by The Wit
‘I was just skipping—’
‘Quite. Real children don’t go hop-pity-skip unless they are on drugs.’
He grinned at her.
‘If I catch you being twee again I will knot your arms behind your head,’ said Susan levelly
*
Susan reads a bedtime story:
‘… and then Jack chopped down the beanstalk, adding murder and ecological vandalism to the theft, enticement and trespass charges already mentioned, but he got away with it and lived happily ever after without so much as a guilty twinge about what he had done. Which proves that you can be excused just about anything if you’re a hero, because no one asks inconvenient questions.’
*
Death in person did not turn up upon the cessation of every life. It was not necessary. Governments govern, but prime ministers and presidents do not personally turn up in people’s homes to tell them how to run their lives, because of the mortal danger this would present. There are laws instead.
*
It was the night before Hogswatch. All through the house …
… one creature stirred. It was a mouse.
And someone, in the face of all appropriateness, had baited a trap. Although, because it was the festive season, they’d used a piece of pork crackling. The smell of it had been driving the mouse mad all day but now, with no one about, it was prepared to risk it.
The mouse didn’t know it was a trap. Mice aren’t good at passing on information. Young mice aren’t taken up to famous trap sites and told, ‘This is where your Uncle Arthur passed away’ All it knew was that, what the hey here was something to eat. On a wooden board with some wire round it.
A brief scurry later and its jaw had closed on the rind.
Or, rather, passed through it.
The mouse looked around at what was now lying under the big spring, and thought, ‘Oops …’
Then its gaze went up to the black-clad figure that had faded into view by the wainscoting.
‘Squeak?’ it asked.
SQUEAK, said the Death of Rats.
‘Never say die, master. That’s our motto, eh?’ said Albert. I CAN’T SAY IT’S EVER REALLY BEEN MINE.
In Biers, unless you weren’t choosy, it paid to order a drink that was transparent because Igor also had undirected ideas about what you could stick on the end of a cocktail stick. If you saw something spherical and green, you just had to hope that it was an olive.
*
‘Did you check the list?’
YES. TWICE. ARE YOU SURE THAT’S ENOUGH?
‘Definitely’
COULDN’T REALLY MAKE HEAD OR TAIL OF IT, TO TELL YOU THE TRUTH. HOW CAN I TELL IF HE’S BEEN NAUGHTY OR NICE, FOR EXAMPLE?
‘Oh, well … I don’t know … Has he hung his clothes up, that sort of thing …’
AND IF HE HAS BEEN GOOD I may give him this KLATCHIAN WAR CHARIOT WITH REAL SPINNING SWORD BLADES?
‘That’s right.’
AND IF HE’S BEEN BAD?
Albert scratched his head. ‘When I was a lad, you got a bag of bones, ‘s’mazing how kids got better behaved towards the end of the year.’
OH DEAR. AND NOW?
Albert held a package up to his ear and rustled it. ‘Sounds like socks.’
SOCKS.
‘Could be a woolly vest.’
SERVE HIM RIGHT, IF I MAY VENTURE TO EXPRESS AN OPINION…
*
The guard was cowering behind an overturned cabinet. He cringed back as Teatime stepped over it. ‘What’re you doing here?’ he shouted. ‘Who are you?’
‘Ah, I’m glad you asked. I’m your worst nightmare!’ said Teatime cheerfully.
The man shuddered.
‘You mean … the one with the giant cabbage and the sort of whirring knife thing?’
‘Sorry?’ Teatime looked momentarily nonplussed.
‘Then you’re the one about where I’m falling, only instead of ground underneath it’s all—’
‘No, in fact I’m—’
The guard sagged. ‘Awww, not the one where there’s all this kind of, you know, mud and then everything goes blue—’
‘No, I’m—’
‘Oh, shit, then you’re the one where there’s this door only there’s no floor beyond it and then there’s these claws—’
‘No,’ said Teatime. ‘Not that one.’ He withdrew a dagger from his sleeve. ‘I’m the one where this man comes out of nowhere and kills you stone dead.’
