Discworld 16 - Soul Music

by Terry Pratchett

  “Ah, yes. I can definitely not see her. Good. And now, if you don’t play Music With Rocks In this time, we’re dead.”

  Buddy picked up the guitar. The strings trembled under his fingers. He felt elated. He’d been allowed to play it in front of them. Everything else was unimportant now. Whatever happened next didn’t matter.

  “You ain’t heard nothing yet,” he said.

  He stamped his foot.

  “One, two, one two three four—”

  Glod had time to recognize the tune before the music took him. He’d heard it only a few seconds before. But now it swung.

  Ponder peered into his box.

  “I think we’re trapping this, Archchancellor,” he said, “But I don’t know what it is.”

  Ridcully nodded, and scanned the audience. They were listening with their mouths open. The harp had scoured their souls, and now the guitar was hot-wiring their spines.

  And there was an empty patch near the stage.

  Ridcully put a hand over one eye and focused until the other eye watered. Then he smiled.

  He turned to look at the Musicians’ Guild and saw, to his horror, that Satchelmouth was raising a crossbow. He seemed to be doing it with reluctance; Mr. Clete was prodding him.

  Ridcully raised a finger and appeared to scratch his nose.

  Even above the sound of the playing he heard the twang as the crossbow’s string broke and, to his secret delight, a yelp from Mr. Clete as a loose end caught his ear. He hadn’t even thought of that.

  “I’m just an old softy, that’s my trouble,” Ridcully said to himself. “Hat. Hat. Hat.”

  “You know, this was an extremely good idea,” said the Bursar, as the tiny images moved in the crystal ball. “What an excellent way to see things. Could we perhaps have a look at the Opera House?”

  “How about the Skunk Club in Brewer Street?” said the Senior Wrangler.

  “Why?” said the Bursar.

  “Just a thought,” said the Senior Wrangler quickly. “I’ve never been in there at all in any way, you understand.”

  “We really shouldn’t be doing this,” said the Lecturer in Recent Runes. “It’s really not a proper use of a magic crystal—”

  “I can’t think of a better use of a magic crystal,” said the Dean, “than to see people playing Music With Rocks In.”

  Mr. Scrub, The Duck Man, Coffin Henry, Arnold Sideways, Foul Ole Ron and Foul Ole Ron’s Smell and Foul Ole Ron’s dog ambled around the edges of the crowd. Pickings had been particularly good. They always were when Dibbler’s hot dogs were on sale. There were some things people wouldn’t eat even under the influence of Music With Rocks In. There were some things even mustard couldn’t disguise.

  Arnold gathered up the scraps and put them in a basket on his trolley. There was going to be the prince of a primal soup under the bridge tonight.

  The music had poured over them. They ignored it. Music With Rocks In was the stuff of dreams, and there were no dreams under the bridge.

  Then they’d stopped, and listened, as new music poured out over the park and took every man and woman and thing by the hand and showed him or her or it the way home.

  The beggars stood and listened, mouths open. Someone looking from face to face, if anyone did look at the invisible beggars, would have had to turn away…

  Except from Mr. Scrub. You couldn’t turn away there.

  When the band were playing Music With Rocks In again the beggars got back down to earth.

  Except for Mr. Scrub. He just stood and stared.

  The last note rang out.

  Then, as the tsunami of applause began to roll, The Band ran off the stage.

  Dibbler watched happily from the wings at the other side of the stage. He’d been a bit worried for a while there, but it all seemed back on course now.

  Someone tugged at his sleeve.

  “What’re they doing, Mr. Dibbler?”

  Dibbler turned.

  “Scum, isn’t it?” he said.

  “It’s Crash, Mr. Dibbler.”

  “What they’re doing, Scum, is not giving the audience what they want,” said Dibbler. “Superb business practice. Wait till they’re screaming for it, and then take it away. You wait. By the time the crowd is stamping its feet they’ll come prancing back on again. Superb timing. When you learn that sort of trick, Scum—”

  “It’s Crash, Mr. Dibbler.”

  “—then maybe you’ll know how to play Music With Rocks In. Music With Rocks In, Scum—”

  “—Crash—”

  “isn’t just music,” said Dibbler, pulling some cotton wool out of his ears. “It’s lots of things. Don’t ask me how.”

