Any idea, Jack?A movie called Spartacus, Jack says, and youre wrong as usual, Wendell. I believe youre thinking about Ben-Hur. sounding sulky, Wendell holds out his greasy hands. More. Meat.Parkus pulls t he last grouse from its sizzling stick and tosses it between two of the stones, where Wendell sits with his pallid, greasy face peering from between his knees. Fresh prey for the news hawk, he says. Now do us a favor and shut up.Or. What. The old defiant gleam is rising in Wendells eyes.Parkus draws his shooting iron partway from its holster. The grip, made of sandalwood, is worn, but the barrel gleams murder-bright. He has to say no more holding his second bird in one hand, Wendell Green hitches up his robe and hies himself back over the rise. Jack is extremely relieved to see him go. Spartacus indeed, he thinks, and snorts.So the Crimson King wants to use these Breakers to destroy the Beams, Jack says. Thats it, isnt it? Thats his plan.You speak as though of the future, Parkus says mildly. This is happening now, Jack. Only look at your own world if you want to see the ongoing disintegration. Of the six Beams, only one still holds true. Two others still generate some holding power. The other three are dead. One of these went out thousands of years ago, in the ordinary course of things. The others . . . killed by the Breakers. All in two centuries or less.Christ, Jack says. He is beginning to understand how Speedy could call the Fisherman small-fry.The job of protecting the Tower and the Beams has always belonged to the ancient war guild of Gilead, called gunslingers in this world and many others. They also generated a powerful psychic force, Jack, one fully capable of countering the Crimson Kings Breakers, but The gunslingers are all gone save for one, Sophie says, looking at the big pistol on Parkuss hip. And, with timid hope Unless you really are one, too, Parkus.Not I, darling, he says, but theres more than one.I thought Roland was the last. So the stories say.He has made at least three others, Parkus tells her. Ive no idea how that can be possible, but I believe it to be true. If Roland were still alone, the Breakers would have toppled the Tower long sin ce. But with the force of these others added to his I have no clue what youre talking about, Jack says. I did, sort of, but you lost me about two turns back.Theres no need for you to understand it all in order to do your job, Parkus says.Thank God for that.As for what you do need to understand, leave galleys and oarsmen and think in call of the Western movies your mother used to make. To begin with, imagine a fort in the desert.This Dark Tower you keep talking about. Thats the fort.Yes. And surrounding the fort, instead of wild Indians The Breakers. Led by Big Chief Abbalah.Sophie murmurs The King is in his Tower, eating bread and honey. The Breakers in the basement, making all the money.Jack feels a light but singularly unpleasant chill shake up his spine he thinks of rat paws scuttering over broken glass. What? Why do you say that?Sophie looks at him, flushes, shakes her head, looks down. Its what she says, sometimes. Judy. Its how I hear her, sometimes.Parkus seizes one of the charred greensticks and draws in the rocky dust beside the figure-eight shape. Fort here. Marauding Indians here, led by their merciless, evil and most likely insane chief. But over here Off to the left, he draws a harsh arrow in the dirt. It points at the rudimentary shapes indicating the fort and the besieging Indians. What always arrives at the last moment in all the best Lily Cavanaugh Westerns?The cavalry, Jack says. Thats us, I suppose.No, Parkus says. His tone is patient, but Jack suspects it is costing him a great effort to maintain that tone. The cavalry is Roland of Gilead and his new gunslingers. Or so those of us who want the Tower to stand or to fall in its own time dare hope. The Crimson King hopes to hold Roland back, and to finish the job of destroying the Tower while he and his band are still at a distance. That means gathering all the Breakers he can, especially the telekinetics.Is Tyler Marshall Stop interrupting. This is difficult enough without that.You used to be a hell of a lot cheerier, Speedy, Jack says reproachfully. For a moment he thinks his old friend is going to give him another tongue-lashing or perhaps even lose his temper completely and turn him into a frog but Parkus relaxes a little, and utters a laugh.Sophie looks