Terry Pratchett.

Hogfather

Everything starts somewhere, although many physicists disagree.

But people have always been dimly  aware of the problem with  the start of things. They wonder aloud how the snowplough driver gets to work,  or how the makers  of dictionaries look up the spelling of  the words. Yet there is the constant desire to find some point in the twisting, knotting,  ravelling nets of space-time on  which a metaphorical finger  can  be  put to indicate that here, here, is the point where it all began...

Something began when  the Guild of Assassins  enrolled Mister  Teatime, who  saw things differently from other people, and one  of the ways that  he saw things differently  from other  people was  in  seeing  other  people as things  (later, Lord Downey of the Guild said, 'We took  pity on him because he'd  lost both parents  at an  early age.  I think that,  on reflection, we should have wondered a bit more about that.')

But it was much earlier even than that when most people forgot that the very oldest stories are,  sooner or  later, about blood. Later on  they took the blood out to make the  stories more acceptable to children,  or at least to the people  who had  to  read them  to children  rather than the children themselves (who,  on the whole, are quite keen on blood provided  it's being shed by the deserving[1]), and then wondered where the stories went.

And earlier still  when  something in the darkness of the deepest caves and  gloomiest forests  thought: what  are  they,  these creatures?  I  will observe them.

And  much, much earlier  than  that,  when  the Discworld  was  formed, drifting onwards through space atop four elephants on the shell of the giant turtle, Great A'Tuin.

Possibly, as it moves,  it gets tangled like a blind man in a cobwebbed house in those highly specialized little spacetime strands that try to breed in every  history they  encounter,  stretching  them  and breaking them  and tugging them into new shapes.

Or possibly not, of course. The philosopher Didactylos has summed up an alternative hypothesis as 'Things just happen. What the hell.'

The senior wizards of Unseen University stood and looked at the door.

There was no doubt  that  whoever  had shut it wanted  it to stay shut. Dozens  of nails secured it  to the door frame. Planks had been nailed right across. And finally it had, up until this morning, been hidden by a bookcase that had been put in front of it.

'And there's the sign, Ridcully,'  said the Dean. 'You have read  it, I assume. You know? The sign which says "Do not, under any circumstances, open this door"?'

'Of course I've read it,'  said Ridcully. 'Why  d'yer  think  I want it opened?'

'Er ... why?' said the Lecturer in Recent Runes.

'To see why they wanted it shut, of course.'[2]

He gestured to Modo,  the University's gardener  and  oddjob dwarf, who was standing by with a crowbar.

'Go to it, lad.'

The gardener saluted. 'Right you are, sir.'

Against a background of  splintering timber, Ridcully went on: 'It says on the plans that this was a bathroom. There's nothing  frightening  about a bathroom, for gods' sake. I want  a  bathroom. I'm fed up with sluicing down with you fellows. It's  unhygienic. You can catch stuff. My  father told  me that. Where  you get lots of people bathing together, the  Verruca  Gnome is running around with his little sack.'

'Is that like the Tooth Fairy?' said the Dean sarcastically.

'I'm in  charge here  and I want a  bathroom  of my own,' said Ridcully firmly. 'And that's all there is to it, all right? I want a bathroom in time for Hogswatchnight, understand?'

And that's a problem with beginnings, of course. Sometimes, when you're dealing with occult realms that have quite a different attitude to time, you get the effect a little way before the cause.

From somewhere  on  the edge of  hearing came  a  glingleglingleglingle noise, like little silver bells.

At  about  the same time as the Archchancellor was laying down the law, Susan Sto-Helit was sitting up in bed, reading by candlelight.

Frost patterns curled across the windows.

She enjoyed these early evenings. Once she had put  the children to bed she was more or less left to  herself. Mrs Gaiter was pathetically scared of giving her any instructions even though she paid Susan's wages.

Not that the wages  were important, of course.  What was  important was that she was being  her Own Person and holding down a  Real job. And being a governess was a real job. The  only  tricky bit  had been  the embarrassment when her employer found out  that she was a duchess, because in Mrs Gaiter's book, which was  a  rather short book  with big handwriting, the upper crust wasn't  supposed to  work. It was supposed to loaf around. It was  all Susan could do to stop her curtseying when they met.

A flicker made her turn her head.

The candle flame was streaming out horizontally, as though in a howling wind.

She looked up. The curtains billowed away from the window, which...

...flung itself open with a clatter.

But there was no wind.

At least, no wind in this world.

Images formed in her mind. A red  ball  ... The sharp  smell of snow... And then they were gone, and instead there were...

'Teeth?' said Susan, aloud. 'Teeth, again?'

She blinked. When she opened her eyes  the  window was,  as she knew it would be,  firmly  shut. The  curtain  hung  demurely. The candle flame  was innocently upright. Oh, no, not again. Not after all this  time.  Everything had been going so well

'Thusan?'

She  looked around. Her door had been pushed open and  a  small  figure stood there, barefoot in a nightdress.

She sighed. 'Yes, Twyla?'

'I'm afwaid of the monster in the cellar, Thusan. It's going  to eat me up.'

Susan shut her book firmly and raised a warning finger.

'What  have I  told  you  about trying  to  sound  ingratiatingly cute, Twyla?' she said.

The little girl said, 'You said I  mustn't. You  said  that exaggerated lisping is a hanging offence and I only do it to get attention.'

'Good. Do you know what monster it is this time?'

'It's the big hairy one wif-'

Susan raised the finger. 'Uh?' she warned.

'-with eight arms,' Twyla corrected herself.

'What, again? Oh, all right.'

She got out of bed and put  on her dressing gown, trying to stay  quite calm  while  the child watched her.  So they  were coming back.  Oh, not the monster in the cellar. That was all in a day's work. But it looked as if she was going to start remembering the future again.

She  shook  her  head.  However  far you  ran away,  you  always caught yourself up.

But  monsters  were easy,  at least.  She'd  learned  how to  deal with monsters. She  picked up the poker from the nursery fender and went down the back stairs, with Twyla following her.

The  Gaiters were having  a dinner party.  Muffled voices came from the direction of the dining room.

Then, as she crept past, a door opened and yellow light spilled out and a  voice  said,  'Ye gawds,  there's a gel in  a nightshirt out here with  a poker!'

She saw figures silhouetted in the light and made out the  worried face of Mrs Gaiter.

'Susan? Er ... what are you doing?'

Susan looked at the poker and then back at the woman. 'Twyla said she's afraid of a monster in the cellar, Mrs Gaiter.'

'And yer  going to attack it with a poker, eh?' said one of the guests. There was a strong atmosphere of brandy and cigars.

'Yes,' said Susan simply.

'Susan's  our  governess,' said  Mrs  Gaiter. 'Er ... I told  you about her.'

There was  a change in the expression on the faces peering out from the dining room. It became a sort of amused respect.

'She beats up monsters with a poker?' said someone.

'Actually, that's  a very clever idea,'  said someone else. 'Little gel gets  it into her head there's a monster  in the cellar, you go in  with the poker  and  make  a  few bashing  noises while the child  listens, and  then everything's  all  right.  Good  thinkin',  that girl. Ver'  sensible.  Ver' modern.'

'Is that what you're doing Susan?' said Mrs Gaiter anxiously.

'Yes, Mrs Gaiter,' said Susan obediently.

'This  I've got  to watch, by Io!  It's  not every day you see monsters beaten up by a gel,'  said the man behind her. There was a swish of silk and a cloud of cigar smoke as the diners poured out into the hall.

Susan sighed  again  and went down  the  cellar stairs, while Twyla sat demurely at the top, hugging her knees.

A door opened and shut.

There was a short period of  silence and  then a terrifying scream. One woman fainted and a man dropped his cigar.

'You  don't  have  to worry,  everything will be all right,' said Twyla calmly. 'She always wins. Everything will be all right.'

There were thuds and clangs, and then a  whirring noise, and  finally a sort of bubbling.

Susan pushed open the door. The poker was bent at  right  angles. There was nervous applause.

'Ver' well  done,'  said a  guest.  'Ver' persykological.  Clever idea, that, bendin' the poker. And I expect you're not afraid any more, eh, little girl?'

'No,' said Twyla

'Ver' persykological.'

'Susan says don't get afraid, get angry,' said Twyla.

'Er, thank  you,  Susan,'  said Mrs  Gaiter, now a trembling bouquet of nerves. 'And, er, now, Sir Geoffrey, if you'd all like to come back into the parlour - I mean, the drawing room-'

The party went  back up the hall. The last thing Susan heard before the door shut was 'Dashed convincin', the way she bent the poker like that-'

She waited.

'Have they all gone, Twyla?'

'Yes, Susan.'

'Good.' Susan  went back  into the cellar and emerged towing  something large and  hairy  with eight legs.  She managed to haul  it up the steps and down the other passage to  the  back yard, where she kicked it out. It would evaporate before dawn.

'That's what we do to monsters,' she said.

Twyla watched carefully.

'And now it's bed for you, my girl,' said Susan, picking her up.

'C'n I have the poker in my room for the night?'

'All right.'

'It only  kills monsters, doesn't it...?' the child  said  sleepily, as Susan carried her upstairs.

'That's right,' Susan said. 'All kinds.'

She put the  girl  to bed  next  to her  brother  and leaned the  poker against the toy cupboard.

The  poker was made of some cheap metal  with  a brass knob on the end. She would,  Susan reflected, give quite a lot to be able to  use  it  on the children's previous governess.

'G'night.'

'Goodnight.'

She went back to her own small bedroom and got back into  bed, watching the curtains suspiciously.

It would be nice to think she'd imagined it. It would also be stupid to think that, too.  But she'd been nearly normal for two years now, making her own way in the real world, never remembering the future at all...

Perhaps she had just dreamed things (but even dreams could be real...).

She tried to ignore  the long  thread of wax that suggested  the candle had, just for a few seconds, streamed in the wind.

As Susan sought sleep,  Lord Downey sat in his study catching up on the paperwork.

Lord Downey  was an assassin. Or,  rather,  an  Assassin.  The  capital letter was important.  It separated those  curs  who  went around  murdering people for money from the gentlemen who were occasionally consulted by other gentlemen who wished to have removed,  for a consideration, any inconvenient razorblades from the candyfloss of life.

The  members of the Guild  of Assassins considered  themselves cultured men who enjoyed good music and  food and literature. And they knew the value of human life. To a penny, in many cases.

Lord Downey's  study was  oak-panelled and well carpeted. The furniture was very old and quite worn,  but the wear was the wear that comes only when very good furniture is carefully used over several centuries. It was matured furniture.

A  log fire burned in the grate. In front of it  a couple  of dogs were sleeping in the tangled way of large hairy dogs everywhere.

Apart from the occasional doggy snore or the crackle of a shifting log, there were no other sounds but the scratching of Lord Downey's  pen and  the ticking of  the longcase clock by  the door ...  small, private noises which only served to define the silence.

At least, this was the case until someone cleared their throat.

The sound suggested  very clearly  that the purpose of the exercise was not  to erase the  presence of a  troublesome bit of biscuit, but  merely to indicate in the politest possible way the presence of the throat.

Downey stopped writing but did not raise his head.

Then,  after what  appeared to  be  some  consideration,  he said  in a businesslike voice, 'The doors are locked. The windows are  barred. The dogs do not appear to  have  woken  up.  The squeaky  floorboards haven't.  Other little  arrangements  which  I will not specify seem to  have been bypassed. That severely limits the possibilities. I really doubt that  you are a ghost and gods generally do not  announce themselves so politely.  You  could,  of course, be  Death,  but I don't believe he bothers with such  niceties  and, besides, I am feeling quite well. Hmm!'

Something hovered in the air in front of his desk.

'My  teeth are in fine condition  so you  are  unlikely to be the Tooth Fairy. I've always found that  a stiff brandy before bedtime quite does away with the need  for the  Sandman. And, since I can carry a tune quite well, I suspect I'm not likely to attract the attention of Old Man Trouble. Hmm.'

The figure drifted a little nearer.

'I suppose a  gnome could  get  through a  mousehole, but I  have traps down,' Downey went on. 'Bogeymen can  walk through  walls but  would be very loath to reveal themselves. Really, you have me at a loss. Hmm?'

And then he looked up.

A grey robe hung in the air. It appeared to be occupied, in that it had a shape, although the occupant was not visible.

The  prickly  feeling  crept  over  Downey  that  the  occupant  wasn't invisible, merely not, in any physical sense, there at all.

'Good evening,' he said.

The robe said, Good evening, Lord Downey.

His brain registered the words. His ears swore they hadn't heard them.

But you did not become head  of  the Assassins' Guild by  taking fright easily. Besides,  the  thing  wasn't frightening.  It  was,  thought Downey, astonishingly dull. If monotonous drabness could take on a shape, this would be the shape it would choose.

'You appear to be a spectre,' he said.

Our  nature  is not  a  matter  for discussion, arrived in his head. We offer you a commission.

'You wish someone inhumed?' said Downey.

Brought to an end.

Downey considered this.  It was  not as  unusual  as it appeared. There were precedents. Anyone could buy the services of the Guild. Several zombies had,  in the past, employed the Guild to settle scores with their murderers. In fact the Guild, he liked to  think  practised the ultimate democracy. You didn't need intelligence, social position,  beauty or charm to  hire it. You just needed money which, unlike the other stuff, was available  to everyone. Except for the poor, of course, but there was no helping some people.

'Brought to an end...' That was an odd way of putting it.

'We can-' he began.

The payment will reflect the difficulty of the task.

'Our scale of fees-'

The payment will be three million dollars.

Downey sat back. That was  four times higher than any fee yet earned by any member  of the Guild, and that had been a special family rate, including overnight guests.

'No questions asked, I assume?' he said, buying time.

No questions answered.

'But  does the  suggested fee  represent the difficulty  involved?  The client is heavily guarded?'

Not  guarded at all. But almost  certainly impossible  to  delete  with conventional weapons.

Downey nodded.  This  was not  necessarily  a big problem, he  said  to himself. The  Guild had amassed quite a  few unconventional weapons over the years. Delete? An unusual way of putting it ...

'We like to know for whom we are working, he said.

We are sure you do.

'I  mean that we  need to know your  name.  Or names. In  strict client confidentiality, of course. We have to write something down in our files.'

You may think of us as ... the Auditors.

'Really? What is it you audit?'

Everything.

'I think we need to know something about you.'

We are the people with three million dollars.

Downey  took the point,  although  he  didn't  like  it. Three  million dollars could buy a lot of no questions.

'Really?' he said. 'In the circumstances, since you are a new client, I think we would like payment in advance.'

As you wish. The gold is now in your vaults.

'You mean that it will shortly be in our vaults,' said Downey.

No. It has always  been in your  vaults. We know  this because we  have just put it there.

Downey watched the empty  hood for a  moment, and then without shifting his gaze he reached out and picked up the speaking tube.

'Mr Winvoe?' he said, after whistling  into it. 'Ah. Good. Tell me, how much do  we have  in our  vaults at  the  moment? Oh, approximately. To  the nearest million, say.'  He held the tube away from his ear for a moment, and then spoke into it again. 'Well, be a good chap and check anyway, will you?'

He hung up the tube and placed his hands flat  on the desk in front  of him.

'Can I offer you a drink while we wait?' he said.

Yes. We believe so.

Downey stood up with some relief and walked  over to  his  large drinks cabinet. His  hand  hovered over  the Guild's  ardent and valuable tantalus, with its labelled decanters of Mur, Nig, Trop and Yksihw.[3]

'And what  would  you like  to  drink?'  he  said, wondering  where the Auditor kept its mouth. His hand hovered for just a moment over the smallest decanter, marked Nosiop.

We do not drink.

'But you did just say I could offer you a drink ... '

Indeed. We judge you fully capable of performing that action.

'Ah.'Downey's  hand hesitated over the  whisky  decanter, and  then  he thought better of it. At that point, the speaking tube whistled.

'Yes, Mr  Winvoe? Really? Indeed? I myself  have frequently found loose change under  sofa  cushions, it's amazing how it mou ... No,  no,  I wasn't being ... Yes, I did have some reason to ... No, no blame attaches to you in any ... No, I could hardly  see  how it ... Yes, go and have a rest, what  a good idea. Thank you.'

He hung up the tube again. The cowl hadn't moved.

'We will need  to know where, when and, of course, who,' he said, after a moment.

The cowl nodded. The location is not on any map. We would like the task to be completed within the week. This is essential. As for the who...

A drawing appeared on Downey's desk and  in his head arrived the words: Let us call him the Fat Man.

'Is this a joke?' said Downey.

We do not joke.

No, you don't, do you, Downey thought. He drummed his fingers.

'There are many who would say this... person does not exist,' he said.

He must exist. How else could you so readily recognize his picture? And many are in correspondence with him.

'Well, yes, of course, in a sense he exists:

In  a  sense  everything  exists. It  is cessation  of  existence  that concerns us here.

'Finding him would be a little difficult.'

You will find  persons  on any street who can tell you his  approximate address.

'Yes,  of course,' said  Downey, wondering why anyone would  call  them 'persons'. It was an  odd usage. 'But, as you say,  I  doubt that they could give a map reference.  And even  then,  how could the  . . . the Fat  Man be inhumed? A glass of poisoned sherry, perhaps?'

The cowl had no face to crack a smile.

You misunderstand the nature of employment, it said in Downey's head.

He bridled at this. Assassins were never employed. They were engaged or retained or commissioned, but never employed. Only servants were employed.

'What is it that I misunderstand, exactly?' he said.

We pay. You find the ways and means.

The cowl began to fade.

'How can I contact you?' said Downey.

We will contact you. We know where you are. We know where everyone is.

The  figure  vanished. At the  same moment the  door  was flung open to reveal the distraught figure of Mr Winvoe, the Guild Treasurer.

'Excuse me, my lord, but I really  had to come up!' He flung some discs on the desk. 'Look at them!'

