'Oh, I probably heard that somewhere,' Speedy said, grinning at him. 'Come over here and see what I brought you. Plus, I have to tell you where to go first, don't I?'
Relieved, Jack walked across the sidewalk to Speedy's tree. The old man set his sandwich in his lap and fished the bag closer to him. 'Merry Christmas,' Speedy said, and brought forth a tall, battered old paperback book. It was, Jack saw, an old Rand McNally road atlas.
'Thanks,' Jack said, taking the book from Speedy's outstretched hand.
'Ain't no maps over there, so you stick as much as you can to the roads in ole Rand McNally. That way you'll get where you're goin.'
'Okay,' Jack said, and slipped out of the knapsack so that he could slide the big book down inside it.
'The next thing don't have to go in that fancy rig you carryin on your back,' Speedy said. He put the sandwich on the flat paper bag and stood up all in one long smooth motion. 'No, you can carry this right in your pocket.' He dipped his fingers into the left pocket of his workshirt. What emerged, clamped between his second and third fingers like one of Lily's Tarrytoons, was a white triangular object it took the boy a moment to recognize as a guitar-pick. 'You take this and keep it. You'll want to show it to a man. He'll help you.'
Jack turned the pick over in his fingers. He had never seen one like it - of ivory, with scrimshaw filigrees and patterns winding around it in slanted lines like some kind of unearthly writing. Beautiful in the abstract, it was almost too heavy to be a useful fingerpick.
'Who's the man?' Jack asked. He slipped the pick into one of his pants pockets.
'Big scar on his face - you'll see him pretty soon after you land in the Territories. He's a guard. Fact is, he's a Captain of the Outer Guards, and he'll take you to a place where you can see a lady you has to see. Well, a lady you ought to see. So you know the other reason you're puttin your neck on the line. My friend over there, he'll understand what you're doin and he'll figure out a way to get you to the lady.'
'This lady . . . ' Jack began.
'Yep,' Speedy said. 'You got it.'
'She's the Queen.'
'You take a good look at her, Jack. You see what you see when you sees her. You see what she is, understand? Then you hit out for the west.' Speedy stood examining him gravely, almost as if he were just now doubting that he'd ever see Jack Sawyer again, and then the lines in his face twitched and he said, 'Steer clear of ole Bloat. Watch for his trail - his own and his Twinner's. Ole Bloat can find out where you went if you're not careful, and if he finds out he's gonna be after you like a fox after a goose.' Speedy shoved his hands in his pockets and regarded Jack again, looking very much as though he wished he could think of more to say. 'Get the Talisman, son,' he concluded. 'Get it and bring it back safe. It gonna be your burden but you got to be bigger than your burden.'
Jack was concentrating so hard on what Speedy was telling him that he squinted into the man's seamed face. Scarred man, Captain of the Outer Guards. The Queen. Morgan Sloat, after him like a predator. In an evil place over on the other side of the country. A burden. 'Okay,' he said, wishing suddenly that he were back in the Tea and Jam Shoppe with his mother.
Speedy smiled jaggedly, warmly. 'Yeah-bob. Ole Travellin Jack is okey-doke.' The smile deepened. 'Bout time for you to sip at that special juice, wouldn't you say?'
'I guess it is,' Jack said. He tugged the dark bottle out of his hip pocket and unscrewed the cap. He looked back up at Speedy, whose pale eyes stabbed into his own.
'Speedy'll help you when he can.'
Jack nodded, blinked, and raised the neck of the bottle to his mouth. The sweetly rotten odor which leaped out of the bottle nearly made his throat close itself in an involuntary spasm. He tipped the bottle up and the taste of the odor invaded his mouth. His stomach clenched. He swallowed, and rough, burning liquid spilled down his throat.
Long seconds before Jack opened his eyes, he knew from the richness and clarity of the smells about him that he had flipped into the Territories. Horses, grass, a dizzying scent of raw meat; dust; the clear air itself.
INTERLUDE
Sloat in This World (I)