up, relieved, and gives Jacks hand a squeeze.Oh, well, maybe youre right to hitch on my cord a little, Parkus says. Gettin all wound up wont help anything, will it? He touches the big iron on his hip. I wouldnt be surprise if wearin this thing has given me a few delusions of grandeur.Its a step or two up from amusement-park janitor, Jack allows.In both the Bible your world, Jack and the rule book of Good Farming yours, Sophie dear theres a scripture that goes something like ?For in my kingdom there are many mansions. Well, in the Court of the Crimson King there are many monsters.Jack hears a short, hard laugh bolt out of his mouth. His old friend has made a typically nonflavored policemans joke, it seems.They are the Kings courtiers . . . his knights-errant. They have all sorts of tasks, I imagine, but in these last years their chief job has been to happen upon talented Breakers. The more talented the Breaker, the greater the reward.Theyre headhunters, Jack murmurs, and doesnt realize the resonance of the term until its out of his mouth. He has used it in the business sense, but of course there is another, more literal meaning. Headhunters are cannibals.Yes, Parkus agrees. And they have mortal subcontractors, who work for . . . one doesnt like to say for the joy of it, but what else could we call it?Jack has a nightmarish vision then a cartoon Albert Fish standing on a New York sidewalk with a sign reading WILL WORK FOR FOOD. He tightens his arm around Sophie. Her blue eyes turn to him, and he looks into them gladly. They soothe him.How many Breakers did Albert Fish send his pal Mr. Monday? Jack wants to know. Two? Four? A dozen? And do they die off, at least, so the abbalah has to replace them?They dont, Parkus replies gravely. They are kept in a place a basement, yes, or a cavern where there is essentially no time.Purgatory. Christ.And it doesnt matter. Albert Fish is long gone. Mr. Monday is now Mr. Munshun. The deal Mr. Munshun has with your killer is a simple one this Burnside can kill and eat all the children he wants, as long as they are untalented children. If he should find any who are talented any Breakers they are to be turned over to Mr. Munshun at once.Who will take them to the abbalah, Sophie murmurs.Thats right, Parkus says.Jack feels that hes back on relatively solid ground, and is extremely glad to be there. Since Tyler hasnt been killed, he must be talented. ?Talented is hardly the word. Tyler Marshall is, potentially, one of the two most powerful Breakers in all the history of all the worlds. If I can briefly sink to the analogy of the fort surrounded by Indians, then we could say that the Breakers are like fire arrows shot over the walls . . . a new kind of warfare. But Tyler Marshall is no simple fire arrow. Hes more like a guided missile.Or a nuclear weapon.Sophie says, I dont know what that is.You dont want to, Jack replies. Believe me.He looks down at the scribble of drawings in the dirt. Is he surprised that Tyler should be so powerful? No, not really. Not after experiencing the aura of strength surrounding the boys mother. Not after meeting Judys Twinner, whose plain dress and manner cant conceal a character that strikes him as almost regal. Shes beautiful, but he senses that beauty is one of the least important things about her.Jack? Parkus asks him. You all right? Theres no time to be anythin else, his tone suggests.Give me a minute, Jack says.We dont have much t That has been made perfectly clear to me, Jack says, biting off the words, and he feels Sophie shift in surprise at his tone of voice. Now give me a minute. Let me do my job.From beneath a ruffle of green feathers, one of the parrots hea ds mutters God loves the poor laborer. The other replies Is that why he made so fucking many of them?All right, Jack, Parkus says, and cocks his head up at the set up.Okay, what have we got here? Jack thinks. Weve got a valuable little boy, and the Fisherman knows hes valuable. But this Mr. Munshun doesnt have him yet, or Speedy wouldnt be here. Deduction?Sophie, looking at him anxiously. Parkus, still looking up into the blameless blue sky above this borderland between the Territories what Judy Marshall calls Faraway and the Whatever Comes Next. Jacks mind is ticking faster now, picking up speed like an express train leaving the station. He is aware that the black man with the bald head is watching the sky for a certain malevolent crow. He is aware that the