Song of Susannah (52 page)

For a moment there was nothing, and then Susannah’s mind lit up with pain beyond anything she had ever been called upon to endure. More than she had suspected could exist. Yet her lips remained closed as it raved through her. She thought of the song, and heard it true even through the thunder of the pain:
I am a maid . . . of constant sorrow . . . I’ve seen trials all my days . . .

At last the thunder ceased.

“Please speak your name, slowly and distinctly,” said the pleasant female voice in the middle of her head, “or this procedure will be intensified by a factor of ten.”

No need of that
, Susannah sent the female voice.
I’m convinced.

“Suuuu-zaaaa-nahhh,” she said. “Suuu-zannnahhh . . .”

They stood watching her, all of them except for Ms. Rathead, who was peering ecstatically up to where the baby’s down-covered head had once again appeared between the withdrawing lips of Mia’s vagina.

“Miiii-aaaahhhh . . .”

“Suuuu-zaaa . . .”

“Miiii . . .”

“annn-ahhh . . .”

By the time the next contraction began, Dr. Scowther had seized a pair of forceps. The voices of the women became one, uttering a word, a name, that was neither
Susannah
nor
Mia
but some combination of both.

“The link,” said the pleasant female voice, “has been established.” A faint
click.
“Repeat the link has been established. Thank you for your cooperation.”

“This is it, people,” Scowther said. His pain and terror appeared forgotten; he sounded excited. He turned to his nurse. “It may cry, Alia. If it does, let it alone, for your father’s sake! If it doesn’t, swab out its mouth at once!”

“Yes, doctor.” The thing’s lips quivered back, revealing a double set of fangs. Was that a grimace or a smile?

Scowther looked around at them with a touch of his previous arrogance. “All of you stay exactly where you are until I say you can move,” he said. “None of us knows exactly what we’ve got here. We only know that the child belongs to the Crimson King himself—”

Mia screamed at that. In pain and in protest.

“Oh, you idiot,” Sayre said. He drew back a hand and slapped Scowther with enough force to make his hair fly and send blood spraying against the white wall in a pattern of fine droplets.

“No!” Mia cried. She tried to struggle up onto her elbows, failed, fell back. “No, you said I should have the raising of him! Oh, please . . . if only for a little while, I beg . . .”

Then the worst pain yet rolled over Susannah—over both of them, burying them. They screamed in tandem, and Susannah didn’t need to hear Scowther, who was commanding her to
push
, to
push NOW!

“It’s coming, doctor!” the nurse cried in nervous ecstasy.

Susannah closed her eyes and bore down, and as she felt the pain begin to flow out of her like water whirlpooling its way down a dark drain, she also felt the deepest sorrow she had ever known. For it was Mia the baby was flowing into; the last few lines of the living message Susannah’s body had somehow been made to transmit. It was ending. Whatever happened next, this part was ending, and Susannah Dean let out a cry of mingled relief and regret; a cry that was itself like a song.

And on the wings of that song, Mordred Deschain, son of Roland (and one other, O can you say Discordia), came into the world.

STAVE:
Commala-come-kass!

The child has come at last!

Sing your song, O sing it well
,

The child has come to pass.

RESPONSE:
Commala-come-kass
,

The worst has come to pass.

The Tower trembles on its ground;

The child has come at last.

July 12th, 1977

Man, it’s good to be back in Bridgton. They always treat us well in what Joe still calls “Nana-town,” but Owen fussed almost nonstop. He’s better since we got back home. We only stopped once, in Waterville to grab grub at the Silent Woman (I’ve had better meals there, I must add).

Anyway, I kept my promise to myself and went on a grand hunt for that
Dark Tower
story as soon as I got back. I’d almost given up when I found the pages in the farthest corner of the garage, under a box of Tab’s old catalogues. There was a lot of “spring thaw drip” over there, and those funny blue pages smell all mildewy, but the copy is perfectly readable. I finished going over it, then sat down and added a small section to the Way Station material (where the gunslinger meets the boy Jake). I thought it would be kind of fun to put in a water pump that runs on an atomic slug, and so I did so without delay. Usually working on an old story is about as appetizing as eating a sandwich made with moldy bread, but this felt perfectly natural . . . like slipping on an old shoe.

What, exactly, was this story supposed to be about?

I can’t remember, only that it first came to me a long, long time ago. Driving back from up north, with my entire family snoozing, I got thinking about that time David and I ran away from Aunt Ethelyn’s. We were planning to go back to Connecticut, I think. The grups (i.e., grownups) caught us, of course, and put us to work in the barn, sawing wood. Punishment Detail, Uncle Oren called it. It seems to me that something scary happened to me out there, but I’ll be damned if I can remember what it was, only that it was
red
. And I thought up a hero, a magic gunslinger, to keep me safe from it. There was something about magnetism, too, or Beams of Power. I’m pretty sure that was the genesis of this story, but it’s strange how blurry it all seems. Oh well, who remembers all the nasty little nooks of their childhood? Who
wants
to?

