“Her?” said Albert.
SQUEAK.
“She’ll crack soon enough,” said Albert. “Oh, yes. You can’t be an immortal and a mortal at the same time, it’ll tear you in half. I almost feels sorry for her.”
SQUEAK, agreed the Death of Rats.
“And that ain’t the worst bit,” said Albert. “You wait till her memory really starts working…”
SQUEAK.
You listen to me,” said Albert. “You’d better start looking for him right away.”
Susan awoke, and had no idea what time it was.
There was a clock by the bedside, because Death knew there should be things like bedside clocks. It had skulls and bones and the omega sign on it, and it didn’t work. There were no working clocks in the house, except the special one in the hall. Any others got depressed and stopped, or unwound themselves all in one go.
Her room looked as though someone had moved out yesterday. There were hairbrushes on the dressing table, and a few odds and ends of makeup. There was even a dressing gown on the back of the door. It had a rabbit on the pocket. The cozy effect would have been improved if it hadn’t been a skeletal one.
She had a rummage through the drawers. This must have been her mother’s room. There was a lot of pink. Susan had nothing against pink in moderation, but this wasn’t it; she put on her old school dress.
The important thing, she decided, was to stay calm. There was always a logical explanation for everything, even if you had to make it up.
SQEAUFF.
The Death of Rats landed on the dressing table, claws scrabbling for a purchase. He removed the tiny scythe from his jaws.
“I think,” said Susan carefully, “that I would like to go home now, thank you.”
The little rat nodded, and leapt.
It landed on the edge of the pink carpet and scurried away across the dark floor beyond.
When Susan stepped off the carpet the rat stopped and looked around in approval. Once again, she felt she’d passed some sort of test.
She followed it out into the hall and then into the smoky cavern of the kitchen. Albert was bent over the stove.
“’Morning,” he said, out of habit rather than any acknowledgment of the time of day. “You want fried bread with your sausages? There’s porridge to follow.”
Susan looked at the mess sizzling in the huge frying pan. It wasn’t a sight to be seen on an empty stomach, although it could probably cause one. Albert could make an egg wish it had never been laid.
“Haven’t you got any muesli?” she said.
“Is that some kind of sausage?” said Albert suspiciously.
“It’s nuts and grains.”
“Any fat in it?”
“I don’t think so.”
“How’re you suppose to fry it, then?”
“You don’t fry it.”
“You call that breakfast?”
“It doesn’t have to be fried to be breakfast,” said Susan. “I mean, you mentioned porridge, and you don’t fry porridge—”
“Who says?”
“A boiled egg, then?”
“Hah, boiling’s no good, it don’t kill off all the germs.”
“BOIL ME AN EGG, ALBERT.”
As the echoes bounced and died away, Susan wondered where the voice had came from.
Albert’s ladle tinkled on the tiles.
“Please?” said Susan.
“You did the voice,” said Albert.
“Don’t bother about the egg,” said Susan. The voice had made her jaw ache. It worried her even more than it worried Albert. After all, it was her mouth. “I want to go home!”
“You are home,” said Albert.
“This place? This isn’t my home!”
“Yeah? What’s the inscription on the big clock?”
“‘Too Late,’” said Susan promptly.
“Where are the beehives?”
“In the orchard.”
“How many plates’ve we got?”
“Seven—” Susan shut her mouth firmly.
“See? It’s home to part of you,” said Albert.
“Look…Albert,” said Susan, trying sweet reason in case it worked any better this time round, “maybe there is…someone…sort of…in charge of things but I’m really no one special…I mean…”
“Yeah? How come the horse knows you?”
“Yes, but I really am just a normal girl—”
“Normal girls didn’t get a My Little Binky set on their third birthday!” snapped Albert. “Your dad took it away. The Master was very upset about that. He was trying.”
“I mean I’m an ordinary kid!”
“Listen, ordinary kids get a xylophone. They don’t just ask their granddad to take his shirt off!”