Downey carefully  picked up  a  golden circle. It  looked like a  small coin, but -

'No denomination!' said Winvoe. 'No  heads, no tails, no  milling! It's just a blank disc! They're all just blank discs!'

Downey  opened his mouth to say,  'Valueless?' He realized that  he was half hoping that this was  the case. If they, whoever they were, had paid in worthless metal then there wasn't even  the glimmering of a contract. But he could see this wasn't the  case. Assassins learned  to recognize money early in their careers.

'Blank discs,' he said, 'of pure gold.'

Winvoe nodded mutely.

'That,' said Downey, 'will do nicely.'

'It must be magical!' said Winvoe. 'And we never accept magical money!'

Downey  bounced  the coin on  the desk a  couple of times.  It  made  a satisfyingly  rich thunking noise.  It wasn't magical. Magical  money  would look real, because its whole purpose was to deceive. But this didn't need to ape something as human  and adulterated as  mere currency.  This is gold, it told his fingers. Take it or leave it.

Downey sat and thought, while Winvoe stood and worried.

'We'll take it,' he said.

'But...'

'Thank you,  Mr  Winvoe. That is  my decision,' said Downey.  He stared into  space for a while, and then smiled.  'Is  Mister Teatime still in  the building?'

Winvoe  stood  back. 'I thought the council had agreed to dismiss him,' he said stiffly. 'After that business with...'

'Mister Teatime does not  see the world in  quite the same way as other people,' said Downey, picking up the picture from his desk and looking at it thoughtfully.

'Well, indeed, I think that is certainly true.'

'Please send him up.'

The  Guild attracted  all  sorts of people, Downey  reflected. He found himself wondering  how it had come to attract Winvoe, for one thing. It  was hard to imagine him stabbing anyone in the heart in case he got blood on the victim's wallet. Whereas Mister Teatime...

The problem was that the Guild took young boys and gave them a splendid education  and   incidentally  taught   them  how  to   kill,  cleanly and dispassionately, for money  and for the good  of  society, or at  least that part of society that had money, and what other kind of society was there?

But very  occasionally you found you'd got someone like Mister Teatime, to  whom  the money was merely  a  distraction. Mister Teatime  had  a truly brilliant mind, but it was brilliant like a fractured mirror, all marvellous facets and rainbows but, ultimately, also something that was broken.

Mister Teatime enjoyed himself too much. And other people, also.

Downey  had  privately decided that some  time soon  Mister Teatime was going to meet with an accident. Like many people with no actual morals, Lord Downey did  have  standards,  and Teatime repelled him. Assassination was  a careful game, usually played against people who knew the rules themselves or at least could afford the services of  those who did. There was considerable satisfaction in a clean kill.  What there wasn't supposed to be was pleasure in a messy one. That sort of thing led to talk.

On the other  hand, Teatime's corkscrew of  a mind was exactly the tool to deal with something like this. And if he didn't ... well, that was hardly Downey's fault, was it?

He turned his  attention to  the paperwork  for a while. It was amazing how the stuff mounted up. But you had to deal with  it.  It wasn't as though they were murderers, after all...

There was a knock at the door.  He pushed the  paperwork aside and  sat back.

'Come in, Mister Teatime,'  he  said.  It  never  hurt to put the other fellow slightly in awe of you.

In fact the door  was opened by one of the Guild's servants,  carefully balancing a tea tray.

'Ah,  Carter,' said Lord Downey, recovering magnificently. 'Just put it on the table over there, will you?'

'Yes, sir,' said Carter. He  turned and nodded. 'Sorry, sir,  I will go and fetch another cup directly, sir.'

'What?'

'For your visitor, sir.'

'What visitor? Oh, when Mister Teati-'

He stopped. He turned.

There was a young man sitting on the hearthrug, playing with the dogs.

'Mister Teatime!'

'It's pronounced Teh-ah-tim-eh, sir,' said Teatime, with just a hint of reproach. 'Everyone gets it wrong, sir.'

'How did you do that?'

'Pretty well,  sir.  I got mildly scorched  on  the last  few  feet, of course.'

There  were some lumps of soot on the  hearthrug. Downey  realized he'd heard them  fall, but  that hadn't  been particularly extraordinary. No  one could get down the chimney. There was a heavy grid firmly in place  near the top of the flue.

'But there's  a  blocked-in  fireplace  behind the  old  library,' said Teatime,  apparently reading his thoughts. 'The  flues  connect,  under  the bars. It was really a stroll, sir.'

'Really . . .'

'Oh, yes, sir.'

Downey nodded. The tendency of old buildings  to  be  honeycombed  with sealed chimney flues was a fact  you learned early in your career. And then, he told himself,  you forgot. It always paid to put the other  fellow in awe of you, too. He had forgotten they taught that, too.

'The dogs seem to like you,' he said.

'I get on well with animals, sir.'

Teatime's face was young and open and friendly. Or, at least, it smiled all the time. But the effect was spoiled for most people by the fact that it had only one eye. Some unexplained accident had taken the other one, and the missing  orb  had  been  replaced  by  a  ball  of  glass.  The  result  was disconcerting. But  what bothered Lord Downey far more  was  the man's other eye, the one  that might  loosely  be called normal. He'd never seen such  a small and sharp pupil. Teatime looked at the world through a pinhole.

He  found  he'd retreated behind his desk again.  There  was that about Teatime. You always felt

happier if you had something between you and him.

'You like animals,  do  you?' he said. 'I have a report  here that says you nailed Sir George's dog to the ceiling.'

'Couldn't have it barking while I was working, sir.'

'Some people would have drugged it.'

'Oh.' Teatime looked despondent for a moment,  but then  he brightened. 'But  I definitely fulfilled the contract, sir. There can be no  doubt about that,  sir. I checked Sir  George's  breathing with a mirror  as instructed. It's in my report.'

'Yes, indeed.' Apparently the man's head had been several feet from his body at that point. It was a terrible thought that Teatime might see nothing incongruous about this.

'And ... the servants...?' he said.

'Couldn't have them bursting in, sir.'

Downey nodded, half hypnotized  by the glassy  stare  and  the  pinhole eyeball. No, you  couldn't have them bursting in. And an Assassin might well face serious professional opposition, possibly even by people trained by the same  teachers.  But an  old  man and  a  maidservant who'd merely  had  the misfortune to be in the house at the time...

There  was no actual rule, Downey  had to admit. It was just that, over the years, the Guild had  developed a certain ethos and members tended to be very  neat  about their work, even shutting  doors behind them and generally tidying up as they went. Hurting the harmless was worse than a transgression against the moral fabric of society, it was a breach of good manners. It was worse even than that. It was bad taste. But there was no actual rule...

'That  was  all  right, wasn't it, sir?'  said  Teatime, with  apparent anxiety.

'It, uh ... lacked elegance,' said Downey.

'Ah.  Thank  you,  sir.  I  am always happy to  be  corrected.  I shall remember that next time.'

Downey took a deep breath.

'It's about  that I wish to talk,'  he said. He  held up the picture of ... what had the thing called him? ... the Fat Man?

'As a matter  of interest,' he  said, 'how would you go about  inhuming this ... gentleman?'

Anyone  else, he  was  sure, would have  burst out laughing. They would have said things like 'Is this a joke, sir?' Teatime merely  leaned forward, with a curious intent expression.

'Difficult, sir.'

'Certainly,' Downey agreed.

'I would need some time to prepare a plan, sir,' Teatime went on.

'Of course, and-'

There was a knock at the door and  Carter came in  with another cup and saucer. He nodded respectfully to Lord Downey and crept out again.

'Right, sir,' said Teatime.

'I'm sorry?' said Downey, momentarily distracted.

'I have now thought of a plan, sir,' said Teatime, patiently.

'You have?'

'Yes, sir.'

'As quickly as that?'

'Yes, sir.'

'Ye gods!'

'Well,  sir,  you  know  we  are  encouraged to  consider  hypothetical problems.

'Oh, yes. A very valuable exercise----' Downey stopped, and then looked shocked.

'You mean you have actually  devoted  time to considering how to inhume the  Hogfather?' he said weakly. 'You've actually  sat  down and thought out how to do it? You've actually devoted your spare time to the problem?'

'Oh, yes, sir. And the Soul Cake Duck. And the Sandman. And Death.'

Downey blinked again. 'You've actually sat down and considered how to-'

'Yes, sir. I've amassed quite an interesting  file. In  my own time, of course.'

'I want to  be quite certain about this, Mister Teatime.  You  ... have ... applied ... yourself to a study of ways of killing Death?'

'Only as a hobby, sir.'

'Well, yes, hobbies,  yes,  I  mean,  I  used  to  collect  butterflies myself,' said Downey, recalling those first moments of awakening pleasure at the use of poison and the pin, 'but-' .

'Actually, sir, the  basic methodology is exactly the same as  it would be for a human. Opportunity,  geography, technique . .  . You  just  have to work with the known facts about the individual concerned. Of course, with this one such a lot is known.'

'And  You've  worked  it  all  out,  have  you?'  said  Downey,  almost fascinated.

'Oh, a long time ago, sir.'

'When, may I ask?'

'I think it was when I was lying in bed one Hogswatchnight, sir.'

My  gods, thought Downey, and to  think  that I just used to listen for sleigh bells.

'My word,' he said aloud.

'I may have to check some details,  sir.  I'd appreciate access to some of the books in the  Dark Library. But, yes,  I think I  can  see the  basic shape.'

'And  yet  ...  this  person  ...  some  people might  say that  he  is technically immortal.'

Everyone has their weak point, sir.'

Even Death?'

'Oh, yes. Absolutely. Very much so.'

'Really?'

Downey drummed his fingers on the desk again. The boy couldn't possibly have a real plan, he told himself. He certainly  had a skewed mind - skewed? It was a positive helix - but the Fat Man wasn't just another target in some mansion somewhere. It was reasonable to assume that people had tried to trap him before.

He felt happy about this.  Teatime would fail, and possibly  even  fail fatally if his plan was  stupid enough.  And  maybe the Guild would lose the gold, but maybe not.

'Very well,' he said. 'I don't need to know what your plan is.'

'That's just as well, sir.'

'What do you mean?'

'Because  I  don't propose  to  tell  you,  sir.  You'd  be obliged  to disapprove of it.'

'I am amazed that you are so confident that it can work, Teatime.'

'I  just think logically about the  problem,  sir,' said  the  boy.  He sounded reproachful.

'Logically?' said Downey.

'I  suppose  I just  see  things differently from  other  people,' said Teatime.

It  was  a quiet day for Susan, although  on the way to the park Gawain trod on a crack in the pavement. On purpose.

One  of the many terrors conjured  up by the previous governess's happy way with children had been the bears that waited around in the street to eat you if you stood on the cracks.

Susan had taken to carrying  the  poker under her respectable coat. One wallop generally did the trick. They were amazed that anyone else saw them.

'Gawain?' she said, eyeing a nervous bear who had  suddenly spotted her and was now trying to edge away nonchalantly.

'Yes?'

'You meant to tread on that  crack so  that I'd have to thump some poor creature whose

only fault is wanting to tear you limb from limb.'

'I was just skipping-'

'Quite. Real children don't go hoppity-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.

He nodded, and went to push Twyla off the swings.

Susan relaxed,  satisfied. It was her  personal  discovery.  Ridiculous threats didn't worry them  at all, but they were obeyed. Especially the ones in graphic detail.

The previous governess had used various monsters and bogeymen as a form of discipline. There was  always  something waiting to eat  or carry off bad boys and  girls for crimes  like stuttering  or defiantly  and aggravatingly persisting in writing with their  left hand. There was always  a Scissor Man waiting  for a little girl who  sucked her  thumb, always a  bogeyman in the cellar. Of such bricks is the innocence of childhood constructed.

Susan's  attempts  at getting  them  to disbelieve in  the  things only caused the problems to get worse.

Twyla had  started to wet the bed. This may have been a crude  form  of defence  against the terrible clawed creature that  she  was  certain  lived under it.

Susan had found out about this one the first night, when the child had woken up crying because of a bogeyman in  the closet.

She'd  sighed  and gone to have  a look. She'd been so angry that she'd pulled it out,  hit  it over the head with the nursery poker, dislocated its shoulder as a means of emphasis and kicked it out of the back door.

The  children refused to disbelieve  in  the monsters because, frankly, they knew damn well the things were there.

But  she'd  found  that they  could,  very firmly, also  believe in the poker.

Now she sat down on a bench and read a book. She made a point of taking the children,  every day, somewhere where they could meet others of the same age. If they got the hang of the  playground, she thought,  adult life would hold no fears. Besides, it was nice to hear the voices of little children at play,  provided you took care to be  far  enough away not to hear what  they were actually saying.

There were  lessons  later on. These were  going a lot better now she'd got rid of the reading books about bouncy balls and dogs  called Spot. She'd got Gawain on  to  the  military campaigns of General Tacticus,  which  were suitably bloodthirsty  but, more importantly, considered too difficult for a child.  As  a  result his  vocabulary  was  doubling every week and he could already use words  like 'disembowelled' in everyday conversation. After all, what was the point of teaching children to be children?

They were naturally good at it.

And she was, to her mild horror, naturally good with them. She wondered suspiciously if this was a  family trait. And  if, to judge by  the way  her hair so readily knotted  itself into a prim bun, she  was  destined for jobs like this for the rest of her life.

It was her parents' fault.  They hadn't meant it to turn out like this. At least, she hoped charitably that they hadn't.

They'd wanted to protect her, to keep her away  from the worlds outside this one, from what people thought of as the occult, from ... well, from her grandfather, to  put  it bluntly.  This  had, she felt,  left  her a  little twisted up.

Of course, to be  fair, that was a parent's  job. The world was so full of  sharp  bends that  if they didn't put a  few twists in you, you wouldn't stand a chance  of fitting in.  And they'd been conscientious  and  kind and given her a good home and even an education.

It had been  a good  education, too. But it had only been later on that she'd realized that it had  been  an education in, well, education. It meant that if ever  anyone  needed  to calculate the volume of a cone,  then  they could  confidently call on Susan Sto-Helit.  Anyone at a loss to  recall the campaigns of General Tacticus  or the square root of 27.4 would not find her wanting. If  you  needed someone who could  talk  about household  items and things to buy in  the shops in five languages, then Susan was at the head of the queue. Education had been easy.

Learning things had been harder.

Getting an education was  a bit  like a communicable sexual disease. It made you unsuitable for a lot of jobs and then you had the urge  to pass  it on.

She'd become a governess. It was one of the few jobs a known lady could do. And she'd taken to it well. She'd sworn that if she did indeed ever find herself  dancing on rooftops with chimney sweeps she'd beat herself to death with her own umbrella.

After tea she read them a story. They liked her stories. The one in the book was pretty  awful,  but  the  Susan  version  was  well  received.  She translated as she read.

'... 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. And now,'  she closed the  book with  a  snap, 'it's time for bed.'

The previous governess had taught them a prayer which included the hope that some god or other  would take their soul if they died  while they  were asleep and, if  Susan was any judge,  had the underlying message  that  this would be a good thing.

One day, Susan averred, she'd hunt that woman down.

'Susan,' said Twyla, from somewhere under the blankets.

'Yes?'

'You know last week we wrote letters to the Hogfather?'

'Yes?'

'Only ... in the park Rachel says he doesn't exist and it's your father really. And everyone else said she was right.'

There  was a rustle from the other bed. Twyla's brother had turned over and was listening surreptitiously.

Oh  dear, thought Susan. She  had hoped she  could avoid this.  It  was going to be like that business with the Soul Cake Duck all over again.

'Does  it matter  if you get the  presents anyway?' she said, making  a direct appeal to greed.

' ' es.'

Oh dear, oh  dear. Susan sat down on the bed, wondering how the hell to get through this. She patted the one visible hand.

'Look  at it  this way, then,' she said, and took a deep mental breath. 'Wherever people are  obtuse and absurd ... and wherever they have,  by even the  most  generous standards, the attention  span of a  small  chicken in a hurricane and  the investigative  ability of a  one-legged cockroach ... and wherever  people  are  inanely  credulous,  Pathetically   attached  to  the certainties of the nursery and, in general, have as much grasp of the  realities  of  the   physical  universe  as  an   oyster   has  of mountaineering ... yes, Twyla: there is a Hogfather.'

There was silence from  under the  bedclothes,  but she sensed that the tone  of  voice had  worked.  The  words had  meant nothing.  That,  as  her grandfather might have said, was humanity all over.

'G' night.'

'Good night,' said Susan.

It wasn't even a bar. It was just a  room where people drank while they waited for  other people with whom they  had  business. The business usually involved the transfer of ownership of  something from one person to another, but then, what business doesn't?

Five businessmen sat round a table, lit by  a candle stuck in a saucer. There was an open bottle between them. They were taking some care to keep it away from the candle flame.

' ' s gone six,' said  one, a  huge man with dreadlocks and a beard you could keep goats in. 'The clocks struck ages ago. He ain't coming. Let's go.

'Sit down, will you? Assassins are always late. 'cos of style, right?'

'This one's mental.'

'Eccentric.'

'What's the difference?'

'A bag of cash.'

The three that hadn't spoken yet looked at one another.

'What's this? You never said he was an Assassin,' said Chickenwire. 'He never said the guy was an Assassin, did he, Banjo?'

There was a sound like distant thunder. It was Banjo Lilywhite clearing his throat.

'Dat's right,' said a voice from the upper slopes. 'Youse never said.'

The  others  waited until  the rumble  died away.  Even  Banjo's  voice hulked.

'He's'  - the first  speaker  waved  his  hands vaguely,  trying to get across the point that someone was a  hamper of food, several folding chairs, a  tablecloth, an  assortment of cooking  gear  and an entire colony of ants short of a picnic -'mental. And he's got a funny eye.'

'It's just glass, all right?' said the one known as Catseye, signalling a waiter for  four beers and a glass  of milk. 'And he's paying ten thousand dollars each. I don't care what kind of eye he's got.'

