Roland and Oy came leaping down behind. Roland bent over her at once, clearly concerned, and Oy sniffed anxiously at her face, but Susannah was still laughing. So was the codger.
Daddy Mose would have called his laughter "gay as old Dad's hatband."
"I'm fine, Roland-took worse tumbles off my Flexible Flyer when I was a kid, tell ya true."
"All's well diat ends well," Joe Collins agreed. He gave her a look with his good eye to make sure she was indeed all right, then began to pick up some of the scattered goods, leaning laboriously over on his stick, his fine white hair blowing around his rosy face.
"Nah, nah," Roland said, reaching out to grasp his arm. "I'll do that, thee'll fall on thy thiddles."
At this the old man roared with laughter, and Roland joined him willingly enough. From behind the cottage, the horse gave another loud whinny, as if protesting all this good humor.
"'Fall on thy thiddles'! Man, that's a good one! I don't have the veriest clue under heaven what my diiddles are, yet it's a good one! Ain't it just!" He brushed the snow off Susannah's hide coat while Roland quickly picked up the spilled goods and stacked them back on dieir makeshift sled. Oy helped, bringing several wrapped packages of meat in his jaws and dropping them on the back of the travois.
"That's a smart little beastie!" Joe Collins said admiringly.
"He's been a good trailmate," Susannah agreed. She was now very glad they had stopped; would not have deprived herself of this good-natured old man's acquaintance for worlds.
She offered him her clumsily clad right hand. "I'm Susannah Dean-Susannah of New York. Daughter of Dan."
He took her hand and shook it. His own hand was ungloved, and although the fingers were gnarled with arthritis, his grip was strong. "New York, is it! Why, I once hailed from there, myself.
Also Akron, Omaha, and San Francisco. Son of Henry and Flora, if it matters to you."
"You're from America-side?" Susannah asked.
"Oh God yes, but long ago and long," he said. "What'chee might call delah." His good eye sparkled; his bad eye went on regarding the snowy wastes with that same dead lack of interest.
He turned to Roland. "And who might you be, my friend? For I'll call you my friend same as I would anyone, unless they prove different, in which case I'd belt em with Bessie, which is what I call my stick."
Roland was grinning. Was helpless not to, Susannah thought. "Roland Deschain, of Gilead. Son of Steven."
"Gilead! Gilead!" Collins's good eye went round with amazement.
"There's a name out of the past, ain't it? One for the books! Holy Pete, you must be older'n God!"
"Some would say so," Roland agreed, now only smiling...
but warmly.
"And the little fella?" he asked, bending forward. From his pocket, Collins produced two more gumdrops, one red and one green. Christmas colors, and Susannah felt a faint touch of deja vu. It brushed her mind like a wing and then was gone. "What's your name, little fella? What do they holler when they want you to come home?"
"He doesn't-"
-talk anymore, although he did once was how Susannah meant to finish, but before she could, the bum bier said: "Oy!" And he said it as brightly and firmly as ever in his time with Jake.
"Good fella!" Collins said, and tumbled the gumdrops into Oy's mouth. Then he reached out with that same gnarled hand, and Oy raised his paw to meet it. They shook, well-met near the intersection of Odd's Lane and Tower Road.
"I'll be damned," Roland said mildly.
"So won't we all in the end, I reckon, Beam or no Beam,"
Joe Collins remarked, letting go of Oy's paw. "But not today.
Now what I say is that we ort to get in where it's warm and we can palaver over a cup of coffee-for I have some, so I do-or a pot of ale. I even have sumpin I call eggnog, if it does ya. It does me pretty fine, especially with a teensy piss o' rum in it, but who knows? I ain't really tasted nuf amp;nk in five years or more. Air outta the Discordia's done for my taste-buds and for my nose, too. Anyro', what do you say?" He regarded them brightly.
"I'd say that sounds pretty damned fine," Susannah told him. Rarely had she said anything she meant more.
He slapped her companionably on the shoulder. "A good woman is a pearl beyond price! Don't know if that's Shakespeare, the Bible, or a combination