Hogfather 12 страница

'Listen,' said the king, raising his voice a little, 'I've walked miles tonight and I bet you've never seen food like this in your whole life, eh?'

Tears of humiliated embarrassment were rolling down the old man's face.

'...well, I'm sure it's very kind of you fine gennelmen but I ain't sure I knows how to eat swans and suchlike, but if you want a bit o' my beans you've only got to say...'

'Let me make myself absolutely clear,' said the king sharply. 'This is some genuine Hogswatch charity, d'you understand? And we're going to sit here and watch the smile on your grubby but honest face, is that understood?'

'And what do you say to the good king?' the page prompted.

The peasant hung his head.

' 'nk you.'

'Right,' said the king, sitting back. 'Now, pick up your fork...'

The door burst open. An indistinct figure strode into the room, snow swirling around it in a cloud.

WHAT'S GOING ON HERE?

The page started to stand up, drawing his sword. He never worked out how the other figure could have got behind him, but there it was, pressing him gently down again.

'Hello, son, my name is Albert,' said a voice by his ear. 'Why don't you put that sword back very slowly? People might get hurt.'

A finger prodded the king, who had been too shocked to move.

WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU ARE DOING, SIRE?

The king tried to focus on the figure. There was an impression of red and white, but black, too.

To Albert's secret amazement, the man managed to get to his feet and draw himself up as regally as he could.

'What is going on here, whoever you are, is some fine old Hogswatch charity! And who...'

NO, IT'S NOT.

'What? How dare you...'

WERE YOU HERE LAST MONTH? WILL YOU BE HERE NEXT WEEK? NO. BUT TONIGHT YOU WANTED TO FEEL ALL WARM INSIDE. TONIGHT YOU WILL WANT THEM TO SAY: WHAT A GOOD KING HE IS.

'Oh, no, he's going too far again...' muttered Albert under his breath. He pushed the page down again. "No, you stay still, sonny. Else you'll just be a paragraph.'

'Whatever it is, it's more than he's got!' snapped the king. 'And all we've had from him is ingratitude...'

YES, THAT DOES SPOIL IT, DOESN'T IT? Death leaned forward. GO AWAY.

To the kings's own surprise his body took over and marched him out of the door.

Albert patted the page on the shoulder. 'And you can run along too,' he said.

'... I didn't mean to go upsetting anyone, its just that I never asked no one for nothing...' mumbled the old man, in a small humble world of his own, his hands tangling themselves together out of nervousness.

'Best if you leave this one to me, master, if you don't mind,' said Albert. 'I'll be back in just a tick.' Loose ends, he thought, that's my job. Tying up loose ends. The master never thinks things through.

He caught up with the king outside.

'Ah, there you are, your sire,' he said. 'Just before you go, won't keep you a minute, just a minor point...' Albert leaned dose to the stunned monarch. 'If anyone was thinking about making a mistake, you know, like maybe sending the guards down here tomorrow, tipping the old man out of his hovel, chuckin' him in prison, anything like that... werrlll... that's the kind of mistake he ought to treasure on account of it being the last mistake he'll ever make. A word to the wise men, right?' He tapped the side of his nose conspiratorially. 'Happy Hogswatch.'

Then he hurried back into the hovel.

The feast had vanished. The old man was looking blearily at the bare table.

HALF-EATEN LEAVINGS, said Death. WE COULD CERTAINLY DO BETTER THAN THIS. He reached into the sack.

Albert grabbed his arm before he could withdraw his hand.

'Mind taking a bit of advice, master? I was brung up in a place like this.'

DOES IT BRING TEARS TO YOUR EYES?

'A box of matches to me hand, more like. Listen

The old man was only dimly aware of some whispering. He sat hunched up, staring at nothing.

WELL, IF YOU ARE SURE...

'Been there, done that, chewed the bones,' said Albert. 'Charity ain't giving people what you wants to give, it's giving people what they need to get.'

VERY WELL.

Death reached into the sack again.

HAPPY HOGSWATCH. HO. HO. HO.

There was a string of sausages. There was a side of bacon. And a small tub of salt pork. And a mass of chitterlings wrapped up in greased paper. There was a black pudding. There were several other tubs of disgusting yet savoury porkadjacent items highly prized in any pig-based economy. And, laid on the table with a soft thump, there was...

'A pig's head,' breathed the old man. 'A whole one! Ain't had brawn in years! And a basin of pig knuckles! And a bowl of pork dripping!'

HO. HO. HO.