'I heard  it was made of the same stuff they  make them fortune-telling crystals out of. You  can't tell me that's  right. And he looks at  you with it,'  said the first  speaker.  He was known as Peachy,  although no one had ever found out why[4].

Catseye sighed. Certainly there was something odd about Mister Teatime, there  was no  doubt  about  that. But there  was something weird  about all Assassins. And  the man  paid  well.  Lots of  Assassins  used informers and locksmiths.  It was against the rules, technically, but standards were going down everywhere, weren't they?  Usually they paid you late  and sparsely, as if they were doing the favour. But Teatime was OK. True, after a few minutes talking  to him your  eyes began to water  and you felt  you needed to scrub your skin even on the inside, but no one was perfect, were they?

Peachy leaned forward.  'You know what?' he said. 'I reckon he could be here already. In disguise! Laughing at us! Well, if he's in here laughing at us-' He cracked his knuckles.

Medium Dave Lilywhite, the last of the  five, looked around. There were indeed a number of solitary figures in the low, dark room. Most of them wore cloaks with big hoods. They sat alone, in corners, hidden by the hoods. None of them looked very friendly.

'Don't be daft, Peachy,' Catseye murmured.

'That's the sort of thing they do,'  Peachy insisted.  'They're masters of disguise!'

'With that eye of his?'

'That guy sitting  by the fire has got an eye patch,' said Medium Dave. Medium Dave didn't speak much. He watched a lot.

The others turned to stare.

'He'll wait till we're off our guard then go ahahaha,' said Peachy.

'They can't kill  you unless it's for  money,'  said  Catseye.  But now there was a soupcon of doubt in his voice.

They kept their eyes on the hooded man. He kept his eye on them.

If asked  to describe  what they did for a  living, the five men around the  table  would have  said something like 'This  and that' or 'The  best I can', although in Banjo's case he'd have probably said 'Dur?'  They were, by the standards of an uncaring society, criminals, although they wouldn't have thought  of  themselves   as  such  and  couldn't  even  spell  words   like 'nefarious'. What  they generally did was  move things around. Sometimes the things were on the wrong side of a steel door, say,  or in the wrong  house. Sometimes the things  were  in  fact people who were far too unimportant  to trouble  the Assassins' Guild with, but who were nevertheless inconveniently positioned where they were and could much better be located on, for example, a sea bed somewhere[5].  None of the  five belonged to any  formal guild and they  generally found their clients among those people  who, for  their  own dark  reasons,  didn't  want to put  the  guilds to  any  trouble, sometimes because  they were guild  members themselves. They had plenty of work. There was always something that needed transferring from A to B or,  of course, to the bottom of the C.

'Any minute now,' said Peachy, as the waiter brought their beers.

Banjo  cleared his throat. This  was a  sign that another  thought  had arrived.

'What I don' unnerstan,' he said, 'is:'

'Yes?' said his brother.[6]

'What I don' unnerstan is, how longaz diz place had waiters?'

'Good evening,' said Teatime, putting down the tray.

They stared at him in silence.

He gave them a friendly smile.

Peachy's huge hand slapped the table.

'You crept up on us, you little- he began.

Men in their line of business develop a certain prescience. Medium Dave and  Catseye, who  were  sitting  on  either side  of  Peachy,  leaned  away nonchalantly.

'Hi!' said Teatime. There  was  a  blur, and a knife  shuddered  in the table between Peachy's thumb and index finger.

He looked down at it in horror.

'My name's Teatime,' said Teatime.'Which one are you?'

'I'm ... Peachy,' said Peachy, still staring at the vibrating knife.

'That's an interesting name,' said Teatime. 'Why are you called Peachy, Peachy?'

Medium Dave coughed.

Peachy looked  up into Teatime's face. The glass eye was a mere ball of faintly  glowing  grey. The other eye  was a little dot in a sea  of  white. Peachy's only contact with intelligence  had been to beat it  up  and rob it whenever  possible,  but a sudden sense of selfpreservation glued him to his chair.

' cos I don't shave,' he said.

'Peachy don't like blades, mister,' said Catseye.

'And do you have a lot of friends, Peachy?' said Teatime.

'Got a few, yeah.'

With a sudden whirl  of movement that made the men start, Teatime  spun away, grabbed a chair, swung it up to the table and sat down on it. Three of them had already got their hands on their swords.

'I don't  have many,' he said,  apologetically. 'Don't seem to have the knack. On the  other hand ... I  don't seem to have  any enemies at all. Not one. Isn't that nice?'

Teatime had  been thinking, in  the cracking, buzzing firework  display that was his head. What he had been thinking about was immortality.

He might have been quite, quite insane, but he was no fool. There were, in the Assassins' Guild, a number  of paintings and busts of  famous members who had, in the past,  put ... no, of course, that wasn't right.  There were paintings and busts of  the famous  clients of members,  with  a  noticeably modest brass plaque screwed somewhere nearby, bearing some unassuming little comment like 'Departed this vale of tears  on Grune 3,  Year of the Sideways Leech,  with  the assistance of the  Hon.  K. W. Dobson (Viper House)'. Many fine  old educational  establishments had dignified memorials  in some  hall listing the Old Boys who had laid down their lives for  monarch and country. The Guild's was very similar, except for the question of whose life had been laid.

Every Guild member wanted to be  up there somewhere. Because getting up there  represented  immortality.  And  the  bigger  your  client,  the  more incredibly discreet and restrained would be the little brass plaque, so that everyone couldn't help but notice your name.

In fact, if you  were  very, very  renowned, they wouldn't even have to write down your name at all...

The men around  the table watched him. It was always hard to know  what Banjo was thinking, or even if he was thinking at all, but the other four were thinking  along the lines of: bumptious little tit,  like all Assassins. Thinks  he knows  it  all. I  could  take him down one-handed, no trouble. But ... you hear stories. Those eyes give me the creeps...

'So what's the job?' said Chickenwire.

'We don't do jobs,' said Teatime. 'We perform services. And the service will earn each of you ten thousand dollars.'

'That's a lot more'n Thieves' Guild rate,' said Medium Dave.

'I've never  liked the  Thieves' Guild,' said  Teatime, without turning his head.

'Why not?'

'They ask too many questions.'

'We don't ask questions,' said Chickenwire quickly.

'We  shall suit one another  perfectly,' said Teatime. 'Do have another drink while we wait for the other members of our little troupe.'

Chickenwire saw Medium Dave's lips start to  frame  the opening letters 'Who-'. These letters he deemed inauspicious  at this time. He kicked Medium Dave's leg under the table.

The door opened slightly. A figure came in,  but only just. It inserted itself in the gap  and sidled along the wall in a  manner  calculated not to attract attention. Calculated, that is, by someone  not good at this sort of calculation.

It looked at them over its turned-up collar.

'That's a wizard,' said Peachy.

The figure hurried over and dragged up a chair.

'No I'm not!' it hissed. 'I'm incognito!'

'Right, Mr Gnito,' said Medium  Dave. 'You're  just someone in a pointy hat. This is my brother Banjo, that's Peachy, this is Chick---'

The wizard looked desperately at Teatime.

'I didn't want to come!'

'Mr Sideney here is indeed a wizard,' said Teatime. 'A student, anyway. But down on his luck at the moment, hence his willingness to join us on this venture.'

'Exactly how far down on his luck?' said Medium Dave.

The wizard tried not to meet anyone's gaze.

'I made a misjudgement to do with a wager,' he said.

'Lost a bet, you mean?' said Chickenwire.

'I paid up on time,' said Sideney.

'Yes, but Chrysoprase  the troll has this odd little thing  about money that turns into lead the next day,' said Teatime cheerfully.  'So our friend needs to earn a little cash in a hurry and in  a climate where arms and legs stay on.'

'No one  said anything  about  there  being  magic in all  this,'  said Peachy.

'Our destination  is ... probably you should  think of it as  something like a wizard's tower, gentlemen,' said Teatime.

'It isn't an actual wizard's tower, is it?' said Medium Dave. 'They got a very odd sense of humour when it comes to booby traps.'

'No.'

'Guards?'

'I believe so. According to legend. But nothing very much.'

Medium  Dave  narrowed his eyes. 'There's valuable  stuff  in  this ... tower?'

'Oh, yes.'

'Why ain't there many guards, then?'

'The ...  person who  owns the  property  probably does not realize the value of what ... of what they have.'

'Locks?' said Medium Dave.

'On our way we shall be picking up a locksmith.'

'Who?'

'Mr Brown.'

They  nodded. Everyone  -  at  least, everyone  in 'the business',  and everyone in 'the business'  knew what 'the business' was,  and if you didn't know what  'the business' was you weren't a businessman - knew Mr Brown. His presence anywhere  around a job gave it a certain kind of respectability. He was a neat, elderly man who'd invented most of the tools in his big  leather bag. No  matter what cunning you'd used to  get into a place, or overcome  a small army, or find the secret treasure room, sooner or later you  sent  for Mr Brown, who'd turn  up with his  leather bag and his little springy things and his  little bottles of  strange alchemy and his  neat little boots.  And he'd do nothing for ten minutes but look at the lock, and then he'd select a piece of bent metal from a ring of several hundred almost  identical pieces, and under an hour later he'd be walkingaway with a neat ten per  cent of the takings. Of course, you didn't have  to  use Mr  Brown's services. You could always opt to spend the rest of your life looking at a locked door.

'All right. Where is this place?' said Peachy.

Teatime turned and smiled at him. 'If I'm paying you, why isn't it me who's asking the questions?'

Peachy didn't even try to outstare the glass eye a second time.

'Just want to be prepared, that's all,' he mumbled.

'Good reconnaissance is  the essence of  a successful operation,'  said Teatime. He turned and looked up at the bulk that was Banjo and added, 'What is this?'

'This is Banjo,' said Medium Dave, rolling himself a cigarette.

'Does it do tricks?'

Time stood still for a moment. The other men looked at  Medium Dave. He was known to Ankh-Morpork's professional underclass as a thoughtful, patient man, and considered something of an intellectual because some of his tattoos were spelled  right. He was reliable in a tight spot  and, above all, he was honest,  because good criminals have to be honest. If he had a fault, it was a tendency to deal  out  terminal  and  definitive retribution to anyone who said anything about his brother.

If  he had a virtue, it was a tendency to pick his  time. Medium Dave's fingers tucked the tobacco into the paper and raised it to his lips.

'No,' he said.

Chickenwire tried to  defrost the conversation.  'He's not  what  you'd call  bright, but he's always useful. He can lift two men  in each  hand. By their necks.'

'Yur,' said Banjo.

'He looks like a volcano,' said Teatime.

'Really?'  said Medium  Dave Lilywhite. Chickenwire reached out hastily and pushed him back down in his seat.

Teatime turned and smiled at him.

'I do so hope we're going to be friends, Mr Medium Dave,'  he said. 'It really hurts to think I might  not  be among  friends.' He  gave him another bright smile. Then he turned back to the rest of the table.

'Are we resolved, gentlemen?'

They nodded. There was  some reluctance, given the consensus  view that Teatime belonged in a room with soft walls, but ten thousand dollars was ten thousand dollars. possibly even more.

'Good,' said Teatime.  He looked Banjo up and  down. 'Then I suppose we might as well make a start.'

And he hit Banjo very hard in the mouth.

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.

But  from time  to time  Death  checked  up  to  see that  things  were functioning properly or, to  put  it another and more accurate way, properly ceasing to function in the less significant areas of his jurisdiction.

And now he walked through dark seas.

Silt rose  in  clouds  around his  feet as  he  strode along the trench bottom. His robes floated out around him.

There was silence,  pressure and  utter, utter darkness.  But there was life down  here, even this far below  the waves. There were giant squid, and lobsters  with  teeth on their eyelids. There were spidery things with their stomachs on their feet, and fish that made their own light.  It was a quiet, black nightmare world, but life lives everywhere  that life  can. Where life can't, this takes a little longer.

Death's destination was a slight  rise in the trench floor. Already the water around him was getting  warmer and  more populated, by  creatures that looked as though  they had been  put together from the bits left  over  from everything else.

Unseen but felt, a  vast column  of  scalding hot  water was welling up from  a fissure. Somewhere  below were rocks heated to near incandescence by the Disc's magical field.

Spires of minerals had been deposited around this vent. And, in this tiny oasis, a type of life had grown up. It did not need air or light. It did not even need food  in the way that most other species would understand the term.

It just grew at the edge of the streaming column of water, looking like a cross between a worm and a flower.

Death kneeled down and peered at it, because it  was so small. But  for some reason,  in this world  without eyes or light, it was also  a brilliant red. The profligacy of life in these matters never ceased to amaze him.

He  reached inside  his  robe  and  pulled  out a small  roll of  black material, like a jeweller's toolkit. With great care he took from one of its pouches a scythe about an inch  long, and held it expectantly between  thumb and forefinger.

Somewhere overhead a shard of rock was dislodged by a stray current and tumbled down, raising little puffs of silt as it bounced off the tubes.

It  landed just beside the living flower  and then rolled, wrenching it from the rock.

Death flicked the tiny scythe just as the bloom faded ...

The  omnipotent  eyesight of  various  supernatural  entities is  often remarked upon. It is said they can see the fall of every sparrow.

And this may be true. But there is only one who is always there when it hits the ground.

The soul of the  tube worm was very small and uncomplicated.  It wasn't bothered  about sin. it had  never coveted  its neighbour's  polyps.  It had never  gambled or  drunk  strong liquor. It had never  bothered itself  with questions like 'Why am I here?'  because it had no concept  at all of 'here' or, for that matter, of 'I'.

Nevertheless, something was  cut  free  under the  surgical edge of the scythe and vanished in the roiling waters.

Death  carefully put the  instrument away and stood  up. All was  well, things were functioning satisfactorily, and...

...but they weren't.

In the  same way that the best  of engineers can  hear  the tiny change that signals a bearing going bad long before the finest of instruments would detect  anything  wrong,  Death picked up a discord  in the  symphony of the world. It was one wrong note among billions but all  the more noticeable for that, like a tiny pebble in a very large shoe.

He waved a  finger in  the waters.  For  a moment  a blue,  door-shaped outline appeared He ste pped through it and was gone.

The tube creatures didn't notice him go.

They hadn't noticed him arrive. They never ever noticed anything.

A cart  trundled through the freezing foggy streets, the driver hunched in his seat. He seemed to be all big thick brown overcoat.

A figure darted out of the  swirls and was suddenly on  the box next to him

'Hi!' it said. 'My name's Teatime. What's yours?'

'Here, you get down, I ain't allowed to give li...'

The  driver stopped. It was amazing how Teatime had been able to thrust a knife through  four layers of thick clothing and stop it just at the point where it pricked the flesh.

'Sorry?' said Teatime, smiling brightly.

'Er - there ain't nothing valuable, y'know,  nothing  valuable,  only a few bags of...'

'Oh, dear,' said  Teatime,  his face  a sudden acre  of concern. 'Well, we'll just have to see, won't we ... What is your name, sir?'

'Ernie. Er. Ernie,' said Ernie. 'Yes. Ernie. Er... '

Teatime turned his head slightly.

'Come along, gentlemen. This is my friend  Ernie. He's going  to be our driver for tonight.'

Ernie  saw half  a dozen figures emerge from the fog and climb into the cart  behind him. He didn't turn to  look at  them. By  the pricking of  his kidneys he knew this would not  be an exemplary career move. But  it  seemed that one of the figures, a huge shambling mound of a  creature, was carrying a long bundle over its shoulder. The bundle moved and made muffled noises.

'Do stop  shaking, Ernie. We just need a lift said Teatime, as the cart rumbled over the cobbles.

'Where to, mister?'

'Oh, we don't mind. But first, I'd like  you  to stop  in Sator Square, near the second fountain.'

The  knife was withdrawn. Ernie  stopped trying to breathe through  his ears.

'Er...'

'What  is it? You do seem tense,  Ernie.  I always find a neck  massage helps.'

'I ain't rightly allowed to  carry passengers, see Charlie'll give me a right telling-off ...'

'Oh, don't you worry about  that,' said  Tea time, slapping  him on the back. 'We're all friends here!'

'What're we bringing the girl for?' said a voice behind them.

''s  not  right, hittin' girls,'  said a deep voice.  'Our mam  said no hittin' girls. Only bad boys do that, our mam said!'

'You be quiet, Banjo.'

'Our mam said...'

'Shssh!  Emie  here doesn't  want  to listen  to  our  troubles,'  said Teatime, not taking his gaze off the driver.

'Me?  Deaf as a  post, me,' burbled Ernie, who  in some ways was a very quick  learner.  'Can't  hardly see  more'n  a  few  feet, neither.  Cot  no recollection for them  faces that I do  see, come to  that. Bad memory? Hah! Talk about bad memory. Cor, sometimes I can be like as it  were on the cart, talking  to people, hah, just like I'm talking gone,  hah, remember anything about them  or  how  many they were or  what they were carrying or  anything about any to you now, and then when they're try as I might, do you think I car girl or anything?' By  this time his  voice  was  a highpitched wheeze. 'Hah! Sometimes I forget me own name!'

'It's Ernie, isn't it?' said  Teatime,  giving him a happy  smile. 'Ah, and here we are. Oh dear. There seems to be some excitement.'

There  was the sound  of fighting somewhere ahead, and then a couple of masked trolls ran past  with three Watchmen after them. They all ignored the cart.

'I  heard  the De  Bris  gang were  going to  have  a go  at  Packley's strongroom tonight,' said a voice behind Ernie.

'  Looks like Mr Brown won't be joining  us, then,' said another voice. There was a snigger.

'Oh,  I don't know about that, Mr Lilywhite, I don't know about that at all,'  said  a  third  voice,  and this one was from  the  direction of  the fountain. 'Could you take  my  bag while  I climb up, please? Do be careful, it's a little heavy.'

It was a neat little voice. The owner of  a voice  like that  kept  his money  in a  shovel  purse and always counted his  change  carefully.  Ernie thought all this, and then tried very hard to forget that he had.

