The Dark Tower

The room fell silent. The wind gusted,throwing snow against the side of the cottage, and Susa

“Less than three weeks, even if we had towalk,” Roland said. He reached out toward the Polaroid photograph of the duskystone tower standing against the sunset sky, but did not quite touch it. It wasas if, Susa

Not to mention the gallons of spilledblood, Susa

Sympathy was to respect the feelings ofanother. Empathy was to actually share those feelings. Why would folkscall any land Empathica?

And why would this pleasant old man lieabout it?

“Tell me something, Joe Collins,” Rolandsaid.

“Aye, gunslinger, if I can.”

“Have you been right up to it? Laidyour hand on the stone of it?”

The old man looked at first to see ifRoland was joshing him. When he was sure that wasn’t the case, he lookedshocked. “No,” he said, and for the first time sounded as American as Susa

Roland nodded. “And why not?”

“Because I thought to go closer might killme, but I wouldn’t be able to stop. The voices would draw me on. So I thoughtthen, and so I do think, even today.”

Seven

After di

He served chicken, roasted to a turn andespecially tasty after all the venison. With it, Joe brought to table mashedpotatoes with gravy, cranberry jelly sliced into thick red discs, green peas(“Only ca

“I couldn’t eat dessert so don’t ask me,”Susa

“Well, that’s all right,” Joe said, lookingdisappointed, “maybe later. I’ve got a chocolate pudding and a butterscotchone.”

Roland raised his napkin to muffle a belchand then said, “I could eat a dab of both, I think.”

“Well, come to that, maybe I could, too,”Susa

When they were done with the pudding,Susa

He poured coffee and the three of them(four, counting Oy) sat down in the living room. Outside it was growing darkand the wind was screaming louder than ever. Mordred’s out there someplace,hunkered down in a snow-hollow or a grove of trees, she thought, and onceagain had to stifle pity for him. It would have been easier if she hadn’t knownthat, murderous or not, he must still be a child.

“Tell us how you came to be here, Joe,”Roland invited.

Joe gri

He’d started off trying to be a teacher,Joe said, but quickly discovered that life wasn’t for him. He liked thekids—loved them, in fact—but hated all the administrative bullshitand the way the system seemed set up to make sure no square pegs escaped therelentless rounding process. He quit teaching after only three years and wentinto show business.

“Did you sing or dance?” Roland wanted toknow.

“Neither one,” Joe replied. “I gave em theold stand-up.”

“Stand-up?”

“He means he was a comedian,” Susa

“Correct!” Joe said brightly. “Some folksactually thought they were fu

He got an agent whose previous enterprise,a discount men’s clothing store, had gone bankrupt. One thing led to another,he said, and one gig led to another, too. Eventually he found himselfworking second- and third-rate nightclubs from coast to coast, driving a batteredbut reliable old Ford pickup truck and going where Shantz, his agent, sent him.He almost never worked the weekends; on the weekends, even the third-rate clubswanted to book rock-and-roll bands.

This was in the late sixties and earlyseventies, and there’d been no shortage of what Joe called “current eventsmaterial”: hippies and yippies, bra-burners and Black Panthers, movie-stars,and, as always, politics—but he said he had been more of a traditionaljoke-oriented comedian. Let Mort Sahl and George Carlin do the current-eventsshtick if they wanted it; he’d stick to Speaking of my mother-in-law andThey say our Polish friends are dumb but let me tell you about this Irishgirl I met.

During his recitation, an odd (and—toSusa

Roland stopped him early on to ask if acomic was like a court jester, and the old man laughed heartily. “You got it.Just think of a bunch of people sitting around in a smoky room with drinks intheir hands instead of the king and his courtiers.”

Roland nodded, smiling.

“There are advantages to being a fu

At this the gunslinger burst out laughing,a sound that still had the power to startle Susa