'Amazing,' said Albert. 'How did you get the head's expression to look like the king?'

I THINK THAT'S ACCIDENTAL.

Albert patted the old man on the back.

'Have yourself a ball,' he said. 'In fact, have two. Now I think we ought to be going, master.'

They left the old man staring at the laden board.

WASN'T THAT NICE? said Death, as the hogs accelerated.

'Oh, yes,' said Albert, shaking his head. 'Poor old devil. Beans at Hogswatch? Unlucky, that. Not a night for a man to find a bean in his bowl.'

I FEEL I WAS CUT OUT FOR THIS SORT OF THING, YOU KNOW.

'Really, master?'

IT'S NICE TO DO A JOB WHERE PEOPLE LOOK FORWARD TO SEEING YOU.

'Ah,' said Albert glumly.

THEY DON'T NORMALLY LOOK FORWARD TO SEEING ME.

'Yes, I expect so.'

EXCEPT IN SPECIAL AND RATHER UNFORTUNATE CIRCUMSTANCES.

'Right, right.'

AND THEY SELDOM LEAVE A GLASS OF SHERRY OUT.

'I expect they don't, no.'

I COULD GET INTO THE HABIT OF DOING THIS, IN FACT.

'But you won't need to, will you, master?' said Albert hurriedly, with the horrible prospect of being a permanent Pixie Albert looming in his mind again. 'Because we'll get the Hogfather back.. right? That's what you said we were going to do, right? And young Susan's probably bustling around...

YES. OF COURSE.

'Not that you asked her to, of course.'

Albert's jittery ears didn't detect any enthusiasm.

Oh dear, he thought.

I HAVE ALWAYS CHOSEN THE PATH OF DUTY.

'Right, master.'

The sleigh sped on.

I AM THOROUGHLY IN CONTROL AND FIRM OF PURPOSE.

'No problem there, then, master.' said Albert.

NO NEED TO WORRY AT ALL.

'Pleased to hear it, master.'

IF I HAD A FIRST NAME, 'DUTY' WOULD BE MY MIDDLE NAME.

'Good.'

NEVERTHELESS...

Albert strained his ears and thought he heard, just on the edge of hearing, a voice whisper sadly.

HO. HO. HO.

 

There was a party going on. It seemed to occupy the entire building.

'Certainly very energetic young men,' said the oh god carefully, stepping over a wet towel. 'Are women allowed in here?'

'No,' said Susan. She stepped through a wall into the superintendent's office.

A group of young men went past, manhandling a barrel of beer.

'You'll feel bad about it in the morning,' said Bilious. 'Strong drink is a mocker, you know.'

They set it up on a table and knocked out the bung.

'Someone's going to have to be sick after all that,' he said, raising his voice above the hubbub. 'I hope you realize that. You think it's clever, do you, reducing yourself to the level of the beasts of the field... er... or the level they'd sink to if they drank, I mean.'

They moved away, leaving one mug of beer by the barrel.

The oh god glanced at it, and picked it up and sniffed at it.

'Ugh.'

Susan stepped out of the wall.

'He hasn't been back for- What're you doing?'

'I thought Id see what beer tastes like,' said the oh god guiltily.

'You don't know what beer tastes like?'

'Not on the way down, no. It's... quite different by the time it gets to me,' he said sourly. He took another sip, and then a longer one. 'I can't see what all the fuss is about,' he added.

He tipped up the empty pot.

'I suppose it comes out of this tap here,' he said. 'You know, for once in my existence I'd like to get drunk.'

'Aren't you always?' said Susan, who wasn't really paying attention.

'No. I've always been drunk. I'm sure I explained.'

'He's been gone a couple of days,' said Susan. 'That's odd. And he didn't say where he was going. The last night he was here was the night he was on Violet's list. But he paid for his room for the week, and I've got the number.'

'And the key?' said the oh god.

'What a strange idea.'

 

Mr Lilywhite's room was small. That wasn't surprising. What was surprising was how neat it was, how carefully the little bed had been made, how well the floor had been swept. It was hard to imagine anyone living in it, but there were a few signs. On the simple table by the bed was a small, rather crude portrait of a bulldog in a wig, although on closer inspection it might have been a woman. This tentative hypothesis was borne out by the inscription 'To a Good Boy, from his Mother' on the back.

A book lay next to it. Susan wondered what kind of reading someone with Mr Banjo's background would buy.

It turned out to be a book of six pages, one of those that were supposed to enthral children with the magic of the printed word by pointing out that they could See Spot Run.