'On you  go,  Ernie,'  said Teatime. 'Round  behind  the  University, I think.'

As the cart rolled on, the neat little  voice said,  'You grab  all the money and then you get out very smartly. Am I right?'

There was a murmur of agreement.

'Learned that on my mother's knee, yeah.'

'You learned a lot of stuff across your ma's knee, Mr Lilywhite.'

'Don't  you  say  nuffin'  about  our  mam!'  The  voice  was  like  an earthquake.

'This is Mr Brown, Banjo. You smarten up.'

'He dint ort to tork about our mam!'

'All right!  All right! Hello, Banjo ... I think  I may  have  a  sweet somewhere ... Yes, there you' are. Yes, your ma knew the way all right.  You go in quietly,  you take your time, you get what you  came for and you leave smartly and  in good order. You don't hang  around  at the scene to count it out and tell one another what brave lads you are, am I right?'

'You seem  to  have done all right, Mr Brown.' The cart rattled towards the other side of the square.

'Just a  little for expenses, Mr  Catseye. A little Hogswatch  present, you might say.  Never take the lot and  run. Take  a little and walk.  Dress neat.  That's my motto. Dress neat  and  walk away slowly. Never  run. Never run.  The  Watch'Il always  chase a running man.  They're  like terriers for giving chase. No,  you walk out  slow, you walk round the  corner,  you wait till there's a lot of excitement, then you turn  around and walk back.  They can't cope with that, see. Half the time they'll stand aside to let you walk past. "Good evening, officers," you say, and then you go home for your tea.'

'Wheee!  Gets you out  of trouble, I  can  see  that. If you've got the nerve.'

'Oh, no, Mr Peachy. Doesn't get you out of. Keeps You out of.'

It  was  like  a very good schoolroom, Ernie  thought  (and immediately tried to forget). Or a back-street gym when a champion prizefighter had just strolled in.

'What's up with your mouth, Banjo?'

'He lost a tooth, Mr Brown,' said another voice, and sniggered.

'Lost a toot, Mr Brown,' said the thunder that was Banjo.

'Keep your eyes on the road, Ernie,' said Teatime beside him. 'We don't want an accident, do we. . .'

The road here  was deserted, despite the bustle of the city behind them and  the bulk of the University  nearby. There  were  a few streets, but the buildings were abandoned. And something was happening to the sound. The rest of AnkhMorpork seemed very far away, the sounds arriving as if through quite a thick wall. They were  entering that  scorned little corner of AnkhMorpork that had long been  the site  of  the University's rubbish  pits and was now known as the Unreal Estate.

'Bloody wizards,' muttered Ernie, automatically.

'I beg your pardon?' said Teatime.

'My great-grandpa said we used t'own  prop'ty round here. Low levels of magic, my  arse! Hah, it's all right for them  wizards,  they got all kindsa spells to protect 'em. Bit of magic here, bit of magic there... Stands to reason it's got to go somewhere, right?'

'There used to be warning signs up,' said the neat voice from behind.

'Yeah,  well, warning signs in  Ankh-Morpork  might as well  have "Good firewood" written on them,' said someone else.

'I  mean, stands to reason, they chuck  out an old spell for  exploding this, and another one for twiddlin' that, and another one for making carrots grow,  they  finish up  interfering with one another, who knows what they'll end  up  doing?' said Ernie. 'Great-grandpa said sometimes they'd wake up in the  morning and the cellar'd be higher than the attic. And that weren't the worst,' he added darkly.

'Yeah, I heard where it got so bad you could walk  down  the street and meet  yourself coming  the  other way,' someone supplied. 'It  got  so's you didn't know it was bum or breakfast time, I heard.'

'The  dog  used  to  bring  home  all  kinds  of  stuff,'  said  Ernie. 'Great-grandpa  said half the time they used to dive behind the sofa  if  it came  in  with anything in its mouth. Corroded fire spells startin' to fizz, broken  wands with green smoke  coming out of 'em and I don't know what else ... and if you saw the cat playing with anything, it  was best not to try to find out what it was, I can tell you.'

He  twitched the reins, his current predicament almost forgotten in the tide of hereditary resentment.

'I mean, they say all the old spell books and stuff was buried deep and they recycle the used spells now, but that don't seem much comfort when your potatoes started walkin' about,' he  grumbled. 'My great-grandpa went to see the head wizard  about it,  and he said' - he put on a strangled nasal voice which was his idea of how you talked when you'd got an  education -  ' " Oh, there might be some  temp'ry  inconvenience now, my good man, but  just  you come back in fifty thousand years." Bloody wizards.'

The horse turned a corner.

This was  a  dead-end street. Half-collapsed  houses, windows  smashed, doors stolen, leaned against one another on either side.

'I  heard  they  said  they were  going to  clean up this  place,' said someone.

'Oh, yeah,' said Ernie,  and spat. When it hit the  ground it ran away. 'And  you know what?  You get loonies coming in  all the  time  now,  poking around, pulling things about...'

'Just at the wall up  ahead,' said  Teatime  conversationally. 'I think you generally go through just where there's a pile of rubble by the old dead tree, although you wouldn't see it unless you looked closely. But I've never seen how you do it ... '

'' ere, I can't take you lot through,' said Ernie. 'Lifts is one thing, but not taking people through- '

Teatime sighed. 'And we were  getting on so well. Listen, Ernie ... Ern ... you  will  take us through  or, and  I say  this with  very considerable regret, I will have to kill you. You  seem a nice man. Conscientious. A very serious overcoat and sensible boots.'

'But if'n I take you through-'

'What's the  worst that  can happen?' said Teatime.  'You'll lose  your job. Whereas if you don't, you'll die. So if you look at it like that, we're actually doing you a favour. Oh, do say yes.'

'Er . .  .' Ernie's brain felt twisted up. The lad  was definitely what Ernie thought of  as a toff, and he seemed nice and friendly,  but it didn't all add up. The tone and the content didn't match.

'Besides,' said Teatime, 'if  you've been coerced, it's not your fault, is it? No one can blame you. No one could blame anyone who'd been coerced at knife point.'

'Oh, well, I  s'pose, if we're talking coerced:' Ernie muttered.  Going along with things seemed to be the only way.

The horse stopped and stood waiting  with the patient look of an animal that probably knows the route better than the driver.

Ernie  fumbled in his overcoat pocket and took out a  small tin, rather like a snuff box. He opened it. There was glowing dust inside.

'What do you do with that?' said Teatime, all interest.

'Oh, you just takes a pinch and throws it in the  air and it goes twing and it opens the soft place,' said Ernie.

'SO ... you don't need any special training or anything?'

'Er... you just chucks it at the  wall there and it  goes twing,'  said Ernie.

'Really? May I try?'

Teatime took  the tin  from his unresisting hand  and threw a pinch  of dust into the air in  front of the horse. It hovered  for  a moment and then produced a narrow, glittering arch in the air. It sparkled and went:

... twing.

'Aw,' said a voice behind them. 'Innat nice, eh, our Davey?'

'Yeah.'

'All pretty sparkles...'

'And then you just drive forward?' said Teatime.

'That's  right,'  said  Ernie.  'Quick, mind. It only stays  open for a little while.'

Teatime pocketed the little tin. 'Thank you very much, Ernie. Very much indeed.'

His  other  hand lashed out.  There was a  glint  of metal.  The carter blinked, and then fell sideways off his seat.

There was  silence from behind, tinted with horror and possibly  just a little terrible admiration.

'Wasn't he dull?' said Teatime, picking up the reins.

Snow began to fall. It fell on the recumbent shape of  Ernie, and it also fell through several hooded grey robes that hung in the air.

There appeared to  be  nothing inside them. You could believe they were there merely to make a certain point in space.

Well, said one, we are frankly impressed.

Indeed, said another. We would never have thought of doing it this way.

He is certainly a resourceful human, said a third.

The beauty of it all, said the first - or it may have  been the second, because, absolutely nothing  distinguished the  robes - is that there  is so much else we will control.

Quite, said another. It is really amazing how they think. A sort of ... illogical logic.

Children,  said  another.  Who  would  have thought  it? But  today the children, tomorrow the world.

Give me a child until he is seven and he's mine for life, said another.

There was a dreadful pause.

The  consensus beings  that  called  themselves  the  Auditors  did not believe in  anything,  except  possibly  immortality.  And  the  way  to  be immortal, they  knew, was to avoid  living. Most of all they did not believe in personality. To be  a  personality was to  be a creature with a beginning and  an end. And  since they reasoned that  in an infinite universe any life was by comparison unimaginably short, they  died instantly. There was a flaw in their logic, of course, but by the time they found this out it was always too late. In the meantime, they  scrupulously avoided  any comment, action or experience that  set them apart ...

You said 'me', said one.

Ah. Yes. But, you  see, we were quoting, said the other  one hurriedly. Some religious person said that. About  educating  children.  And  so  would logically say 'me'. But I wouldn't use that term of myself, of - damn!

The robe vanished in a little puff of smoke.

Let that be a lesson to us, said one of the  survivors, as  another and totally  indistinguishable  robe popped  into existence  where  the stricken colleague had been.

Yes, said the newcomer. Well, it certainly appears...

It stopped. A dark shape was approaching through the snow.

It's him, it said.

They faded hurriedly  -  not  simply vanishing, but spreading  out  and thinning until they were just lost in the background.

The dark figure stopped by the dead carter and reached down.

COULD I GIVE YOU A HAND?

Ernie looked up gratefully.

'Cor, yeah,' he said. He got to his feet, swaying a little. 'Here, your fingers're cold, mister!'

SORRY.

'What'd he  go and do that for? I  did what he said. He could've killed me.'

Ernie  felt inside  his overcoat  and  pulled out a small  and, at this point, strangely transparent silver flask.

'I always keep a  nip  on  me these cold  nights,'  he  said. 'Keeps me spirits up.'

YES INDEED. Death looked around briefly and sniffed the air.

'How'm I  going to  explain all this, then, eh?' said  Ernie, taking  a pull.

SORRY? THAT WAS VERY RUDE OF ME. I WASN'T PAYING ATTENTION.

'I said what'm  I going  to tell people?  Letting some blokes  ride off with  my  cart neat as  you like ... That's gonna be the  sack for sure, I'm gonna be in big trouble . . .'

All. WELL. THERE AT  LEAST I  HAVE  SOME GOOD  NEWS,  ERNEST. AND, THEN AGAIN, I HAVE SOME BAD NEWS.

Ernie  listened. Once or twice he looked at the corpse at his  feet. He looked smaller from  the  outside. He was bright enough  not to  argue. Some things are  fairly  obvious when it's a  seven-foot  skeleton with  a scythe telling you them.

'So I'm dead, then,' he concluded.

CORRECT.

'Er ... The priest said that ... you know. after you're dead . . . it's like going through a door and on one  side of it there's ... He. . . well, a terrible place ... ?'

Death looked at his worried, fading face.

THROUGH A DOOR...

'That's what he said . .

I EXPECT IT DEPENDS ON THE DIRECTION YOU'RE WALKING IN.

When the street was  empty again, except  for  the fleshy  abode of the late Ernie, the grey shapes came back into focus.

Honestly, he gets worse and worse, said one.

He  was looking for us, said  another. Did you  notice?  He  suspects something. He gets so ... concerned about things.

Yes ... but the beauty  of this  plan, said a  third, is that he can't interfere.

He can go everywhere, said one.

No, said another. Not quite everywhere.

And, with ineffable smugness, they faded into the foreground.

It started to snow quite heavily.

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.

And that was it, more or less.

Afterwards,  the  Death of  Rats looked around  with interest.  In  the nature of things his very important job tended to take him to brickyards and dark cellars and the inside of cats and all the little dank holes where rats and mice finally found  out  if there was a Promised Cheese. This  place was different.

It was brightly decorated, for one  thing. Ivy  and mistletoe  hung  in bunches from  the bookshelves.  Brightly  coloured  streamers  festooned the walls, a feature seldom found in most holes or even quite civilized cats.

The Death of Rats took a leap onto  a  chair and from  there on  to the table and  in fact right into a glass of amber liquid, which tipped over and broke.  A  puddle spread around four turnips  and began to soak into  a note which had been written rather awkwardly on pink writing paper.

It read:

Dere Hogfather,

For  Hogswatch  I would like a drum an a  dolly  an  a  teddybear  an a Gharstley Omnian Inquisision Torchure Chamber  with Wind-up Rack  and Nearly Real  Blud You Can Use Again, you can  get  it From  the toyshoppe  in Short Strete,  it  is $5.99p. I have been good an here is a glars of Sherre  an  a Pork pie for you and turnips for Gouger an Rooter an Snot Snouter. I hop the Chimney is big enough but my friend Willaim Says you are your father really.

Yrs. Virginia Prood

The Death  of  Rats nibbled a bit of the pork pie because when  you are the personification of the death of  small  rodents  you have  to  behave in certain ways.  He  also piddled on one  of the turnips for the same  reason, although  only metaphorically, because  when you  are a small skeleton in  a black robe there are also some things you technically cannot do.

Then he leapt down  from the table and left sherryflavoured  footprints all  the way  to the tree that stood in a pot in the  corner.  It was really only a bare branch of oak,  but  so much shiny holly  and mistletoe had been wired onto it that it gleamed in the fight of the candles.

There was tinsel  on  it, and  glittering ornaments,  and small bags of chocolate money.

The Death of Rats peered at his hugely distorted reflection  in a glass ball, and then looked up at the mantelpiece.

He reached  it in one jump, and ambled curiously through the cards that had been  ranged  along it. His grey  whiskers  twitched  at  messages  like 'Wifhin  you  Joye and all Goode Cheer at Hogswatchtime  &  All Through  The Yeare'. A couple  of  them had pictures  of a big jolly  fat man  carrying a sack. In one of them he was riding in a sledge drawn by four enormous pigs.

The  Death of Rats sniffed at a couple of long stockings  that had been hung from the mantelpiece, over the fireplace in which a fire had  died down to a few sullen ashes.

He was aware of a subtle tension in the  air, a feeling that here was a scene that was also a stage, a round  hole, as it were, waiting for  a round peg

There was a scraping noise. A few lumps of soot thumped into the ashes.

The Grim Squeaker nodded to himself.

The scraping became louder, and was followed by a moment of silence and then a  clang as something  landed  in  the ashes and  knocked over a set of ornamental fire irons.

The rat  watched carefully as  a red-robed figure pulled itself upright and  staggered  across  the hearthrug, rubbing  its  shin  where it had been caught by the toasting fork.

It reached the table  and read the note. The Death of  Rats thought  he heard a groan.

The turnips were pocketed and so, to the Death of Rats' annoyance,  was the  pork pie. He was pretty sure it was meant to be  eaten  here, not taken away.

The figure  scanned the  dripping  note  for a moment, and  then turned around  and  approached  the mantelpiece.  The Death  of  Rats  pulled  back slightly behind 'Seafon's Greetings!'

A  red-gloved hand took down  a stocking. There  was some creaking  and rustling and it was replaced, looking a lot fatter - the larger box sticking out  of  the top had, just visible,  the words 'Victim Figures Not Included. 3-10 yrs'.

The Death of  Rats couldn't see much of the  donor of this munificence. The big red hood hid all the face, apart from a long white beard.

Finally, when the figure finished, it stood back and  pulled a list out of its  pocket. It held it up to  the hood and appeared to be consulting it. It waved  its other hand vaguely at the fireplace, the sooty footprints, the empty sherry  glass and  the stocking. Then  it bent forward, as  if reading some tiny print.

AH, YES, it said. ER... HO. HO. HO.

With  that,  it  ducked down and  entered the  chimney. There  was some scrabbling before its boots gained a purchase, and then it was gone.

The  Death  of Rats realized  he'd begun  to  knaw his little  scythe's handle in sheer shock.

SQUEAK?

He landed in the ashes and swarmed up the sooty cave of the chimney. He emerged  so fast that he shot out with his legs still  scrabbling and landed in the snow on the roof.

There was a sledge hovering in the air by the gutter.

The red-hooded figure had just climbed in and appeared to be talking to someone invisible behind a pile of sacks.

HERE'S ANOTHER PORK PIE.

'Any mustard?' said the sacks. 'They're a treat with mustard.'

IT DOES NOT APPEAR SO.

'Oh, well. Pass it over anyway.'

IT LOOKS VERY BAD.

'Nah, 's just where something's nibbled it---'

I MEAN THE SITUATION.  MOST  OF  THE  LETTERS  ...  THEY  DON'T  REALLY BELIEVE. THEY PRETEND TO

BELIEVE, JUST IN  CASE[7]. I FEAR IT MAY BE TOO LATE. IT HAS  SPREAD SO FAST AND BACK IN TIME, TOO.

'Never  say  die,  master.  That's our  motto,  eh?'  said  the  sacks, apparently with their mouth full.

I CAN'T SAY IT'S EVER REALLY BEEN MINE.

'I  meant we're not going to  be intimidated by the certain prospect of complete and utter failure, master.'

AREN'T WE? OH,  GOOD. WELL, I SUPPOSE  WE'D BETTER BE GOING. The figure picked  up  the reins.  UP,  GOUGER! UP, ROOTER!  UP,  TUSKER!  UP, SNOUTER! GIDDYUP!

The four large boars harnessed to the sledge did not move.

WHY DOESN'T THAT WORK? said the figure in a puzzled, heavy voice.

'Beats me, master,' said the sacks.

IT WORKS ON HORSES.

'You could try "Pig-hooey! "'

PIG-HOOEY. They waited. NO ... DOESN'T SEEM TO REACH THEM.

There was some whispering.

REALLY? YOU THINK THAT WOULD WORK?

'It'd bloody well work on me if I was a pig, master.'

VERY WELL, THEN.

The figure gathered up the reins again.

APPLE! SAUCE!

The pigs' legs blurred. Silver  light flicked across them, and exploded outwards. They dwindled to a dot, and vanished.

SQUEAK?

