“But this is a man you see. Not Susannah but a man.”

“Yes, with a toothbrush mustache, and he wears funny little gold-rimmed glasses, like a wizard in a fairy-tale.”

They stopped just outside the radiance of the hotel’s entrance. A doorman in a green swallowtail coat blew an ear-splitting blast on his little silver whistle, hailing down a Yellow Cab.

“Is it Gan, do you think? Is the black man in the jail cell Gan?”

“I don’t know.” Jake shook his head with frustration.

“There’s something about the Dogan, too, all mixed in.”

“And this comes from the touch.”

“Yes, but it’s not from Mia or Susannah or you or me. I think …” Jake’s voice lowered. “I think I better figure out who that black man is and what he means to us, because I think that what I’m seeing comes from the Dark Tower itself.” He looked at Callahan solemnly. “In some ways, we’re getting very close to it, and that’s why it’s so dangerous for the ka-tet to be broken like it is.

“In some ways, we’re almost there.”

SIX

Jake took charge smoothly and completely from the moment he stepped out of the revolving doors with Oy in his arms and then put the billy-bumbler down on the lobby’s tile floor. Callahan didn’t think the kid was even aware of it, and probably that was all to the good. If he got self-conscious, his confidence might crumble.

Oy sniffed delicately at his own reflection in one of the lobby’s green glass walls, then followed Jake to the desk, his claws clicking faintly on the black and white marble squares. Callahan walked beside him, aware that he was looking at the future and trying not to goggle at it too obviously.

“She was here,” Jake said. “Pere, I can almost see her. Both of them, her and Mia.”

Before Callahan could reply, Jake was at the desk. “Cry pardon, ma’am,” he said. “My name is Jake Chambers. Do you have a message for me, or a package, or something? It’d be either from Susannah Dean or maybe from a Miss Mia.”

The woman peered down doubtfully at Oy for a moment. Oy looked up at her with a cheery grin that revealed a great many teeth. Perhaps these disturbed the clerk, because she turned away from him with a frown and examined the screen of her computer.

“Chambers?” she asked.

“Yes, ma’am.” Spoken in his best getting-along-with-grownups voice. It had been awhile since he’d needed to use that one, but it was still there, Jake found, and within easy reach.

“I have something for you, but it’s not from a woman. It’s from someone named Stephen King.” She smiled. “I don’t suppose it’s the famous writer? Do you know him?”

“No, ma’am,” Jake said, and snuck a sidewards glance at Callahan. Neither of them had heard of Stephen King until recently, but Jake understood why the name might give his current traveling companion the chills. Callahan didn’t look particularly chilly at the moment, but his mouth had thinned to a single line.