There were no more than ten words on each page and yet, carefully placed between pages four and five, was a bookmark.

She turned back to the cover. The book was called Happy Tales. There was a blue sky and trees and a couple of impossibly pink children playing with a jollylooking dog.

It looked as though it had been read frequently, if slowly.

And that was it.

A dead end.

No. Perhaps not...

On the floor by the bed, as if it had been accidentally dropped, was a small, silvery halfdollar piece.

Susan picked it up and tossed it idly. She looked the oh god up and down. He was swilling a mouthful of beer from cheek to cheek and looking thoughtfully at the ceiling.

She wondered about his likelihood of survival incarnate in Ankh-Morpork at Hogswatch, especially if the cure wore off. After all, the only purpose of his existence was to have a headache and throw up. There were not a great many postgraduate jobs for which these were the main qualifications.

'Tell me,' she said. 'Have you ever ridden a horse?'

'I don't know. What's a horse?'

In the depths of the library of Death, a squeaking noise.

It was not loud, but it appeared louder than mere decibels would suggest in the furtive, scribbling hush of the books.

Everyone, it is said, has a book inside them. In this library, everyone was inside a book.

The squeaking got louder. It had a rhythmical, circular quality.

Book on book, shelf on shelf... and in every one, at the page of the ever-moving now, a scribble of handwriting following the narrative of every life...

The squeaking came round the corner.

It was issuing from what looked like a very rickety edifice, several storeys high. It looked rather like a siege tower, open at the sides. At the base, between the wheels, was a pair of geared treadles which moved the whole thing.

Susan dung to the railing of the topmost platform.

'Can't you hurry up?' she said. 'We're only at the Bi's at the moment.'

'I've been pedalling for ages!' panted the oh god.

'Well, "A" is a very popular letter.'

Susan stared up at the shelves. A was for Anon, among other things. All those people who, for one reason or another, never officially got a name.

They tended to be short books.

'M... Bo... Bod... Bog... turn left..

The library tower squeaked ponderously around the next corner.

'Ah, Bo... blast, the Bots are at least twenty shelves up.'

'Oh, how nice,' said the oh god grimly.

He heaved on the lever that moved the drive chain from one sprocket to another, and started to pedal again.

Very ponderously, the creaking tower began to telescope upwards.

'Right, we're there,' Susan shouted down, after a few minutes of slow rise. 'Here's... let's see... Aabana Bottler...'

'I expect Violet will be a lot further,' said the oh god, trying out irony.

'Onwards!'

Swaying a little, the tower headed down the Bs until.

'Stop!'

It rocked as the oh god kicked the brake block against a wheel.

'I think this is her,' said a voice from above. 'OK, you can lower away.'

A big wheel with ponderous lead weights on it spun slowly as the tower concertina'd back, creaking and grinding. Susan climbed down the last few feet.

'Everyone's in here?' said the oh god, as she thumbed through the pages.

'Yes.'

'Even gods?'

'Anything that's alive and self-aware,' said Susan, not looking up. 'This is... odd. It looks as though she's in some sort of... prison. Who'd want to lock up a tooth fairy?'

'Someone with very sensitive teeth?'

Susan flicked back a few pages. 'It's all... hoods over her head and people carrying her and so on. But...' she turned a page '... it says the last job she did was on Banjo and... yes, she got the tooth... and then she felt as though someone was behind her and... there's a ride on a cart... and the hood's come off... and there's a causeway... and...'

'All that's in a book?'

'The autobiography. Everyone has one. It writes down your life as you go along.'

'I've got one?'

'I expect so.'

'Oh, dear. "Got up, was sick, wanted to die." Not a gripping read, really.'

Susan turned the page.

'A tower,' she said. 'She's in a tower. From what she saw, it was tall and white inside... but not outside? It didn't look real. There were apple trees around it, but the trees, the trees didn't look right. And a river, but that wasn't right either. There were goldfish in it... but they were on top of the water.'

'Ah. Pollution,' said the oh god.

'I don't think so. It says here she saw them swimming!

'Swimming on top of the water?'

'That's how she thinks she saw it.'

'Really? You don't think she'd been eating any of that mouldy cheese, do you?'

'And there was blue sky but... she must have got this wrong... it says here there was only blue sky above...'

'Yep. Best place for the sky,' said the oh god. 'Sky underneath you, that probably means trouble.'

Susan flicked a page back and forth. 'She means... sky overhead but not around the edges, I think No sky on the horizon.'