The guard grinned with relief. ‘Oh, that one,’ he said. ‘But that one’s not very—’
*
The snow had done what even wizards and the Watch couldn’t do, which was clean up Ankh-Morpork. It hadn’t had time to get dirty. In the morning it’d probably look as though the city had been covered in coffee meringue, but for now it mounded the bushes and trees in pure white.
*
Susan had never been able to see the attraction in cats. They were owned by the kind of people who liked puddings. There were actual people in the world whose idea of heaven would be a chocolate cat.
*
The late (or at least severely delayed) Bergholt Stuttley Johnson was generally recognized as the worst inventor in the world, yet in a very specialized sense. Merely bad inventors made things that failed to operate. He wasn’t among these small fry. Any fool could make something that did absolutely nothing when you pressed the button. He scorned such fumble-fingered amateurs. Everything he built worked. It just didn’t do what it said on the box. If you wanted a small ground-to-air missile, you asked Johnson to design an ornamental fountain. It amounted to pretty much the same thing. But this never discouraged him, or the morbid curiosity of his clients. Music, landscape gardening, architecture - there was no start to his talents.
*
Johnson’s inventiveness didn’t just push the edge of the envelope but often went across the room and out through the wall of the sorting office.
*
‘Amazin’,’ said Ridcully ‘This thing’s a kind of big artificial brain, then?’
‘You could think of it like that,’ said Ponder, carefully. ‘Of course, Hex doesn’t actually think. Not as such. It just appears to be thinking.’
‘Ah. Like the Dean,’ said Ridcully. ‘Any chance of fitting a brain like this into the Dean’s head?’
‘It does weigh ten tons, Archchancellor.’
Ah. Really? Oh. Quite a large crowbar would be in order, then.’
*
‘I … think my name is Bilious. I’m the … I’m the oh God of Hangovers.’
‘I’ve never heard of a God of Hangovers …’
‘You’ve heard of Bibulous, the God of Wine?’
‘Oh, yes.’
‘Big fat man, wears vine leaves round his head, always pictured with a glass in his hand … Ow. Well, you know why he’s so cheerful? Him and his big face? It’s because he knows he’s going to feel good in the morning! It’s because it’s me that—’
‘—gets the hangovers?’ said Susan.
‘I don’t even drink!’ Bilious swayed. ‘You know when people say “I had fifteen lagers last night and when I woke up my head was clear as a bell”?’
‘Oh, yes.’
‘Bastards! That’s because I was the one who woke up groaning in a pile of recycled chilli. Just once, I mean just once, I’d like to open my eyes in the morning without my head sticking to something.’
*
‘How do we usually test stuff?’
‘Generally we ask for student volunteers,’ said the Dean.
‘What happens if we don’t get any?’
‘We give it to them anyway’
‘Isn’t that a bit unethical?’
‘Not if we don’t tell them, Archchancellor.’
*
‘I am not losing my hair!’ snapped the Dean. ‘It is just very finely spaced.’
‘Half on your head and half on your hairbrush,’ said the Lecturer in Recent Runes.
‘No sense in bein’ b
ashful about goin’ bald,’ said Ridcully evenly. ‘Anyway, you know what they say about bald men, Dean.’
‘Yes, they say, “Look at him, he’s got no hair.’”
*
At the far end of the corridor was one of the very tall, very thin windows. It looked out on to the black gardens. Black bushes, black grass, black trees. Skeletal fish cruising in the black waters of a pool, under black water lilies.
There was colour, in a sense, but it was the kind of colour you’d get if you could shine a beam of black through a prism. There were hints of tints, here and there a black you might persuade yourself was a very deep purple or a midnight blue. But it was basically black, under a black sky, because this was the world belonging to Death and that was all there was to it.
*
‘Just shut up, will you?’ Ridcully said. ‘It’s Hogswatch! That’s not the time for silly arguments, all right?’
‘Oh, yes it is,’ said the Chair of Indefinite Studies glumly. ‘It’s exactly the time for silly arguments. In our family we were lucky to get through dinner without a reprise of What A Shame Henry Didn’t Go Into Business With Our Ron. Or Why Hasn’t Anyone Taught Those Kids To Use A Knife? That was another favourite.’
