Wolves of the Calla - Stephen King [78]
Eddie gave a short laugh. It sounded shrill and unhealthy. When he brushed his hair back from his forehead, he left a dark smear of forest earth on his brow.
“The joke is that, out here a billion miles from nowhere, we come upon a storybook town. Civilized. Decent. The kind of folks you feel you know. Maybe you don’t like em all—Overholser’s a little hard to swallow—but you feel you know em.”
Eddie was right about that, too, Roland thought. He hadn’t even seen Calla Bryn Sturgis yet, and already it reminded him of Mejis. In some ways that seemed perfectly reasonable—farming and ranching towns the world over bore similarities to each other—but in other ways it was disturbing. Disturbing as hell. The sombrero Slightman had been wearing, for instance. Was it possible that here, thousands of miles from Mejis, the men should wear similar hats? He supposed it might be. But was it likely that Slightman’s sombrero should remind Roland so strongly of the one worn by Miguel, the old mozo at Seafront in Mejis, all those years before? Or was that only his imagination?
As for that, Eddie says I have none, he thought.
“The storybook town has a fairy-tale problem,” Eddie was continuing. “And so the storybook people call on a band of movie-show heroes to save them from the fairy tale villains. I know it’s real—people are going to die, very likely, and the blood will be real, the screams will be real, the crying afterward will be real—but at the same time there’s something about it that feels no more real than stage scenery.”
“And New York?” Roland asked. “How did that feel to you?”
“The same,” Eddie said. “I mean, think about it. Nineteen books left on the table after Jake took Charlie the Choo-Choo and the riddle book…and then, out of all the hoods in New York, Balazar shows up! That fuck!”
“Here, here, now!” Susannah called merrily from behind them. “No profanity, boys.” Jake was pushing her up the road, and her lap was full of muffin-balls. They both looked cheerful and happy. Roland supposed that eating well earlier in the day had something to do with it.
Roland said, “Sometimes that feeling of unreality goes away, doesn’t it?”
“It’s not exactly unreality, Roland. It—”
“Never mind splitting nails to make tacks. Sometimes it goes away. Doesn’t it?”
“Yes,” Eddie said. “When I’m with her.”
He went to her. Bent. Kissed her. Roland watched them, troubled.
Three
The light was fading out of the day. They sat around the fire and let it go. What little appetite they’d been able to muster had been easily satisfied by the muffin-balls Susannah and Jake had brought back to camp. Roland had been meditating on something Slightman had said, and more deeply than was probably healthy. Now he pushed it aside still half-chewed and said, “Some of us or all of us may meet later tonight in the city of New York.”
“I only hope I get to go this time,” Susannah said.
“That’s as ka will,” Roland said evenly. “The important thing is that you stay together. If there’s only one who makes the journey, I think it’s apt to be you who goes, Eddie. If only one makes the journey, that one should stay exactly where he…or mayhap she…is until the bells start again.”
“The kammen,” Eddie said. “That’s what Andy called em.”
“Do you all understand that?”
They nodded, and looking into their faces, Roland realized that each one of them was reserving the right to decide what to do when the time came, based upon the circumstances. Which was exactly right. They were either gunslingers or they weren’t, after all.
He surprised himself by uttering a brief snort of a laugh.
“What’s so funny?” Jake asked.
“I was just thinking that long life brings strange companions,” Roland said.
“If you mean us,” Eddie said, “lemme tell you something, Roland—you’re not exactly Norman Normal yourself.”
“I suppose not,” Roland said. “If it’s a group that crosses—two, a trio, perhaps all of us—we should join hands when the chimes start.”
“Andy said we had to concentrate on each other,” Eddie said. “To keep from getting lost.”