'Excuse me,' said the oh god. 'I'm not long in this world, I appreciate that, but I think you have, to have sky on the horizon. That's how you can tell it's the horizon.'

A sense of familiarity was creeping up on Susan, but surreptitiously, dodging behind things whenever she tried to concentrate on it.

'I've seen this place,' she said, tapping the page. 'If only she'd looked harder at the trees... She says they've got brown trunks and green leaves and it says here she thought they were odd. And... She concentrated on the next paragraph. 'Flowers. Growing in the grass. With big round petals.'

She stared unseeing at the oh god again.

'This isn't a proper landscape,' she said.

'It doesn't sound too unreal to me,' said the oh god. 'Sky. Trees. Flowers. Dead fish.'

'Brown tree trunks? Really they're mostly a sort of greyish mossy colour. You only ever see brown tree trunks in one place,' said Susan. 'And it's the same place where the sky is only ever overhead. The blue never comes down to the ground.'

She looked up. 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 'm 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.

The shape of Death was the shape people had created for him, over the centuries. Why bony? Because bones were associated with death. He'd got a scythe because agricultural people could spot a decent metaphor. And he lived in a sombre land because the human imagination would be rather stretched to let him live somewhere nice with flowers.

People like Death lived in the human imagination, and got their shape there, too. He wasn't the only one...

... but he didn't like the script, did he? He'd started to take an interest in people. Was that a thought, or just a memory of something that hadn't happened yet?

The oh god followed her gaze.

'Can we go after her?' said the oh god. 'I say we, I think I've just got drafted in because I was in the wrong place.'

'She's alive. That means she is mortal,' said Susan. 'That means I can find her, too.' She turned and started to walk out of the library.

'If she says the sky is just blue overhead, what's between it and the horizon?' said the oh god, running to keep up.

'You don't have to come,' said Susan. 'It's not your problem.'

'Yes, but given that my problem is that my whole purpose in life is to feel rotten, anything's an improvement.'

'It could be dangerous. I don't think she's there of her own free will. Would you be any good in a fight?'

'Yes. I could be sick on people.'

 

It was a shack, somewhere out on the outskirts of the Plains town of Scrote. Scrote had a lot of outskirts, spread so widely - a busted cart here, a dead dog there that often people went through it without even knowing it was there, and really it only appeared on the maps because cartographers get embarrassed about big empty spaces.

Hogswatch came after the excitement of the cabbage harvest when it was pretty quiet in Scrote and there was nothing much to look forward to until the fun of the sprout festival.

This shack had an iron stove, with a pipe that went up through the thick cabbage-leaf thatch.

Voices echoed faintly within the pipe.

THIS IS REALLY, REALLY STUPID.

'I think the tradition got started when everyone had them big chimneys, master.' This voice sounded as though it was coming from someone standing on the roof and shouting down the pipe.

INDEED? IT'S ONLY A MERCY IT'S UNLIT.

There was some muffled scratching and banging, and then a thump from within the pot belly of the stove.

DAMN.

'What's up, master?'

THE DOOR HAS NO HANDLE ON THE INSIDE. I CALL THAT INCONSIDERATE.

There were some more bumps, and then a scrape as the stove lid was lifted up and pushed sideways. An arm came out and felt around the front of the stove until it found the handle.

It played with it for a while, but it was obvious that the hand did not belong to a person used to opening things.

In short, Death came out of the stove. Exactly how would be difficult to describe without folding the page. Time and space were, from Death's point of view, merely things that he'd heard described. When it came to Death, they ticked the box marked Not Applicable. It might help to think of the universe as a rubber sheet, or perhaps not.

'Let us in, master,' a pitiful voice echoed down from the roof. 'It's brass monkeys out here.'

Death went over to the door. Snow was blowing underneath it. He peered nervously at the woodwork. There was a thump outside and Albert's voice sounded a lot closer.

'What's up, master?'

Death stuck his head through the wood of the door.

THERE'S THESE METAL THINGS

'Bolts, master. You slide them,' said Albert, sticking his hands under his armpits to keep them warm.

AH.

Death's head disappeared. Albert stamped his feet and watched his breath cloud in the air while he listened to the pathetic scrabbling on the other side of the door.

Death's head appeared again.

ER...

'It's the latch, master,' said Albert wearily.

RIGHT. RIGHT.

'You put your thumb on it and push it down.'

RIGHT.

The head disappeared. Albert jumped up and down a bit, and waited.

The head appeared.

ER... I WAS WITH YOU UP TO THE THUMB...

