The Dark Tower tdt-7

by Stephen King

  “What’s he doing?” Justine asks, a little nervously.

  “Taking a leak would be my guess, “her friend replies. “But if Mr.

  King back there is lucky, maybe doing Number Two, instead. That might give him time to get off Route 7 and back onto Turtleback Lane.”

  Suddenly Justine doesn’t feel like picking berries anymore. She wants to go back home and have a strong cup of tea.

  The man comes limping briskly out of the bushes and uses his cane to help him back over the rock wall.

  “Iguess he didn’t need to Number Two, “Elvira says, and as the bad driver climbs back into his blue van, the two going-on-old women look at each other and burst into giggles.

  TWELVE

  Roland watched the old man give the woman instructions-something about using Warrington’s Road as a shortcut-and then Jake opened his eyes. To Roland the boy looked unutterably weary.

  “I was able to make him stop and take a leak,” he said.

  “Now he’s fixing something behind his seat. I don’t know what it is, but it won’t keep him busy for long. Roland, this is bad.

  We’re awfully late. We have to go.”

  Roland looked at the woman, hoping that his decision not to replace her behind the wheel with die old man had been die right one. “Do you know where to go? Do you understand?”

  “Yes,” she said. “Up Warrington’s to Route 7. We sometimes go to dinner at Warrington’s. I know that road.”

  “Can’t guarantee you’ll cut his path goin that way,” said the caretaker, “but it seems likely.” He bent down to pick up his hat and began to brush bits of freshly cut grass from it. He did this with long, slow strokes, like a man caught in a dream. “Ayuh, seems likely t’me.” And then, still like a man who dreams awake, he tucked his hat beneath his arm, raised a fist to his forehead, and bent a leg to the stranger with the big revolver on his hip. Why would he not?

  The stranger was surrounded by white light.

  THIRTEEN

  When Roland pulled himself back into the cab of the storekeeper’s truck-a chore made more difficult by the rapidly escalating pain in his right hip-his hand came down on Jake’s leg, and just like that he knew what Jake had been keeping back, and why. He had been afraid that knowing might cause the gunslinger’s focus to drift. It was not ka-shume the boy had felt, or Roland would have felt it, too. How could there be ka-shume among them, with the tet already broken? Their special power, something greater than all of them, perhaps drawn from the Beam itself, was gone. Now they were just three friends (four, counting the bumbler) united by a single purpose. And they could save King. Jake knew it. They could save the writer and come a step closer to saving the Tower by doing so. But one of them was going to die doing it.

  Jake knew that, too.

  FOURTEEN

  An old saying-one taught to him by his father-came to Roland then: Ifka will say so, let it be so. Yes; all right; let it be so.

  During the long years he had spent on the trail of the man in black, the gunslinger would have sworn nothing in the universe could have caused him to renounce the Tower; had he not literally killed his own mother in pursuit of it, back at the start of his terrible career? But in those years he had been friendless, childless, and (he didn’t like to admit it, but it was true) heartless. He had been bewitched by that cold romance the loveless mistake for love. Now he had a son and he had been given a second chance and he had changed. Knowing that one of them must die in order to save the writer-that their fellowship must be reduced again, and so soon-would not make him cry off. But he would make sure that Roland of Gilead, not Jake of New York, provided the sacrifice this time.

  Did the boy know that he’d penetrated his secret? No time to worry about that now.

  Roland slammed the truckomobile’s door shut and looked at the woman. “Is your name Irene?” he asked.

  She nodded.

  “Drive, Irene. Do it as if Lord High Splitfoot were on your trail with rape on his mind, do ya I beg. Out Warrington’s Road. If we don’t see him there, out the Seven-Road. Will you?”

  “You’re fucking right,” said Mrs. Tassenbaum, and shoved the gearshift into First with real authority.

  The engine screamed, but the truck began to roll backward, as if so frightened by the job ahead that it would rather finish up in the lake. Then she engaged the clutch and the old International Harvester leaped ahead, charging up the steep incline of the driveway and leaving a trail of blue smoke and burnt rubber behind.

