“Well? What do you think, sugar?” Susannah spoke nervously, like a woman who has come home to her husband with some radical new hairdo.

“A definite improvement,” Eddie said. “I don’t need em to love you, but they’re way beyond good and into the land of excellent. Christ, now you’re an inch taller than I am!”

Susannah saw this was true and laughed. Oy sniffed at the ankle that hadn’t been there the last time he’d seen this woman, and then he laughed, too. It was an odd barky-bark of a sound, but quite clearly a laugh for all that.

“Like your legs, Suze,” Jake said, and the perfunctory quality of this compliment made Susannah laugh again. The boy didn’t notice; he had already turned to Roland. “Do you want to see the bookstore?”

“Is there anything to see?”

Jake’s face clouded. “Actually, not much. It’s closed.”

“I would see the vacant lot, if there’s time before we’re sent back,” Roland said. “And the rose.”

“Do they hurt?” Eddie asked Susannah. He was looking at her closely indeed.

“They feel fine,” she said, laughing. “Fine.”

“You look different.”

“I bet!” she said, and executed a little barefoot jig. It had been moons and moons since she had last danced, but the exultancy she so clearly felt made up for any lack of grace. A woman wearing a business suit and swinging a briefcase bore down on the ragged little party of wanderers, then abruptly veered off, actually taking a few steps into the street to get around them. “You bet I do, I got legs !”

“Just like the song says,” Eddie told her.

“Huh?”

“Never mind,” he said, and slipped an arm around her waist. But again Roland saw him give her that searching, questioning look. But with luck he’ll leave it alone, Roland thought.

And that was what Eddie did. He kissed the corner of her mouth, then turned to Roland. “So you want to see the famous vacant lot and the even more famous rose, huh? Well, so do I. Lead on, Jake.”

Seven

Jake led them down Second Avenue, pausing only long enough so they could all take a quick peek into The Manhattan Restaurant of the Mind. No one was wasting light in this shop, however, and there really wasn’t much to see. Roland was hoping for a look at the menu sign, but it was gone.

Reading his mind in the matter-of-fact way of people who share khef, Jake said, “He probably changes it every day.”