  Dibbler lit a cigar. The din made the match flame flicker.

  “Any minute now,” he said. “You’ll see.”

  There was a fire that had been made of old boots and mud. A grey shape circled it, snuffling excitedly.

  “Get on, get on, get on!”

  “Mr. Dibbler’s not going to like this,” moaned Asphalt.

  “Tough one for Mr. Dibbler,” said Glod, as they hauled Buddy into the cart. “Now I want to see those hooves spark, know what I mean?”

  “Head for Quirm,” said Buddy, as the cart jerked into motion. He didn’t know why. It just seemed the right destination.

  “Not a good idea,” said Glod. “People’ll probably want to ask questions about that cart I pulled out of the swimming pool.”

  “Head toward Quirm!”

  “Mr. Dibbler’s really not going to like this,” said Asphalt, as the cart swung out onto the road.

  “Any…moment…now,” said Dibbler.

  “I expect so,” said Crash. “Because they’re stamping their feet, I think.”

  There was indeed a certain thumping under the cheers.

  “You wait,” said Dibbler. “They’ll judge it just right. No problem. Akk!”

  “You’re supposed to put your cigar in your mouth the other way round, Mr. Dibbler,” said Crash meekly.

  The waning moon lit the landscape as the cart bounced out of the gates and along the Quirm road.

  “How did you know I’d got the cart made ready?” said Glod, as they landed after a brief flight.

  “I didn’t,” said Buddy.

  “But you ran out!”

  “Yes.”

  “Why?”

  “It was…just…time.”

  “Why d’you want to go to Quirm?” said Cliff.

  “I…I can get a boat home, can’t I?” said Buddy. “That’s right. A boat home.”

  Glod glanced at the guitar. This felt wrong. It couldn’t just…and then they’d just walk away…

  He shook his head. What could go wrong now?

  “Mr. Dibbler’s really not going to like this,” moaned Asphalt.

  “Oh, shut up,” said Glod. “I don’t know what he’s got not to like.”

  “Well, for a start,” said Asphalt, “the main thing, the thing he won’t like most, is…um…we’ve got the money…”

  Cliff reached down under the seat. There was a dull, clinking noise, of the sort made by a lot of gold keeping nice and quiet.

  The stage was trembling with the vibration of the stamping. There was some shouting now.

  Dibbler turned to Crash and grinned horribly.

  “Hey, I’ve just had a great idea,” he said.

  A tiny shape swarmed up the road from the river. Ahead of it, the lights of the stage glowed in the dusk.

  The Archchancellor nudged Ponder and flourished his staff.

  “Now,” he said, “if there’s a sudden rip in reality and horrible screaming Things come through, our job is to—” He scratched his head. “What is it the Dean says? Kick a righteous donkey?”

  “Some righteous ass, sir,” said Ponder. “He says kick some righteous ass.”

  Ridcully peered at the empty stage.

  “I don’t see one,” he said.

  The four members of The Band sat up and stared straight ahead, over the moonl
it plain.

  Finally Cliff broke the silence.

  “How much?”

  “Best part of five thousand dollars—”

  “FIVE THOUSAND DOL—?”

  Cliff clamped his huge hand over Glod’s mouth.

  “Why?” said Cliff, as the dwarf squirmed.

  “MMF MMFMMF MMFMMFS?”

  “I got a bit confused,” said Asphalt. “Sorry.”

  “We’ll never get far enough,” said Cliff. “You know dat? Not even if we die.”

  “I tried to tell you all!” Asphalt moaned. “Maybe…maybe we could take it back?”

  “MMF MMF MMF?”

  “How can we do dat?”

  “MMF MMF MMF?”

  “Glod,” said Cliff, in a reasonable tone of voice, “I’m going to take my hand away. And you’re not to shout. Right?”

  “Mmf.”

  “Okay.”

  “TAKE IT BACK? FIVE THOUSAND DOL—mmf-mmfmmf—”

  “I suppose some of dat is ours,” said Cliff, tightening his grip.

  “Mmf!”

  “I know I haven’t had any wages,” said Asphalt.

  “Let’s get to Quirm,” said Buddy urgently. “We can take out what’s…ours and send the rest back to him.”

  Cliff scratched his chin with his free hand.