  Garrett McKeen’s great-grandson watched them go with his mouth hanging open. He had no idea what had just happened, but he felt sure that a great deal depended on what would happen next.

  Maybe everything.

  FIFTEEN

  Needing to piss that bad was weird, because pissing was the last thing Bryan Smith had done before leaving the Million Dollar Campground.

  And once he’d clambered over the fucking rock wall, he hadn’t been able to manage more than a few drops, even though it had felt like a real bladder-buster at the time. Bryan hopes he’s not going to have trouble with his prostrate; trouble with the old prostrate is the last thing he needs. He’s got enough other problems, by the hairy old Jesus.

  Oh well, now that he’s stopped he might as well try to fix the Styrofoam cooler behind the seat-the dogs are still staring at it with their tongues hanging out. He tries to wedge it underneath the seat, but it won’t go-there’s not quite enough clearance. What he does instead is to point a dirty finger at his rotties and tell them again to ne’mine the cooler and the meat inside, that’s his, that’s gonna be his suppah. This time he even thinks to add a promise that later on he’ll mix a little of the hamburger in with their Purina, if they’re good. This is fairly deep thinking for Bryan Smith, but the simple expedient of swinging the cooler up front and putting it in the unoccupied passenger seat never occurs to him.

  “You leave it alone!” he tells them again, and hops back behind the wheel. He slams the door, takes a brief glance in the rearview mirror, sees two old ladies back there (he didn’t notice them before because he wasn’t exactly looking at the road when he passed them), gives them a wave they never see through the Caravan’s filthy rear window, and then pulls back onto Route 7. Now the radio is playing “Gangsta Dream 19,” by Owt-Ray-Juss, and Bryan turns it up (once more swerving across the white line and into the northbound lane as he does so-this is the sort of person who simply cannot fix the radio without looking at it). Rap rules!

  And metal rules, too! All he needs now to make his day complete is a tune by Ozzy-“Crazy Train “would be good.

  And some of those Marses bars.

  SIXTEEN

  Mrs. Tassenbaum came bolting out of the Cara Laughs driveway and onto Turtleback Lane in second gear, the old pickup truck’s engine overcranking (if there’d been an RPM gauge on the dashboard, the needle would undoubtedly have been redlining),

  the few tools in the back tapdancing crazily in the rusty bed.

  Roland had only a bit of the touch-hardly any at all, compared to Jake-but he had met Stephen King, and taken him down into the false sleep of hypnosis. That was a powerful bond to share, and so he wasn’t entirely surprised when he touched the mind Jake hadn’t been able to reach. It probably didn’t hurt that King was thinking about them.

  He often does on his walks, Roland thought. When he’s alone, he hears the Song of the Turtle and knows that he has a job to do. One he’s shirking. Well, my friend, that ends today.

  If, that was, they could save him.

  He leaned past Jake and looked at the woman. “Can’t you make this gods-cursed thing go faster?”

  “Yes,” she said. “I believe I can.” And then, to Jake: “Can you really read minds, son, or is that only a game you and your friend play?”

  “I can’t read them, exactly, but I can touch them,” Jake said.

  “I hope to hell that’s the truth,” she said, “because Turtleback’s hilly and only one lane wide in places. If yo
u sense someone coming the other way, you have to let me know.”

  “I will.”

  “Excellent,” said Irene Tassenbaum. She bared her teeth in a grin. Really, there was no longer any doubt: this was the best thing that had ever happened to her. The most exciting thing.

  Now, as well as hearing those singing voices, she could see faces in the leaves of the trees on the sides of the road, as if they were being watched by a multitude. She could feel some tremendous force gathering all around them, and she was possessed by a sudden giddy notion: that if she floored the gas-pedal of Chip McAvoy’s old rusty pickup, it might go faster than the speed of light. Powered by the energy she sensed around them, it might outrace time itself.

  Well, let’s just see about that, she thought. She swung the I-H

  into the middle of Turtleback Lane, then punched the clutch and yanked the gearshift into Third. The old truck didn’t go faster than die speed of light, and it didn’t outrace time, but the speedometer needle climbed to fifty… and then past. The truck crested a hill, and when it started down the other side it flew briefly into the air.