The Death  of Rats  skipped across the snow, slid  down a drainpipe and landed on the roof of a shed.

There  was a  raven perched there.  It  was staring  disconsolately  at something.

SQUEAK!

'Look at that, willya?' said the raven rhetorically. It waved a claw at a  bird table in the garden below.  'They hangs up  half a bloody coconut, a lump of bacon rind,  a handful  of peanuts in a bit  of wire and they  think they're the gods' gift to the  nat'ral  world. Huh.  Do I see eyeballs? Do I see entrails? I think  not. Most intelligent bird in the temperate latitudes an' I gets the cold shoulder just because  I can't hang  upside  down and go twit, twit.  Look at robins,  now. Stroppy little  evil  buggers, fight like demons,  but all  they got to do is go bob-bob-bobbing along and they  can't move  for  breadcrumbs. Whereas me myself can recite poems  and repeat  many hum'rous phrases...'

SQUEAK!

'Yes? What?'

The Death  of Rats pointed at  the roof and then the sky  and jumped up and down excitedly. The raven swivelled one eye upwards.

'Oh, yes. Him,' he said. 'Turns up  at this time of year. Tends  to  be associated distantly with robins, which-'

SQUEAK! SQUEE IK  IR IK! The Death of Rats  pantomimed a figure landing in a grate and walking  around a room. SQUEAK  EEK IK IK, SQUEAK  'HEEK HEEK HEEK'! IK IK SQUEAK!

'Been overdoing the Hogswatch cheer,  have you? Been rustling around in the brandy butter?'

SQUEAK?

The raven's eyes revolved.

'Look, Death's Death. It's a full-time job right?

it's  not as  though you can run, like, a window  cleaning round on the side or nip round after work cutting people's lawns.'

SQUEAK!

'Oh, please yourself.'

The raven crouched a little to allow  the tiny figure to hop  on to its back, and then lumbered into the air.

'Of course, they  can  go mental, your occult  types,' it  said, as  it swooped over the moonlit garden. 'Look at Old Man Trouble, for one...'

SQUEAK.

'Oh, I'm not suggestin...'

Susan didn't like Biers but she went there anyway, when the pressure of being normal got too much. Biers,  despite  the smell and the drink  and the company,  had one  important  virtue.  In Biers  no one took any notice.  Of anything. Hogswatch was traditionally supposed to be a time for families but the people who  drank in Biers probably didn't have families;  some  of them looked as though  they might  have had litters, or  clutches.  Some  of them looked  as  though  they'd  probably  eaten  their  relatives, or  at  least someone's relatives.

Biers  was where the undead drank. And  when Igor  the barman was asked for a Bloody Mary, he didn't mix a metaphor.

The regular customers didn't ask questions, and not only  because  some of them found anything above a growl hard to articulate. None of them was in the answers business. Everyone in Biers  drank alone. even when they were in groups. Or packs.

Despite the decorations put  up inexpertly by  Igor the barman to  show willing,[8] Biers was not a family place.

Family was a subject Susan liked to avoid.

Currently  she was  being aided in this by a gin and tonic.  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.

She  felt hot breath  on  her ear. A bogeyman had sat down on the stool beside her.

'Woss  a normo doin' in a place like this, then?' it rumbled, causing a cloud of vaporized alcohol and halitosis to engulf her. 'Hah, you fink  it's cool comin' down here an' swannin' around in  a black dress wid all the lost boys, eh? Dabblin' in a bit of designer darkness, eh?'

Susan moved her stool away a little. The bogeyman grinned.

'Want a bogeyman under yer bed, eh?'

'Now  then, Shlimazel,' said Igor,  without looking up from polishing a glass.

'Well, woss she down here  for,  eh?' said the bogeyman.  A huge  hairy hand grabbed Susan's arm. 'O' course, maybe what she wants is-'

'I ain't telling you again, Shlimazel,' said Igor.

He saw the girl turn to face Shlimazel.

Igor wasn't in a position to see her face fully, but the bogeyman  was. He shot back so quickly that he fell off his stool.

And when the girl spoke, what she said was only partly words but also a statement, written in stone, of how the future was going to be.

' GO AWAY AND STOP BOTHERING ME.'

She turned back and  gave Igor a polite and slightly  apologetic smile. The  bogeyman  struggled frantically  out of the  wreckage of his stool  and loped towards the door.

Susan felt  the drinkers turn  back to their private preoccupations. It was amazing what you could get away with in Biers.

Igor put down the glass and looked up at the window. For a drinking den that  relied  on darkness it had  rather a  large one but, of  course,  some customers did arrive by air.

Something was tapping on it now.

Igor lurched over and opened it.

Susan looked up.

'Oh, no . . . '

The  Death  of  Rats  leapt  down onto  the  counter,  with  the  raven fluttering after it.

SQUEAK SQUEAK EEK! EEK! SQUEAK IK IK 'HEEK HEEK HEEK'! SQ...

'Go  away,'  said Susan coldly.  'I'm  not  interested. You're  just  a figment of my imagination.'

The raven perched on a bowl behind the bar and said, 'Ah, great.'

SQUEAK!

'What're these?' said the raven, flicking something off the end  of its beak. 'Onions? Pfah!'

'Go on, go away, the pair of you,' said Susan.

'The  rat says your granddad's  gone mad,' said  the raven. 'Says  he's pretending to be the Hogfather.'

'Listen, I just don't... What?'

'Red cloak, long beard...'

HEEK! HEEK! HEEK!

...going "Ho, ho, ho", driving around in the big sledge drawn by the four piggies, the whole thing...'

'Pigs? What happened to Binky?'

'Search me. O' course, it can happen,  as I  was telling  the  rat only just now-'

Susan put her hands over her ears, more for desperate theatrical effect than for the muffling they gave.

'I don't want to know! I don't have a grandfather!'

She had to hold on to that.

The Death of Rats squeaked at length.

'The rat says you must remember, he's tall, not what you'd call fleshy, he carries a scythe...'

'Go away! And take the ... the rat with you!'

She waved  her hand wildly  and, to  her horror and shame,  knocked the little hooded skeleton over an ashtray.

EEK?

The raven took the rat's  cowl in its beak and tried to  drag him away, but a tiny skeletal fist shook its scythe.

EEK IK EEK SQUEAK!

'He says, you don't mess with the rat,' said the raven.

In a flurry of wings they were gone.

Igor dosed the window. He didn't pass any comment.

'They  weren't real,' said  Susan, hurriedly.  'Well,  that is ...  the raven's probably real, but he hangs around with the rat...'

'Which isn't real,' said Igor.

'That's right!'  said  Susan, gratefully.  'You  probably didn't see  a thing.'

'That's right,' said Igor. 'Not a thing.'

'Now ... how much do I owe you?' said Susan.

Igor counted on his fingers.

'That'll be a dollar for  the drinks,' he said, 'and  fivepence because the raven that wasn't here messed in the pickles.'

It was the night before Hogswatch.

In the Archchancellor's new bathroom Modo wiped his hands on a piece of rag and looked proudly at his handiwork.  Shining porcelain  gleamed back at him. Copper and brass shone in the lamplight.

He  was a little worried that  he hadn't been able to  test everything, but  Mr Ridcully  had said, 'I'll test  it when I  use it,' and  Modo  never argued with the Gentlemen, as he thought of them. He knew that they all knew a lot more than he knew, and was quite happy knowing this.  He didn't meddle with the fabric of time and space, and they kept out of his greenhouses. The way he saw it, it was a partnership.

He'd  been particularly careful to scrub the floors.  Mr  Ridcully  had been very specific about that.

'Verruca Gnome,' he said to himself, giving tap a last polish. 'What an imagination the Gentlemen do have.'

Far off,  unheard by anyone, was a faint little noise, like the ringing of tiny silver bells.

Glingleglingleglingle...

And someone landed abruptly in a  snowdrift  and said, 'Bugger!', which is a terrible thing to say as your first word ever.

Overhead, heedless of the new and somewhat angry life that was even now dusting itself off, the sledge soared onwards through time and space.

I'M FINDING THE BEARD A BIT OF A TRIAL, said Death.

'Why've  you  got  to have the beard?' said the  voice  from among  the sacks. 'I thought you said people see what they expect to see.'

CHILDREN DON'T. TOO OFTEN THEY SEE WHAT'S THERE.

'Well, at least it's keeping you in the right frame of mind, master. In character, sort of thing.'

BUT GOING DOWN THE CHIMNEY? WHERE'S  THE SENSE IN THAT? I CAN JUST WALK THROUGH THE WALLS.

'Walking  through the walls is not right, neither,' said the voice from the sacks.

IT WORKS FOR ME.

'It's got to be chimneys. Same as the beard, really.'

A head  thrust itself out  from the pile.  It appeared to belong to the oldest,  most  unpleasant  pixie  in  the  universe.  The  fact that it  was underneath a jolly little green hat with a bell on it did not do anything to improve matters.

It waved a crabbed hand containing a thick wad of letters, many of them on pastel-coloured paper, often with  bunnies and teddy  bears on  them, and written mostly in crayon.

'You reckon  these little buggers'd be  writing  to  someone who walked through walls?' it said. 'And the "Ho, ho, ho" could use  some more work, if you don't mind my saying so.'

HO. HO. HO.

'No, no, no!' said Albert. 'You got to put a bit of life in it, sir, no offence intended. It's got to be  a big fat laugh. You got to ... you got to sound  like you're pissing brandy and crapping  plum pudding, sir, excuse my Klatchian.'

REALLY? HOW DO YOU KNOW ALL THIS?

'I was young once, sir. Hung up my stocking like a good boy every year. For to get it filled with toys, just like you're doing. Mind you, in those days  basically  it was sausages and  black puddings if  you were lucky. But  you always got a pink sugar piglet in the toe.  It wasn't a good Hogswatch unless you'd eaten so much you were sick as a pig, master.'

Death looked at the sacks.

It was a strange but demonstrable fact that  the  sacks of toys carried by the Hogfather,  no matter  what they really contained, always appeared to have sticking out  of the  top a teddy bear, a  toy  soldier in  the kind of colourful  uniform that  would  stand  out in a disco,  a  drum and  a  red-and-white candy cane.  The actual contents always turned out to be something a bit garish and costing $5.99.

Death had investigated one or two. There had been a Real Agatean Ninja, for  example, with Fearsome  Death Grip, and a Captain Carrot One-Man  Night Watch with a complete wardrobe of toy weapons, each of which cost as much as the original wooden doll in the first place.

Mind you, the stuff for the girls was just as depressing. It seemed  to be  nearly  all  horses. Most of them  were  grinning.  Horses, Death  felt, shouldn't grin- Any horse that was grinning was planning something.

He sighed again.

Then  there  was this business  of deciding who'd been naughty or nice. He'd never had to think about that sort of thing before. Naughty or nice, it was ultimately all the same.

Still, it had to be done right. Otherwise it wouldn't work.

The pigs pulled up alongside another chimney.

'Here we are, here we are,' said Albert. 'James Riddle, aged eight.'

HAH, YES. HE ACTUALLY SAYS IN  HIS LETTER,  'I BET YOU DON'T EXIST 'COS EVERYONE  KNOWS  ITS  YORE  PARENTS.' OH  YES, said Death,  with what almost sounded like sarcasm, I'M SURE HIS  PARENTS ARE JUST IMPATIENT TO BANG THEIR ELBOWS IN TWELVE FEET OF  NARROW  UNSWEPT  CHIMNEY, I  DON'T THINK.  I SHALL TREAD EXTRA SOOT INTO HIS CARPET.

'Right, sir. Good thinking. Speaking of which - down you go, sir.'

HOW  ABOUT  IF  I  DON'T  GIVE HIM  ANYTHING  AS A PUNISHMENT  FOR  NOT BELIEVING?

'Yeah, but what's that going to prove?'

Death sighed. I SUPPOSE YOU'RE RIGHT.

'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...

Albert: looked across the snowy rooftops and sighed. This wasn't right. He was helping because, well, Death was his master and that's all  there was to it, and if the master had a heart it would be in the right place. But...

'Are you sure we ought to be doing this, master?'

Death stopped, halfway out of the chimney.

CAN YOU THINK OF A BETTER ALTERNATIVE, ALBERT?

And that was it. Albert couldn't.

Someone had to do it.

There were bears on the street again.

Susan ignored them and didn't even make a point of not treading  on the cracks.

They just stood around, looking a bit puzzled and slightly transparent, visible only to children and  Susan. News  like Susan gets around. The bears had heard  about  the poker. Nuts  and berries,  their expressions seemed to say. That's what  we're here for.  Big sharp teeth? What big  shar--- Oh, these big sharp  teeth? They're just for, er, cracking nuts. And some of these berries can be really vicious.

The city's clocks were striking six when she got back to the house. She was allowed her own key. It wasn't as if she was a servant, exactly.

You couldn't be  a duchess and a servant. But it  was all right to be a governess.  It was  understood that it wasn't exactly what you  were, it was merely a way of  passing the time until you did what every girl, or gel, was supposed to do  in life, i.e., marry some  man.  It  was understood that you were playing.

The parents were in awe of her. She was the daughter of a  duke whereas Mr  Gaiter was a man to be reckoned with  in  the wholesale boots and  shoes business.  Mrs  Gaiter was bucking for  a transfer  into the  Upper Classes, which  she currently  hoped to  achieve  by reading books on etiquette.  She treated Susan  with  the kind  of worried deference she  thought  was due to anyone  who'd  known the difference between  a serviette and a  napkin  from birth.

Susan had  never before  come  across the idea that you  could rise  in Society by, as it  were,  gaining marks,  especially since  such noblemen as she'd met in her father's house had used neither serviette  nor napkin but a state of mind, which was 'Drop it on the floor, the dogs'll eat it.'

When Mrs Gaiter had tremulously  asked her how one addressed the second cousin of a queen,

Susan had replied without thinking, 'We called him Jamie, usually,' and Mrs Gaiter had had to go and have a headache in her room.

Mr Gaiter just nodded when he met her in a passage and never said  very much to  her. He was pretty sure he knew where he stood  in  boots and shoes and that was that.

Gawain and Twyla, who'd been named by people who apparently loved them, had been put to bed by the time Susan  got in, at their own insistence. It's a widely held belief at a certain age that going to bed early makes tomorrow come faster.

She  went  to tidy  up  the  schoolroom  and  get things ready for  the morning, and began to pick up the things the children had left lying around. Then something tapped at a window pane.

She peered out at the darkness,  and then opened the window. A drift of snow fell down outside.

In the summer the  window opened into the branches of a cherry tree. In the winter dark, they were little grey fines where  the snow had settled  on them.

'Who's that?' said Susan.

Something hopped through the frozen branches.

'Tweet tweet tweet, would you believe?' said the raven.

'Not you again?'

'You wanted maybe some dear little robin? Listen, your grand-'

'Go away! '

Susan slammed  the  window and pulled the curtains across. She put  her back  to them, to make sure, and tried to concentrate on the room. It helped to think about ... normal things.

There was the Hogswatch tree, a rather smaller version of the grand one in the hall. She'd  helped the  children to make paper  decorations  for it. Yes. Think about that.

There  were the  paperchains. There were the bits  of holly, thrown out from the main  rooms for not having  enough  berries on them, and  now given fake  modelling clay berries  and  stuck  in anyhow on  shelves  and  behind pictures.

There were  two stockings  hanging  from the mantelpiece of  the  small schoolroom grate.  There were  Twyla's paintings, all blobby blue  skies and violently  green grass  and red houses with four square  windows. There were

...

Normal things ...

She  straightened  up and  stared  at them, her  fingernails beating  a thoughtful tattoo on a wooden pencil case.

The  door was  pushed  open.  It revealed the  tousled  shape of Twyla, hanging onto the doorknob with one hand.

'Susan, there's a monster under my bed again...'

The click of Susan's fingernails stopped.

'...I can hear it moving about...'

Susan sighed and turned towards the child.

'All right, Twyla. I'll be along directly.'

The girl  nodded and  went back  to her room, leaping into  bed  from a distance as a precaution against claws.

There was a  metallic tzing as Susan withdrew the poker from the little brass stand it shared with the tongs and the coal shovel.

She sighed. Normality was what you made it.

She went into  the children's bedroom  and  leaned over  as if  to tuck Twyla up. Then her hand darted down and under the bed. She grabbed a handful of hair. She pulled.

The  bogeyman came out like a  cork but before it could get its balance it found itself spreadeagled against the wall with one arm  behind its back. But it did manage to turn its head, to see Susan's face glaring at it from a few inches away.

Gawain bounced up and down on his bed.

'Do the Voice on it! Do the Voice on it!' he shouted.

'Don't  do  the  Voice,  don't do  the  Voice!'  pleaded  the  bogeyman urgently.

'Hit it on the head with the poker!'

'Not the poker! Not the poker!'

'It's you, isn't it,' said Susan. 'From this afternoon . . .'

'Aren't you going to poke it with the poker?' said Gawain.

'Not the poker!' whined the bogeyman.

'New in town?' whispered Susan.

'Yes!' The  bogeyman's forehead  wrinkled  with puzzlement. 'Here,  how come you can see me?'

'Then this is a friendly warning, understand? Because it's Hogswatch.'

The bogeyman tried to move. 'You call this friendly?'

'Ah, you want to try for unfriendly?' said Susan, adjusting her grip.

'No, no, no, I like friendly!'

'This house is out of bounds, right?'

'You a witch or something?' moaned the bogeyman.

' I'm just ... something. Now  ... you won't be around here again, will you? Otherwise it'll be the blanket next time.'

'No!'

'I mean it. We'll put your head under the blanket.'

'No!'

'It's got fluffy bunnies on it. '

'No!'

'Off you go, then.'

The bogeyman half fell, half ran towards the door.

'It's not right,' it mumbled. 'You're not s'posed  to see us if you ain't dead or magic. 's not fair. . .'

'Try number nineteen,' said  Susan, relenting a little. 'The  governess there doesn't believe in bogeymen.'

