dozing aide, old Alice Weathers lies (snoring gently, dreaming of dancing in perfect partnership with Fred Astaire across a white marble floor) surrounded by so much of her former life that she must navigate past the chairs and end tables to maneuver from the door to her bed. Alice still possesses even more of her wits than she does her old furniture, and she cleans her room herself, immaculately. Next door in D12, two old farmers named Thorvaldson and Jesperson, who have not spoken to each other in years, sleep, separated by a thin curtain, in a bright clutter of family photographs and grandchildren’s drawings.
Farther down the hallway, D18 presents a spectacle completely opposite to the clean, crowded jumble of D10, just as its inhabitant, a man known as Charles Burnside, could be considered the polar opposite of Alice Weathers. In D18, there are no end tables, hutches, overstuffed chairs, gilded mirrors, lamps, woven rugs, or velvet curtains: this barren room contains only a metal bed, a plastic chair, and a chest of drawers. No photographs of children and grandchildren stand atop the chest, and no crayon drawings of blocky houses and stick figures decorate the walls. Mr. Burnside has no interest in housekeeping, and a thin layer of dust covers the floor, the window sill, and the chest’s bare top. D18 is bereft of history, empty of personality; it seems as brutal and soulless as a prison cell. A powerful smell of excrement contaminates the air.
For all the entertainment offered by Chipper Maxton and all the charm of Alice Weathers, it is Charles Burnside, “Burny,” we have most come to see.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
This book contains an excerpt from the forthcoming hardcover edition of
A Ballantine Book
Published by The Ballantine Publishing Group
Copyright © 1984 by Stephen King and Peter Straub
Excerpt from
© 2001 by Stephen King and Peter Straub
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by The Ballantine Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and simultaneously in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto. Originally published by Viking Penguin/G. P. Putnam’s Sons in 1984.
Ballantine is a registered trademark and the Ballantine colophon is a trademark of Random House, Inc.
www.ballantinebooks.com
First Ballantine Books Edition: August 2001
eISBN: 978-0-345-45240-5
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