"She told me what happened," he tells the gunslinger. "I won't pretend to understand everything the way the both of you do – I wasn't there."

He looks back and forth between the two men, shoulders set. "All I want is to comfort her and keep her safe, body and mind and all. I expect she'll need the both of you for the night, when it comes... but for today, I ask that you let me do what I can."

In the end, the decision is Susan's, of course, but he's not fool enough to leave the two men before him out of the conversation. The nature of the strange relationship between them all is still largely a mystery to him, but not so much he doesn't recognize its importance.

And so he asks, odd though it feels.