fair-skinned cleaning lady beside him is looking at him with the sort of fascination that could become love, given world enough and time. Mostly, though, hes lost in his own thoughts. They are the thoughts of a coppiceman.Now Bierstones Burnside, and hes old. Old and not doing so well in the cognition department these days. I think maybe hes gotten caught between what he wants, which is to keep Tyler for himself, and what hes promised this Munshun guy. Somewhere theres a fuddled, creaky, on the hook(predicate) mind trying to make itself up. If he decides to kill Tyler and stick him in the stewpot like the witch in Hansel and Gretel, thats bad for Judy and Fred. Not to mention Tyler, who may already have seen things that would drive a Marine combat vet insane. If the Fisherman turns the boy over to Mr. Munshun, its bad for everyone in creation. No wonder Speedy give tongue to time was blowing in our teeth.You knew this was coming, didnt you? he says. Both of you. You must have. Because Judy knew. Shes been weird for months, long before the murders started.Parkus shifts and looks away, uncomfortable. I knew something was coming, yes there have been great disruptions on this side but I was on other bus iness. And Sophie cant cross. She came here with the flying men and will go back the same way when our palavers done.Jack turns to her. You are who my mother once was. Im sure of it. He supposes he isnt being entirely clear about this, but he cant help it his mind is trying to go in too many directions at once. Youre Laura DeLoessians successor. The Queen of this world.Now Sophie is the one who looks uncomfortable. I was nobody in the great scheme of things, really I wasnt, and that was the way I desire it. What I did mostly was write letters of commendation and thank people for coming to see me . . . only in my official capacity, I always state ?us. I enjoyed walking, and sketching flowers, and cataloging them. I enjoyed hunting. Then, due to bad luck, bad times, and bad behavior, I found myself the last of the royal line. Queen of this world, as you say. Married once, to a good and simple man, but my Fred Marshall died and left me alone. Sophie the Barren.Dont, Jack says. He is s urprised at how deeply it hurts him to hear her refer to herself in this bitter, joking way.Were you not single-natured, Jack, your Twinner would be my cousin.She turns her slim fingers so that now she is gripping him instead of the other way around. When she speaks again, her voice is low and passionate. Put all the great matters aside. All I know is that Tyler Marshall is Judys child, that I love her, that Id not see her hurt for all the worlds that are. Hes the closest thing to a child of my own that Ill ever have. These things I know, and one other that youre the only one who can save him.Why? He has sensed this, of course why else in Gods name is he here? but that doesnt lessen his bewilderment. Why me?Because you touched the Talisman. And although some of its power has left you over the years, much still remains.Jack thinks of the lilies Speedy left for him in Dales bathroom. How the smell lingered on his hands even after he had given the bouquet itself to Tansy. And he reme mbers how the Talisman looked in the murmuring darkness of the Queens Pavilion, rising brightly, changing everything before it finally vanished.He thinks Its still changing everything.Parkus. Is it the first time hes called the other man the other coppiceman by that name? He doesnt know for sure, but he thinks it may be.Yes, Jack.Whats left of the Talisman is it enough? Enough for me to take on this Crimson King?Parkus looks shocked in spite of himself. Never in your life, Jack. Never in any life. The abbalah would blow you out like a candle. But it may be enough for you to take on Mr. Munshun to go into the furnace-lands and bring Tyler out.There are machines, Sophie says. She looks caught in some dark and unhappy dream. Red machines and black machines, all lost in smoke. There are great belts and children without number upon them. They trudge and trudge, turning the belts that turn the machines. Down in the foxholes. Down in the ratholes where the sun never shines. Down in the great caverns where the furnace-lands lie.Jack is shaken to the bottom of his mind and spirit. He finds himself thinking of Dickens not Bleak House but Oliver Twist. And, of course he thinks of his conversation with Transy Freneau. At least Irmas not there, he