by Stephen King
“Will you tell me what this means, Mr. Deschain?” she asked him.
“Yes,” he said, “if you will call me Roland.”
“If you ask, I’ll try.”
“This is Arthur’s mark,” he said, tracing it himself. “The only mark on the door of his tomb, do ya. ’Tis his dinh mark, and means WHITE.”
The old man held out his trembling hands, silent but imperative.
“Is it loaded?” she asked Roland, and then, before he could answer: “Of course it is.”
“Give it to him,” Roland said.
Marian looked doubtful, the two guards even more so, but Daddy Mose still held his hands out for the widowmaker, and Roland nodded. The woman reluctantly held the gun out to her father. The old man took it, held it in both hands, and then did something that both warmed and chilled the gunslinger’s heart: he kissed the barrel with his old, folded lips.
“What does thee taste?” Roland asked, honestly curious.
“The years, gunslinger,” Moses Carver said. “So I do.” And with that he held the gun out to the woman again, butt first.
She handed it back to Roland as if glad to be rid of its grave and killing weight, and he wrapped it once more in its belt of shells.
“Come in,” she said. “And although our time is short, we’ll make it as joyful as your grief will allow.”
“Amen to that!” the old man said, and clapped Roland on the shoulder. “She’s still alive, my Odetta—she you call Susannah. There’s that. Thought you’d be glad to know it, sir.”
Roland was glad, and nodded his thanks.
“Come now, Roland,” Marian Carver said. “Come and be welcome in our place, for it’s your place as well, and we know the chances are good that you’ll never visit it again.”
Ten
Marian Carver’s office was on the northwest corner of the ninety-ninth floor. Here the walls were all glass unbroken by a single strut or muntin, and the view took the gunslinger’s breath away. Standing in that corner and looking out was like hanging in midair over a skyline more fabulous than any mind could imagine. Yet it was one he had seen before, for he recognized yonder suspension bridge as well as some of the tall buildings on this side of it. He should have recognized the bridge, for they’d almost died on it in another world. Jake had been kidnapped off it by Gasher, and taken to the Tick-Tock Man. This was the City of Lud as it must have been in its prime.
“Do you call it New York?” he asked. “You do, yes?”
“Yes,” Nancy Deepneau said.
“And yonder bridge, that swoops?”
“The George Washington,” Marian Carver said. “Or just the GWB, if you’re a native.”
So yonder lay not only the bridge which had taken them into Lud but the one beside which Pere Callahan had walked when he left New York to start his wandering days. That Roland remembered from his story, and very well.
“Would you care for some refreshment?” Nancy asked.
He began to say no, took stock of how his head was swimming, and changed his mind. Something, yes, but only if it would sharpen wits that needed to be sharp. “Tea, if you have it,” he said. “Hot, strong tea, with sugar or honey. Can you?”
“We can,” Marian said, and pushed a button on her desk. She spoke to someone Roland couldn’t see, and all at once the woman in the outer office—the one who had appeared to be talking to herself—made more sense to him.
When the ordering of hot drinks and sandwiches (what Roland supposed he would always think of as popkins) was done, Marian leaned forward and captured Roland’s eye. “We’re well-met in New York, Roland, so I hope, but our time here isn’t…isn’t vital. And I suspect you know why.”
The gunslinger considered this, then nodded. A trifle cautiously, but over the years he had built a degree of caution into his nature. There were others—Alain Johns had been one, Jamie DeCurry another—for whom a sense of caution had been inbred, but that had never been the case with Roland, whose tendency had been to shoot first and ask questions later.
“Nancy told you to read the plaque in the Garden of the Beam,” Marian said. “Did—”
“Garden of the Beam, say Gawd!” Moses Carver interjected. On the walk down the corridor to his daughter’s office, he had picked a cane out of a faux elephant-foot stand, and now he thumped it on the expensive carpet for emphasis. Marian bore this patiently. “Say Gawd-bomb!”
“My father’s recent friendship with the Reverend Harrigan, who holds court down below, has not been the high point in my life,” Marian said with a sigh, “but never mind. Did you read the plaque, Roland?”
