Stephen King – The Dark Tower

was what she imagined. The bag of Orizas was once more slung over his shoulder. His gun,

the holster wrapped in its shell-belt, was in there, too. He had covered it from enquiring

eyes with the Old Home Days tee-shirt.

Roland shook his head. “I appreciate the offer, but I’d as soon do what needs doing and

then go back to where I belong.” He surveyed the hurrying throngs on the sidewalks

bleakly. “If I belong anywhere.”

“You could stay at the apartment for a couple of days and rest up,” she said. “I’d stay with

you.”And fuck thy brains out, do it please ya, she thought, and could not help a smile. “I

mean, I know you won’t, butyou need to know the offer’s open.”

He nodded. “Thankee, but there’s a woman who needs me to get back to her as soon as I

can.” It felt like a lie to him, and a grotesque one at that. Based on everything that had

happened, part of him thought that Susannah Dean needed Roland of Gilead back in her

life almost as much as nursery bah-bos needed rat poison added to their bedtime bottles.

Irene Tassenbaum accepted it, however. And part of her was actually anxious to get back to

her husband. She had called him last night (using a pay phone a mile from the motel, just to

be safe), and it seemed that she had finally gotten David Seymour Tassenbaum’s attention

again. Based on her encounter with Roland, David’s attention was definitely second prize,

but it was better than nothing, by God. Roland Deschain would vanish from her life soon,

leaving her to find her way back to northern New England on her own and explain what

had happened as best she could. Part of her mourned the impending loss, but she’d had

enough adventure in the last forty hours or so to last her for the rest of her life, hadn’t she?

And things to think about, that too. For one thing, it seemed that the world was thinner than she had ever imagined. And reality wider.

“All right,” she said. “It’s Second Avenue and Forty-sixth Street you want to go to first,

correct?”

“Yes.” Susannah hadn’t had a chance to tell them much about her adventures after Mia had

hijacked their shared body, but the gunslinger knew there was a tall building—what Eddie,

Jake, and Susannah called a skyscraper—now standing on the site of the former vacant lot,

and the Tet Corporation must surely be inside. “Will we need a tack-see?”

“Can you and your furry friend walk seventeen short blocks and two or three long ones?

It’s your call, but I wouldn’t mind stretching my legs.”

Roland didn’t know how long a long block or how short a short one might be, but he was

more than willing to find out now that the deep pain in his right hip had departed. Stephen

King had that pain now, along with the one in his smashed ribs and the right side of his split head. Roland did not envy him those pains, but at least they were back with their rightful

owner.

“Let’s go,” he said.

Three

Fifteen minutes later he stood across from the large dark structure thrusting itself at the

summer sky, trying to keep his jaw from coming unhinged and perhaps dropping all the

way to his chest. It wasn’t the Dark Tower, nothis Dark Tower, at least (although it

wouldn’t have surprised him to know there were people working in yon sky-tower—some

of them readers of Roland’s adventures—who called 2 Hammarskjöld Plaza exactly that),

but he had no doubt that it was the Tower’s representative in this Keystone World, just as

the rose represented a field filled with them; the field he had seen in so many dreams.

He could hear the singing voices from here, even over the jostle and hum of the traffic. The woman had to call his name three times and finally tug on one sleeve to get his attention.

When he turned to her—reluctantly—he saw it wasn’t the tower across the street that she

was looking at (she had grown up just an hour from Manhattan and tall buildings were an

old story to her) but at the pocket park on their side of the street. Her expression was

delighted. “Isn’t it a beautiful little place? I must have been by this corner a hundred times and I never noticed it until now. Do you see the fountain? And the turtle sculpture?”

He did. And although Susannah hadn’t told them this part of her story, Roland knew she

had been here—along with Mia, daughter of none—and sat on the bench closest to the

turtle’s wet shell. He could almost see her there.

“I’d like to go in,” she said timidly. “May we? Is there time?”

“Yes,” he said, and followed her through the little iron gate.

Four

The pocket park was peaceful, but not entirely quiet.

“Do you hear people singing?” Mrs. Tassenbaum asked in a voice that was hardly more

than a whisper. “A chorus from somewhere?”

“Bet your bottom dollar,” Roland answered, and was sorry immediately. He’d learned the

phrase from Eddie, and saying it hurt. He walked to the turtle and dropped on one knee to

examine it more closely. There was a tiny piece gone from the beak, leaving a break like a

missing tooth. On the back was a scratch in the shape of a question mark, and fading pink

letters.

“What does it say?” she asked. “Something about a turtle, but that’s all I can make out.”

“ ‘See the TURTLE of enormous girth.’ ” He knew this without reading it.

“What does it mean?”

Roland stood up. “It’s too much to go into. Would you like to wait for me while I go in

there?” He nodded in the direction of the tower with its black glass windows glittering in

the sun.

“Yes,” she said. “I would. I’ll just sit on the bench in the sunshine and wait for you.

It’s…refreshing. Does that sound crazy?”

“No,” he said. “If someone whose looks you don’t trust should speak to you, Irene—I

think it unlikely, because this is a safe place, but it’s certainly possible—concentrate just as hard as you can, and call for me.”

Her eyes widened. “Are you talking ESP?”

He didn’t know what ESP stood for, but he understood what she meant, and nodded.

“You’d hear that? Hearme? ”

He couldn’t say for sure that he would. The building might be equipped with damping

devices, like the thinking-caps the can-toi wore, that would make it impossible.

“I might. And as I say, trouble’s unlikely. This is a safe place.”

She looked at the turtle, its shell gleaming with spray from the fountain. “It is, isn’t it?”

She started to smile, then stopped. “You’ll come back, won’t you? You wouldn’t dump me

without at least…” She shrugged one shoulder. The gesture made her look very young.

“Without at least saying goodbye?”

“Never in life. And my business in yonder tower shouldn’t take long.” In fact it was hardly

business at all…unless, that was, whoever was currently running the Tet Corporation had

some with him. “We have another place to go, and it’s there Oy and I would take our leave

of you.”

“Okay,” she said, and sat on the bench with the bumbler at her feet. The end of it was damp

and she was wearing a new pair of slacks (bought in the same quick shopping-run that had

netted Roland’s new shirt and jeans), but this didn’t bother her. They would dry quickly on

such a warm, sunny day, and she found she wanted to be near the turtle sculpture. To study

its tiny, timeless black eyes while she listened to those sweet voices. She thought that

would be very restful. It was not a word she usually thought of in connection with New

York, but this was a very un–New York place, with its feel of quiet and peace. She thought

she might bring David here, that if they could sit on this bench he might hear the story of

her missing three days without thinking her insane. Ortoo insane.

Roland started away, moving easily—moving like a man who could walk for days and

weeks without ever varying his pace.I wouldn’t like to have him on my trail, she thought,

and shivered a little at the idea. He reached the iron gate through which he would pass to

the sidewalk, then turned to her once more. He spoke in a soft singsong.

“See the TURTLE of enormous girth!

On his shell he holds the earth.

His thought is slow but always kind;

He holds us all within his mind.

On his back all vows are made;

He sees the truth but mayn’t aid.

He loves the land and loves the sea,

And even loves a child like me.”

Then he left her, moving swiftly and cleanly, not looking back. She sat on the bench and