The Dark Tower

Past LADING/LOST LUGGAGE was (reasonablyenough, Susa

Dinky, it seemed, was the youngest of thethree. He took hold of the knob and Susa

When the door was closed, Dinky once moregrasped the knob. There was another brisk snap.

“You just locked it again,” Jake said. Hesounded accusing, but there was a smile on his face, and the color was comingback into his cheeks. “Didn’t you?”

“Not now, please,” said the white-hairedman—Ted. “No time. Follow me, please.”

He flipped up a section of the counter andled them through. Behind it was an office area containing two robots thatlooked long dead, and three skeletons.

“Why the hell do we keep finding bones?”Eddie asked. Like Jake he was feeling better and only thinking out loud, notreally expecting an answer. He got one, however. From Ted.

“Do you know of the Crimson King, youngman? You do, of course you do. I believe that at one time he covered thisentire part of the world with poison gas. Probably for a lark. Killed almosteveryone. The darkness you see is the lingering result. He’s mad, of course.It’s a large part of the problem. In here.”

He led them through a door marked PRIVATEand into a room that had once probably belonged to a high poobah in thewonderful world of shipping and lading. Susa

And of course it was darker.

Tracks (eternally halted trains sat on someof them) radiated out like strands of a steel spiderweb. Above them, a sky ofdarkest slate-gray seemed to sag almost close enough to touch. Between the skyand the Earth the air was thick, somehow; Susa

“Dinky,” the white-haired man said.

“Yes, Ted.”

“What have you left for our friend TheWeasel to find?”

“A maintenance drone,” Dinky replied.“It’ll look like it found its way in through the Fedic door, set off the alarm,then got fried on some of the tracks at the far end of the switching-yard.Quite a few are still hot. You see dead birds around em all the time, fried toa crisp, but even a good-sized rustie’s too small to trip the alarm. A drone,though… I’m pretty sure he’ll buy it. The Wease ain’t stupid, but it’ll lookpretty believable.”

“Good. That’s very good. Look yonder,gunslingers.” Ted pointed to a sharp upthrust of rock on the horizon. Susa

“The Little Needle,” Roland said.

“Excellent translation. It’s where we’regoing.”

Susa

On the other hand, she thought, whatchoice do we have?

“You won’t need to be carried,” Ted toldher, “but Stanley can use your help. We’ll join hands, like folks at aséance. I’ll want you all to visualize that rock formation when we gothrough. And hold the name in the forefront of your mind: Steek-Tete, theLittle Needle.”

“Whoa, whoa,” Eddie said. They hadapproached yet another door, this one standing open on a closet. Wire hangersand one ancient red blazer hung in there. Eddie grasped Ted’s shoulder andswung him around. “Go through what? Go through where? Because if it’s a doorlike the last one—”

Ted looked up at Eddie—had to lookup, because Eddie was taller—and Susa

“It’s not a door we’re going through atall, at least not of the kinds with which you may be familiar. You have totrust me, young man. Listen.”

They all fell silent, and Susa

“That’s The Weasel,” Ted told them. “He’llhave taheen with him, at least four, maybe half a dozen. If they catch sight ofus in here, Dink and Stanley are almost certainly going to die. They don’t haveto catch us but only catch sight of us. We’re risking our livesfor you. This isn’t a game, and I need you to stop asking questions and followme!”

“We will,” Roland said. “And we’ll thinkabout the Little Needle.”

“Steek-Tete,” Susa

“You won’t get sick again,” Dinky said. “Promise.”

“Thank God,” Jake said.

“Thang-odd,” Oy agreed.

Stanley, the third member of Ted’s party,continued to say nothing at all.

Four

It was just a closet, and an office closet,at that—narrow and musty. The ancient red blazer had a brass tag on the breastpocket with the words HEAD OF SHIPPING stamped on it. Stanley led the way tothe back, which was nothing but a blank wall. Coathangers jingled and jangled.Jake had to watch his step to keep from treading on Oy. He’d always beenslightly prone to claustrophobia, and now he began to feel the pudgy fingers ofthe Panic-Man caressing his neck: first one side and then the other. The ‘Rizasclanked softly together in their bag. Seven people and one billy-bumblercrowding into an abandoned office closet? It was nuts. He could still hear thesnarl of the approaching engines. The one in charge called The Weasel.

“Join hands,” Ted murmured. “Andconcentrate.”

“Steek-Tete,” Susa

“Little Nee—” Eddie began, and thenstopped. The blank wall at the end of the closet was gone. Where it had beenwas a small clearing with boulders on one side and a steep, scrub-crustedhillside on another. Jake was willing to bet that was Steek-Tete, and if it wasa way out of this enclosed space, he was delighted to see it.

Stanley gave a little moan of pain oreffort or both. The man’s eyes were closed and tears were trickling out frombeneath the lids.

“Now,” Ted said. “Lead us through,Stanley.” To the others he added: “And help him if you can! Help him, for yourfathers’ sakes!”

Jake tried to hold an image of the outcropTed had pointed to through the office window and walked forward, holdingRoland’s hand ahead of him and Susa

Five

They did not come out in Narnia.

It was cold on the slope of the butte, andJake was soon shivering. When he looked over his shoulder he saw no sign of theportal they’d come through. The air was dim and smelled of something pungentand not particularly pleasant, like kerosene. There was a small cave foldedinto the flank of the slope (it was really not much more than another closet),and from it Ted brought a stack of blankets and a canteen that turned out tohold a sharp, alkali-tasting water. Jake and Roland wrapped themselves insingle blankets. Eddie took two and bundled himself and Susa