He nodded. Nancy Deepneau had used a different word—sign or sigul—but he understood it came to the same. “The letters changed into Great Letters. I could read it very well.”
“And what did it say?”
“GIVEN BY THE TET CORPORATION, IN HONOR OF EDWARD CANTOR DEAN AND JOHN “JAKE” CHAMBERS.” He paused. “Then it said ‘Cam-a-cam-mal, Pria-toi, Gan delah,’ which you might say as WHITE OVER RED, THUS GAN WILLS EVER.”
“And to us it says GOOD OVER EVIL, THIS IS THE WILL OF GOD,” Marian said.
“God be praised!” Moses Carver said, and thumped his cane. “May the Prim rise!”
There was a perfunctory knock at the door and then the woman from the outer desk came in, carrying a silver tray. Roland was fascinated to see a small black knob suspended in front of her lips, and a narrow black armature that disappeared into her hair. Some sort of far-speaking device, surely. Nancy Deepneau and Marian Carver helped her set out steaming cups of tea and coffee, bowls of sugar and honey, a crock of cream. There was also a plate of sandwiches. Roland’s stomach rumbled. He thought of his friends in the ground—no more popkins for them—and also of Irene Tassenbaum, sitting in the little park across the street, patiently waiting for him. Either thought alone should have been enough to kill his appetite, but his stomach once more made its impudent noise. Some parts of a man were conscienceless, a fact he supposed he had known since childhood. He helped himself to a popkin, dumped a heaping spoonful of sugar into his tea, then added honey for good measure. He would make this as brief as possible and return to Irene as soon as he could, but in the meantime…
“May it do you fine, sir,” Moses Carver said, and blew across his coffee cup. “Over the teeth, over the gums, look out guts, here it comes! Hee!”
“Dad and I have a house on Montauk Point,” said Marian, pouring cream into her own coffee, “and we were out there this past weekend. At around five-fifteen on Saturday afternoon, I got a call from one of the security people here. The Hammarskjöld Plaza Association employs them, but the Tet Corporation pays them a bonus so we may know…certain things of interest, let’s say…as soon as they occur. We’ve been watching that plaque in the lobby with extraordinary interest as the nineteenth of June approached, Roland. Would it surprise you to know that, until roughly quarter of five on that day, it read GIVEN BY THE TET CORPORATION, IN HONOR OF THE BEAM FAMILY, AND IN MEMORY OF GILEAD?”
Roland considered this, sipped his tea (it was hot and strong and good), then shook his head. “No.”
She leaned forward, eyes gleaming. “And why do you say so?”
“Because until Saturday afternoon between four and five o’clock, nothing was sure. Even with the Breakers stopped, nothing was sure until Stephen King was safe.” He glanced around at them. “Do you know about the Breakers?”
Marian nodded. “Not the details, but we know the Beam they were working to destroy is safe from them now, and that it wasn’t so badly damaged it can’t regenerate.” She hesitated, then said: “And we know of your loss. Both of your losses. We’re ever so sorry, Roland.”
“Those boys are safe in the arms of Jesus,” Marian’s father said. “And even if they ain’t, they’re together in the clearing.”
Roland, who wanted to believe this, nodded and said thankya. Then he turned back to Marian. “The thing with the writer was very close. He was hurt, and badly. Jake died sav
ing him. He put his body between King and the van-mobile that would have taken his life.”
“King is going to live,” Nancy said. “And he’s going to write again. We have that on very good authority.”
“Whose?”
Marian leaned forward. “In a minute,” she said. “The point is, Roland, we believe it, we’re sure of it, and King’s safety over the next few years means that your work in the matter of the Beams is done: Ves’-Ka Gan.”
Roland nodded. The song would continue.
“There’s plenty of work for us ahead,” Marian went on, “thirty years’ worth at least, we calculate, but—”
“But it’s our work, not yours,” Nancy said.
“You have this on the same ‘good authority’?” Roland asked, sipping his tea. Hot as it was, he’d gotten half of the large cup inside of him already.