'Right?' said the monster hopefully.

'She believes in algebra, though.'

'Ah.  Nice.' The bogeyman  grinned hugely. It was amazing  the sort  of mischief that  could becaused in a  house where  no one in authority thought you existed.

'I'll be off, then,' it said. 'Er. Happy Hogswatch.'

'Possibly,' said Susan, as it slunk away.

'That wasn't as much  fun as the one last  month,' said Gawain, getting between the sheets again. 'You know, when you kicked him in the trousers...'

'Just you two get to sleep now,' said Susan.

'Verity said the sooner we got to sleep  the sooner the Hogfather would come,' said Twyla conversationally.

'Yes,' said Susan. 'Unfortunately, that might be the case.'

The remark  passed right over their heads. She wasn't  sure why  it had gone through hers, but she knew enough to trust her senses.

She hated that kind of sense. It ruined your life. But it was the sense she had been born with.

The children were tucked in, and  she closed the door  quietly and went back to the schoolroom.

Something had changed.

She glared at  the stockings, but  they were unfulfilled.  A paperchain rustled.

She  stared at  the  tree.  Tinsel  had  been twined  around it,  badly pasted-together decorations had been hung on  it. And  on  top was the fairy made of

She  crossed  her  arms,  looked   up  at   the  ceiling,   and  sighed theatrically.

'It's you, isn't it?' she said.

SQUEAK?

'Yes, it is. You're sticking out your  arms like a scarecrow and you've stuck a little star on your scythe, haven't you...?'

The Death of Rats hung his head guiltily.

SQUEAK.

'You're not fooling anyone.'

SQUEAK.

'Get down from there this minute!'

SQUEAK.

'And what did you do with the fairy?'

'It's  shoved  under a cushion  on the chair,' said  a  voice  from the shelves on the other side of  the room.  There was a clicking  noise and the raven's voice added, 'These damn eyeballs are hard, aren't they?'

Susan raced across the room and snatched the bowl away so fast that the raven somersaulted and landed on its back.

'They're  walnuts!'  she  shouted,  as  they  bounced  around her. 'Not eyeballs! This  is a schoolroom! And the  difference  between  a  school and a-a-a raven delicatessen is that they hardly ever have eyeballs lying around in bowls  in case  a  raven  drops  in for  a  quick snack!  Understand?  No eyeballs! The world is full of small round things that aren't eyeballs! OK?'

The raven's own eyes revolved.

' ' n' I suppose a bit of warm liver's out of the question...'

'Shut up!  I want both of you out  of here right now! I don't  know how you got in here-'

'There's a law against coming down the chimney on Hogswatchnight?'

'...but I don't want you back in my life, understand?'

'The rat said  you ought to be warned even if you were crazy,' said the raven  sulkily. 'I  didn't want  to come, there's a donkey dropped dead just outside the city gates, I'll be lucky now if I get a hoof---'

'Warned?' said Susan.

There it was again. The change  in the weather of the mind, a sensation of tangible time ...

The Death of Rats nodded.

There was a scrabbling sound far overhead. A few flakes of soot dropped down the chimney.

SQUEAK, said the rat, but very quietly.

Susan  was aware of a new sensation, as a  fish might be aware of a new tide, a spring of  fresh water flowing into the sea.  Time was  pouring into the world.

She glanced up at the clock. It was just on half past six.

The raven scratched its beak.

'The rat says ... The rat says: you'd better watch out ...'

There were others at  work on this  shining Hogswatch  Eve. The Sandman was out and  about, dragging his  sack from bed to bed. Jack Frost  wandered from window pane to window pane, making icy patterns.

And  one  tiny hunched  shape  slid  and  slithered  along the  gutter, squelching its feet in slush and swearing under its breath.

It wore a stained black suit and, on its head, the type of hat known in various parts of the multiverse as 'bowler', 'derby'  or 'the one that makes you look a  bit of  a tit'.  The hat  had been pressed down very firmly and, since the creature had long pointy  ears, these had been forced out sideways and gave it the look of a small malignant wing-nut.

The  thing  was a gnome by  shape  but  a fairy by  profession. Fairies aren't necessarily little  twinkly creatures. It's purely a job description, and  the  commonest ones aren't even  visible.[9]  A  fairy  is  simply  any creature currently employed under supernatural laws  to take things away or, as in  the case of the small creature presently climbing up the inside  of a drainpipe and swearing, to bring things.

Oh, yes. He does. Someone has  to do it, and he looks  the right  gnome for the job.

Oh, yes.

Sideney was  worried. He didn't like violence, and there had been a lot of it in  the last few days, if days passed in this place. The men ... well, they only seemed to find  life  interesting when  they were doing  something sharp to someone else and, while they didn't bother him much in the same way that lions don't trouble themselves with ants, they certainly worried him.

But  not as  much  as  Teatime  did. Even the brute  called Chickenwire treated  Teatime with caution, if not  respect, and the monster called Banjo just followed him around like a puppy.

The enormous man was watching him now.

He reminded Sideney too  much of Ronnie Jenks, the bully who'd made his life  miserable  at  Cammer Wimblestone's dame school. Ronnie hadn't been  a pupil. He was the old woman's  grandson or nephew  or something,  which gave him a licence to hang around the place and beat up any kid smaller or weaker or brighter  than he was, which more or less meant he had the whole world to choose  from.  In  those circumstances, it was particularly unfair  that  he always chose Sideney.

Sideney hadn't hated Ronnie. He'd  been too frightened.  He'd wanted to be  his friend. Oh, so much. Because  that way, just possibly,  he  wouldn't have his head trodden on such a lot and would actually get to eat  his lunch instead of having it thrown in the privy. And it had been a good day when it had been his lunch.

And then,  despite all Ronnie's best efforts, Sideney  had grown up and gone to university. Occasionally  his mother told him how Ronnie was getting on (she assumed, in the way of  mothers, that because they had been small boys at school together  they had been friends). Apparently he ran a fruit stall and was married to a girl called Angie.[10] This was not enough punishment, Sideney considered.

Banjo even breathed  like Ronnie,  who  had to  concentrate on  such an intellectual exercise and always had one blocked nostril. And his mouth open all the time. He looked as though he was living on invisible plankton.

He tried to keep his mind on what he  was doing and ignore the laboured gurgling behind him. A change in its tone made him look up.

'Fascinating,' said Teatime. 'You make it look so easy.'

Sideney sat back, nervously.

'Urn  ... it  should be  fine now,  sir,' he said.  'It just  got a bit scuffed when we were piling up the

He couldn't bring himself to say it, he even had to avert his eyes from the heap, it was the sound they'd made. '...the things,' he finished.

'We don't need to repeat the spell?' said Teatime.

'Oh, it'll keep going for ever,' said Sideney.

'The simple ones do. It's just a state change, powered by  the ...  the ... it just keeps going

He swallowed.

'So,' he said, 'I  was thinking ... since  you don't  actually need me, sir, perhaps ...'

'Mr Brown seems  to  be having some trouble with the  locks  on the top floor,' said Teatime. 'That door we couldn't open, remember? I'm sure you'll want to help.'

Sideney's face fell.

'Urn, I'm not a locksmith. '

'They appear to be magical.'

Sideney opened his mouth to say, 'But  I'm very bad  at magical locks,' and then thought much better of it. He had already fathomed that if  Teatime wanted you to do something, and you weren't very good at  it, then your best plan, in fact quite possibly  your only plan, was  to learn to be good at it very quickly.  Sideney was not a fool. He'd  seen the way the others reacted around Teatime, and they were men who did things he'd only dreamed of.[11]

At which point he was relieved to see Medium Dave walk down the stairs, and  it said  a lot for the effect of Teatime's  stare that  anyone could be relieved to have it punctuated by someone like Medium Dave.

'We've found  another guard, sir.  Up on the  sixth  floor.  He's  been hiding.'

Teatime stood  up.  'Oh dear,'  he said. 'Not  trying to be heroic, was he?'

'He's just scared. Shall we let him go?'

'Let him go?'  said  Teatime.  'Far too messy. I'll go up  there.  Come along, Mr Wizard.'

Sideney followed him reluctantly up the stairs.

The tower - if  that's what it was, he thought; he was used  to the odd architecture at Unseen University and this  made UU look normal was a hollow tube.  No  fewer   than  four  spiral   staircases  climbed  the   inside, criss-crossing  on landings and occasionally passing through  one another in defiance of generally accepted  physics. But that was practically normal for an alumnus of Unseen University, although technically  Sideney had  not alumed. What  threw the eye was the  absence of  shadows.  You didn't notice shadows,  how they delineated things, how  they gave texture to  the  world, until they weren't there. The white marble, if that's what it was  seemed to glow from the inside. Even when the impossible sun shone through a window it barely caused faint  grey  smudges where honest shadows should be. The tower seemed to avoid darkness.

That was even more frightening than the times when, after a complicated landing, you found yourself  walking up by  stepping down the underside of a stair and the  distant floor now hung overhead like a  ceiling. He'd noticed that even the other men shut their eyes when that happened. Teatime, though, took those stairs three at a time, laughing like a kid with a new toy.

They reached an upper landing and followed a corridor.  The others were gathered by a closed door.

'He's barricaded himself in,' said Chickenwire.

Teatime tapped on  it. 'You in  there,' he said. 'Come on out. You have my word you won't be harmed.'

'No!'

Teatime stood back. 'Banjo, knock it down,' he said.

Banjo  lumbered  forward. The door withstood a couple  of massive kicks and then burst open.

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...'

He  crumpled around  Teatime's  suddenly outthrust fist. And then, just like the others had done, he faded.

'Rather  a charitable  act  there, I feel,'  Teatime said  as  the  man vanished. 'But it is nearly Hogswatch, after all.'

Death,  pillow slipping gently under his red robe, stood in  the middle of the nursery carpet ...

It was an old one. Things ended up in the  nursery when they had seen a complete tour of duty in the rest  of the house. Long ago, someone had  made it by carefully knotting long bits  of brightly coloured rag into a sacking base,  giving it the look of a deflated Rastafarian hedgehog. Things lived among the rags. There were old rusks, bits of toy, buckets of dust.  It had seen life. It may even have evolved some.

Now the occasional lump of grubby melting snow dropped onto it.

Susan was crimson with anger.

'I  mean,  why?'  she  demanded, walking  around the figure.  'This  is Hogswatch! It's supposed  to be jolly, with mistletoe  and holly, and -  and other things ending in olly! It's a time when people want to feel good about things  and  eat until they explode!  It's a  time when they want to see all their relatives...'

She stopped that sentence.

'I mean it's a time  when humans are really human,' she said. 'And they don't want a ... a skeleton at the feast! Especially one, I might add, who's wearing a false beard and has got a damn cushion shoved up his robe! I mean, why?'

Death looked nervous.

ALBERT SAID IT WOULD HELP ME GET INTO THE SPIRIT OF THE THING. ER AGAIN

There was a small squelchy noise.

Susan spun around, grateful right now for any distraction.

'Don't  think I  can't hear  you! They're  grapes, understand?  And the other things are satsumas! Get out of the fruit bowl!'

'Can't blame  a bird  for trying,' said  the  raven  sulkily, from  the table.

'And you, you leave those nuts alone! They're for tomorrow!'

SKQUEAF, said the Death of Rats, swallowing hurriedly.

Susan turned back to  Death. The Hogfather's artificial stomach was now at groin level.

'This is a nice house,' she said. 'And this is a ...

.. IT'S GOOD TO SEE YOU

... good job. And it's real, with  normal people. And I was looking forward to a  real  life,  where  normal things happen! And suddenly  the old circus comes to town. Look at yourselves. Three Stooges, No Waiting! Well, I  don't know what's going on, but you can  all leave again, right? This is my  life. It doesn't belong to any of you. It's not going to ...'

There was a muffled curse, a  rush of soot, and a skinny old man landed in the grate.

'Bum!' he said.

'Good  grief! ' raged  Susan. 'And here  is  Pixie  Albert! Well, well, well! Come along in, do! If the real Hogfather doesn't come soon there's not going to be room.'

HE WON'T BE JOINING US, said Death.  The pillow slid  softly on to  the rug.

'Oh, and why not? Both of the children did letters to him,' said Susan. 'There's rules, you know.'

YES. THERE ARE RULES. AND THEY'RE ON THE LIST. I CHECKED IT.

Albert pulled the pointy hat off his head and spat out some soot.

'Right. He did. Twice,' he said. 'Anything to drink around here?'

'So what  have you turned up for?'  Susan demanded. 'And  if  it's  for business reasons, I will add, then that outfit is in extremely poor taste ...'

THE HOGFATHER IS ... UNAVAILABLE.

'Unavailable? At Hogswatch?'

YES.

'Why?'

HE IS ... LET ME SEE ... THERE ISN'T AN ENTIRELY APPROPRIATE HUMAN WORD, SO ... LET'S SETTLE FOR ... DEAD. YES. HE IS DEAD.

Susan had never hung up a stocking. She'd never looked for eggs laid by the Soul Cake Duck. She'd never put a tooth  under her pillow in the serious expectation that a dentally inclined fairy would turn up.

It wasn't that her  parents didn't believe in such things. They  didn't need to  believe in them.  They  knew they existed.  They  just wished  they didn't.

Oh, there had been presents, at the right  time,  with a careful  label saying  who they were from. And a  superb egg on  Soul Cake Morning,  filled with  sweets. Juvenile teeth  earned  no less than a dollar  each  from  her father, without argument.[12] But it was all straightforward.

She knew now that they'd been trying  to protect her. She  hadn't known then  that her father  had been Death's apprentice for a while, and that her mother  was  Death's  adopted daughter. She'd  had very dim recollections of being taken  a few  times to see someone who'd been quite, well, jolly, in a strange,  thin  way. And the visits had suddenly stopped. And she'd met  him later and, yes, he had his good side, and for a while she'd wondered why her parents had been so unfeeling and

She knew now why they'd  tried to keep her away.  There was far more to genetics than little squirmy spirals.

She could walk through walls  when she  really had to. She could  use a tone of voice that  was more like actions  than words, that  somehow reached inside people and operated all the right switches. And her hair ...

That  had only happened  recently,  though. It used to be unmanageable, but  at  around  the age of seventeen she had found  it more or less managed itself.

That had  lost her several young men. Someone's hair rearranging itself into  a  new style, the  tresses curling around themselves like a nest of kittens, could definitely put the crimp on any relationship.

She'd been  making good progress, though. She  could  go  for  days now without feeling anything other than entirely human.

But it was always the case, wasn't it? You could go out into the world, succeed  on your own terms,  and  sooner  or  later  some  embarrassing  old relative was bound to turn up.

Grunting and  swearing,  the gnome clambered out of  another drainpipe, jammed  its hat  firmly  on its  head, threw its  sack onto a snowdrift  and jumped down after it.

' 's a good one,' he said. 'Ha, take 'im weeks to get rid of that one!'

He took  a crumpled piece of paper out of  a  pocket  and  examined  it closely. Then he looked at an elderly  figure working  away  quietly at  the next house.

It was standing by a window,  drawing  with great concentration  on the glass.

The gnome wandered up, interested, and watched critically.

'Why  just fern patterns?'  he said, after  a while. 'Pretty, yeah, but you wouldn't catch me puttin' a penny in your hat for fern patterns.'

The figure turned, brush in hand.

'I happen to like fern patterns,' said jack Frost coldly.

'It's  just that people  expect, you know,  sad  big-eyed kids, kittens lookin' out of boots, little doggies, that sort of thing.'

'I do ferns.'

'Or big pots of sunflowers, happy seaside scenes... '

'And ferns.'

'I mean,  s'posing some big high priest wanted you to paint the  temple ceiling with gods 'n' angels and suchlike, what'd you do then?'

'He could have as many gods and angels as he liked, provided they ...'

'... looked like ferns?'

'I resent  the implication that  I  am solely  fernfixated,'  said Jack Frost. 'I can also do a very nice paisley pattern.'

'What's that look like, then?'

'Well  ... it does, admittedly, have a certain  ferny  quality to the uninitiated eye.' Frost leaned forward. 'Who're you?'

The gnome took a step backwards.

'You're  not a tooth fairy, are you? I see more and more of  them about these days. Nice girls.'

'Nah. Nah. Not teeth,' said the gnome, clutching his sack.

'What, then?'

The gnome told him.

'Really?' said Jack Frost. 'I thought they just turned up.'

'Well, come to  that, I  thought frost on the windows just happened all by itself,' said the gnome. "ere, you don't  half look  spiky. I  bet You go through a lot of bedsheets.'

'I don't  sleep,' said Frost icily, turning away. 'And now,  if  you'll excuse  me, I have a large number of windows to do.  Ferns aren't easy.  You need a steady hand.'

'What do you mean  dead?'  Susan demanded. 'How  can  the Hogfather  be dead? He's ... isn't he what you are? An ...'

ANTHROPOMORPHIC  PERSONIFICATION.  YES. HE HAS BECOME SO. THE SPIRIT OF HOGSWATCH.

'But  ...  how?  How can anyone kill  the  Hogfather? Poisoned  sherry? Spikes in the chimney?'

THERE ARE ... MORE SUBTLE WAYS.

'Coff. Coff. Coff. Oh dear, this soot,' said Albert  loudly. 'Chokes me up something cruel.'

'And you've taken over?' said Susan, ignoring him. 'That's sick!'

Death contrived to look hurt.

'I'll just go and have a  look somewhere,' said Albert,  brushing  past her and opening the door.

She pushed it shut quickly.

'And what are  you  doing  here, Albert?'  she said,  clutching  at the straw. 'I thought you'd die if you ever came back to the world!'

AH, BUT WE  ARE NOT  IN  THE WORLD, said Death.  WE ARE  IN THE SPECIAL CONGRUENT  REALITY CREATED  FOR  THE HOGFATHER.  NORMAL  RULES  HAVE  TO  BE SUSPENDED. HOW ELSE COULD ANYONE GET AROUND THE ENTIRE WORLD IN ONE NIGHT?