“I mean I can’t help it! That’s not my fault! It’s not fair!”
“Really? Oh, why didn’t you say?” said Albert sourly. “That cuts a lot of thin ice, that does. I should just go out now, if I was you, and tell the universe that it’s not fair. I bet it’ll say, oh, all right then, sorry you’ve been troubled, you’re let off.”
“That’s sarcasm! You can’t talk to me like that! You’re just a servant!”
“That’s right. And so are you. So I should get started, if I was you. The Rat’ll help. He mainly does rats, but the principle’s the same.”
Susan sat with her mouth open.
“I’m going outside,” she snapped.
“I ain’t stopping you.”
Susan stormed out through the back door, across the enormous expanses of the outer room, past the grindstone in the yard, and into the garden.
“Huh,” she said.
If someone had told Susan that Death had a house, she would have called them mad or, even worse, stupid. But if she’d had to imagine one, she’d have drawn, in sensible black crayon, some towering, battlemented, Gothic mansion. It would loom, and involve other words ending in “oom,” like gloom and doom. There would have been thousands of windows. She’d fill odd corners of the sky with bats. It would be impressive.
It wouldn’t be a cottage. It wouldn’t have a rather tasteless garden. It wouldn’t have a mat in front of the door with “Welcome” on it.
Susan had invincible walls of common sense. They were beginning to melt like salt in a wet wind, and that made her angry.
There was grandfather Lezek, of course, on his little farm so poor that even the sparrows had to kneel down to eat. He’d been a nice old chap, so far as she could recall; a bit sheepish, now she came to think about it, especially when her father was around.
Her mother had told Susan that her own father had been…
Now she came to think about that, she wasn’t sure what her mother had told her. Parents were quite clever at not telling people things, even when they used a lot of words. She’d just been left with the impression that he wasn’t around.
Now it was being suggested that he was renowned for being around all the time.
It was like having a relative in trade.
A god, now…a god would be something. Lady Odile Flume, in the fifth form, was always boasting that her great-great-grandmother had once been seduced by the god Blind Io in the form of a vase of daisies, which apparently made her a demi-hemi-semi-goddess. She said her mother found it useful to get a table in restaurants. Saying you were a close relative of Death probably would not have the same effect. You probably wouldn’t even manage a seat near the kitchen.
If it was all some kind of dream, she didn’t seem at any risk of waking up. Anyway, she didn’t believe in that kind of thing. Dreams weren’t like this.
A path led from the stable yard past a vegetable garden and, descending slightly, into an orchard of black-leaved trees. Glossy black apples hung from them. Off to one side were some white beehives.
And she knew she’d seen it all before.
There was an apple tree that was quite, quite different from the others.
She stood and stared at it as memory flooded back.
She remembered being just old enough to see how logically stupid the whole idea was, and he’d been standing there, anxiously waiting to see what she’d do…
Old certainties drained away, to be replaced by new certainties.
Now she understood whose granddaughter she was.
The Mended Drum had traditionally gone in for, well, traditional pub games, such as dominoes, darts, and Stabbing People In The Back and Taking All Their Money. The new owner had decided to go up-market. This was the only available direction.
There had been The Quizzing Device, a three-ton water-driven monstrosity based on a recently discovered design by Leonard of Quirm. It had been a bad idea. Captain Carrot of the Watch, who had a mind like a needle under his open, smiling face, had surreptitiously substituted a new roll of questions like: Were you nere Vortin’s Diamond Warehourse on the Nite of the 15th? and: Who was the Third Man Who did the Blagging At Bearhugger’s Distillery Larst week? and had arrested three customers before they caught on.
The owner had promised another machine any day now. The Librarian, one of the tavern’s regulars, had been collecting pennies in readiness.
There was a small stage at one end of the bar. The owner had tried a lunchtime stripper, but only once. At the sight of a large orang-utan in the front row with a big innocent grin, a big bag of penny pieces, and a big banana the poor girl had fled. Yet another entertainment Guild had blacklisted the Drum.
