Chapter IV: The Pied Piper
ONE
“We are ka-tet,” said the gunslinger. “We are one from many.” He saw Callahan’s doubtful look—it was impossible to miss— and nodded. “Yes, Pere, you’re one of us. I don’t know for how long, but I know it’s so.
And so do my friends.”
Jake nodded. So did Eddie and Susannah. They were in the Pavilion today; after hearing Jake’s story, Roland no longer wanted to meet at the rectory-house, not even in the back yard. He thought it all too likely that Slightman or Andy— maybe even some other as yet unsuspected friend of the Wolves—had placed listening devices as well as cameras there. Overhead the sky was gray, threatening rain, but the weather remained remarkably warm for so late in the season. Some civic-minded ladies or gents had raked away the fallen leaves in a wide circle around the stage where Roland and his friends had introduced themselves not so long ago, and the grass beneath was as green as summer. There were folken flying kites, couples promenading hand in hand, two or three outdoor tradesmen keeping one eye out for customers and the other on the lowbellied clouds overhead. On the bandstand, the group of musicians who had played them into Calla Bryn Sturgis with such brio were practicing a few new tunes. On two or three occasions, townsfolk had started toward Roland and his friends, wanting to pass a little time, and each time it happened, Roland shook his head in an unsmiling way that turned them around in a hurry. The time for so-good-to-meet-you politics had passed. They were almost down to what Susannah called the real nitty-gritty.
Roland said, “In four days comes the meeting, this time I think of the entire town, not just the men.”
“Damn well told it ought to be the whole town,” Susannah said. “If you’re counting on the ladies to throw the dish and make up for all the guns we don’t have, I don’t think it’s too much to let em into the damn hall.”
“Won’t be in the Gathering Hall, if it’s everyone,” Callahan said. “There won’t be room enough. We’ll light the torches and have it right out here.”
“And if it rains?” Eddie asked.
“If it rains, people will get wet,” Callahan said, and shrugged.
“Four days to the meeting and nine to the Wolves,” Roland said. “This will very likely be our last chance to palaver as we are now—sitting down, with our heads clear—until this is over. We won’t be here long, so let’s make it count.” He held out his hands. Jake took one, Susannah the other. In a moment all five were joined in a little circle, hand to hand. “Do we see each other?”
“See you very well,” Jake said.
“Very well, Roland,” said Eddie.
“Clear as day, sug,” Susannah agreed, smiling.
Oy, who was sniffing in the grass nearby, said nothing, but he did look around and tip a wink.
“Pere?” Roland asked.
“I see and hear you very well,” Callahan agreed with a small smile, “and I’m glad to be included. So far, at
least.”
TWO
Roland, Eddie, and Susannah had heard most of Jake’s tale; Jake and Susannah had heard most of Roland’s and Eddie’s. Now Callahan got both—what he later called “the double feature.” He listened with his eyes wide and his mouth frequently agape. He crossed himself when Jake told of hiding in the closet. To Eddie the Pere said, “You didn’t mean it about killing the wives and children, of course? That was just a bluff?”
Eddie looked up at the heavy sky, considering this with a faint smile. Then he looked back at Callahan.
“Roland tells me that for a guy who doesn’t want to be called Father, you have taken some very Fatherly stands just lately.”
“If you’re speaking about the idea of terminating your wife’s pregnancy—”
Eddie raised a hand. “Let’s say I’m not speaking of any one thing in particular. It’s just that we’ve got a job to do here, and we need you to help us do it. The last thing we need is to get sidetracked by a lot of your old Catholic blather. So let’s just say yes, I was bluffing, and move on. Will that serve? Father?”
Eddie’s smile had grown strained and exasperated. There were bright smudges of color on his cheekbones.
Callahan considered the look of him with great care, and then nodded. “Yes,” he said. “You were bluffing. By all means let’s leave it at that and move on.”
“Good,” Eddie said. He looked at Roland.
