Wizard and glass - Stephen King [289]
Roland nodded gravely. “Yes. I hope.”
18
At first Reynolds was content to lead the girl along the broken backtrail at a fast walk, but about thirty minutes after leaving Jonas, Lengyll, and the rest, he broke into a trot. Pylon matched Reynolds’s horse easily, and just as easily when, ten minutes later, he upped their speed to a light but steady run.
Susan held to the horn of her saddle with her bound hands and rode easily at Reynolds’s right, her hair streaming out behind her. She thought her face must be quite colorful; the skin of her cheeks felt raised at least two inches higher than usual, welted and tender. Even the passing wind stung a little.
At the place where the Bad Grass gave way to the Drop, Reynolds stopped to give the horses a blow. He dismounted himself, turned his back to her, and took a piss. As he did, Susan looked up along the rise of land and saw the great herd, now untended and unravelling at the edges. They had done that much, perhaps. It wasn’t much, but it was something.
“Do you need to do the necessary?” Reynolds asked. “I’ll help you down if you do, but don’t say no now and whine about it later.”
“Ye’re afraid. Big brave regulator that ye are, ye’re scared, ain’t ye? Aye, coffin tattoo and all.”
Reynolds tried a contemptuous grin. It didn’t fit his face very well this morning. “You ort to leave the fortune-telling to those that are good at it, missy. Now do you need a necessary stop or not?”
“No. And ye are afraid. Of what?”
Reynolds, who only knew that his bad feeling hadn’t left him when he left Jonas, as he’d hoped it would, bared his tobacco-stained teeth at her. “If you can’t talk sensible, just shut up.”
“Why don’t ye let me go? Perhaps my friends will do the same for you, when they catch us up.”
This time Reynolds grunted laughter which was almost genuine. He swung himself into his saddle, hawked, spat. Overhead, Demon Moon was a pale and bloated ball in the sky. “You can dream, miss’sai,” he said, “dreaming’s free. But you ain’t never going to see those three again. They’re for the worms, they are. Now let’s ride.”
They rode.
19
Cordelia hadn’t gone to bed at all on Reaping Eve. She sat the night through in her parlor chair, and although there was sewing on her lap, she had put not a single stitch in nor picked one out. Now, as morning’s light brightened toward ten o’ the clock, she sat in the same chair, looking out at nothing. What was there to look at, anyway? Everything had come down with a smash—all her hopes of the fortune Thorin would settle on Susan and Susan’s child, perhaps while he still lived, certainly in his dead-letter; all her hopes of ascending to her proper place in the community; all her plans for the future. Swept away by two wilful young people who couldn’t keep their pants up.
She sat in her old chair with her knitting on her lap and the ashes Susan had smeared on her cheek standing out like a brand, and thought: They’ll find me dead in this chair, someday—old, poor, and forgotten. That ungrateful child! After all I did for her!
What roused her was a weak scratching at the window. She had no idea how long it had been going on before it finally intruded on her consciousness, but when it did, she laid her needlework aside and got up to see. A bird, perhaps. Or children playing Reaping jokes, unaware that the world had come to an end. Whatever it was, she would shoo it away.
Cordelia saw nothing at first. Then, as she was about to turn away, she spied a pony and cart at the edge of the yard. The cart was a little disquieting—black, with gold symbols overpainted—and the pony in the shafts stood with its head lowered, not grazing, looking as if it had been run half to death.
She was still frowning out at this when a twisted, filthy hand rose in the air directly in front of her and began to scratch at the glass again. Cordelia gasped and clapped both hands to her bosom as her heart took a startled leap in her chest. She backed up a step, and gave a little shriek as her calf brushed the fender of the stove.
The long, dirty nails scratched twice more,