  “Some of it belongs to Chrysoprase,” said Asphalt. “Mr. Dibbler borrowed some money off him to set up the Festival.”

  “We won’t get away from him,” said Cliff, “except if we drive all der way to der Rim and chuck ourselves over. And even den, only maybe.”

  “We could explain…couldn’t…we…?” said Asphalt.

  A vision of Chrsyoprase’s gleaming marble head formed in their vision.

  “Mmf.”

  “No.”

  “Quirm, then,” said Buddy.

  Cliff’s diamond teeth glittered in the moonlight.

  “I thought…” he said, “I thought…I heard something on der road back there. Sounded like harness—”

  The invisible beggars began to wander away from the park. Foul Ole Ron’s Smell had stayed on for a while, because it was enjoying the music. And Mr. Scrub still hadn’t moved.

  “We got nearly twenty sausages,” said Arnold Sideways.

  Coffin Henry coughed a cough with bones in it.

  “Buggrem!” said Foul Ole Ron, “I told ’em, spying’ on me with rays!”

  Something bounded across the trodden turf toward Mr. Scrub, ran up his robe, and grabbed either side of his hood with both paws.

  There was the hollow sound of two skulls meeting.

  Mr. Scrub staggered backward.

  SQUEAK!

  Mr. Scrub blinked and sat down suddenly.

  The beggars stared down at the little figure jumping up and down on the cobbles. Being of an invisible nature themselves, they were naturally good at seeing things unseen by other men or, in the case of Foul Ole Ron, by any known eyeball.

  “That’s a rat,” said The Duck Man.

  “Buggrit,” said Foul Ole Ron.

  The rat pranced in circles on its hind legs, squeaking loudly. Mr. Scrub blinked again. And Death stood up.

  I HAVE TO GO, he said.

  SQUEAK!

  Death strode away, stopped, and came back. He pointed a skeletal finger at The Duck Man.

  WHY, he said, ARE YOU WALKING AROUND WITH THAT DUCK?

  “What duck?”

  AH. SORRY.

  “Listen, how can it go wrong?” said Crash, waving his hands frantically. “It’s got to work. Everyone knows that when you get your big chance because the star is ill or something, then the audience’ll go mad for you. It happens every time, right?”

  Jimbo, Noddy, and Scum peered around the curtain at the pandemonium. They nodded uncertainly.

  Of course things always went well when you had your big chance.

  “We could do ‘Anarchy in Ankh-Morpork,’” said Jimbo doubtfully.

  “We haven’t got that right,” said Noddy.

  “Yeah, but there’s nothing new about that.”

  “I suppose we could give it a try…”

  “Excellent!” said Crash. He raised his guitar defiantly. “We can do it! For the sake of sex and drugs and Music With Rocks In!”

  He was aware of their disbelieving stares.

  “You never said you’d had any drugs,” said Jimbo accusingly.

  “If it comes to that,” said Noddy, “I don’t reckon you’ve ever had—”

  “One out of three ain’t bad!” shouted Crash.

  “Yes it is, it’s only thirty-three per—”

  “Shut up!”

  People were stamping their feet and clapping their hands derisively.

  Ridcully squinted along his staff.

  “There was the Holy St. Bobby,” he said. “I suppose he was a righteous ass, come to think about it.”

  “Sorry?” said Ponder.

  “He was a donkey,” said Ridcully. “Hundreds of years ago. Got made a bishop in the Omnian church for carrying some holy man, I believe. Can’t get more righteous than that.”

  “No…no…no…Archchancellor,” said Ponder. “It’s just a sort of military saying. It means…the…you know, sir…backside.”

  “I wonder how we tell which bit that is?” said Ridcully. “The creatures from the Dungeon Dimensions have legs and things all over the place.”

  “I don’t know, sir,” said Ponder wearily.

  “Perhaps we’d just better kick everything, to be on the safe side.”

  Death caught up with the rat near the Brass Bridge.

  No one had disturbed Albert. Since he was in the gutter, he’d become nearly as invisible as Coffin Henry.

  Death rolled his sleeve up. His hand moved through the fabric of Albert’s coat as if it was mist.

  DAFT OLD FOOL ALWAYS TOOK IT WITH HIM, he muttered. I CAN’T IMAGINE WHAT HE THOUGHT I’D DO WITH IT…

  The hand came out, cupping a fragment of curved glass. A pinch of sand glittered on it.