Albert sighed. 'And then you press down and pull, master.'

AH. RIGHT. GOT YOU.

The head disappeared.

Oh dear, thought Albert. He just can't get the hang of them, can he...?

The door jerked open. Death stood behind it, beaming proudly, as Albert staggered in, snow blowing in with him.

'Blimey, it's getting really parky,' said Albert. 'Any sherry?' he added hopefully.

IT APPEARS NOT.

Death looked at the sock hooked on to the side of the stove. It had a hole in it.

A letter, in erratic handwriting, was attached to it. Death picked it up.

THE BOY WANTS A PAIR OF TROUSERS THAT HE DOESN'T HAVE TO SHARE, A HUGE MEAT PIE, A SUGAR MOUSE, 'A LOT OF TOYS' AND A PUPPY CALLED SCRUFF.

'Ah, sweet,' said Albert. 'I shall wipe away a tear, 'cos what he's gettin', see, is this little wooden toy and an apple.' He held them out.

BUT THE LETTER CLEARLY

'Yes, well, it's socio-economic factors again,

right?' said Albert 'The world'd be in a right mess if everyone got what they asked for, eh?'

I GAVE THEM WHAT THEY WANTED IN THE STORE...

'Yeah, and that's gonna cause a lot of trouble, master. All them "toy pigs that really work". I didn't say nothing 'cos it was getting the job done but you can't go on like that. What good's a god who gives you everything you want?'

YOU HAVE ME THERE.

'It's the hope that's important. Big part of belief, hope. Give people jam today and they'll just sit and eat it. jam tomorrow, now - that'll keep them going for ever.'

AND YOU MEAN THAT BECAUSE OF THIS THE POOR GET POOR THINGS AND THE RICH GET RICH THINGS?

' 's right,' said Albert. 'That's the meaning of Hogswatch.'

Death nearly wailed.

BUT I'M THE HOGFATHER! He looked embarrassed. AT THE MOMENT, I MEAN.

'Makes no difference,' said Albert, shrugging. 'I remember when I was a nipper, one Hogswatch I had my heart set on this huge model horse they had in the shop...' His face creased for a moment in a grim smile of recollection. 'I remember I spent hours one day, cold as charity the weather was, I spent hours with my nose pressed up against the window... until they heard me callin', and unfroze me. I saw them take it out of the window, someone was in there buying it, and, y'know, just for a second I thought it really was going to be for me... Oh. I dreamed of that toy horse. It were red and white with a real saddle and everything. And rockers. I'd've killed for that horse.' He shrugged again. 'Not a chance, of course, 'cos we didn't have a pot to piss in and we even `ad to spit on the bread to make it soft enough to eat...'

PLEASE ENLIGHTEN ME. WHAT IS SO IMPORTANT ABOUT HAVING A POT TO PISS IN?

'It's... it's more like a figure of speech, master. It means you're as poor as a church mouse.'

ARE THEY POOR?

'Well... yeah.'

BUT SURELY NOT MORE POOR THAN ANY OTHER MOUSE? AND, AFTER ALL, THERE TEND TO BE LOTS OF CANDLES AND THINGS THEY COULD EAT.

'Figure of speech again, master. It doesn't have to make sense.'

OH. I SEE. DO CARRY ON.

'O' course, I still hung up my stocking on Hogswatch Eve, and in the morning, you know, you know what? Our dad had put in this little horse he'd carved his very own self...'

AH, said Death. AND THAT WAS WORTH MORE THAN ALL THE EXPENSIVE TOY HORSES IN THE WORLD,EH?

Albert gave him a beady look. 'No!' he said. 'It weren't. All I could think of was it wasnt the big horse in the window.'

Death looked shocked.

BUT HOW MUCH BETTER TO HAVE A TOY CARVED WITH...

'No. Only grown-ups think like that,' said

Albert. 'You're a selfish little bugger when you're seven. Anyway, Dad got ratted after lunch and trod on it.'

LUNCH?

'All right, mebbe we had a bit of pork chipping tor the bread...'

EVEN SO, THE SPIRIT OF HOGSWATCH...

Albert sighed. 'If you like, master. If you like.'

Death looked perturbed.

BUT SUPPOSING THE HOGFATHER HAD BROUGHT YOU THE WONDERFUL HORSE---

'Oh, Dad would've flogged it for a couple of bottles,' said Albert.

BUT WE HAVE BEEN INTO HOUSES WHERE THE CHILDREN HAD MANY TOYS AND BROUGHT THEM EVEN MORE TOYS, AND IN HOUSES LIKE THIS THE CHILDREN GET PRACTICALLY NOTHING.