  At least someone was happy; Irene Tassenbaum shouted in excitement.

  SEVENTEEN

  Stephen King takes two walks, the short one and the long one. The short one takes him out to the intersection ofWarrington’s Road and Route 7, then back to his house, Cam Laughs, the same way. That one is three miles. The long walk (which also happens to be the name of a book he once wrote under the Bachman name, back before the world moved on)

  takes him past the Warrington’s intersection, down Route 7 as far as the Slab City Road, then all the way back Route 7 to Berry Hill, bypassing Warrington’s Road. This walk returns him to his house by way of the north end of Turtleback Lane, and is four miles. This is the one he means to take today, but when he gets back to the intersection of 7 and Warrington ’s he stops, playing with the idea of going back the short way.

  He’s always careful about walking on the shoulder of the public road, though traffic is light on Route 7, even in summer; the only time this highway ever gets busy is when the Fryeburg Fair’s going on, and that doesn’t start until the first week of October. Most of the sightlines are good, anyway. If a bad driver’s coming (or a drunk) you can usually spot him half a mile away, which gives you plenty of time to vacate the area. There’s only one blind hill, and that’s the one directly beyond the Warrington’s intersection. Yet that’s also an aerobic hill, one that gets the old heart really pumping, and isn’t that what he’s doing all these stupid walks for"? To promote what the TV talking heads call “heart healthiness?” He’s quit drinking, he’s quit doping, he’s almost quit smoking, he exercises. What else is there?

  Yet a voice whispers to him just the same. Get off the main road, it says. Go on back to the house. You’ll have an extra hour before you have to meet the rest of them for the party on the other side of the lake. You can do some work. Maybe start the next Dark Tower story; you know it’s been on your mind.

  Aye, so it has, but he already has a story to work on, and he likes it fine. Going back to the tale of the Tower means swimming in deep water.

  Maybe drowning there. Yet he suddenly realizes, standing here at this crossroads, that if he goes back early he will begin. He won’t be able to help himself. He’ll have to listen to what he sometimes thinks of as Ves’-

  Ka Gan, the Song of the Turtle (and sometimes as Susannah’s Song).

  He’ll junk the current story, turn his back on the safety of the land, and swim out into that dark water once again. He’s done it four times before, but this time he’ll have to swim all the way to the other side.

  Sioim or drown.

  “No, “he says. He speaks aloud, and why not? There’s no one to hear him out here. He perceives, faintly, the attenuate sound of an approaching vehicle-or is it two? one on Route 7 and one on Warrington’s Road?-but that’s all.

  “No,” he says again. “I’m gonna walk, and then I’m gonna party.

  No more writing today. Especially not that.”

  And so, leaving the intersection behind, he begins making his way up the steep hill with its short sightline. He begins to walk toward the sound of the oncoming Dodge Caravan, which is also the sound of his oncoming death. The ka of the rational world wants him dead; that of the Prim wants him alive, and singing his song. So it is that on this sunny afternoon in luestern Maine, the irresistible force rushes toward the immovable object, and for the first time since the Prim receded, all worlds and all existence turn toward the Dark Tower which stands at the far end of Can ’-Ka No Rey, which is to say the Red Fields of None.

  Even the Crimson King ceases his angry screaming. For it is the Dark Tower that will decide.

  “Resolution demands a sacrifice, “King says, and although no one hears but the birds and he has no idea what this means, he is not disturbed.

  He’s always muttering to himself; it’s as though there is a Cave of Voices in his head, one full of brilliant-but not necessarily intelligent-mimics.

  He walks, swinging his arms beside his bluejeaned thighs, unaware that his heart is

  (isn’t)

  finishing its last few beats, that his mind is

  (isn’t)

  thinking its last few thoughts, that his voices an

  (aren’t)

  making their last Delphic pronouncements.

