"What's your plan, Roland?" Ted asked.
"It relies on two assumptions: that we can surprise them and then stampede them. I don't think they expect to be interrupted in these last days; from Pimli Prentiss down to the lowliest hume guard outside the fence, they have no reason to believe they'll be bothered in their work, certainly not attacked. If my assumptions are correct, we'll succeed. If we fail, at least we won't live long enough to see the Beams break and the Tower fall."
Roland found the crude map of die Algul and put it on the floor of the cave. They all gathered around it.
"These railroad sidetracks," he said, indicating the hashmarks labeled 10. "Some of the dead engines and traincars on them stand widiin twenty yards of the south fence, it looks like through the binoculars. Is that right?"
"Yeah," Dinky said, and pointed to the center of die nearest line. "Might as well call it south, anyway-it's as good a word as any. There's a boxcar on this track that's real close to the fence.
Only ten yards or so. It says soo LINE on the side."
Ted was nodding.
"Good cover," Roland said. "Excellent cover." Now he pointed to the area beyond the north end of the compound.
"And here, all sorts of sheds."
"There used to be supplies in them," Ted said, "but now most are empty, I think. For awhile a gang of Rods slept there, but six or eight months ago, Pimli and the Wease kicked them out."
"But more cover, empty or full," Roland said. "Is the ground behind and around them clear of obstacles and pretty much smooth? Smooth enough for that thing to go back and forth?"
He cocked a thumb at Suzie's Cruisin Trike.
Ted and Dinky exchanged a glance. "Definitely," Ted said.
Susannah waited to see if Eddie would protest, even before he knew what Roland had in mind. He didn't. Good. She was already thinking about what weapons she'd want. What guns.
Roland sat quiet for a moment or two, gazing at the map, almost seeming to commune with it. When Ted offered him a cigarette, the gunslinger took it. Then he began to talk. Twice he drew on the side of a weapons crate with a piece of chalk.
Twice more he drew arrows on the map, one pointing to what they were calling north, one to the south. Ted asked a question;
Dinky asked another. Behind them, Sheemie and Haylis played with Oy like a couple of children. The bumbler mimicked their laughter with eerie accuracy.
When Roland had finished, Ted Brautigan said: 'You mean to spill an almighty lot of blood."
"Indeed I do. As much as I can."
"Risky for the lady," Dink remarked, looking first at her and then at her husband.
Susannah said nothing. Neither did Eddie. He recognized the risk. He also understood why Roland would want Suze north of the compound. The Cruisin Trike would give her mobility, and they'd need it. As for risk, they were six planning to take on sixty. Or more. Of course there would be risk, and of course there would be blood.
Blood and fire.
"I may be able to rig a couple of other guns," Susannah said. Her eyes had taken on that special Detta Walker gleam.
"Radio-controlled, like a toy airplane. I dunno. But I'll move, all right. I'm goan speed around like grease on a hot griddle."
"Can this work?" Dinky asked bluntly.
Roland's lips parted in a humorless grin. "It a?7/work."
"How can you say that?" Ted asked.
Eddie recalled Roland's reasoning before their call to John Cullum and could have answered that question, but answers were for their ka-tet's dinh to give-if he would-and so he left this one to Roland.
"Because it has to," the gunslinger said. "I see no other way."
Chapter XI:THE ATTACK ON ALGUL SIENTO
ONE
It was a day later and not long before the horn signaled the morning change of shift. The music would soon start, the sun would come on, and the Breaker night-crew would exit The Study stage left while the Breaker day-crew entered stage right.
Everything was as it should be, yet Pimli Prentiss had slept less than an hour the previous night and even that brief time had been haunted by sour and chaotic dreams. Finally, around four
(what his bedside clock in fact claimed was four, but who knew anymore, and what did it matter anyway, this close to the end),