Proust stared at it as if it might explode or vent some mind-altering gas. 'What's this, sir?'
'A note for a dollar. A dollar bill. It's the latest thing.'
'Do I have to sign it or anything?'
'No. That's the interesting bit. It's a dollar. It can be anyone's.'
'I'd like it to be mine, thank you!'
'It is, now,' said Moist. 'But you can use it to buy things.'
'There's no gold in it,' said the shopkeeper, picking it up and holding it away from his body, just in case.
'Well, if I paid in pennies and shillings there would be no gold in them either, right? As it is, you're fifteen pence ahead, and that's a good place to be, agreed? And that note is worth a dollar. If you take it along to my bank, they'll give you a dollar for it.'
'But I've already got a dollar! Er, haven't I?' Proust added.
'Good man! So why not go out in the street and spend it right now? Come on, I want to see how it works.'
'Is this like the stamps, Mr Lipwig?' said Proust, clutching for something he could understand. 'People sometimes pay me in stamps, me doing a lot of mail-order—'
'Yes! Yes! Exactly! Think of it as a big stamp. Look, I'll tell you what, this is an introductory offer. Spend that dollar and I'll give you another bill for a dollar, so that you'll still have a dollar. So what are you risking?'
'Only if this is, like, one of the first dollar bills, right… well, my lad bought some of the first stamps you did, right, and now they're worth a mint, so if I hang on to it, it'll be worth money some day—'
'It's worth money now? Moist wailed. That was the trouble with slow people. Give him a fool any day. Slow people took some time to catch up, but when they did they rolled right over you.
'Yes, but, see,' and here the shopkeeper grinned what he probably thought was an artful grin that in fact made him look like Mr Fusspot halfway through a toffee, 'you're a sly one with them stamps, Mr Lipwig, bringin' out different ones all the time. My granny says if it's true a man's got enough iron in his blood to make a nail then you've got enough brass in your neck to make a doorknob, no offence meant, she speaks her mind does my granny—'
'I've made the mail run on time, haven't I?'
'Oh, yes, Gran says you may be a Slippery Jim but you get things done, no doubt about it—'
'Right! Let's spend a damn dollar, then, shall we?' Is it some kind of duplex magical power I have, he wondered, that lets old ladies see right through me but like what they see?
And thus Mr Proust decided to hazard his dollar in the shop next door, on an ounce of Jolly Sailor pipe tobacco, some mints and a copy of What Novelty?. And Mr 'Natty' Poleforth, once the exercise was explained, accepted the note and took it across the road to Mr Drayman the butcher, who cautiously accepted it, after having things set out fair and square for him, in payment for some sausages and also gave Moist a bone 'for your little doggie'. It was more than likely that Mr Fusspot had never seen a real bone before. He circled it carefully, waiting for it to squeak.
Tenth Egg Street was a street of small traders, who sold small things in small quantities for small sums on small profits. In a street like that, you had to be small-minded. It wasn't the place for big ideas. You had to look at the detail. These were men who saw far more farthings than dollars.
Some of the other shopkeepers were already pulling down the shutters and closing up for the day. Drawn by the Ankh-Morporkian's instinct for something interesting, the traders drifted over to see what was going on. They all knew one another. They all dealt with one another. And everyone knew Moist von Lipwig, the man in the gold suit. The notes were examined with much care and solemn discussion.
'It's just an IOU or marker, really.'
'All right, but supposing you needed the money?'
'But, correct me if I'm wrong, isn't the IOU the money?'
'All right then, who owes it to you?'
'Er… Jack here, because… No, hang on… it is the money, right?'
Moist grinned as the discussion wobbled back and forth. Whole new theories of money were growing here like mushrooms, in the dark and based on bullshit. But these were men who counted every half-farthing and slept at night with the cash box under their bed. They'd weigh out flour and raisins and hundreds-and-thousands with their eyes ferociously focused on the scale's pointer, because they were men who lived in the margins. If he could get the idea of paper money past them then he was home and, if not dry, then at least merely Moist.
'So you think these could catch on?' he said, during a lull.