The new owner’s name was Hibiscus Dunelm. It wasn’t his fault. He really wanted to make the Drum, he said, a fun place. For two pins he’d have put stripy umbrellas outside.
He looked down at Glod.
“Just three of you?” he said.
“Yes.”
“When I agreed to five dollars you said you had a big band.”
“Say hello, Lias.”
“My word, that is a big band.” Dunelm backed away. “I thought,” he said, “just a few numbers that everyone knows? Just to provide some ambience.”
“Ambience,” said Imp, looking around the Drum. He was familiar with the word. But, in a place like this, it was all lost and alone. There were only three or four customers in at this early hour of the evening. They weren’t paying any attention to the stage.
The wall behind the stage had clearly seen action. He stared at it as Lias patiently stacked up his stones.
“Oh, just a bit of fruit and old eggs,” said Glod. “People probably get a bit boisterous. I shouldn’t worry about that.”
“I’m not worried about it,” said Imp.
“I should think not.”
“It’s the ax marks and arrow holles I’m worried about. Gllod, we haven’t even practiced! Not properly!”
“You can play your guitar, can’t you?”
“Well, yes, I suppose…”
He’d tried it out. It was easy to play. In fact, it was almost impossible to play badly. It didn’t seem to matter how he touched the strings—they still rang out the tune he had in mind. It was, in solid form, the kind of instrument you dream about when you first start to play—the one you can play without learning. He remembered when he’d first picked up a harp and struck the strings, confidently expecting the kind of lambent tones the old men coaxed from them. He’d got a discord instead. But this was the instrument he’d dreamed of…
“We’ll stick to numbers everyone knows,” said the dwarf. “‘A Wizard’s Staff’ and ‘Gathering Rhubarb.’ Stuff like that. People like songs they can snigger along to.”
Imp looked down at the bar. It was filling up a bit now. But his attention was drawn to a large orang-utan, which had pulled up its chair right in front of the stage and was holding a bag of fruit.
“Gllod, there’s an ape watching us.”
“Well?” said Glod, unfolding a string bag.
“It’s an ape.”
“This is Ankh-Morpork. That’s how things are here.” Glod removed his helmet and unfolded something from inside.
“Why’ve you got a string bag?” said Imp.
“Fruit’s fruit. Waste not, want not. If they throw eggs, try to catch them.”
Imp slung the guitar’s strap over his shoulder. He’d tried to tell the dwarf, but what could he say: This is too easy to play?
He hoped there was a god of musicians.
And there is. There are many, one for almost every type of music. Almost every type. But the only one due to watch over Imp that night was Reg, god of club musicians, who couldn’t pay much attention because he’d also got three other gigs to do.
“We ready?” said Lias, picking his hammers.
The others nodded.
“Let’s give ’em ‘The Wizard’s Staff,’ then,” said Glod. “That always breaks the ice.”
“Okay,” said the troll. He counted on his fingers. “One, two…one, two, many, lots.”
The first apple was thrown seven seconds later. It was caught by Glod, who didn’t miss a note. But the first banana curved viciously and grounded in his ear.
“Keep playing!” he hissed.
Imp obeyed, ducking a fusillade of oranges.
In the front row, the ape opened his bag and produced a very large melon.
“Can you see any pears?” said Glod, taking a breath. “I like pears.”
“I can see a man with a throwing ax!”
“Does it look valuable?”
An arrow vibrated in the wall by Lias’s head.
It was three in the morning. Sergeant Colon and Corporal Nobbs were reaching the conclusion that anyone who intended to invade Ankh-Morpork probably wasn’t going to do so now. And there was a good fire back in the watch house.
“We could leave a note,” said Nobby, blowing on his fingers. “You know? Come back tomorrow, sort of thing?”
He looked up. A solitary horse was walking under the gate arch. A white horse, with a somber, black-clad rider.
