The old men joined hands, each holding a bob or a mag at the clasping point. As soon as the circle was complete, Eddie heard that humming again. It was as loud as an over-amped stereo speaker. He saw Jake raise his hands to his ears, and Roland's face tighten in a brief grimace.
Eddie looked at the door and saw it had lost that dusty, unimportant look. The hieroglyphs on it once more stood out crisply, some forgotten word that meant UNFOUND. The crystal doorknob glowed, outlining the rose carved there in lines of white light.
Could I open it now?Eddie wondered.Open it and step through? He thought not. Not yet, anyway. But he was a hell of a lot more hopeful about this process than he'd been five minutes ago.
Suddenly the voices from deep in the cave came alive, but they did so in a roaring jumble. Eddie could make out Benny Slightman the Younger screaming the wordDogan, heard his Ma telling him that now, to top off a career of losing things, he'd lost hiswife, heard some man (probably Elmer Chambers) telling Jake that Jake had gone crazy, he wasfou, he wasMonsieur Lunatique. More voices joined in, and more, and more.
Henchick nodded sharply to his colleagues. Their hands parted. When they did, the voices from below ceased in midbabble. And, Eddie was not surprised to see, the door immediately regained its look of unremarkable anonymity - it was any door you ever passed on the street without a second look.
"What in God's name wasthat? " Callahan asked, nodding toward the deeper darkness where the floor sloped down. "It wasn't like that before."
"I believe that either the quake or the loss of the magic ball has driven the cave insane," Henchick said calmly. "It doesn't matter to our business here, anyroa'. Our business is with the door." He looked at Callahan's packsack. "Once you were a wandering man."
"So I was."
Henchick's teeth made another brief guest appearance. Eddie decided that, on some level, the old bastard was enjoying this. "From the look of your gunna, sai Callahan, you've lost the knack."
"I suppose it's hard for me to believe that we're really going anywhere," Callahan said, and offered a smile. Compared to Henchick's, it was feeble. "And I'm older now."
Henchick made a rude sound at that - fah!,it sounded like.
"Henchick," Roland said, "do you know what caused the ground to shake early this morning?"
The old man's blue eyes were faded but still sharp. He nodded. Outside the cave's mouth, in a line going down the path, almost three dozen Manni men waited patiently. "Beam let go is what we think."
"What I think, too," Roland said. "Our business grows more desperate. I'd have an end to idle talk, if it does ya. Let's have what palaver we must have, and then get on with our business."
Henchick looked at Roland as coldly as he had looked at Eddie, but Roland's eyes never wavered. Henchick's brow furrowed, then smoothed out.
"Aye," he said. "As'ee will, Roland. Thee's rendered us a great service, Manni and forgetful folk alike, and we'd return it now as best we can. The magic's still here, and thick. Wants only a spark. We can make that spark, aye, easy as commala. You may get what'ee want. On the other hand, we all may go to the clearing at the end of the path together. Or into the darkness. Does thee understand?"
Roland nodded.
"Would'ee go ahead?"
Roland stood for a moment with his head lowered and his hand on the butt of his gun. When he looked up, he was wearing his own smile. It was handsome and tired and desperate and dangerous. He twirled his whole left hand twice in the air:Let's go.
Five
The coffs were set down - carefully, because the path leading up to what the Manni called Kra Kammen was narrow - and the contents were removed. Long-nailed fingers (the Manni were allowed to cut their nails only once a year) tapped the magnets, producing a shrill hum that seemed to slice through Jake's head like a knife. It reminded him of the todash chimes, and he guessed that wasn't surprising; those chimeswere the kammen.
"What does Kra Kammen mean?" he asked Cantab. "House of Bells?"
"House of Ghosts," he replied without looking up from the chain he was unwinding. "Leave me alone, Jake, this is delicate work."
Jake couldn't see why it would be, but he did as bade. Roland, Eddie, and Callahan were standing just inside the cave's mouth. Jake joined them. Henchick, meanwhile, had placed the oldest members of his group in a semicircle that went around the back of the door. The front side, with its incised hieroglyphs and crystal doorknob, was unguarded, at least for the time being.
The old man went to the mouth of the cave, spoke briefly with Cantab, then motioned for the line of Manni waiting on the path to move up. When the first man in line was just inside the cave, Henchick stopped him and came back to Roland. He squatted, inviting the gunslinger with a gesture to do the same.
The cave's floor was powdery with dust. Some came from rocks, but most of it was the bone residue of small animals unwise enough to wander in here. Using a fingernail, Henchick drew a rectangle, open at the bottom, and then a semicircle around it.
"The door," he said. "And the men of my kra. Do'ee kennit?"
Roland nodded.