The consensus was, yes, they could, but they should look 'fancier', in the words of Natty Poleforth: 'You know, with more fancy lettering and similar.'
Moist agreed, and handed over a note to every man, as a souvenir. It was worth it.
'And if it all goes wahoonie-shaped,' said Mr Proust, 'you've still got the gold, right? Locked up down there in the cellar?'
'Oh, yes, you've got to have the gold,' said Mr Drayman.
There was a general murmur of agreement, and Moist felt his spirits slump.
'But I thought we'd all agreed that you don't need the gold?' he said. In fact they hadn't, but it was worth a try.
'Ah, yes, but it's got to be there somewhere,' said Mr Drayman.
'It keeps banks honest,' said Mr Poleforth, in that tone of plonking certainty that is the hallmark of that most knowledgeable of beings, The Man In The Pub.
'But I thought you understood,' said Moist. 'You don't need the gold!'
'Right, sir, right,' said Poleforth soothingly. 'Just so long as it's there.'
'Er, do you happen to know why it has to be there?' said Moist.
'Keeps banks honest,' said Poleforth, on the basis that truth is achieved by repetition. And, with nods all round, this was the feeling of Tenth Egg Street. So long as the gold was somewhere, it kept banks honest and everything was okay. Moist felt humbled by such faith. If the gold was somewhere, herons would no longer eat frogs, either. But in fact there was no power in the world that could keep a bank honest if it didn't want to be.
Still, not a bad start to his first day, even so. He could build on it.
It started to rain, not hard, but the kind of fine rain where you can almost get away without an umbrella. No cabs bothered to trawl Tenth Egg Street for trade, but there was one at the kerb in Losing Street, the horse sagging in the harness, the driver hunched into his greatcoat, the lamps flickering in the dusk. With the rain getting to the blobby, soaking stage, it was a sight for damp feet.
He hurried over, climbed in, and a voice in the gloom said: 'Good evening, Mr Lipwig. It's so nice to meet you at last. I'm Pucci. I'm sure we will be friends…'
'Now, you see, that was good,' said Sergeant Colon of the Watch, as the figure of Moist von Lipwig disappeared round the corner, still accelerating. 'He went right through the cab window without touching the sides, bounced off that bloke creepin' up, very nice roll as he landed, I thought, and he still had hold of the little dog the whole time. Done it before, I shouldn't wonder. Nevertheless, I'm forced, on balance, to consider him a twit.'
'The first cab,' said Corporal Nobbs, shaking his head. 'Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear. I would not have thought it of a man like him.'
'My point exactly,' said Colon. 'When you know you've got enemies at large, never, never get in the first cab. Fact of life. Even things what live under rocks know it.'
They watched the former creeper gloomily picking up the remains of his iconograph, while Pucci screamed at him from the coach.
'I bet when the first cab was built, no one dared to get into it, eh, sarge?' said Nobby happily. 'I bet the first cabby used to go home every night starvin' on account of everyone knowin', right?'
'Oh, no, Nobby, people with no enemies at large would be okay. Now let's go and report.'
'What does it mean, "at large", anyway,' said Nobby, as they ambled towards the Chittling Street Watch House and the certain prospect of a cup of hot sweet tea.
'It mea
ns large enemies, Nobby. It's as clear as the nose on your face. Especially yours.'
'Well, she's a large girl, that Pucci Lavish.'
'And nasty enemies to have, that family,' Colon opined. 'What's the odds?'
'Odds, sarge?' said Nobby innocently.
'You're runnin' a book, Nobby. You always run a book.'
'Can't get any takers, sarge. Foregone conclusion,' said Nobby.
'Ah, right. Sensible. Lipwig goin' to be found lyin' in chalk by Sunday?'
'No, sarge. Everyone thinks he'll win.'
Moist woke up in the big soft bed and strangled a scream.
Pucci! Aaagh! And in a state of what the delicately inclined called dishabille. He'd always wondered what dishabille looked like, but he'd never expected to see so much of it in one go. Even now some of his memory cells were still trying to die.