  THIRTY-FOUR SECONDS, said Death. He handed the glass to the rat. FIND SOMETHING TO PUT THIS IN. AND DON’T DROP IT.

  He stood up, and surveyed the world.

  There was the glong-glong-glong noise of an empty beer bottle bouncing on the stones as the Death of Rats trotted back out of the Mended Drum.

  Thirty-four seconds of sand orbited slightly erratically inside it.

  Death hauled his servant to his feet. No time was passing for Albert. His eyes were glazed, his body clock idled. He hung from his master’s arm like a cheap suit.

  Death snatched the bottle from the rat and tilted it gently. A bit of life began to flow.

  WHERE IS MY GRANDDAUGHTER? he said. YOU HAVE TO TELL ME. OTHERWISE I CAN’T KNOW.

  Albert’s eyes clicked open.

  “She’s trying to save the boy, Master!” he said. “She doesn’t know the meaning of the word Duty—”

  Death tipped the bottle back. Albert froze in mid-sentence.

  BUT WE DO, DON’T WE, said Death bitterly. YOU AND ME.

  He nodded to the Death of Rats.

  LOOK AFTER HIM, he said.

  Death snapped his fingers.

  Nothing happened, apart from the click.

  ER. THIS IS VERY EMBARRASSING. SHE HAS SOME OF MY POWER. I DO SEEM MOMENTARILY UNABLE TO…ER…

  The Death of Rats squeaked helpfully.

  NO. YOU LOOK AFTER HIM. I KNOW WHERE THEY’RE GOING. HISTORY LIKES CYCLES.

  Death looked at the towers of Unseen University, rising over the rooftops.

  AND SOMEWHERE IN THIS TOWN IS A HORSE I CAN RIDE.

  “Hold on. Something’s coming…” Ridcully glared at the stage. “What are they?”

  Ponder stared.

  “I think…they may be human, sir.”

  The crowd had stopped stamping its collective feet and watching in a sullen, “this had better be good” silence.

  Crash stepped forward with a big mad glossy grin on his face.

  �
�Yes, but any minute they’ll split down the middle and gharstely creatures will come out,” said Ridcully hopefully.

  Crash hefted his guitar and played a chord.

  “My word!” said Ridcully.

  “Sir?”

  “That sounded exactly like a cat trying to go to the lavatory through a sewn-up bum.”

  Ponder looked aghast. “Sir, you’re not telling me you ever—”

  “No, but that’s what it’d sound like, sure enough. Exactly like that.”

  The crowd hovered, uncertain of this new development.

  “Hello, Ankh-Morpork!” said Crash. He nodded at Scum, who hit his drums at the second attempt.

  Ande Supporting Bands launched into its first and, in the event, last number. Three last numbers, in fact. Crash was trying for “Anarchy in Ankh-Morpork,” Jimbo had frozen because he couldn’t see himself in a mirror and was playing the only page he could remember from Blert Wheedown’s book, which was the index, and Noddy had got his fingers caught in the strings.

  As far as Scum was concerned, tunes’ names were things that happened to other people. He was concentrating on the rhythm. Most people don’t have to. But for Scum, even clapping his hands was an exercise in concentration. So he played in a small contented world of his own, and didn’t even notice the audience rise like a bad meal and hit the stage.

  Sergeant Colon and Corporal Nobbs were on duty at the Deosil Gate, sharing a comradely cigarette and listening to the distant roar of the Festival.

  “Sounds like a big night,” said Corporal Nobbs.

  “Right enough, Sarge.”

  “Sounds like some trouble.”

  “Good job we’re out of it, Sarge.”

  A horse came clattering up the street, its rider struggling to keep on. As it got closer they made out the contorted features of C.M.O.T. Dibbler, riding with the ease of a sack of potatoes.

  “Did a cart just go through here?” he demanded.

  “Which one, Throat?” said Sergeant Colon.

  “What do you mean, which one?”

  “Well, there was two,” said the sergeant. “One with a couple of trolls in, and one with Mr. Clete just after that. You know, the Musicians’ Guild—”

  “Oh, no!”

  Dibbler pummeled the horse into action again and bounced off into the night.