' 's right,'  said Albert,  leering.  'One  of  the Hogfather's  Little Helpers, me.  Official. Cot the pointy green hat and everything.' He spotted the glass of sherry and couple of  turnips that the children had left on the table, and bore down on them.

Susan looked shocked. A couple of days earlier she'd taken the children to the Hogfather's Grotto in one of the big shops in The Maul. Of course, it wasn't the real one,  but it had turned out to be a  fairly good actor  in a red suit. There had been people dressed up as pixies, and a picket outside the shop by the Campaign for Equal Heights.[13]

None of the pixies had looked anything like Albert. If they had, people would have only gone into the grotto armed.

'Been good, 'ave yer?' said Albert, and spat into the fireplace.

Susan stared at him.

Death leaned down. She stared up into the blue glow of his eyes.

YOU ARE KEEPING WELL? he said.

'Yes.'

SELF-RELIANT? MAKING YOUR OWN WAY IN THE WORLD?

'Yes!'

GOOD. WELL, COME, ALBERT. WE  WILL LOAD  THE STOCKINGS  AND GET ON WITH THINGS.

A couple of letters appeared in Death's hand.

SOMEONE CHRISTENED THE CHILD TWYLA?

'I m afraid so, but why ...'

AND THE OTHER ONE GAWAIN?

'Yes. But look, how ...'

WHY GAWAIN?

'I ... suppose it's a good strong name for a fighter ...'

A SELF-FULFILLING PROPHECY,  I SUSPECT. I SEE  THE GIRL WRITES IN GREEN CRAYON ON PINK PAPER WITH A  MOUSE  IN  THE CORNER.  THE MOUSE IS WEARING  A DRESS.

'I ought to point out that she  decided to do  that  so the Hogfather would  think  she was  sweet,'  said Susan. 'Including  the  deliberate  bad spelling. But look, why are you ...'

SHE SAYS SHE IS FIVE YEARS OLD.

'In years, yes. In cynicism, she's about  thirtyfive. Why are you doing the...'

BUT SHE BELIEVES IN THE HOGFATHER?

'She'd believe in  anything if there  was a dolly  in  it  for her. But you're not going to leave without telling me ...'

Death hung the stockings back on the mantelpiece.

NOW WE MUST BE GOING. HAPPY HOGSWATCH. ER ... OH, YES: HO. HO. HO.

'Nice sherry,' said Albert, wiping his mouth.

Rage overtook Susan's curiosity. It had to travel quite fast.

'You've actually been drinking  the actual drinks little children leave out for the actual Hogfather?' she said.

'Yeah, why not? He ain't drinking 'em. Not where he's gone.'

'And how many have you had, may I ask?'

'Dunno, ain't counted,' said Albert happily.

ONE MILLION, EIGHT HUNDRED THOUSAND, SEVEN HUNDRED AND SIX, said Death. AND SIXTY EIGHT THOUSAND, THREE HUNDRED AND NINETEEN PORK PIES. AND ONE TURNIP.

'It  looked  pork-pie  shaped,' said Albert. 'Everything does, after  a while.'

'Then why haven't you exploded?'

'Dunno. Always had a good digestion.'

TO  THE  HOGFATHER, ALL PORK PIES  ARE AS ONE  PORK PIE. EXCEPT THE ONE LIKE A TURNIP. COME, ALBERT. WE HAVE TRESPASSED ON SUSAN'S TIME.

'Why are you doing this?' Susan screamed.

I AM SORRY. I CANNOT TELL YOU. FORGET YOU SAW ME. IT'S NOT YOUR BUSINESS.

'Not my business? How can ...'

AND NOW ... WE MUST BE GOING...

'Nighty-night,' said Albert.

The clock struck, twice, for the half-hour. It was still half past six.

And they were gone.

The sledge hurtled across the sky.

'She'll try to find out what this is all about, you know,' said Albert.

OH DEAR.

'Especially after you told her not to.'

YOU THINK SO?

'Yeah,' said Albert.

DEAR ME. I STILL HAVE A LOT TO LEARN ABOUT HUMANS, DON'T I?

'Oh ... I dunno... ' said Albert.

OBVIOUSLY IT WOULD BE  QUITE WRONG TO INVOLVE A HUMAN IN ALL THIS. THAT IS WHY, YOU WILL RECALL, I CLEARLY FORBADE HER TO TAKE AN INTEREST.

'Yeah ... you did. .

BESIDES, IT'S AGAINST THE RULES.

'You said them little grey buggers had already broken the rules.'

YES, BUT  I CAN'T JUST WAVE A MAGIC WAND AND  MAKE IT ALL BETTER. THERE MUST BE PROCEDURES. Death stared ahead for a moment  and then shrugged.  AND WE HAVE SO MUCH TO DO. WE HAVE PROMISES TO KEEP.

'Well, the night is young,' said Albert, sitting back in the sacks.

THE NIGHT IS OLD. THE NIGHT IS ALWAYS OLD.

The pigs galloped on. Then, 'No, it ain't.'

I'M SORRY?

'The night isn't any  older than  the day, master. It stands to reason. There must have been a day before anyone knew what the night was.'

YES, BUT IT'S MORE DRAMATIC.

'Oh. Right, then.'

Susan stood by the fireplace.

It  wasn't  as  though  she  disliked Death. Death considered as an individual rather than  life's  final curtain was someone she  couldn't help liking, in a strange kind of way.

Even so ...

The idea of the Grim Reaper filling the

Hogswatch stockings of the world didn't fit well in her head, no matter which  way she twisted it. It was like  trying to imagine Old Man Trouble as the Tooth Fairy. Oh, yes. Old Man Trouble ... now there was a nasty one  for you...

But honestly, what  kind of sick person went round creeping into little children's bedrooms all night?

Well, the Hogfather, of course, but...

There was  a little tinkling sound from  somewhere near the base of the Hogswatch tree.

The raven backed away from the shards of one of the glittering balls.

'Sorry,' it mumbled. 'Bit of a species reaction there.  You  know ... round, glittering sometimes you just gotta peck ...'

'That chocolate money belongs to the children!'

SQUEAK? said the Death of Rats, backing away from the shiny coins.

'Why's he doing this?'

SQUEAK.

'You don't know either?'

SQUEAK.

'Is there some  kind of  trouble?  Did he  do  something  to  the  real

Hogfather?'

SQUEAK.

'Why won't he tell me?'

SQUEAK.

'Thank you. You've been very helpful.'

Something  ripped, behind her. She  turned and saw  the raven carefully removing a strip of red wrapping paper from a package.

'Stop that this minute!'

It looked up guiltily.

'It's only a little bit,' it said. 'No one's going to miss it.'

'What do you want it for, anyway?'

'We're attracted to bright colours, right? Automatic reaction.'

'That's jackdaws!'

'Damn. Is it?'

The Death of Rats nodded. SQUEAK.

'Oh, so suddenly you're Mr Ornithologist, are you?' snapped the raven.

Susan sat down and held out her hand.

The  Death of Rats leapt onto it. She  could feel its claws,  like tiny pins.

It was just  like those scenes where the sweet and pretty heroine sings a little duet with Mr Bluebird.

Similar, anyway.

In general outline, at least. But with more of a PG rating.

'Has he gone funny in the head?'

SQUEAK. The rat shrugged.

'But it could happen, couldn't it? He's very old, and I suppose he sees a lot of terrible things.'

SQUEAK.

'All the trouble in the world,' the raven translated.

'I  understood,'  said  Susan.  That  was  a  talent, too.  She  didn't understand what the rat said. She just understood what it meant.

'There's something wrong and he won't tell me?' said Susan.

That made her even more angry.

'But Albert is in on it too,' she added.

She thought:  thousands, millions of years in the same job.  Not a nice one. It isn't always cheerful old men passing away at a great age. Sooner or later, it was bound to get anyone down.

Someone had  to  do  something.  It  was  like that  time  when Twyla's grandmother had started telling  everyone that  she was the Empress of Krull and had stopped wearing clothes.

And Susan was bright enough to know that the phrase  'Someone ought  to do something'  was not,  by itself,  a helpful one. People who used it never added the rider 'and that someone is me'. But someone ought to do something, and right now the whole pool of someones consisted of her, and no one else.      Twyla's grandmother had ended up  in a nursing home overlooking the sea at Quirm. That sort of option probably didn't apply  here. Besides, he'd  be unpopular with the other residents.

She concentrated. This was the  simplest  talent of  them all. She  was amazed that other people couldn't do it. She shut her eyes, placed her hands palm down in front of her at shoulder height, spread her fingers and lowered her hands.

When they were halfway down  she heard the clock stop ticking. The last tick was longdrawn-out, like a death rattle.

Time stopped.

But duration continued.

She'd  always  wondered,  when  she  was   small,  why  visits  to  her grandfather could  go on  for days and yet, when they got back, the calendar was still plodding along as if they'd never been away.

Now she  knew  the why,  although probably no human being would ever really understand the how. Sometimes, somewhere, somehow, the numbers on the clock did not count.

Between every rational moment were a billion irrational ones. Somewhere behind  the  hours there was  a  place where  the  Hogfather rode, the tooth fairies  climbed their ladders, jack Frost drew his pictures, the  Soul Cake Duck  laid her  chocolate eggs. In  the  endless spaces between  the  clumsy seconds Death moved like  a  witch dancing  through raindrops, never getting wet.

Humans could liv...  No, humans couldn't live here, no, because even when you  diluted a glass of wine with a  bathful of  water you  might  have more liquid but you still have the same amount of wine. A  rubber  band was still the same rubber band no matter how far it was stretched.

Humans could exist here, though.

It  was never too cold, although the air did prickle like winter air on a sunny day. But out of human habit Susan got her cloak out of the closet.

SQUEAK.

'Haven't you got some mice and rats to see to, then?'

'Nah, 's pretty quiet just before Hogswatch,' said  the raven, who  was trying  to fold the  red paper between his claws. 'You get a lot  of gerbils and hamsters and that in a few days, mind. When the kids forget to feed them or try to find out what makes them go.'

Of course, she'd be leaving the children. But  it wasn't as if anything could happen to them. There wasn't any time for it to happen to them in.

She hurried down the stairs and let herself out of the front door.

Snow hung in  the air. It was not a poetic description. It hovered like the  stars.  When  flakes  touched Susan they  melted  with  little electric flashes.

There was  a  lot of traffic  in the street, but  it was fossilized  in Time. She walked  carefully between it until she reached the entrance to the park.

The snow had done what  even wizards and the Watch  couldn't do,  which was clean up AnkhMorpork. 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.

There was no noise. The  curtains of  snow shut out the  city lights. A few yards into the park and she might as well be in the country.

She stuck her fingers into her mouth and whistled.

Y'know, that could've been done with a bit more ceremony,' said the raven, who'd perched on a snowencrusted twig.

'Shut up.'

' 's good, though. Better than most women could do.'

'Shut up.'

They waited.

'Why  have  you  stolen that  piece of red  paper from a  little girl's present?' said Susan.

'I've got plans,' said the raven darkly.

They waited again.

She wondered what would  happen if it didn't work. She  wondered if the rat would snigger. It had the most annoying snigger in the world.

Then  there  were hoofbeats and  the  floating snow burst open  and the horse was there.

Binky trotted round in a circle, and then stood and steamed.

He wasn't saddled. Death's horse didn't let you fall.

If I get  on, Susan thought, it'll all start again.  I'll be out of the light and into the world beyond this one. I'll fall off the tightrope.

But a voice inside her said, 'You want to, though, don't you ... ?'

Ten seconds later, there was only the snow.

The raven turned to the Death of Rats.

'Any idea where I can get some string?'

SQUEAK.

She was watched.

One said, Who is she?

One said, Do we remember that Death adopted a daughter? The young woman is her daughter.

One said, She is human?

One said, Mostly.

One said, Can she be killed?

One said, Oh, yes.

One said, Well, that's all right, then.

One said, Er ... we don't  think we're going to get  into  trouble over this, do we? All this is not exactly ... authorized. We don't want questions asked.

One said, We have a duty to rid the universe of sloppy thinking.

One said, Everyone will be grateful when they find out.

Binky touched down lightly on Death's lawn.

Susan didn't bother with the front door but went round the  back, which was never locked.

There had been changes. One significant change, at least.

There was a cat-flap in the door.

She stared at it.

After a second or  two a ginger  cat came through the flap, gave her an I'm-not-hungryand-you're-notinteresting  look,  and padded off  into the gardens.

Susan pushed open the door into the kitchen.

Cats of every size and colour covered every surface.  Hundreds of  eyes swivelled to watch her.

It  was  Mrs  Gammage all over  again, she thought. The old woman was a regular in Biers for the company and was quite gaga, and one of the symptoms of those going  completely yoyo was  that  they  broke out  in chronic cats. Usually  cats  who'd  mastered every  detail  of feline existence except the whereabouts of the dirt box.

Several of them had their noses in a bowl of cream.

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.

'Push off, the lot of you,' she said. 'I've never known him have pets.'

The  cats gave  her a look to  indicate that they were intending  to go somewhere else in any case and strolled off, licking their chops.

The bowl slowly filled up again.

They were obviously living cats. Only life  had colour here. Everything else was created by Death. Colour, along with plumbing and music, were  arts that escaped the grasp of his genius.

She left them in the kitchen and wandered along to the study.

There were changes here, too.  By the look  of  it, he'd been trying to learn to  play the violin  again. He'd never been able to understand  why he couldn't play music.

The desk  was a mess. Books  lay open, piled  on one another. They were the ones Susan had never learned to  read.  Some  of  the characters hovered above the pages or  moved  in complicated  little patterns as they read  you while you read them.

Intricate  devices  had  been  scattered  across the top.  They  looked vaguely navigational, but on what oceans and under which stars?

Several  pages  of  parchment  had  been filled  up  with  Death's  own handwriting. It was immediately recognizable. No one else Susan had ever met had handwriting with serifs.

It looked as though he'd been trying to work something out.

NOT KLATCH. NOT HOWOWONDALAND. NOT THE EMPIRE. LET US SAY 20 MILLION CHILDREN AT 2LB OF TOYS PER CHILD.

EQUALS 17,857 TONS. 1,785 TONS PER HOUR.

MEMO: DON'T FORGET THE SOOTY FOOTPRINTS. MORE PRACTICE ON THE HO HO HO.

CUSHION.

She put the paper back carefully.

Sooner or later  it'd get to  you. Death was fascinated by  humans, and study was never a one-way thing.  A man might spend his life peering at  the private life of elementary particles and then find he either knew who he was or where he was, but not both. Death had picked  up ... humanity. Not the real thing, but something  that might pass for it until you examined it closely.

The house even imitated human houses.  Death had  created a bedroom for himself, despite the fact that he never slept. If he really picked things up from humans, had he tried insanity? It was very popular, after all.

Perhaps, after all these millennia, he wanted to be nice.

She let herself into  the Room of Lifetimers. She'd liked the sound  of it,  when she was a little girl.  But now the hiss of sand from  millions of hourglasses,  and  the little pings and pops as  full  ones vanished and new empty ones appeared, was not  so enjoyable. Now she knew what  was going on. Of course,  everyone  died  sooner or  later.  It  just wasn't right  to  be listening to it happening.

She  was about to leave when she noticed the open door in a place where she had never seen a door before.

It  was disguised.  A  whole  section  of  shelving, complete with  its whispering glasses, had swung out.

Susan pushed it back and forth  with a finger. When it was  shut, you'd have to look hard to see the crack.

There was a much smaller room on the other side. It was merely the size of,  say,  a  cathedral.  And  it  was  lined  floor  to ceiling  with  more hourglasses that Susan could just see dimly in the      light from the big room. She stepped inside and snapped her fingers.

'Light,' she commanded. A couple of candles sprang into life.

The hourglasses were ... wrong.

The ones  in  the main room, however  metaphorical they might  be, were solid-looking things of wood and brass and glass. But these looked as though they were made of highlights and shadows with no real substance at all.

She peered at a large one.

The name in it was: OFFLER.

'The crocodile god?' she thought.

Well, gods had a life, presumably. But they never actually died, as far as  she knew. They just dwindled away  to a voice on the wind and a footnote in some textbook on religion.

There were other gods lined up. She recognized a few of them.

But there were smaller lifetimers on the shelf. When she saw the labels she nearly burst out laughing.

'The Tooth Fairy? The Sandman? John Barleycorn? The Soul Cake Duck? The God of what?'

She stepped back, and something crunched under her feet.

There were shards of glass on the floor. She reached down and picked up the biggest. Only a few letters remained of the name etched into the glass HOGFA...

'Oh, no ... it's true. Granddad, what have you done?'

When she left, the candles winked out. Darkness sprang back.

And in the darkness, among, the spilled sand, a faint sizzle and a tiny spark of light...

Mustrum Ridcully adjusted the towel around his waist.

'How're we doing, Mr Modo?'

The University gardener saluted.

'The tanks  are full, Mr  Archchancellor sir!' he said  brightly.  'And I've been stoking the hotwater boilers an day!'

The other senior wizards clustered in the doorway.

'Really,  Mustrum,  I really  think  this  is  most  unwise,' said  the Lecturer in Recent Runes. 'It was surely sealed up for a purpose.'

'Remember what it said on the door,' said the Dean.

'Oh,  they  just wrote that on  it to keep people out,'  said Ridcully, opening a fresh bar of soap.

'Wen, yes,' said the Chair of Indefinite Studies. 'That's right. That's what people do.'

'It's  a bathroom,' said Ridcully. 'You are all acting  as if it's some kind of a torture chamber.'

'A  bathroom,'  said  the  Dean,  'designed by  Bloody Stupid  Johnson. Archchancellor  Weatherwax  only used it  once and then had  it  sealed  up! Mustrum, I beg you to reconsider! It's a Johnson!'

There was something of a pause, because even Ridcully had to adjust his mind around this.

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.

