The gunslinger knew the question; it had gnawed him all this night, and he thought, for years before. It trembled on his lips but he didn't ask it... not yet.
"This Stranger, this Maerlyn, is a minion of the Tower? Like yourself?"
"Much greater than I. It has been given to him to live backward in time. He darkies. He tincts. He is in all times. Yet there is one greater than he."
"Who?"
"The Beast," the man in black whispered fearfully. "The keeper of the Tower. The originator of all glammer.
"What is it? What does this Beast - "
"Ask me no more!" The man in black cried. His voice aspired to sternness and crumbled into beseechment. "I know not! I do not wish to know. To speak of the Beast is to speak of the ruination of one's own soul. Before It, Maerlyn is as Jam to him."
"And beyond the Beast is the Tower and whatever the Tower contains?"
"Yes," whispered the man in black. "But none of these things are what you wish to ask."
True.
"All right," the gunslinger said, and then asked the world's oldest question. "Do I know you? Have I seen you somewhere before?"
"Yes."
"Where?" The gunslinger leaned forward urgently. This was a question of his destiny.
The man in black clapped his hands to his mouth and giggled through them like a small child. "I think you know. "
"Where!" He was on his feet; his hands had dropped to the worn butts of his guns.
"Not with those, gunslinger. Those do not open doors; those only close them forever. "
"Where?" The gunslinger reiterated.
"Must I give him a hint?" The man in black asked the darkness. "I believe I must "He looked at the gunslinger with eyes that burned. "There was a man who gave you advice," he said. "Your teacher - "
"Yes, Cort," the gunslinger interrupted impatiently.
"The advice was to wait. It was bad advice. For even then Marten's plans against your father had proceeded. And when your father returned - "
"He was killed," the gunslinger said emptily.
"And when you turned and looked, Marten was gone ... gone west Yet there was a man in Marten's entourage, a man who affected the dress of a monk and the shaven head of a penitent - "
"Walter," the gunslinger whispered. "You. .. you're not Marten at all. You're Walter!"
The man in black tittered. "At your service. "
"I ought to kill you now."
"That would hardly be fair. After all, it was I who delivered Marten into your hands three years later, when - "
"Then you've controlled me."
"In some ways, yes. But no more, gunslinger. Now comes the time of sharing. Then, in the morning, I will cast the runes. Dreams will come to you. And then your real quest must begin."
"Walter," the gunslinger repeated, stunned.
"Sit," the man in black invited. "I tell you my story. Yours, I think, will be much longer. "
"I don't talk of myself," the gunslinger muttered.
"Yet tonight you must So that we may understand."
"Understand what? My purpose? You know that To find the Tower is my purpose. I'm sworn."
"Not your purpose, gunslinger. Your mind. Your slow, plodding, tenacious mind. There has never been one quite like it, in all the history of the world. Perhaps in the history of creation.
"This is the time of speaking. This is the time of histories.
"Then speak."
The man in black shook the voluminous arm of his robe. A foil-wrapped package fell out and caught the dying embers in many reflective folds.
"Tobacco, gunslinger. Would you smoke?"
He had been able to resist the rabbit, but he could not resist this. He opened the foil with eager fingers. There was fine crumbled tobacco inside, and green leaves to wrap it in, amazingly moist. He had not seen such tobacco for ten years.
He rolled two cigarettes and bit the ends of each to release flavor. He offered one to the man in black, who took it. Each of them took a burning twig from the fire.
The gunslinger lit his cigarette and drew the aromatic smoke deep into his lungs, closing his eyes to concentrate the senses. He blew out with long, slow satisfaction.
"Is it good?" the man in black enquired.
"Yes. Very good."
"Enjoy it. It may be the last smoke for you in a very long time."
The gunslinger took this impassively.
"Very well," the man in black said. "To begin then:
"You must understand that the Tower has always been, and there have always been boys who know of it and lust for it, more than power or riches or women.. "