  “Ves’-Ka Gan,” he says, amused by the sound of it-yet attracted, too. He has promised himself that he’ll try not to stuff his Dark Tower fantasies with unpronounceable words in some made-up (not to say fucked-up) language-his editor, Chuck Verrill in New York, will only cut most of them if he does-but his mind seems to be filling up with such words and phrases all the same: ka, ka-tet, sai, soh, can-toi

  (that one at least is from another book of his, Desperation), taheen.

  Can Tolkien’s Cirith Ungol and H. P. Lovecraft’s Great Blind Fiddler,

  Nyarlahotep, be far behind1?

  He laughs, then begins to sing a song one of his voices has given him. He thinks he will certainly use it in the next gunslinger book, when he finally allows the Turtle its voice again. “Commala-come-one,”

  he sings as he walks, “there’s a young man with a gun. That young man lost his honey when she took it on the run.”

  And is that young man Eddie Dean? Or is it Jake Chambers?

  “Eddie,” he says out loud. “Eddie’s the gunny with the honey.” He’s so deep in thought that at first he doesn’t see the roof of the blue Dodge Caravan as it comes over the short horizon ahead of him and so does not realize this vehicle is not on the highway at all, but on the soft shoulder where he is walking. Nor does he hear the oncoming roar of the pickup truck behind him…

  EIGHTEEN

  Bryan hears the scrape of the cooler’s lid even over the funky rip-rap beat of the music, and when he looks in the rearview mirror he’s both dismayed and outraged to see that Bullet, always the more forward of the two rotties, has leaped from the storage area at the rear of the van into the passenger compartment. Bullet’s rear legs are up on the dirty seat, his stubby tail is wagging happily, and his nose is buried in Bryan’s cooler.

  At this point any reasonable driver would pull over to the side of the road, stop his vehicle, and take care of his wayward animal. Bryan Smith, however, has never gotten high marks for reason when behind the wheel, and has the driving record to prove it. Instead of pulling over, he twists around to the right, steering with his left hand and shoving ineffectually at the top of the rottweiler’s flat head with his right.

  “Leave ’at alone!” he shouts at Bullet as his minivan drifts first toward the righthand shoulder and then onto it. “Din’you hear me, Bullet? Aw you foolish? Leave ’at alone! “He actually succeeds in shoving the dog’s head up for a moment, but there’s no fur for his fingers to grasp and Bullet, while no genius, is smart enough to know he has at least one more chance to grab the stuff in the white paper, the stuff radiating that entrancing red smell
. He dips beneath Bryan’s hand and seizes the wrapped package of hamburger in his jaws.

  “Drop it!” Bryan screams. “You drop it right… NOW!”

  In order to gain the purchase necessary to twist further in the driver’s bucket, he presses down firmly with both feet. One of them, unfortunately, is on the accelerator. The van puts on a burst of speed as it rushes toward the top of the hill. At this moment, in his excitement and outrage, Bryan has completely forgotten where he is (Route 7) and what he’s supposed to be doing (driving a van). All he cares about is getting the package of meat out of Bullet’s jaws.

  “Gimme it!” he shouts, tugging. Tail wagging more furiously than ever (to him it’s now a game as well as a meal), Bullet tugs back.

  There’s the sound of ripping butcher’s paper. The van is now all the xoay off the road. Beyond it is a grove of old pines lit by lovely afternoon light: a haze of green and gold. Bryan thinks only of the meat. He’s not going to eat hamburg with dog-drool on it, and you best believe it.

  “Gimme it!” he says, not seeing the man in the path of his van, not seeing the truck that has now pulled up just behind the man, not seeing the truck’s passenger door open or the lanky cowboy-type who leaps out, a revolver with big yellow grips spilling from the holster on his hip and onto the ground as he does; Bryan Smith’s world has narrowed to one very bad dog and one package of meat. In the struggle for the meat, blood-roses are blooming on the butcher’s paper like tattoos.

  NINETEEN

  “There he is!” the boy named Jake shouted, but Irene Tassenbaum didn’t need him to tell her. Stephen King was wearing jeans, a chambray workshirt, and a baseball cap. He was well beyond the place where the road to Warrington’s intersected with Route 7, about a quarter of the way xxp the slope.