But he wouldn't be Moist von Lipwig if a certain amount of insouciance didn't rise to heal the wounds. He'd got away, after all. Oh, yes. It wasn't as though it was the first window he'd jumped through. And the sound of Pucci's scream of rage was almost as loud as the crack the man's iconograph made as it hit the cobbles. The ol' honey trap game. Hah. But it was high time he did something illegal, just to get his mind back to a proper state of cynical self-preservation. He wouldn't have got into the first cab a year ago, that was for sure. Mind you, it would be a strange jury that believed he could be attracted to Pucci Lavish; he couldn't see that standing up in court.
He got up, dressed and listened hopefully for signs of life from the kitchen. In their absence, he made himself some black coffee.
Armed with this he made his way into the office, where Mr Fusspot dozed in his in-tray and the official top hat sat, accusingly black.
Ah, yes, he was going to do something about that, wasn't he?
He reached into his pocket and pulled out the little pot of glue, which was one of the convenient ones with a brush in the lid, and after some careful spreading began to pour the glittering flakes as smoothly as he could.
He was still engrossed in this exercise when Gladys loomed in his vision like an eclipse of the sun, holding what turned out to be a bacon and egg sandwich two feet long and one-eighth of an inch thick. She'd also picked up his copy of the Times.
He groaned. He'd made the front page. He usually did. It was his athletic mouth. It ran away with him whenever he saw a notebook.
Er… he'd made page two as well. Oh, and the lead editorial. Bugger, even the political cartoon, too, the one that was never much of a laugh.
First Urchin: 'Why ain't Ankh-Morpork like a desert island?'
Second Urchin: "cos when yer on a desert island the sharks can't bite yer!'
It was side-splitting.
His bleary eyes strayed back to the editorial. They, on the other hand, could be quite funny, since they were based on the assumption that the world would be a much better place if it was run by journalists. They were— What? What was this?
Time to consider the unthinkable… a wind of change blowing through the vaults at last… undoubted success of the new Post Office… stamps already a de facto currency… fresh ideas needed… youth at the helm…
Youth at the helm? This from William de Worde, who was almost certainly the same age as Moist but wrote editorials that suggested his bum was stuffed with tweed.
It was sometimes hard to tell in all the ponderousness what de Worde actually thought about anything, but it appeared through the rolling fog of polysyllables that the Times believed Moist von Lipwig to be, on the whole and all things considered, taking the long view and one thing with another, probably the right man in the right job.
He was aware of Gladys behind him when red light glinted off the brasswork on the desk.
'You Are Very Tense, Mr Lipwig,' she said.
'Yeah, right,' said Moist, reading the editorial again. Ye gods, the man really did write as though he was chipping the letters in stone.
'There Was An Interesting Article About Back-Rubs In The Ladies' Own Magazine,' Gladys went on. Later, Moist felt that perhaps he should have heeded the hopeful note in her voice. But he was thinking: not just carved, but with big serifs, too.
'They Are Very Good For Relieving Tension Caused By The Hurly-Burly Of Modern Life,' Gladys intoned.
'Well, we certainly don't want any of that,' said Moist, and everything went black.
The strange thing was, he thought, when Peggy and Aimsbury had brought him round and clicked bones back into the right sockets, that he actually felt a lot better. Perhaps that was the idea. Perhaps the hideous white-hot pain was there to make you realize that there were worse things in the world than the occasional twinge.
'I Am Very Sorry,' said Gladys, 'I Did Not Know That Was Going To Happen. It Said In The Magazine That The Recipient Would Experience A Delightful Frisson.'
'I don't think that means you should be able to see your own eyeball,' said Moist, rubbing his neck. Gladys's eyes dimmed so much that he was moved to add: 'I feel much better now, though. It's so nice to look down and not see my heels.'
'Don't you listen to him, it wasn't that bad,' said Peggy, with sisterly fellow feeling. 'Men always make a big fuss over a little pain.'
'They Are Just Big Cuddly Babies, Really,' said Gladys. That caused a thoughtful pause.
'Where did that come from?' said Moist.
'The Information Was Imparted To Me By Glenda At The Stamp Counter.'
