"Why, Travelin' Jack!" Parkus says, with a grin of his own. "Well-met! Look at you, sir — you're all grown up."
Jack rushes forward and throws his arms around Parkus, who hugs him back, and heartily. After a moment, Jack holds Parkus at arm's length and studies him. "You were older — you looked older to me, at least. In both worlds."
Still smiling, Parkus nods. And when he speaks again, it is in Speedy Parker's drawl. "Reckon I did look older, Jack. You were just a child, remember."
"But — "
Parkus waves one hand. "Sometimes I look older, sometimes not so old. It all depends on — "
"Age is wisdom," one head of the parrot says piously, to which the other responds, "You senile old f**k."
" — depends on the place and the circumstances," Parkus concludes, then says: "And I told you boys to shut up. You keep on, I'm apt to wring your scrawny neck." He turns his attention to Sophie, who is looking at him with wide, wondering eyes, as shy as a doe. "Sophie," he says. "It's wonderful to see you, darling. Didn't I say he'd come? And here he is. Took a little longer than I expected, is all."
She drops him a deep curtsey, all the way down to one knee, her head bowed. "Thankee-sai," she says. "Come in peace, gunslinger, and go your course along the Beam with my love."
At this, Jack feels an odd, deep chill, as if many worlds had spoken in a harmonic tone, low but resonant.
Speedy — so Jack still thinks of him — takes her hand and urges her to her feet. "Stand up, girl, and look me in the eye. I'm no gunslinger here, not in the borderlands, even if I do still carry the old iron from time to time. In any case, we have a lot to talk about. This's no time for ceremony. Come over the rise with me, you two. We got to make palaver, as the gunslingers say. Or used to say, before the world moved on. I shot a good brace of grouse, and think they'll cook up just fine."
"What about — " Jack gestures toward the muttering, crouched heap that is Wendell Green.
"Why, he looks right busy," Parkus says. "Told me he's a news hawk."
"I'm afraid he's a little above himself," Jack replies. "Old Wendell here's a news vulture."
Wendell turns his head a bit. He refuses to lift his eyes, but his lip curls in a sneer that may be more reflexive than real. "Heard. That." He struggles. The lip curls again, and this time the sneer seems less reflexive. It is, in fact, a snarl. "Gol. Gol. Gol-den boy. Holly. Wood."
"He's managed to retain at least some of his charm and his joi de vivre," Jack says. "Will he be okay here?"
"Not much with ary brain in its head comes near the Little Sisters' tent," Parkus says. "He'll be okay. And if he smells somethin' tasty on the breeze and comes for a look-see, why, I guess we can feed him." He turns toward Wendell. "We're going just over yonder. If you want to come and visit, why, you just up and do her. Understand me, Mr. News Hawk?"
"Wen. Dell. Green."
"Wendell Green, yessir." Parkus looks at the others. "Come on. Let's mosey."
"We mustn't forget him," Sophie murmurs, with a look back. "It will be dark in a few hours."
"No," Parkus agrees as they top the nearest rise. "Wouldn't do to leave him beside that tent after dark. That wouldn't do at all."
There's more foliage in the declivity on the far side of the rise — even a little ribbon of creek, presumably on its way to the river Jack can hear in the distance — but it still looks more like northern Nevada than western Wisconsin. Yet in a way, Jack thinks, that makes sense. The last one had been no ordinary flip. He feels like a stone that has been skipped all the way across a lake, and as for poor Wendell —
To the right of where they descend the far side of the draw, a horse has been tethered in the shade of what Jack thinks is a Joshua tree. About twenty yards down the draw to the left is a circle of eroded stones. Inside it a fire, not yet lit, has been carefully laid. Jack doesn't like the look of the place much — the stones remind him of ancient teeth. Nor is he alone in his dislike. Sophie stops, her grip on his fingers tightening.
"Parkus, do we have to go in there? Please say we don't."
Parkus turns to her with a kindly smile Jack knows well: a Speedy Parker smile for sure.
"The Speaking Demon's been gone from this circle many the long age, darling," he says. "And you know that such as yon are best for stories."
"Yet — "
"Now's no time to give in to the willies," Parkus tells her. He speaks with a trace of impatience, and "willies" isn't precisely the word he uses, but only how Jack's mind translates it. "You waited for him to come in the Little Sisters' hospital tent — "
"Only because she was there on the other side — "
" — and now I want you to come along." All at once he seems taller to Jack. His eyes flash. Jack thinks: A gunslinger. Yes, I suppose he could be a gunslinger. Like in one of Mom's old movies, only for real.
"All right," she says, low. "If we must." Then she looks at Jack. "I wonder if you'd put your arm around me?"