There was no question of “Halt, who goes there?” The night watch walked the streets at strange hours and had become accustomed to seeing things not generally seen by mortal men.
Sergeant Colon touched his helmet respectfully.
“‘Evenin’, your lordship,” he said.
“Er…GOOD EVENING.”
The guards watched the horse walk out of sight.
“Some poor bugger’s in for it, then,” said Sergeant Colon.
“He’s dedicated, you got to admit it,” said Nobby. “Out at all hours. Always got time for people.”
“Yeah.”
The guards stared into the velvety dark. Something not quite right, thought Sergeant Colon.
“What’s his first name?” said Nobby.
They stared some more. Then Sergeant Colon, who still hadn’t quite been able to put his finger on it, said, “What do you mean, what’s his first name?”
“What’s his first name?”
“He’s Death,” said the sergeant. “Death. That’s his whole name. I mean…what do you mean?…you mean like…Keith Death?”
“Well, why not?”
“He’s just Death, isn’t he?”
“No, that’s just his job. What do his friends call him?”
“What do you mean, friends?”
“All right. Please yourself.”
“Let’s go and get a hot rum.”
“I think he looks like a Leonard.”
Sergeant Colon remembered the voice. That was it. Just for a moment there…
“I must be getting old,” he said. “For a moment there I thought he sounded like a Susan.”
“I think they saw me,” whispered Susan, as the horse rounded a corner.
The Death of Rats poked its head out of her pocket.
SQUEAK.
“I think we’re going to need that raven,” said Susan. “I mean, I…think I understand you, I just don’t know what you’re saying…”
Binky stopped outside a large house, set back a little from the road. It was a slightly pretentious residence with more gables and mullions than it should rightl
y have, and this was a clue to its origins: it was the kind of house built for himself by a rich merchant when he goes respectable and needs to do something with the loot.
“I’m not happy about this,” said Susan. “It can’t possibly work. I’m human. I have to go to the toilet and things like that. I can’t just walk into people’s houses and kill them!”
SQUEAK.
“All right, not kill. But it’s not good manners, however you look at it.”
A sign on the door said: Tradesmen to rear entrance.
“Do I count as—”
SQUEAK!
Susan normally would never have dreamed of asking. She’d always seen herself as a person who went through the front doors of life.
The Death of Rats scuttled up the path and through the door.
“Hang on! I can’t—”
Susan looked at the wood. She could. Of course she could. More memories crystallized in front of her eyes. After all, it was only wood. It’d rot in a few hundred years. By the measure of infinity, it hardly existed at all. On average, considered over the lifetime of the multiverse, most things didn’t.
She stepped forward. The heavy oak door offered as much resistance as a shadow.
Grieving relatives were clustered around the bed where, almost lost in the pillows, was a wrinkled old man. At the foot of the bed, paying no attention whatsoever to the keening around it, was a large, very fat, ginger cat.
SQUEAK.
Susan looked at the hourglass. The last few grains tumbled through the pinch.
The Death of Rats, with exaggerated caution, sneaked up behind the sleeping cat and kicked it hard. The animal awoke, turned, flattened its ears in terror, and leapt off the quilt.
The Death of Rats sniggered.
SNH, SNH, SNH.
One of the mourners, a pinch-faced man, looked up. He peered at the sleeper.
“That’s it,” he said, “He’s gone.”
“I thought we were going to be here all day,” said the woman next to him, standing up. “Did you see that wretched old cat move? Animals can tell, you know. They’ve got this sixth sense.”
SNH, SNH, SNH.
“Well, come on there, I know you’re here somewhere,” said the corpse. It sat up.
Susan was familiar with the idea of ghosts. But she hadn’t expected it to be like this. She hadn’t expected the ghosts to be the living, but they were merely pale sketches in the air compared to the old man sitting up in bed. He looked solid enough, but a blue glow outlined him.
Discworld 16 - Soul Music Page 8