Eddie, looked at Susannah, then looked hesitantly into the gunslinger's face. In the gloom he could see nothing there except weariness.
"Ted says to tell you it's almost June 19th America-side, please and thankya. Also that time could slip a notch."
Roland nodded. 'Yet we'll wait for this to be finished, I think. It won't be much longer, and we owe him that."
"How much longer?" Jake murmured.
"I don't know. I thought he might be gone before you got here, even if you ran-"
"I did, once I got to the grassy part-"
"-but, as you see..."
"He fights hard," Susannah said, and that this was the only thing left for her to take pride in made Jake cold. "My man fights hard. Mayhap he still has a word to say."
TEN
And so he did. Five endless minutes after Jake had slipped into the bedroom, Eddie's eyes opened. "Sue..." He said,
"Su... sie-"
She leaned close, still holding his hands, smiling into his face, all her concentration fiercely narrowed. And with an effort Jake wouldn't have believed possible, Eddie freed one of his hands, swung it a little to the right, and grasped the tight kinks of her curls. If the weight of his arm pulled at the roots and hurt her, she showed no sign. The smile that bloomed on her mouth was joyous, welcoming, perhaps even sensuous.
"Eddie! Welcome back!"
"Don't bullshit... a bullshitter," he whispered. "I'm goin, sweetheart, not comin."
"That's just plain sil-"
"Hush," he whispered, and she did. The hand caught in her hair pulled. She brought her face to his willingly and kissed his living lips one last time. "I... will... wait for you," he said, forcing each word out with immense effort.
Jake saw beads of sweat surface on his skin, the dying body's last message to the living world, and that was when the boy's heart finally understood what his head had known for hours. He began to cry. They were tears that burned and scoured. When Roland took his hand, Jake squeezed it fiercely. He was frightened as well as sad. If it could happen to Eddie, it could happen to anybody. It could happen to him.
"Yes, Eddie. I know you'll wait," she said.
"In... "He pulled in another of those great, wretched, rasping breaths. His eyes were as brilliant as gemstones. "In the clearing." Another breath. Hand holding her hair. Lamplight casting them both in its mystic yellow circle. "The one at the end of the path."
"Yes, dear." Her voice was calm now, but a tear fell on Eddie's cheek and ran slowly down to the line of jaw. "I hear you very well. Wait for me and I'll find you and we'll go together. I'll be walking then, on my own legs."
Eddie smiled at her, then turned his eyes to Jake.
"Jake... to me."
No, Jake thought, panicked, no, I can't, I can't.
But he was already leaning close, into that smell of the end. He could see the fine line of grit just below Eddie's hairline turning to paste as more tiny droplets of sweat sprang up.
"Wait for me, too," Jake said through numb lips. "Okay,
Eddie? We'll all go on together. We'll be ka-tet, just like we were." He tried to smile and couldn't. His heart hurt too much for smiling. He wondered if it might not explode in his chest, the way stones sometimes exploded in a hot fire. He had learned that little fact from his friend Benny Slightman. Benny's death had been bad, but this was a thousand times worse. A million.
Eddie was shaking his head. "Not... so fast, buddy." He drew in another breath and then grimaced, as if the air had grown quills only he could feel. He whispered then-not from weakness, Jake thought later, but because this was just between them. "Watch... for Mordred. Watch... Dandelo."
"Dandelion? Eddie, I don't-"
"Dandelo." Eyes widening. Enormous effort. "Protect... your... dinh... from Mordred. From Dandelo. You... Oy. Your job." His eyes cut toward Roland, then back to Jake.
"Shhh." Then: "Protect..."
"I... I will. We will."
Eddie nodded a little, then looked at Roland. Jake moved aside and the gunslinger leaned in for Eddie's word to him.
ELEVEN
Never, ever, had Roland seen an eye so bright, not even on Jericho Hill, when Cuthbert had bade him a laughing goodbye.
Eddie smiled. "We had... some times."
Roland nodded again.
"You... you..." But this Eddie couldn't finish. He raised one hand and made a weak twirling motion.
"I danced," Roland said, nodding. "Danced the commala."
Yes, Eddie mouthed, then drew in another of those whooping, painful breaths. It was the last.
"Thank you for my second chance,"