“Yes. Your quest to defeat the forces of the Crimson King has been successful. The Crimson King himself—”
“That wa’n’t never this man’s quest and you know it!” the centenarian sitting next to the handsome black woman said, and he once more thumped his cane for emphasis. “His quest—”
“Dad, that’s enough.” Her voice was hard enough to make the old man blink.
“Nay, let him speak,” Roland said, and they all looked at him, surprised by (and a little afraid of) that dry whipcrack. “Let him speak, for he says true. If we’re going to have it out, let us have it all out. For me, the Beams have always been no more than means to an end. Had they broken, the Tower would have fallen. Had the Tower fallen, I should never have gained it, and climbed to the top of it.”
“You’re saying you cared more for the Dark Tower than for the continued existence of the universe,” Nancy Deepneau said. She spoke in a just-let-me-make
-sure-I’ve-got-this-right voice and looked at Roland with a mixture of wonder and contempt. “For the continued existence of all the universes.”
“The Dark Tower is existence,” Roland said, “and I have sacrificed many friends to reach it over the years, including a boy who called me father. I have sacrificed my own soul in the bargain, lady-sai, so turn thy impudent glass another way. May you do it soon and do it well, I beg.”
His tone was polite but dreadfully cold. All the color was dashed from Nancy Deepneau’s face, and the teacup in her hands trembled so badly that Roland reached out and plucked it from her hand, lest it spill and burn her.
“Take me not amiss,” he said. “Understand me, for we’ll never speak more. What was done was done in both worlds, well and ill, for ka and against it. Yet there’s more beyond all worlds than you know, and more behind them than you could ever guess. My time is short, so let’s move on.”
“Well said, sir!” Moses Carver growled, and thumped his cane again.
“If I offended, I’m truly sorry,” Nancy said.
To this Roland made no reply, for he knew she was not sorry a bit—she was only afraid of him. There was a moment of uncomfortable silence that Marian Carver finally broke. “We don’t have any Breakers of our own, Roland, but at the ranch in Taos we employ a dozen telepaths and precogs. What they make together is sometimes uncertain but always greater than the sum of its parts. Do you know the term ‘good-mind’?”
The gunslinger nodded.
“They make a version of that,” she said, “although I’m sure it’s not so great or powerful as that the Breakers in Thunderclap were able to produce.”
“B’cause they had hundreds,” the old man grumped. “And they were better fed.”
“Also because the servants of the King were more than willing to kidnap any who were particularly powerful,” Nancy said, “they always had what we’d call ‘the pick of the litter.’ Still, ours have served us well enough.”
“Whose idea was it to put such folk to work for you?” Roland asked.
“Strange as it might seem to you, partner,” Moses said, “it was Cal Tower. He never contributed much—never did much but c’lect his books and drag his heels, greedy highfalutin whitebread sumbitch that he was—”
His daughter gave him a warning look. Roland found he had to struggle to keep a straight face. Moses Carver might be a hundred years old, but he had pegged Calvin Tower in a single phrase.
“Anyway, he read about putting tellypaths to work in a bunch of science fiction books. Do you know about science fiction?”
Roland shook his head.
“Well, ne’mine. Most of it’s bullshit, but every now and then a good idear crops up. Listen to me and I’ll tell you a good ’un. You’ll understand if you know what Tower and your friend Mist’ Dean talked about twenty-two years ago, when Mist’ Dean come n saved Tower from them two honky thugs.”
“Dad,” Marian said warningly. “You quit with the nigger talk, now. You’re old but not stupid.”
He looked at her; his muddy old eyes gleamed with malicious good cheer; he looked back at Roland and once more came that sly droop of a wink. “Them two honky dago thugs!”
“Eddie spoke of it, yes,” Roland said.
The slur disappeared from Carver’s voice; his words became crisp. “Then you know they spoke of a book called The Hogan, by Benjamin Slightman. The title of the book was mis-printed, and so was the writer’s name, which was just the sort of thing that turned old fatty’s dials.”