Not much else happening. Joe and Naomi made Playground, and Tabby’s plans for her trip to England are pretty much complete. Boy, that story about the gunslinger
won’t
get out of my head!

Tell you what ole Roland needs: some friends!

July 19th, 1977

I went to see
Star Wars
on my motorcycle tonight, and I think it’ll be the last time I climb on the bike until things cool off a little. I ate a ton of bugs. Talk about protein!

I kept thinking about Roland, my gunslinger from the Robert Browning poem (with a tip of Hatlo’s Hat to Sergio Leone, of course), while I rode. The manuscript is a novel, no doubt—or a
piece of one—but it occurs to me that the chapters also stand on their own. Or almost. I wonder if I could sell them to one of the fantasy mags? Maybe even to
Fantasy and Science Fiction
, which is, of course, the genre’s Holy Grail.

Probably a stupid idea.

Otherwise, not much doing but the All-Star Game (National League 7, American League 5). I was pretty hammered before it was over. Tabby
not
pleased . . .

August 9th, 1978

Kirby McCauley sold the first chapter of that old
Dark Tower
story of mine to
Fantasy and Science Fiction
! Man, I can hardly believe it! That is just so cool! Kirby sez he thinks Ed Ferman (the Ed-in-chief there) will probably run everything of the
DT
story that I’ve got. He’s going to call the first bit (“The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed,” etc., etc., blah-blah, bang-bang) “The Gunslinger,” which makes sense.

Not bad for an old story that was moldering away forgotten in a wet corner of the garage last year. Ferman told Kirby that Roland “has a feel of reality” that’s missing in a lot of fantasy fiction, and wanted to know if there might be even more adventures. I’m sure there
are
even more adventures (or
were
, or
will be
—what’s the proper tense when you’re talking about unwritten tales?), but I have no idea what they might be. Only that John “Jake” Chambers would have to come back into it.

A rainy, muggy day by the lake. No Playground for the kids. Tonight we had Andy Fulcher sit the
big kids while Tab & I & Owen went to the Bridgton Drive-In. Tabby thought the film (
The Other Side of Midnight
. . . from last
year
, actually) was a piece of shit, but I didn’t hear her begging to be taken home. As for me, I found my mind drifting off to that damn Roland guy again. This time to questions of his lost love. “Susan, lovely girl at the window.”

Who, pray, be she?

September 9, 1978

Got my first copy of the October issue with “The Gunslinger” in it. Man, this looks fine.

Burt Hatlen called today. He’s talking about me maybe doing a year at the University of Maine as writer in residence. Only Burt would be ballsy enough to think of a hack like me in connection w/ a job like that. Sort of an interesting idea, though.

October 29, 1979

Well, shit, drunk again. I can barely see the goddam page, but suppose I better put down
something
before I go staggering off to bed. Got a letter from Ed Ferman at
F&SF
today. He’s going to do the second chapter of
The Dark Tower
—the part where Roland meets the kid—as “The Way Station.” He really wants to publish the entire run of stories, and I’m agreeable enough. I just wish there was more. Meanwhile, there’s
The Stand
to think about—and, of course,
The Dead Zone
.

All of this doesn’t seem to mean much to me just now. I
hate
being here in Orrington—hate
being on such a busy road, for one thing. Owen damned near got creamed by one of those Cianbro trucks today. Scared the hell out of me. Also gave me an idea for a story, having to do with that odd little pet cemetery out in back of the house.
is what the sign sez, isn’t that weird? Funny, but also creepy. Almost a
Vault of Horror
type of thing.

June 19th, 1980

Just got off the phone with Kirby McCauley.
He
got a call from Donald Grant, who publishes lots of fantasy stuff under his own imprint (Kirby likes to joke that Don Grant is “the man who made Robert E. Howard infamous”). Anyway, Don would like to publish my gunslinger stories, and under their original title,
The Dark Tower
(subtitle
The Gunslinger
). Isn’t that neat? My own “limited edition.” He’d do 10,000 copies, plus 500 signed and numbered. I told Kirby to go ahead and make the deal.

Anyway, it looks like my teaching career is over, and I got pretty well baked to celebrate. Took out the
Pet Sematary
ms. and looked it over. Good God, is that grim! Readers would lynch me if I published it, I think. That’s one book that’ll never see the light of day . . .

July 27th, 1983

Publishers Weekly
(our son Owen calls it
Pudlishers Weakness
, which is actually sorta accurate) reviewed the latest Richard Bachman book . . . and once more, baby, I got
roasted
. They implied it was
boring, and that, my friend, it ain’t. Oh well, thinking about it made it that much easier to go to North Windham and pick up those 2 kegs of beer for the party. Got em at Discount Beverage. I’m smoking again, too, so sue me. I’ll quit the day I turn 40 and that’s a promise.