The Dark Tower

For a moment he didn’t think Sheemie wouldmake any reply, leaving him with the job of deciding whether or not to tryagain, but then the former tavern-boy spoke. He looked at none of them as hedid so, but only out of the cave and into the dim of Thunderclap.

“I had a dream last night, so I did,” saidSheemie of Mejis, whose life had once been saved by three young gunslingersfrom Gilead. “I dreamed I was back at the Travellers’ Rest, only Coral wasn’tthere, nor Stanley, nor Pettie, nor Sheb—him that used to play thepianer. There was nobbut me, and I was moppin the floor and singin ‘CarelessLove.’ Then the batwings screeked, so they did, they had this fu

Jake saw that Roland was nodding, a traceof a smile on his lips.

“I looked up,” Sheemie resumed, “and income this boy.” His eyes shifted briefly to Jake, then back to the mouth of thecave. “He looked like you, young sai, so he did, close enough to be twim. Buthis face were covert wi’ blood and one of his eye’n were put out, spoiling hispretty, and he walked all a-limp. Looked like death, he did, and frighten’t meterrible, and made me sad to see him, too. I just kept moppin, thinkin that ifI did that he might not never mind me, or even see me at all, and go away.”

Jake realized he knew this tale. Had heseen it? Had he actually been that bloody boy?

“But he looked right at you…” Rolandmurmured, still a-hunker, still looking out into the gloom.

“Aye, Will Dearborn that was, right at me,so he did, and said ‘Why must you hurt me, when I love you so? When I can donothing else nor want to, for love made me and fed me and—’”

“ ‘And kept me in better days,’” Eddiemurmured. A tear fell from one of his eyes and made a dark spot on the floor ofthe cave.

“ ‘—and kept me in better days? Whywill you cut me, and disfigure my face, and fill me with woe? I have only lovedyou for your beauty as you once loved me for mine in the days before the worldmoved on. Now you scar me with nails and put burning drops of quicksilver in mynose; you have set the animals on me, so you have, and they have eaten of mysoftest parts. Around me the can-toi gather and there’s no peace from theirlaughter. Yet still I love you and would serve you and even bring the magicagain, if you would allow me, for that is how my heart was cast when I rosefrom the Prim. And once I was strong as well as beautiful, but now mystrength is almost gone.’”

“You cried,” Susa

“He wept,” said Sheemie (tears were rollingdown his cheeks as he told his dream), “and I did, too, for I could see that hehad been fair as daylight. He said, ‘If the torture were to stop now, I mightstill recover—if never my looks, then at least my strength—’”

“ ‘My kes,’” Jake said, and althoughhe’d never heard the word before he pronounced it correctly, almost as if itwere kiss.

“ ‘—and my kes. But anotherweek… or maybe five days… or even three… and it will be too late. Even if thetorture stops, I’ll die. And you’ll die too, for when love leaves the world,all hearts are still. Tell them of my love and tell them of my pain and tellthem of my hope, which still lives. For this is all I have and all I am and allI ask.’ Then the boy turned and went out. The batwing door made its same sound.Skree-eek.”

He looked at Jake, now, and smiled like onewho has just awakened. “I can’t answer your question, sai.” He knocked a fiston his forehead. “Don’t have much in the way of brains up here, me—onlycobwebbies. Cordelia Delgado said so, and I reckon she was right.”

Jake made no reply. He was dazed. He haddreamed about the same disfigured boy, but not in any saloon; it had been inGage Park, the one where they’d seen Charlie the Choo-Choo. Last night. Had tohave been. He hadn’t remembered until now, would probably never have rememberedif Sheemie hadn’t told his own dream. And had Roland, Eddie, and Susa

Roland stood up with a wince, clamped hishand briefly to his hip, then said, “Thankee-sai, Sheemie, you’ve helped usgreatly.”

Sheemie smiled uncertainly. “How did I dothat?”

“Never mind, my dear.” Roland turned hisattention to Ted. “My friends and I are going to step outside briefly. We needto speak an-tet.”

“Of course,” Ted said. He shook his head asif to clear it.

“Do my peace of mind a favor and keep itshort,” Dinky said. “We’re probably still all right, but I don’t want to pushour luck.”

“Will you need him to jump you backinside?” Eddie asked, nodding to Sheemie. This was in the nature of arhetorical question; how else would the three of them get back?

“Well, yeah, but…” Dinky began.

“Then you’ll be pushing your luck plenty.”That said, Eddie, Susa

Perhaps not.

Six

“I didn’t remember my dream until he toldhis,” Susa

“Yeah,” Jake said.

“But I remember it clearly enough now,” shewent on. “I was in a subway station and the boy came down the stairs—”

Jake said, “I was in Gage Park—”

“And I was at the Markey Avenue playground,where me and Henry used to play one-on-one,” Eddie said. “In my dream, the kidwith the bloody face was wearing a tee-shirt that said NEVER A DULLMOMENT—”

“—IN MID-WORLD,” Jake finished, andEddie gave him a startled look.

Jake barely noticed; his thoughts hadturned in another direction. “I wonder if Stephen King ever uses dreams in hiswriting. You know, as yeast to make the plot rise.”

This was a question none of them couldanswer.

“Roland?” Eddie asked. “Where were you inyour dream?”

“The Travellers’ Rest, where else? Wasn’t Ithere with Sheemie, once upon a time?” With my friends, now long gone,he could have added, but did not. “I was sitting at the table Eldred Jonas usedto favor, playing one-hand Watch Me.”

Susa

As Roland nodded, Jake realized thatSheemie had told them which task came first, after all. Had told them beyondall doubt.

“Do any of you have a question?” Rolandasked.

One by one, his companions shook theirheads.

“We are ka-tet,” Roland said, and in unisonthey answered: “We are one from many.”

Roland tarried a moment longer, looking atthem—more than looking, seeming to savor their faces—and then heled them back inside.

“Sheemie,” he said.

“Yes, sai! Yes, Roland, Will Dearborn thatwas!”

“We’re going to save the boy you told usabout. We’re going to make the bad folk stop hurting him.”

Sheemie smiled, but it was a puzzled smile.He didn’t remember the boy in his dream, not anymore. “Good, sai, that’s good!”

Roland turned his attention to Ted. “OnceSheemie gets you back this time, put him to bed. Or, if that would attract thewrong sort of attention, just make sure he takes it easy.”

“We can write him down for the sniffles andkeep him out of The Study,” Ted agreed. “There are a lot of colds Thunder-side.But you folks need to understand that there are no guarantees. He could get usback inside this time, and then—” He snapped his fingers in the air.