“Yes,” Roland said. The title misprint had been The Dogan, a phrase that had come to have great meaning to Roland and his tet.
“Well, after your friend came to visit, Cal Tower got interested in that fella all over again, and it turned out he’d written four other books under the name of Daniel Holmes. He was as white as a Klansman’s sheet, this Slightman, but the name he chose to write his other books under was the name of Odetta’s father. And I bet that don’t surprise you none, does it?”
“No,” Roland said. It was just one more faint click as the combination-dial of ka turned.
“And all the books he wrote under the Holmes name were science fiction yarns, about the government hiring tellypaths and precogs to find things out. And that’s where we got the idea.” He looked at Roland and gave his cane a triumphant thump. “There’s more to the tale, a good deal, but I don’t guess you’ve got the time. That’s what it all comes back to, isn’t it? Time. And in this world it only runs one way.” He looked wistful. “I’d give a great lot, gunslinger, to see my goddaughter again, but I don’t guess that’s in the cards, is it? Unless we meet in the clearing.”
“I think you say true,” Roland told him, “but I’ll take her word of you, and how I found you still full of hot spit and fire—”
“Say God, say Gawd-bomb!” the old man interjected, and thumped his cane. “Tell it, brother! And see that you tell her!”
“So I will.” Roland finished the last of his tea, then put the cup on Marian Carver’s desk and stood with a supporting hand on his right hip as he did. It would take him a long time to get used to the lack of pain there, quite likely more time than he had. “And now I must take my leave of you. There’s a place not far from here where I need to go.”
“We know where,” Marian said. “There’ll be someone to meet you when you arrive. The place has been kept safe for you, and if the door you seek is still there and still working, you’ll go through it.”
Roland made a slight bow. “Thankee-sai.”
“But sit a few moments longer, if you will. We have gifts for you, Roland. Not enough to pay you back for all you’ve done—whether doing it was your first purpose or not—but things you may want, all the same. One’s news from our good-mind folk in Taos. One’s from more…” She considered. “…more normal researchers, folks who work for us in this very building. They call themselves the Calvins, but not because of any religious bent. Perhaps it’s a little homage to Mr. Tower, who died of a heart attack in his new shop nine years ago. Or perhaps it’s only a joke.”
“A bad one if it is,” Moses Carver grumped.
“And then there are two more…from us. From Nancy
, and me, and my Dad, and one who’s gone on. Will you sit a little longer?”
And although he was anxious to be off, Roland did as he was asked. For the first time since Jake’s death, a true emotion other than sorrow had risen in his mind.
Curiosity.
Eleven
“First, the news from the folks in New Mexico,” Marian said when Roland had resumed his seat. “They have watched you as well as they can, and although what they saw Thunder-side was hazy at best, they believe that Eddie told Jake Chambers something—perhaps something of importance—not long before he died. Likely as he lay on the ground, and before he…I don’t know…”
“Before he slipped into twilight?” Roland suggested.
“Yes,” Nancy Deepneau agreed. “We think so. That is to say, they think so. Our version of the Breakers.”
Marian gave her a little frown that suggested this was a lady who did not appreciate being interrupted. Then she returned her attention to Roland. “Seeing things on this side is easier for our people, and several of them are quite sure—not positive but quite sure—that Jake may have passed this message on before he himself died.” She paused. “This woman you’re traveling with, Mrs. Tannenbaum—”
“Tassenbaum,” Roland corrected. He did it without thinking, because his mind was otherwise occupied. Furiously so.
“Tassenbaum,” Marian agreed. “She’s undoubtedly told you some of what Jake told her before he passed on, but there may be something else. Not a thing she’s holding back, but something she didn’t recognize as important. Will you ask her to go over what Jake said to her once more before you and she part company?”
“Yes,” Roland said, and of course he would, but he didn’t believe Jake had passed on Eddie’s message to Mrs. Tassenbaum. No, not to her. He realized that he’d hardly thought of Oy since they’d parked Irene’s car, but Oy had been with them, of course; would now be lying at Irene’s feet as she sat in the little park across the street, lying in the sun and waiting for him.