“The first question is for Susannah,” Roland said. “It’s a simple one: how are you feeling?”
“Just fine,” she replied.
“Say true?”
She nodded. “Say true, say thankya.”
“No headaches here?” Roland rubbed above his left temple.
“No. And the jittery feelings I used to get just after sunset, just before dawn—have quit. And look at me!”
She ran a hand down the swell of her breasts, to her waist, to her right hip. “I’ve lost some of the fullness.
Roland… I’ve read that sometimes animals in the wild—carnivores like wildcats, herbivores like deer and rabbits—reabsorb their babies if the conditions to have them are adverse. You don’t suppose…” She trailed off, looking at him hopefully.
Roland wished he could have supported this charming idea, but he couldn’t. And withholding the truth within the ka-tet was no longer an option. He shook his head. Susannah’s face fell.
“She’s been sleeping quietly, so far as I can tell,” Eddie said. “No sign of Mia.”
“Rosalita says the same,” Callahan added.
“You got dat jane watchin me?” Susannah said in a suspiciously Detta-like tone. But she was smiling.
“Every now and then,” Callahan admitted.
“Let’s leave the subject of Susannah’s chap, if we may,” Roland said. “We need to speak of the Wolves. Them and little else.”
“But Roland—” Eddie began.
Roland held up his hand. “I know how many other matters there are. I know how pressing they are. I also know that if we become distracted, we’re apt to die here in Calla Bryn Sturgis, and dead gunslingers can help no one. Nor do they go their course. Do you agree?” His eyes swept them. No one replied. Somewhere in the distance was the sound of many children singing. The sound was high and gleeful and innocent. Something about commala.
“There is one other bit of business that we must address,” Roland said. “It involves you, Pere. And what’s now called the Doorway Cave. Will you go through that door, and back to your country?”
“Are you kidding?” Callahan’s eyes were bright. “A chance to go back, even for a little while? You just say the word.”
Roland nodded. “Later today, mayhap you and I will take a little pasear on up there, and I’ll see you through the door. You know where the vacant lot is, don’t you?”
“Sure. I must have been past it a thousand times, back in my other life.”
“And you understand about the zip code?” Eddie asked.
“If Mr. Tower did as you requested, it’ll be written at the end of the board fence, Forty-sixth Street side. That was brilliant, by the way.”
“Get the number… and get the date, too,” Roland said. “We have to keep track of the time over there if we can, Eddie’s right about that. Get it and come back. Then, after the meeting in the Pavilion, we’ll need you to go through the door again.”
“This time to wherever Tower and Deepneau are in New England,” Callahan guessed.
“Yes,” Roland said.
“If you find them, you’ll want to talk mostly to Mr. Deepneau,” Jake said. He flushed when they all turned to him, but kept his eyes trained on Callahan’s. “Mr. Tower might be stubborn—”
“That’s the understatement of the century,” Eddie said. “By the time you get there, he’ll probably have found twelve used bookstores and God knows how many first editions of Indiana Jones’s Nineteenth Nervous Breakdown.'”
“—but Mr. Deepneau will listen,” Jake went on.
“Issen, Ake,” Oy said, and rolled over onto his back. “Issen kiyet!”
Scratching Oy’s belly, Jake said: “If anyone can convince Mr. Tower to do something, it’ll be Mr. Deepneau.”
“Okay,” Callahan replied, nodding. “I hear you well.”
The singing children were closer now. Susannah turned but couldn’t see them yet; she assumed they were coming up River Street. If so, they’d be in view once they cleared the livery and turned down the high street at Took’s General Store. Some of the folken on the porch over there were already getting up to look.
Roland, meanwhile, was studying Eddie with a small smile. “Once when I used the word assume, you told me a saying about it from your world. I’d hear it again, if you remember.”
Eddie grinned. ” Assume makes an ass out of u and me—is that the one you mean?”
Roland nodded. “It’s a good saying. All the same, I’m going to make an assumption now—pound it like a nail