Eddie stopped, looking at Roland expectantly, smiling a little. Roland was not smiling. Some of his previous sense of well-being had passed away. Too much to do, gods damn it. And not enough time in which to do it.

“You want to see how near time has run to the day the agreement becomes null and void,” he said. “Have I got that right?”

“You do.”

“You don’t need to go to New York physically to do that, Eddie. Todash would serve nicely.”

“Todash would do fine to check the day and the month, sure, but there’s more. We’ve been dumb about that vacant lot, you guys. I mean really dumb.”

Ten

Eddie believed they could own the vacant lot without ever touching Susannah’s inherited fortune; he thought Callahan’s story showed quite clearly how it could be done. Not the rose; the rose was not to be owned (by them or anyone) but to be protected. And they could do it. Maybe.

Frightened or not, Calvin Tower had been waiting in that deserted laundrymat to save Pere Callahan’s bacon. And frightened or not, Calvin Tower had refused—as of May 31st, 1977, anyway—to sell his last piece of real property to the Sombra Corporation. Eddie thought that Calvin Tower was, in the words of the song, holding out for a hero.

Eddie had also been thinking about the way Callahan had hidden his face in his hands the first time he mentioned Black Thirteen. He wanted it the hell out of his church…but so far he’d kept it anyway. Like the bookshop owner, the Pere had been holding out. How stupid they had been to assume Calvin Tower would ask millions for his lot! He wanted to be shed of it. But not until the right person came along. Or the right ka-tet.

“Suziella, you can’t go because you’re pregnant,” Eddie said. “Jake, you can’t go because you’re a kid. All other questions aside, I’m pretty sure you couldn’t sign the kind of contract I’ve been thinking about ever since Callahan told us his story. I could take you with me, but it sounds like you’ve got something you want to check into over here. Or am I wrong about that?”

“You’re not wrong,” Jake said. “But I’d almost go with you, anyway. This sounds really good.”

Eddie smiled. “Almost only counts with grenados and horseshoes, kid. As for sending Roland, no offense, boss, but you’re not all that suave in our world. You…um…lose something in the translation.”

Susannah burst out laughing.

“How much are you thinking of offering him?” Jake asked. “I mean, it has to be something, doesn’t it?”

“A buck,” Eddie said. “I’ll probably have to ask Tower to loan it to me, but—”