‘And the sulks,’ said Ponder Stibbons.
‘Oh, the sulks,’ said the Chair of Indefinite Studies. ‘Not a proper Hogswatch without everyone sitting staring at different walls.’
‘The games were worse,’ said Ponder.
‘Worse than the kids hitting one another with their toys, do you think? Not a proper Hogswatch afternoon without wheels and bits of broken dolly everywhere and everyone whining. Assault and battery included.’
‘We had a game called Hunt the Slipper,’ said Ponder. ‘Someone hid a slipper. And then we had to find it. And then we had a row.’
‘And then later on someone’ll suggest a board game,’ said Ponder.
‘That’s right. Where no one exactly remembers all the rules.’
‘Which doesn’t stop someone suggesting that you play for pennies.’
‘And five minutes later there’s two people not speaking to one another for the rest of their lives because of tuppence.’
‘And some horrible little kid—’
‘I know, I know! Some little kid who’s been allowed to stay up wins everyone’s money by being a nasty little cut-throat swot!’
‘And don’t forget the presents,’ said the Chair of Indefinite Studies, as if reading off some internal list of gloom. ‘How … how full of potential they seem in all that paper, how pregnant with possibilities … and then you open them and basically the wrapping paper was more interesting and you have to say “How thoughtful, that will come in handy!” It’s not better to give than to receive, in my opinion, it’s just less embarrassing.’
‘I’ve worked out,’ said the Senior Wrangler, ‘that over the years I have been a net exporter of Hogswatch presents—’
‘Oh, everyone is,’ said the Chair. ‘You spend a fortune on other people and what you get when all the paper is cleared away is one slipper that’s the wrong colour and a book about ear wax.’
*
‘You didn’t get that stuff out of the sack! Not cigars and peaches in brandy and grub with fancy foreign names!’
YES, IT CAME OUT OF THE SACK.
Albert gave him a suspicious look.
‘But you put it in the sack in the first place, didn’t you?’
No.
You did, didn’t you?’ Albert stated.
No.
You put all those things in the sack.’
No.
You got them from somewhere and put them in the sack.’
No.
You did put them in the sack, didn’t you?’
No.
You put them in the sack.’
YES.
*
‘They’re title deeds,’ said Medium Dave. ‘And they’re better than money’
‘Paper’s better’n money?’ said Catseye.
‘If we steal them, do they become ours?’ said Chickenwire.
‘Is that a trick question?’ said Catseye, smirking.
‘I know people say I’d kill them as soon as look at them,’ whispered Teatime. ‘And in fact I’d much rather kill you than look at you, Mr Lilywhite.’
‘And what’ll you do when he comes after you?’
‘He can’t look everywhere.’
Medium Dave shook his head. You only had to look into Teatime’s mismatched eyes to know one thing, which was this: that if Teatime wanted to find you he would not look everywhere. He’d look in only one place, which would be the place where you were hiding.
‘They’ve piled the teeth up in a magic circle downstairs,’ said Susan.
Violet’s eyes and mouth formed three Os. It was like looking at a pink bowling ball.
‘What for?’
‘I think they’re using them to control the children. By magic’
Violet’s mouth opened wider.
‘That’s horrid.’
Horrible, thought Susan. The word is ‘horrible’. ‘Horrid’ is a childish word selected to impress nearby males with one’s fragility, if I’m any judge.
It is said that the prospect of hanging concentrates the mind wonderfully, but it was Valium compared to being watched by Mister Teatime.
*
‘I could certainly run a marvellous university here if only we didn’t have to have these damn students underfoot all the time.’
*
‘All right,’ said Susan. ‘I’m not stupid. You’re saying humans need … fantasies to make life bearable.’
REALLY? AS IF IT WAS SOME KIND OF PINK PILL? NO. HUMANS NEED FANTASY TO BE HUMAN. TO BE THE PLACE WHERE THE FALLING ANGEL MEETS THE RISING APE.
‘Tooth fairies? Hogfathers? Little—’
YES. AS PRACTICE. YOU HAVE TO START OUT LEARNING TO BELIEVE THE LITTLE LIES.
‘So we can believe the big ones?’
