Stephen King – The Dark Tower

continued (had drawn a bit closer, in fact), but for the time being he ignored them, as well.

Grass, growing out of the tiled wall.

Overwhelmingthe wall.

He looked down and saw more grass, a brilliant green that was almost purple beneath the

fluorescent lights, growing up out of the floor. And bits of broken tile crumbling into

shards and fragments like remains of the old people, the ancestors who had lived and built

before the Beams began to break and the world began to move on.

He bent down. Reached into the grass. Brought up sharp shards of tile, yes, but alsoearth,

the earth of

(the jungle)

some deep catacomb or tomb or perhaps—

There was a beetle crawling through the dirt he’d scooped up, a beetle with a red mark on

its back like a bloody smile, and Jake cast it away with a cry of disgust. Mark of the King!

Say true! He came back to himself and realized that he was down on one knee, practicing at

archaeology like the hero in some old movie while the hounds drew closer on his trail. And

Oy was looking at him, eyes shining with anxiety.

“Ake! Ake-Ake!”

“Yeah,” he said, heaving himself to his feet. “I’m coming. But Oy…whatis this place?”

Oy had no idea why he heard anxiety in his ka-dinh’s voice; whathe saw was the same as

before and what he smelled was the same as before:her smell, the scent the boy had asked

him to find and follow. And it was fresher now. He ran on along its bright brand.

Four

Jake stopped again five minutes later, shouting, “Oy! Wait up a minute!”

The stitch in his side was back, and it was deeper, but it still wasn’t the stitch that had

stopped him.Everything had changed. Or was changing. And God help him, he thought he

knew what it was changing into.

Above him the fluorescent lights still shone down, but the tile walls were shaggy with

greenery. The air had become damp and humid, soaking his shirt and sticking it against his

body. A beautiful orange butterfly of startling size flew past his wide eyes. Jake snatched at it but the butterfly eluded him easily. Almost merrily, he thought.

The tiled corridor had become a jungle path. Ahead of them, it sloped up to a ragged hole

in the overgrowth, probably some sort of forest clearing. Beyond it Jake could see great old

trees growing in a mist, their trunks thick with moss, their branches looped with vines. He

could see giant spreading ferns, and through the green lace of the leaves, a burning jungle

sky. He knew he was under New York, must be under New York, but—

What sounded like a monkey chittered, so close by that Jake flinched and looked up, sure

he would see it directly overhead, grinning down from behind a bank of lights. And then,

freezing his blood, came the heavy roar of a lion. One that was most definitelynot asleep.

He was on the verge of retreating, and at full speed, when he realized he couldnot ; the low

men (probably led by the one who’d told him thefaddah wasdinnah ) were back that way.

And Oy was looking at him with bright-eyed impatience, clearly wanting to go on. Oy was

no dummy, but he showed no signs of alarm, at least not concerning what was ahead.

For his own part, Oy still couldn’t understand the boy’s problem. He knew the boy was

tired—he could smell that—but he also knew Ake was afraid. Why? There were

unpleasant smells in this place, the smell of many men chief among them, but they did not

strike Oy as immediately dangerous. And besides,her smell was here.Very fresh now.

Almost new.

“Ake!” he yapped again.

Jake had his breath now. “All right,” he said, looking around. “Okay. But slow.”

“Lo,” Oy said, but even Jake could detect the stunning lack of approval in the bumbler’s

response.

Jake moved only because he had no other options. He walked up the slope of the

overgrown trail (in Oy’s perception the way was perfectly straight, and had been ever since

leaving the stairs) toward the vine- and fern-fringed opening, toward the lunatic chitter of

the monkey and the testicle-freezing roar of the hunting lion. The song circled through his

mind again and again

(in the village…in the jungle…hush my darling, don’t stir my darling…)

and now he knew the name of it, even the name of the group

(that’s the Tokens with “The Lion Sleeps Tonight,” gone from the charts but not from our

hearts)

that had sung it, but what was themovie ? What was the name of the goddammo —

Jake reached the top of the slope and the edge of the clearing. He looked through an

interlacing of broad green leaves and brilliant purple flowers (a tiny green worm was

journeying into the heart of one), and as he looked, the name of the movie came to him and

his skin broke out in gooseflesh from the nape of his neck all the way down to his feet. A

moment later the first dinosaur came out of the jungle (the mighty jungle), and walked into

the clearing.

Five

Once upon a time long ago

(far and wee)

when he was just a little lad;

(there’s some for you and some for me)

once upon a time when mother went to Montreal with her art club and father went to Vegas

for the annual unveiling of the fall shows;

(blackberry jam and blackberry tea)

once upon a time when ’Bama was four—

Six

’Bama’s what the only good one

(Mrs. Shaw Mrs. Greta Shaw)

calls him. She cuts the crusts off his sandwiches, she puts his nursie-school drawings on

the fridge with magnets that look like little plastic fruits, she calls him ’Bama and that’s a special name to him

(to them)

because his father taught him one drunk Saturday afternoon to chant“Go wide, go wide, roll you Tide, we don’t run and we don’t hide, we’re the ’Bama Crimson Tide!”and so she

calls him ’Bama, it’s a secret name and how they know what it means and no one else does

is like having a house you can go into, a safe house in the scary woods where outside the

shadows all look like monsters and ogres and tigers.

(“Tyger, tyger, burning bright,”his mother sings to him, for this is her idea of a lullabye,

along with “I heard a fly buzz…when I died,”which gives ’Bama Chambers a terrible case

of the creeps, although he never tells her; he lies in bed sometimes at night and sometimes

during afternoon naptime thinking I will hear a fly and it will be my deathfly, my heart will stop and my tongue will fall down my throat like a stone down a welland these are the

memories he denies )

It is good to have a secret name and when he finds out mother is going to Montreal for the

sake of art and father is going to Vegas to help present the Network’s new shows at the

Up-fronts he begs his mother to ask Mrs. Greta Shaw to stay with him and finally his

mother gives in. Little Jakie knows Mrs. Shaw is not mother and on more than one

occasion Mrs. Greta Shaw herself hastoldhim she is not mother

(“I hope you know I’m not your mother, ’Bama,” she says, giving him a plate and on the

plate is a peanut butter, bacon, and banana sandwich with the crusts cut off as only Greta

Shaw knows how to cut them off, “because that is not in my job description”

(And Jakie—only he’s ’Bama here, he’s ’Bama between them—doesn’t know exactly

how to tell her he knows that, knows that, knows that, but he’ll make do with her until the

real thing comes along or until he grows old enough to get over his fear of the Deathfly)

And Jakie saysDon’t worry, I’m okay,but he is still glad Mrs. Shaw agrees to stay instead

of the latest au pair who wears short skirts and is always playing with her hair and her

lipstick and doesn’t care jackshit about him and doesn’t know that in his secret heart he

is ’Bama, and boy that little Daisy Mae

(which is what his father callsallthe au pairs )

is stupid stupidstupid.Mrs. Shaw isn’t stupid. Mrs. Shaw gives him a snack she sometimes

calls Afternoon Tea or even High Tea, and no matter what it is—cottage cheese and fruit, a

sandwich with the crusts cut off, custard and cake, leftover canapés from a cocktail party

the night before—she sings the same little song when she lays it out: “A little snack that’s

far and wee, there’s some for you and some for me, blackberry jam and blackberry tea.”

There is a TV is his room, and every day while his folks are gone he takes his after-school

snack in there and watches watches watches and he hears her radio in the kitchen, always