'Well, from now on I don't want you to—'
The big doors swung open. They let in a hubbub from the floors below, and riding the noise like some kind of aural surfer was Mr Bent, saturnine and far too shiny for this time of the morning.
'Good morning, Master,' he said icily. 'The street outside is full of people. And might I take this opportunity to congratulate you on disproving a theory currently much in vogue at Unseen University?'
'Huh?' said Moist.
'There are, some like to suggest, an infinite number of universes in order to allow everything that may happen a place to happen in. This is of course nonsense, which we entertain only because we believe words are the same as reality. Now, however, I can prove my point, since in such an infinity of worlds there would have to be one where I would applaud your recent actions and, let me assure you, sir, infinity is not that big!' He drew himself up. 'People are hammering on the doors! They want to close their accounts! I told you banking was about trust and confidence!'
'Oh dear,' said Moist.
'They are asking for gold!'
'I thought that's what you prom—'
'It is only a metaphorical promise! I told you, it is based on the understanding that no one will actually demand it!'
'How many people want to withdraw their money?' said Moist.
'Nearly twenty!'
'Then they are making a lot of noise, aren't they?'
Mr Bent looked uncomfortable. 'Well, there are some others,' he said. 'A few misguided people are seeking to open accounts, but—'
'How many?'
'About two or three hundred, but—'
'Opening accounts, you say?' said Moist. Mr Bent was squirming.
'Only for trifling sums, a few dollars here and there,' he said dismissively. 'It would appear that they think you have "something up your sleeve".' The inverted commas shuddered like a well-bred girl picking up a dead vole.
Some of Moist recoiled. But part of him began to feel the wind on his face.
'Well, let's not disappoint them, shall we?' he said, picking up the gold top hat, which was still a bit sticky. Bent glared at it.
'The other banks are furious, you know,' he said, high-stepping hurriedly after Moist as the Master of the Mint headed for the stairs.
'Is that good or bad?' said Moist over his shoulder. 'Listen, what's the rule about bank lending? I heard it once. It's about interest.'
'Do you mean "Borrow at one-half, lend at two, go home at three"?' said Bent.
'Right! I've been thinking about that. We could shave those numbe
rs, couldn't we?'
'This is Ankh-Morpork! A bank has to be a fortress! That is expensive!'
'But we could alter them a bit, couldn't we? And we don't pay interest on balances of less than a hundred dollars, correct?'
'Yes, that is so.'
'Well, from now on anyone can open an account with five dollars and we'll start paying interest a lot earlier. That'll smooth out the lumps in the mattresses, won't it?'
'Master, I protest! Banking is not a game!'
'Dear Mr Bent, it is a game, and it's an old game called "What can we get away with?".'
A cheer went up. They had reached an open landing that overlooked the hall of the bank as a pulpit overlooks the sinners, and a field of faces stared up at Moist in silence for a moment. Then someone called out: 'Are you going to make us all rich, Mr Lipwig?'
Oh damn, thought Moist. Why are they all here?
'Well, I'm going to do my best to get my hands on your money!' he promised.
This got a cheer. Moist wasn't surprised. Tell someone you were going to rob them and all that happened was that you got a reputation as a truthful man.
The waiting ears sucked at his tongue, and his common sense went and hid. It heard his mouth add: And so I can get more of it, I think — that is to say, the chairman thinks — that we should be looking at one per cent interest on all accounts that have five dollars in them for a whole year.'
There was a choking sound from the chief cashier, but no great stir from the crowd, most of whom were of the Sock Under The Mattress persuasion. In fact, the news did not appear to please. Then someone raised his hand and said: 'That's a lot to pay just to have you stick our money in your cellar, isn't it?'
'No, it's what I'll pay you to let me stick your money in my cellar for a year,' said Moist.
'You will?'
'Certainly. Trust me.'
The enquirer's face twisted into the familiar mask of a slow thinker trying to speed up. 'So where's the catch?' he managed.
Everywhere, thought Moist. For one thing, I won't be storing it in my cellar, I'll be storing it in someone else's pocket. But you really don't need to know that right now.
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