“SHUCKS, L’IL TRAILHAND, THAT’S A PURE-D SHAME,” Blaine said. Jake found this drawly John Wayne imitation all but unbearable in their current circumstances. “LOOKS LIKE I WIN THAT THAR GOOSE, UNLESS SOMEBODY ELSE CARES TO SPEAK UP. WHAT ABOUT YOU, OY OF MID-WORLD? GOT ANY RIDDLES, MY LITTLE BUMBLER BUDDY?”

“Oy!” the billy-bumbler responded, his voice muffled by the book. Still smiling, Jake took it and sat down next to Roland, who put an arm around him.

“SUSANNAH OF NEW YORK?”

She shook her head, not looking up. She had turned Roland’s hand over in her own, and was gently tracing the healed stumps where his first two fingers had been.

“ROLAND SON OF STEVEN? HAVE YOU REMEMBERED ANY OTHERS FROM THE FAIR-DAY RIDDLINGS OF GILEAD?”

Roland also shook his head... and then Jake saw that Eddie Dean was raising his. There was a peculiar smile on Eddie’s face, a peculiar shine in Eddie’s eyes, and Jake found that hope hadn’t deserted him, after all. It suddenly flowered anew in his mind, red and hot and vivid. Like... well, like a rose. A rose in the full fever of its summer.

“Blaine?” Eddie asked in a low tone. To Jake his voice sounded queerly choked.

“YES, EDDIE OF NEW YORK.” Unmistakable disdain.

“I have a couple of riddles,” Eddie said. “Just to pass the time between here and Topeka, you understand.” No, Jake realized, Eddie didn’t sound as if he were choking; he sounded as if he were trying to hold back laughter.

“SPEAK, EDDIE OF NEW YORK.”

3

Sitting and listening to Jake run through the last of his riddles, Eddie had mused on Roland’s tale of the Fair-Day goose. From there his mind had returned to Henry, travelling from Point A to Point B through the magic of associative thinking. Or, if you wanted to get Zen about it, via Trans-Bird Airlines: goose to turkey. He and Henry had once had a discussion about getting off heroin. Henry had claimed that going cold turkey wasn’t the only way; there was also, he said, such a thing as going cool turkey. Eddie asked Henry what you called a hype who had just administered a hot shot to himself, and, without missing a beat, Henry had said, You call that baked turkey. How they had laughed... but now, all this long, strange time later, it looked very much as if the joke was going to be on the younger Dean brother, not to mention the younger Dean brother’s new friends. Looked like they were all going to be baked turkey before much longer.

Unless you can yank it out of the zone.

Yes.