thinks. Not in the furnace-lands, not she. She got dead, and a mean old man ate her leg. Tyler, though . . . Tyler . . .They trudge until their feet bleed, he mutters. And the way there . . . ?I think you know it, Parkus says. When you find Black House, youll find your way to the furnace-lands . . . the machines . . . Mr. Munshun . . . and Tyler.The boy is alive. Youre sure of that.Yes. Parkus and Sophie speak together.And where is Burnside now? That information might speed things up a bit.I dont know, Parkus says.Christ, if you know who he was That was the fingerprints, Parkus says. The fingerprints on the telephone. Your first real idea about the case. The Wisconsin State Police got the Bierstone name back from the FBIs V ICAP database. You have the Burnside name. That should be enough.Wisconsin State Police, FBI, VICAP, database these terms come out in good old American English, and in this place they sound unpleasant and foreign to Jacks ear.How do you know all that?I have my sources in your world I keep my ear to the ground. As you know from personal experience. And surely youre cop enough to do the rest on your own.Judy thinks you have a friend who can help, Sophie says unexpectedly.Dale? Dale Gilbertson? Jack finds this a little hard to believe, but he supposes Dale may have uncovered something.I dont know the name. Judy thinks hes like many here in Faraway. A man who sees much because he sees nothing.Not Dale, after all. Its Henry shes talking about.Parkus rises to his feet. The heads of the parrot come up, unveil four bright eyes. Sacred and Profane flutters up to his shoulder and settles there. I think our palaver is done, Parkus says. It must be done. Are you ready to go back, my friend?Yes . And I suppose I better take Green, little as I want to. I dont think hed last long here.As you say.Jack and Sophie, still holding hands, are halfway up the rise when Jack realizes Parkus is still standing in the speaking circle with his parrot on his shoulder. Arent you coming?Parkus shakes his head. We go different ways now, Jack. I may see you again.If I survive, Jack thinks. If any of us survive.Meantime, go your course. And be true.Sophie drops another deep curtsey. Sai.Parkus nods to her and gives Jack Sawyer a little salute. Jack turns and leads Sophie back to the ruined hospital tent, wondering if he will ever see Speedy Parker again.Wendell Green ace reporter, fearless investigator, explicator of good and evil to the great unwashed sits in his former place, holding the crumpled foolscap in one hand and the batteries in the other. He has resumed muttering, and exactly looks up when Sophie and Jack approach.Youll do your best, wont you? Sophie asks. For her.And for you, J ack says. Listen to me, now. If this were to end with all of us still standing . . . and if I were to come back here . . . He finds he can say no more. Hes appalled at his temerity. This is a queen, after all. A queen. And hes . . . what? Trying to ask her for a date?Perhaps, she says, looking at him with her steady blue eyes. Perhaps.Is it a perhaps you want? he asks softly.Yes.He bends and brushes his lips over hers. Its brief, barely a kiss at all. It is also the best kiss of his life.I feel like fainting, she tells him when he straightens up again.Dont joke with me, Sophie.She takes his hand and presses it against the underswell of her left breast. He can feel her heart pounding. Is this a joke? If she were to run faster, shed catch her feet and fall. She lets him go, but he holds his hand where it is a moment longer, palm curved against that springing warmth.Id come with you if I could, she says.I know that.He looks at her, knowing if he doesnt get moving now, right away, he ne ver will. Its wanting not to leave her, but thats not all. The truth is that hes never been more frightened in his life. He searches for something mundane to bring him back to earth to slow the pounding of his own heart and finds the perfect object in the muttering creature that is Wendell Green. He drops to one knee. Are you ready, big boy? Want to take a trip on the mighty Mississip?Dont. Touch. Me. And then, in a just about poetic rush Fucking Hollywood assholeBelieve me, if I didnt have to, I wouldnt. And I plan to wash my hands just as soon as I get the chance.He looks up at Sophie and sees all the Judy in her. All the beauty in her. I love you, he says.Before she can reply, he seizes Wendells hand, closes his eyes, and flips.