YES. JUSTICE. MERCY. DUTY. THAT SORT OF THING.
‘They’re not the same at all!’
YOU THINK SO? THEN TAKE THE UNIVERSE AND GRIND IT DOWN TO THE FINEST POWDER AND SIEVE IT THROUGH THE FINEST SIEVE AND THEN SHOW ME ONE ATOM OF JUSTICE, ONE MOLECULE OF MERCY. AND YET— Death waved a hand. AND YET YOU ACT AS IF THERE IS SOME IDEAL ORDER IN THE WORLD, AS IF THERE IS SOME … SOME RIGHTNESS IN THE UNIVERSE BY WHICH IT MAY BE JUDGED.
Yes, but people have got to believe that, or what’s the point—’
MY POINT EXACTLY.
*
Death fumbled inside his robe.
I HAVE MADE THIS FOR YOU.
Susan reached out and took a square of damp cardboard. Water dripped off the bottom. Somewhere in the middle, a few brown feathers seemed to have been glued on.
‘Thank you. Er … what is it?’
ALBERT SAID THERE OUGHT TO BE SNOW ON IT, BUT IT APPEARS TO HAVE MELTED, said Death. IT IS, OF COURSE, A HOGSWATCH CARD.
‘Oh …’
THERE SHOULD HAVE BEEN A ROBIN ON IT AS WELL, BUT I HAD CONSIDERABLE DIFFICULTY IN GETTING IT TO STAY ON.
‘Ah …’
IT WAS NOT AT ALL CO-OPERATIVE.
‘Really … ?’
IT DID NOT SEEM TO GET INTO THE HOGSWATCH SPIRIT AT ALL.
DISGWORLD goes to war, with armies of sardines, warriors, fishermen, squid and at least one very camp follower.
As two armies march, Commander Vimes of Ankfe-Morpork City Watch faces Unpleasant foes who are out to get Mm … and that’s just the people on his side. The enemy might be even worse.
Jingo makes the World Cup look like a friendly five-a-side.
As every student of exploration knows, the prize goes not to the explorer who first sets foot upon the virgin soil but to the one who gets that foot home first. If it is still attached to his leg, this is a bonus.
*
Detritus’s intelligence wasn’t too bad for a troll, falling somewhere between a cuttlefish and a line-dancer.
*
‘Oh, history,’ said Lord Selachii. That’s all in the past!’
‘Gentlemen, please,’ said the Patrician. ‘Let’s have no fighting, please. This is, after all, a council of war’
*
‘A Klatchian bigwig is coming here?’ said Vimes. ‘No one told me!’
‘Strange as it may seem, Sir Samuel, I am occasionally capable of governing this city for minutes at a time without seeking your advice and guidance.’
*
‘My mum’s uncle was a sailor,’ said Nobby. ‘But after the big plague he got press-ganged. Bunch of farmers got him drunk, he woke up next morning tied to a plough.’
*
Sergeant Colon had had a broad education. He’d been to the School of My Dad Always Said, the College of It Stands to Reason, and was now a postgraduate student at the University of What Some Bloke In the Pub Told Me.
*
Technically they were all in uniform, too, except that mostly they weren’t wearing the same uniform as anyone else. Everyone had just been sent down to the armoury to collect whatever fitted, and the result was a walking historical exhibit: Funny-Shaped Helmets Through the Ages.
*
‘Dad?’
‘Yes, lad?’
‘Who was Mr Hong?’
‘How should I know?’
‘Only, when we was all heading back for the boats one of the other men said, “We all know what happened to Mr Hong when he opened the Three Jolly Luck Take-Away Fish Bar on the site of the old fish-god temple in Dagon Street on the night of the full moon, don’t we … ?” Well, I don’t know.’
‘Ah …’ Solid Jackson hesitated. Still, Les was a big lad now …
‘He … closed up and left in a bit of a hurry, lad. So quick he had to leave some things behind.’
‘Like what?’
‘If you must know … half an ear-hole and one kidney’
*
A few moments later Sergeant Colon walked carefully down to the main office. He toyed with some paper for a while and then said:
‘You don’t mind what people call you, do you, Nobby?’