'Huh, we'd have given anything to get practically nothing when I were a lad,' said Albert.

BE HAPPY WITH WHAT YOU'VE GOT, IS THAT THE IDEA?

'That's about the size of it, master. A good god line, that. Don't give 'em too much and tell 'em to be happy with it. jam tomorrow, see.'

THIS IS WRONG. Death hesitated. I MEAN... IT'S RIGHT TO BE HAPPY WITH WHAT YOU'VE GOT. BUT YOU'VE GOT TO HAVE SOMETHING TO BE HAPPY ABOUT HAVING. THERE'S NO POINT IN BEING HAPPY ABOUT HAVING NOTHING.

Albert felt a bit out of his depth in this new tide of social philosophy.

'Dunno,' he said. 'I suppose people'd say they've got the moon and the stars and suchlike.'

I'M SURE THEY WOULDN'T BE ABLE TO PRODUCE THE PAPERWORK.

'All I know is, if Dad'd caught us with a big bag of pricey toys wed just have got a ding round the earhole for nicking 'em.'

IT IS... UNFAIR.

'That's life, master.'

BUT I'M NOT.

'I meant this is how it's supposed to go, master,' said Albert.

NO. YOU MEAN THIS IS HOW IT GOES.

Albert leaned against the stove and rolled himself one of his horrible thin cigarettes. It was best to let the master work his own way through these things. He got over them eventually. It was like that business with the violin. For three days there was nothing but twangs and broken strings, and then he'd never touched the thing again. That was the trouble, really. Everything the master did was a bit like that. When things got into his head you just had to wait until they leaked out again.

He'd thought that Hogswatch was all... plum pudding and brandy and ho ho ho and he didn't have the kind of mind that could ignore all the other stuff. And so it hurt him.

IT IS HOGSWATCH, said Death, AND PEOPLE DIE ON THE STREETS. PEOPLE FEAST BEHIND LIGHTED WINDOWS AND OTHER PEOPLE HAVE NO HOMES. IS THIS FAIR?

'Well, of course, that's the big issue...' Albert began.

THE PEASANT HAD A HANDFUL OF BEANS AND THE KING HAD SO MUCH HE WOULD NOT EVEN NOTICE THAT WHICH HE GAVE AWAY. IS THIS FAIR?

'Yeah, but if you gave it all to the peasant then in a year or two he'd be just as snooty as the king---' began Albert, jaundiced observer of human nature.

NAUGHTY AND NICE? said Death. BUT IT'S EASY

TO BE NICE IF YOU'RE RICH. IS THIS FAIR?

Albert wanted to argue. He wanted to say, Really? In that case, how come so many of the rich buggers is bastards? And being poor don't mean being naughty, neither. We was poor when I were a kid, but we was honest. Well, more stupid than honest, to tell the truth. But basically honest.

He didn't argue, though. The master wasn't in any mood for it. He always did what needed to be done.

'You did say we just had to do this so's people'd believe... ' he began, and then stopped and started again. 'When it comes to fair, master, you yourself...'

I AM EVEN-HANDED TO RICH AND POOR ALIKE, snapped Death. BUT THIS SHOULD NOT BE A SAD TIME. THIS IS SUPPOSED TO BE THE SEASON TO BE JOLLY. He wrapped his red robe around him. AND OTHER THINGS ENDING IN OLLY, he added.

 

'There's no blade,' said the oh god. 'It's just a sword hilt.'

Susan stepped out of the light and her wrist moved. A sparkling blue line flashed in the air, for a moment outlining an edge too thin to be seen.

The oh god backed away.

'What's that?'

'Oh, it cuts tiny bits of the air in half. It can cut the soul away from the body, so stand back, please.'

'Oh, I will, I will.'

Susan fished the black scabbard out of the umbrella stand.

Umbrella stand! It never rained here, but Death had an umbrella stand. Practically no one else Susan knew had an umbrella stand. In any list of useful furniture, the one found at the bottom would be the umbrella stand.

Death lived in a black world, where nothing was alive and everything was dark and his great library only had dust and cobwebs because he'd created them for effect and there was never any sun in the sky and the air never moved and he had an umbrella stand. And a pair of silverbacked hairbrushes by his bed. He wanted to be something more than just a bony apparition. He tried to create these flashes of personality but somehow they betrayed themselves, they tried too hard, like an adolescent boy going out wearing an aftershave called 'Rampant'.