They shook their heads.

"At the edge of the rice," Roland continued, "take them into one of the streams. Lead them almost to the river, then have them lie down where it's tall and still green." He moved his hands apart, his blue eyes blazing. "Spread em out. You grownups get on the river side of em. If there's trouble-more Wolves, something else we don't expect-that's the side it'll come from."

Without giving them a chance to ask questions, Roland buried his fingers in the corners of his mouth again and whistled. Vaughn Eisenhart, Krella Anselm, and Wayne Overholser joined the others in the ditch and began bellowing for the little 'uns to turn around and start back toward the road. Eddie, meanwhile, took another look over his shoulder and was stunned to see how far toward the river the dust-cloud had progressed. Such rapid movement made perfect sense once you knew the secret; those gray horses weren't horses at all, but mechanical conveyances disguised to look like horses, no more than that. Like a fleet of government Chewies, he thought.

"Roland, they're coming fast! Like hell!"

Roland looked. "We're all right," he said.

"Are you sure?" Rosa asked.

"Yes."

The youngest children were now hurrying back across the road, hand-in-hand, bug-eyed with fear and excitement. Cantab of the Manni and Ara, his wife, were leading them. She told them to walk straight down the middle of the rows and try not to even brush any of the skeletal plants.

"Why, sai?" asked one tyke, surely no older than four. There was a suspicious dark patch on the front of his overalls. "Corn all picked, see."

"It's a game," Cantab said. "A don't-touch-the-corn game." He began to sing. Some of the children joined in, but most were too bewildered and frightened.

As the pairs crossed the road, growing taller and older as they came, Roland cast another glance to the east. He estimated the Wolves were still ten minutes from the other side of the Whye, and ten minutes should be enough, but gods, they were fast! It had already crossed his mind that he might have to keep Slightman the Younger and the Tavery twins up here, with them. It wasn't in the plan, but by the time things got this far, the plan almost always started to change. Had to change.

Now the last of the kids were crossing, and only Overholser, Callahan, Slightman the Elder, and Sarey Adams were still on the road.

"Go," Roland told them.

"I want to wait for my boy!" Slightman objected.

"Go!"

Slightman looked disposed to argue the point, but Sarey Adams touched one elbow and Overholser actually took hold of the other.

"Come'ee," Overholser said. "The man'll take care of yours same as he'll take care of his."

Slightman gave Roland a final doubtful look, then stepped over the ditch and began herding the tail end of the line downhill, along with Overholser and Sarey.

"Susannah, show them the hide," Roland said.

They'd been careful to make sure the kids crossed the ditch on the road's river side well down from where they had done their digging the day before. Now, using one of her capped and shortened legs, Susannah kicked aside a tangle of leaves, branches, and dead corn-plants-the sort of thing one would expect to see left behind in a roadside runoff ditch-and exposed a dark hole.

"It's just a trench," she said, almost apologetically. "There's boards over the top. Light ones, easy to push back. That's where we'll be. Roland's made a… oh, I don't know what you call it, we call it a periscope where I come from, a thing with mirrors inside it you can see through… and when the time comes, we just stand up. The boards'll fall away around us when we do."

"Where's Jake and those other three?" Eddie asked. "They should be back by now."

"It's too soon," Roland said. "Calm down, Eddie."

"I won't calm down and it's not too soon. We should at least be able to see them. I'm going over there-"

"No, you're not," Roland said. "We have to get as many as we can before they figure out what's going on. That means keeping our firepower over here, at their backs."

"Roland, something's not right."

Roland ignored him. "Lady-sais, slide in there, do ya please. The extra boxes of plates will be on your end; we'll just kick some leaves over them."

He looked across the road as Zalia, Rosa, and Margaret began to worm into the hole Susannah had disclosed. The path to the arroyo was now completely empty. There was still no sign of Jake, Benny, and the Tavery twins. He was beginning to think that Eddie was right; that something had gone amiss.

Jake and his companions reached the place where the trail split quickly and without incident. Jake had held back two items, and when they reached the fork, he threw a broken rattle toward the Gloria and a little girl's woven string bracelet toward the Redbird. Choose, he thought, and be damned to you either way.

When he turned, he saw the Tavery twins had already started back. Benny was waiting for him, his face pale and his eyes shining. Jake nodded to him and made himself return Benny's smile. "Let's go," he said.

Then they heard Roland's whistle and the twins broke into a run, despite the scree and fallen rock which littered the path. They were still holding hands, weaving their way around what they couldn't simply scramble over.

"Hey, don't run!" Jake shouted. "He said not to run and mind your f-"

That was when Frank Tavery stepped into the hole. Jake heard the grinding, snapping sound his ankle made when it broke, knew from the horrified wince on Benny's face that he had, too. Then Frank let out a low, screaming moan and pitched sideways. Francine grabbed for him and got a hand on his upper arm, but the boy was too heavy. He fell through her grip like a sashweight. The thud of his skull colliding with the granite outcrop beside him was far louder than the sound his ankle had made. The blood which immediately began to flow from the wound in his scalp was brilliant in the early morning light.

Trouble, Jake thought. And in our road.

Benny was gaping, his cheeks the color of cottage cheese. Francine was already kneeling beside her brother, who lay at a twisted, ugly angle with his foot still caught in the hole. She was making high, breathless keening sounds. Then, all at once, the keening stopped. Her eyes rolled up in their sockets and she pitched forward over her unconscious twin brother in a dead faint.

"Come on," Jake said, and when Benny only stood there, gawping, Jake punched him in the shoulder. "For your father's sake!"

That got Benny moving.

Jake saw everything with a gunslinger's cold, clear vision. The blood splashed on the rock. The clump of hair stuck in it. The foot in the hole. The spittle on Frank Tavery's lips. The swell of his sister's new breast as she lay awkwardly across him. The Wolves were coming now. It wasn't Roland's whistle that told him this, but the touch. Eddie, he uiought Eddie wants to come over here.

Jake had never tried using the touch to send, but he did now: Stay where you are! If we can't get back in time we'll try to hide while they go past BUT DON'T YOU COME DOWN HERE! DON'T YOU SPOIL THINGS!

He had no idea if the message got through, but he did know it was all he had time for. Meanwhile, Benny was… what? What was le mot juste? Ms. Avery back at Piper had been very big on le mot juste. And it came to him. Gibbering. Benny was gibbering.

"What are we gonna do, Jake? Man Jesus, both of them! They were fine! Just running, and then… what if the Wolves come? What if they come while we're still here? We better leave em, don't you think?"