Wolves of the Calla - Stephen King [65]
“What’s your birth date, sai?”
Eddie thought he might be ready for this one. “I’m Goat Moon,” he said, then remembered a little more. “Goat with beard.”
“Winter’s snow is full of woe, winter’s child is strong and wild,” said Andy. Yes, that was smugness in its voice, all right.
“Strong and wild, that’s me,” Eddie said. “Haven’t had a real bath in over a month, you better believe I’m strong and wild. What else do you need, Andy old guy? Want to look at my palm, or anything?”
“That will not be necessary, sai Eddie.” The robot sounded unmistakably happy and Eddie thought, That’s me, spreading joy wherever I go. Even robots love me. It’s my ka. “This is Full Earth, say we all thankya. The moon is red, what is called the Huntress Moon in Mid-World that was. You will travel, Eddie! You will travel far! You and your friends! This very night you return to Calla New York. You will meet a dark lady. You—”
“I want to hear more about this trip to New York,” Eddie said, stopping. Just ahead was the camp. He was close enough so he could see people moving around. “No joking around, Andy.”
“You will go todash, sai Eddie! You and your friends. You must be careful. When you hear the kammen—the chimes, ken ya well—you must all concentrate on each other. To keep from getting lost.”
“How do you know this stuff?” Eddie asked.
“Programming,” Andy said. “Horoscope is done, sai. No charge.” And then, what struck Eddie as the final capping lunacy: “Sai Callahan—the Old Fella, ye ken—says I have no license to tell fortunes, so must never charge.”
“Sai Callahan says true,” Eddie said, and then, when Andy started forward again: “But stay a minute, Andy. Do ya, I beg.” It was absolutely weird how quickly that started to sound okay.
Andy stopped willingly enough and turned toward Eddie, his blue eyes glowing. Eddie had roughly a thousand questions about todash, but he was currently even more curious about something else.
“You know about these Wolves.”
“Oh, yes. I told sai Tian. He was wroth.” Again Eddie detected something like smugness in Andy’s voice…but surely that was just the way it struck him, right? A robot—even one that had survived from the old days—couldn’t enjoy the discomforts of humans? Could it?
Didn’t take you long to forget the mono, did it, sugar? Susannah’s voice asked in his head. Hers was followed by Jake’s. Blaine’s a pain. And then, just his own: If you treat this guy like nothing more than a fortune-telling machine in a carnival arcade, Eddie old boy, you deserve whatever you get.
“Tell me about the Wolves,” Eddie said.
“What would you know, sai Eddie?”
“Where they come from, for a start. The place where they feel like they can put their feet up and fart right out loud. Who they work for. Why they take the kids. And why the ones they take come back ruined.” Then another question struck him. Perhaps the most obvious. “Also, how do you know when they’re coming?”
Clicks from inside Andy. A lot of them this time, maybe a full minute’s worth. When Andy spoke again, its voice was different. It made Eddie think about Officer Bosconi, back in the neighborhood. Brooklyn Avenue, that was Bosco Bob’s beat. If you just met him, walking along the street and twirling his nightstick, Bosco talked to you like you were a human being and so was he—howya doin, Eddie, how’s your mother these days, how’s your goodfornothin bro, are you gonna sign up for PAL Middlers, okay, seeya at the gym, stay off the smokes, have a good day. But if he thought maybe you’d done something, Bosco Bob turned into a guy you didn’t want to know. That Officer Bosconi didn’t smile, and the eyes behind his glasses were like puddle ice in February (which just happened to be the Time o’ the Goat, over here on this side of the Great Whatever). Bosco Bob had never hit Eddie, but there were a couple of times—once just after some kids lit Woo Kim’s Market on fire—when he felt sure that bluesuit mothafuck