screens-Susannah guessed there were diree hundred or more. They must have been built to last, too, because some were still operating. A few showed the rolling hills surrounding the Quonset, but most broadcast only snow, and one showed a series of rolling lines that made her feel queasy in her stomach if she looked at it too long. The snow-screens, Bill said, had once shown pictures from satellites in orbit around the Earth, but the cameras in those had gone dead long ago. The one with the rolling lines was more interesting. Bill told them that, until only a few months ago, that one had shown the Dark Tower. Then, suddenly, the picture had dissolved into nothing but those lines.
"I don't think die Red King liked being on television," Bill told them. "Especially if he knew company might be coming.
Won't you have another sandwich? There are plenty, I assure you. No? Soup, then? What about you, Patrick? You're too thin, you know-far, jar too thin."
Patrick turned his pad around and showed them a picture of Bill bowing in front of Susannah, a tray of neatiy cut sandwiches in one metal hand, a carafe of iced tea in the other. Like all of Patrick's pictures, it went far beyond caricature, yet had been produced with a speed of hand that was eerie. Susannah applauded. Roland smiled and nodded. Patrick grinned, holding his teeth together so that the others wouldn't have to look at the empty hole behind them. Then he tossed the sheet back and began something new.
"There's a fleet of vehicles out back," Bill said, "and while many of them no longer run, some still do. I can give you a truck with four-wheel drive, and while I cannot assure you it will run smoothly, I believe you can count on it to take you as far as the Dark Tower, which is no more than one hundred and twenty wheels from here."
Susannah felt a great and fluttery lift-drop in her stomach.
One hundred and twenty wheels was a hundred miles, perhaps even a bit less. They were close. So close it was scary.
"You would not want to come upon the Tower after dark,"
Bill said. "At least I shouldn't think so, considering the new resident.
But what's one more night camped at the side of the road to such great travelers as yourselves? Not much, I should say! But even with one last night on the road (and barring breakdowns, which the gods know are always possible), you'd have your goal in sight by mid-morning of tomorrowday."
Roland considered this long and carefully. Susannah had to tell herself to breathe while he did so, because part of her didn't want to.
I'm not ready, that part thought. And there was a deeper part-a part that remembered every nuance of what had become a recurring (and evolving) dream-that thought something else: I'm not meant to go at all. Not all the way.
At last Roland said: "I thank you, Bill-we all say thank you,
I'm sure-but I think we'll pass on your kind offer. Were you to ask me why, I couldn't say. Only that part of me thinks that tomorrowday's too soon. That part of me thinks we should go the rest of the way on foot, just as we've already traveled so far."
He took a deep breath, let it out. "I'm not ready to be there yet.
Not quite ready."
You too, Susannah marveled. You too.
"I need a little more time to prepare my mind and my heart. Mayhap even my soul." He reached into his back pocket and brought out the photocopy of the Robert Browning poem that had been left for them in Dandelo's medicine chest.
"There's something writ in here about remembering the old times before coming to the last battle... or the last stand. It's well-said. And perhaps, really, all I need is what this poet speaks of-a draught of earlier, happier sights. I don't know. But unless Susannah objects, I believe we'll go on foot."
"Susannah doesn't object," she said quietly. "Susannah thinks it's just what the doctor ordered. Susannah only objects to being dragged along behind like a busted tailpipe."
Roland gave her a grateful (if distracted) smile-he seemed to have gone away from her somehow during these last few days-and then turned back to Bill. "I wonder if you have a cart I could pull? For we'll have to take at least some gunna... and there's Patrick. He'll have to ride part of the time."
Patrick looked indignant. He cocked an arm in front