in the event of a total system breakdown, had been recorded.
“THIS DEVICE IS SHUTTING DOWN! SHUTDOWN WILL BE COMPLETE IN ONE HOUR AND FIVE MINUTES! THERE IS NO DANGER! REPEAT—”
Eddie touched Susannah’s arm and she looked around. “How long has this been going on?”
“About fifteen minutes. You were dead to the w—” She broke off. “Eddie, you look terrible! Are you sick?”
“No. I just had a bad dream.”
Roland was studying him in a way that made Eddie feel uncomfortable. “Sometimes there’s truth in dreams, Eddie. What was yours?”
He thought for a moment, then shook his head. “I don’t remember.”
“You know, I doubt that.”
Eddie shrugged and favored Roland with a thin smile. “Doubt away, then—be my guest. And how are you this morning, Roland?”
“The same,” Roland said. His faded blue eyes still conned Eddie’s face.
“Stop it,” Susannah said. Her voice was brisk, but Eddie caught an undertone of nervousness. “Both of you. I got better things to do than watch you two dance around and kick each other’s shins like a couple of little kids playin Two for Flinching. Specially this morning, with that dead bear trying to yell down the whole world.”
The gunslinger nodded, but kept his eyes on Eddie. “All right . . . but are you sure there’s nothing you want to tell me, Eddie?”
He thought about it then—really thought about telling. What he had seen in the fire, what he had seen in his dream. He decided against it. Perhaps it was only the memory of the rose in the fire, and the roses which had blanketed that dream-field in such fabulous profusion. He knew he could not tell these things as his eyes had seen them and his heart had felt them; he could only cheapen them. And, at least for the time being, he wanted to ponder these things alone.
But remember, he told himself again . . . except the voice in his mind didn’t sound much like his own. It seemed deeper, older—the voice of a stranger. Remember the rose . . . and the shape of the key.
“I will,” he murmured.
“You will what?” Roland asked.
“Tell,” Eddie said. “If anything comes up that seems, you know, really important, I’ll tell you. Both of you. Right now there isn’t. So if we’re going somewhere, Shane, old buddy, let’s saddle up.”
“Shane? Who is this Shane?”
“I’ll tell you that some other time, too. Meantime, let’s go.”
They packed the gear they had brought with them from the old campsite and headed back, Susannah riding in her wheelchair again. Eddie had an idea she wouldn’t be riding in it for long.
21
ONCE, BEFORE EDDIE HAD become too interested in the subject of heroin to be interested in much else, he and a couple of friends had driven over to New Jersey to see a couple of speed-metal groups— Anthrax and Megadeth—in concert at the Meadowlands. He believed that Anthrax had been slightly louder than the repeating announcement coming from the fallen bear, but he wasn’t a hundred per cent sure. Roland stopped them while they were still half a mile from the clearing in the woods and tore six small scraps of cloth from his old shirt. They stuffed them in their ears and then went on. Even the cloth didn’t do much to deaden the steady blast of sound.
“THIS DEVICE IS SHUTTING DOWN!” the bear blared as they stepped into the clearing again. It lay as it had lain, at the foot of the tree Eddie had climbed, a fallen Colossus with its legs apart and its knees in the air, like a furry female giant who had died trying to give birth. “SHUTDOWN WILL BE COMPLETE IN FORTY-SEVEN MINUTES! THERE IS NO DANGER—”
Yes, there is, Eddie thought, picking up the scattered hides which had not been shredded in either the bear’s attack or its flailing death-throes. Plenty of danger. To my fucking ears. He picked up Roland’s gunbelt and silently handed it over. The chunk of wood he had been working on lay nearby; he grabbed it and tucked it into the pocket in the back of Susannah’s wheelchair as the gunslinger slowly buckled the wide leather belt around his waist and cinched the rawhide tiedown.
“—IN SHUTDOWN PHASE, ONE SUBNUCLEAR CELL OPERATING AT ONE PER CENT CAPACITY. THESE CELLS—”
Susannah followed Eddie, holding in her lap a carry-all bag she had sewn herself. As Eddie handed her the hides, she stuffed them into the bag. When all of them were stored away, Roland tapped Eddie on the arm and