Nevertheless, it was a little bit surprising to find that Bloody Stupid had  turned to bathroom design. But, as Ridcully  said, it was known that he had designed and built several  large musical organs and, when you got right down to it, it was all just plumbing, wasn't it?

The other  wizards, who'd been there  longer than  the  Archchancellor, took  the view that  if Bloody Stupid Johnson had  built a fully  functional bathroom he'd actually meant it to be something else.

'Y'know,  I've always felt  that  Mr Johnson was a much  maligned man,' said Ridcully, eventually.

'Well,  yes, of  course he  was,' said  the  Lecturer in  Recent Runes, clearly exasperated. 'That's like saying that jam attracts wasps, you see.'

'Not   everything  he  made   worked  badly,'  said  Ridcully  stoutly, flourishing his  scrubbing brush. 'Look at  that thing they use down  in the kitchens for peelin' the potatoes, for example.'

'Ah, you  mean the thing  with  the  brass plate on it saying "Improved Manicure Device", Archchancellor?'

'Listen, it's just water,' snapped  Ridcully. 'Even Johnson couldn't do much harm with water. Modo, open the sluices!'

The rest of the wizards backed away  as the gardener turned a couple of ornate brass wheels.

'I'm fed up with groping around for the soap like you fellows!' shouted the Archchancellor,  as water  gushed  through  hidden  channels.  'Hygiene. That's the ticket!'

'Don't say we didn't warn you,' said the Dean, shutting the door.

'Er, I still haven't worked out  where all the  pipes lead, sir,'  Modo ventured.

'We'll find out, never you fear,' said Ridcully happily. He removed his hat  and  put  on a  shower cap of his  own  design.  In  deference  to  his profession, it was pointy. He picked up a yellow rubber duck.

'Man the pumps, Mr Modo. Or dwarf them, of course, in your case.'

'Yes, Archchancellor.'

Modo hauled  on  a lever. The pipes started a hammering noise and steam leaked out of a few joints.

Ridcully took a last look around the bathroom.

It was  a  hidden  treasure, no doubt about it. Say what you like,  old Johnson must sometimes have got it  right, even if it  was only by accident. The entire room,  including  the floor and ceiling, had been tiled in white, blue and green. In  the  centre, under  its  crown  of pipes, was  Johnson's Patent  'Typhoon'  Superior  Indoor Ablutorium  with Automatic Soap  Dish, a sanitary poem in mahogany, rosewood and copper.

He'd got Modo to polish every pipe and brass tap until they gleamed. It had taken ages.

Ridcully shut the frosted door behind him.

The inventor of the ablutionary  marvel  had  decided  to  make a  mere shower a fully controllable experience, and  one  wall of the large  cubicle held a marvellous  panel covered with brass taps  cast  in  the  shape  of mermaids and shells and, for some reason, pomegranates.  There were separate feeds for salt water, hard water and soft water and huge wheels for accurate control of temperature. Ridcully inspected them with care.

Then he stood back, looked around at the tiles and sang, 'Mi, mi, mi!'

His voice reverberated back at him.

'A perfect echo!' said Ridcully, one of nature's bathroom baritones.

He  picked up a  speaking  tube that had  been installed  to  allow the bather to communicate with the engineer.

'All cisterns go, Mr Modo!'

'Aye, aye, sir!'

Ridcully opened the tap marked 'Spray' and leapt aside, because part of him was still  well aware that  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.

A gentle shower of warm water, almost a caressing mist, enveloped him.

'My word!' he exclaimed, and tried another tap.

'Shower'  turned out to be a little more invigorating.  'Torrent'  made him gasp  for breath and 'Deluge' sent him groping  to the panel because the top  of his head felt that  it was being removed.  'Wave' sloshed a wall  of warm salt  water from  one side  of  the  cubicle  to the  other  before  it disappeared into the grating that was set into the middle of the floor.

'Are you all right, sir?' Modo called out.

'Marvellous! And there's a dozen knobs I haven't tried yet!'

Modo nodded,  and  tapped a valve. Ridcully's voice, raised in  what he considered to be song, boomed out through the thick clouds of steam.

'Oh,  IIIIIII  knew  a  ...  er  ... an  agricultural  worker  of  some description, possibly a  thatcher, And I  knew  him  well, and he - he was a farmer,  now I come to think of it - and he had a  daughter and her  name  I can't recall at the moment,

And ... Where was P... Ah yes. Chorus:

Something  something,  a  humorously  shaped  vegetable,  a  turnip,  I believe, something  something and the sweet nightingaleeeeaarggooooooh-ARGHH oh oh oh...'

The song shut off suddenly. All Modo could hear was a ferocious gushing noise.

'Archchancellor?'

After a  moment  a  voice  answered from near  the ceiling.  It sounded somewhat high and hesitant.

'Er . . . I  wonder if you would  be so very good as to  shut the water off from out there, my dear chap? Er ... quite gently, if you wouldn't      mind. . .'

Modo carefully spun a wheel. The gushing sound gradually subsided.

'Ah.  Well done,' said the  voice, but now from  somewhere nearer floor level. 'Well. Jolly good job. I think we  can  definitely call it a success. Yes, indeed.  Er.  I  wonder  if  you  could help  me walk  for a  moment. I inexplicably feel a little unsteady on my feet . . . '

Modo pushed open the  door and helped Ridcully out and onto a bench. He looked rather pale.

'Yes,  indeed,' said  the Archchancellor,  his eyes  a  little  glazed. 'Astoundingly successful. Er. Just a minor point, Modo ...'

'Yes, sir?'

'There's a  tap in there we perhaps should  leave alone  for now,' said Ridcully. 'I'd esteem it a service if you could go and make a little sign to hang on it.'

'Yes, sir?'

'Saying "Do not touch at all", or something like that.'

'Right, sir.'

'Hang it on the one marked "Old Faithful".'

'Yes, sir.'

'No need to mention it to the other fellows.'

'Yes. sir.'

'Ye gods, I've never felt so clean.'

From a vantage point among some ornamental tilework  near the ceiling a small gnome in a bowler hat watched Ridcully carefully.

When  Modo had gone the Archchancellor slowly began to dry himself on a big fluffy  towel. As he  got his composure back, so another song wormed its way under his breath.

'On the second day of Hogswatch I ... sent my true love back

A  nasty  little  letter, hah,  yes indeed,  and a partridge in a  pear tree ...'

The  gnome  slid down  onto the tiles  and crept up  behind the briskly shaking shape.

Ridcully, after a few more trial  runs, settled on a song which evolves somewhere on every planet where there are winters. It's often dragooned into the service  of some local religion  and a few words are changed,  but  it's really about things that  have to do with  gods only  in the same  way  that roots have to do with leaves.

'...the rising of the sun, and the running of the deer ...'

Ridcully spun. A  corner of  wet towel caught the  gnome on the ear and flicked it onto its back.

'I  saw you creeping up!' roared the  Archchancellor. 'What's the game, then? Small-time thief, are you?'

The gnome slid backwards on the soapy surface.

' 'ere, what's your game, mister, you ain't supposed to be able to see me!'

'I'm a wizard! We can see things that are really there, you know,' said Ridcully. 'And in the  case of  the Bursar,  things that aren't  there, too. What's in this bag?'

'You don't wanna open the bag,  mister! You really don't wanna open the bag!'

'Why? What have you got in it?'

The gnome sagged.  'It  ain't what's in  it,  mister. It's what'll come out. I has to let 'em out one at  a time, no knowin' what'd happen  if  they all gets out at once!'

Ridcully looked interested, and started to undo the string.

'You'll really wish you hadn't, mister!' the gnome pleaded.

'Will I? What're you doing here, young man?'

The gnome gave up.

'Well ... you know the Tooth Fairy?'

'Yes. Of course,' said Ridcully.

'Well ... I ain't her. But ... it's sort of like the same business ...'

'What? You take things away?'

'Er not take away, as such. More sort of ... bring ...

'Ah ... like new teeth?'

'Er ... like new verrucas,' said the gnome.

Death threw the sack into the  back  of the sledge and climbed in after it.

'You're doing well, master,' said Albert.

THIS CUSHION  IS STILL UNCOMFORTABLE, said Death, hitching his belt.  I AM NOT USED TO A BIG FAT STOMACH.

'Just a stomach's the best I could do, master. You're starting off with a handicap, sort of thing.'

Albert  unscrewed the top off a bottle of cold tea.  All the sherry had made him thirsty.

'Doing well, master,' he repeated, taking a pull. 'All the  soot in the fireplace, the footprints, them swigged sherries, the sleigh tracks all over the roofs ... it's got to work.'

YOU THINK SO?

'Sure.'

AND I MADE SURE SOME OF THEM SAW ME. I  KNOW IF THEY ARE PEEPING, Death added proudly.

'Well done, sir.'

YES.

'Though here's  a tip, though. Just "Ho.  Ho.  Ho,- will do. Don't say, "Cower, brief mortals" unless you want them to grow up to be moneylenders or some such.'

HO. HO. HO.

'Yes,  you're  really  getting  the  hang of it.'  Albert  looked  down hurriedly at his notebook so that  Death wouldn't see  his face. 'Now, I got to tell you, master, what'll really do some  good  is  a public  appearance. Really.'

OH. I DON'T NORMALLY DO THEM.

'The Hogfather's  more've a public figure,  master. And one good public appearance'll do  more  good  than any  amount  of letting kids  see  you by accident. Good for the old belief muscles.'

REALLY? HO. HO. HO.

'Right,  right, that's really good, master. Where was I ... yes ... the shops'll  be open late. Lots of kiddies get taken  to see the Hogfather, you see. Not the real one, of course. just  some ole geezer with a pillow up his jumper, saving yer presence, master.'

NOT REAL? HO. HO. HO.

'Oh, no. And you don't need...'

THE CHILDREN KNOW THIS? HO. HO. HO.

Albert scratched his nose. 'S'pose so, master.'

THIS  SHOULD NOT BE.  NO WONDER THERE HAS BEEN ... THIS  DIFFICULTY. BELIEF WAS COMPROMISED? HO. HO. HO.

'Could be, master. Er, the "ho, ho ..."'

WHERE DOES THIS TRAVESTY TAKE PLACE? HO. HO. HO.

Albert gave up.  'Well, Crumley's in The  Maul, for  one. Very popular, the Hogfather Grotto. They always have a good Hogfather, apparently.'

LET'S GET THERE AND SLEIGH THEM. HO. HO. HO.

'Right you are, master.'

THAT WAS A PUNE OR PLAY ON WORDS, ALBERT. I DON'T KNOW IF YOU NOTICED.

'I'm laughing like hell deep down, sir.'

HO. HO. HO.

Archchancellor Ridcully grinned.

He often grinned. He was  one  of  those men who grinned even when they were annoyed, but right now he grinned  because  he was proud. A little sore still, perhaps, but still proud.

'Amazing  bathroom, ain't  it?' he said. 'They  had  it  walled up, you know. Damn silly thing  to  do. I mean,  perhaps there were  a few  teething troubles,' he  shifted gingerly,  'but  that's only to be expected. It's got everything, d'you see? Foot baths in the shape of clam shells, look. A whole wardrobe  for dressing gowns.  And  that tub over there's  got  a big blower thingy so's you get  bubbly  water without even havin'  to eat starchy food. And  this  thingy here with the mermaids  holdin'  it up's a special pot for your toenail clippings. It's got everything, this place.'

'A special pot for nail clippings?' said the Verruca Gnome.

'Oh, can't be too careful,' said Ridcully, lifting the lid of an ornate jar marked BATH  SALTS  and  pulling  out a  bottle of  wine. 'Get  hold  of something  like someone's  nail  clipping and  you've  got 'em  under your control. That's real old magic. Dawn of time stuff.'

He held the wine bottle up to the light.

'Should  be  cooled  nicely  by  now,' he  said, extracting  the  cork. 'Verrucas, eh?'

'Wish I knew why,' said the gnome.

'You mean you don't know?'

'Nope. Suddenly I wake up and I'm the Verruca Gnome.'

'Puzzling, that,' said Ridcully. 'My dad used to say the Verruca  Gnome turned up if you walked around in bare feet but  I never knew you existed. I thought he just  made it  up. I mean, tooth  fairies,  yes,  and them little buggers that live in flowers, used to collect 'em myself as a lad, but can't recall  anything  about  verrucas.' He  drank thoughtfully. 'Cot  a  distant cousin  called Verruca, as a matter of fact.  It's quite a nice sound,  when you come to think of it.'

He looked at the gnome over the top of his glass.

You didn't become Archchancellor without a feeling for subtle wrongness in a situation. Well,  that  wasn't quite true. It was  more accurate to say that you didn't remain Archchancellor for very long.

'Good job, is it?' he said thoughtfully.

'Dandruff'd  be better,'  said the gnome. 'At  least I'd  be out in the fresh air.'

'I think we'd better check  up on  this,' said Ridcully. 'Of course, it might be nothing.'

'Oh, thank you,' said the Verruca Gnome, gloomily.

It was a magnificent Grotto this year, Vernon Crumley told himself. The staff  had  worked really hard. The Hogfather's sleigh was a work of art  in itself, and the pigs looked really real and a wonderful shade of pink.

The Grotto took up nearly all of the first floor. One of the pixies had been  Disciplined for smoking  behind  the  Magic Tinkling Waterfall and the clockwork Dolls of All Nations showing how We Could All Get Along were a bit jerky and giving trouble but all in all, he  told himself, it was a  display to Delight the Hearts of Kiddies everywhere.

The  kiddies  were queueing up  with  their  parents  and watching  the display owlishly.

And the money was coming in. Oh, how the money was coming in.

So  that  the staff would  not be  Tempted, Mr Crumley  had  set  up an arrangement  of  overhead  wires  across  the ceilings of the  store. In the middle of each floor  was a cashier in a little cage. Staff took money  from customers, put it in a little clockwork cable car, sent it whizzing overhead to the cashier,  who'd make change and  start  it rattling back  again. Thus there  was  no possibility  of Temptation,  and  the  little  trolleys  were shooting back and forth like fireworks.

Mr Crumley loved Hogswatch. It was for. the Kiddies, after all.

He tucked his fingers in the pockets of his waistcoat and beamed.

'Everything going well, Miss Harding?'

'Yes, Mr Crumley,' said the cashier, meekly.

'Jolly good.' He looked at the pile of coins.

A bright little  zig-zag  crackled off them and earthed  itself on  the metal grille.

Mr Crumley blinked. In front of him sparks  flashed  off the steel rims of Miss Harding's spectacles.

The  Grotto display changed. For just a fraction of a second Mr Crumley had the sensation of speed, as though what appeared had screeched to a halt. Which was ridiculous.

The four pink papier-mache pigs exploded. A cardboard snout bounced off Mr Crumley's head.

There, sweating and grunting  in the place where the little piggies had been, were ...  well, he  assumed  they were pigs, because hippopotamuses didn't have pointy ears  and rings  through their noses.  But  the creatures were huge and grey and bristly and a cloud of acrid mist hung over each one.

And they didn't look sweet. There  was nothing charming about them. One turned to look at  him with small, red eyes, and didn't go 'oink', which was the  sound  that  Mr Crumley,  born  and  raised  in  the  city, had  always associated with pigs.

It went 'Ghnaaarrrwnnkh?'

The sleigh had changed, too.  He'd been very pleased  with that sleigh. It had delicate  silver  curly  bits on it.  He'd personally supervised  the gluing on  of  every  twinkling star. But the splendour of it  was  lying in glittering shards around a sledge that looked as though it had been built of crudely  sawn tree trunks  laid on two  massive  wooden  runners.  It looked ancient and there were  faces carved on the wood, nasty crude grinning faces that looked quite out of place.

Parents were  yelling and trying to  pull their children away, but they weren't having  much  luck. The  children were gravitating  towards  it like flies to jam.

Mr Crumley ran towards the terrible thing, waving his hands.

'Stop that! Stop that!' he screamed. 'You'll frighten the Kiddies!'

He heard a small boy behind him say, 'They 've got tusks! Cool!'

His sister  said, 'Hey, look, that  one's  doing a wee!'  A  tremendous cloud of yellow steam arose. 'Look,  it's  going all the  way to the stairs! All those who can't swim hold onto the banisters!'

'They eat you if you're bad, you know,' said a small girl with  obvious approval. 'All up. Even the bones. They crunch them.'

Another,  older,  child  opined: 'Don't be childish. They're not  real. They've just got a wizard in to do the magic. Or it's all done by clockwork. Everyone knows they're not really r...'

One  of the  boars  turned to  look  at  him. The  boy moved behind his mother.

Mr Crumley, tears of anger streaming clown his face, fought through the milling  crowd  until  he reached  the  Hogfather's  Grotto.  He  grabbed  a frightened pixie.

'It's the Campaign  for Equal Heights that've done  this, isn't it!' he shouted.  'They're  out  to ruin me!  And  they're  ruining it  for all  the Kiddies! Look at the lovely dolls!'

The  pixie hesitated. Children were clustering around the pigs, despite the continued  efforts of their  mothers. The  small girl was  giving one of them an orange.

But  the animated  display  of  Dolls of All  Nations was definitely in trouble. The musical box underneath was still playing 'Wouldn't  It Be  Nice If Everyone Was Nice' but the rods that animated the figures had got twisted out of shape, so that the Klatchian boy was rhythmically hitting  the Omnian girl  over the head with  his ceremonial  spear, while the girl  in  Agatean national  costume was  kicking a  small Llamedosian druid repeatedly in  the ear. A chorus of small children was cheering them on indiscriminately.

'There's, er,  there's more  trouble in the Grotto,  Mr Crum' the pixie began.

A  red and white figure pushed its  way through the crush and rammed  a false beard into Mr Crumley's hands.

'That's it,'  said the old man in the  Hogfather costume. 'I don't mind the smell of  oranges  and the damp trousers but  I  ain't  putting  up with this.'

He stamped off through the  queue. Mr  Crumley heard him add, 'And he's not even doin' it right!'

Mr Crumley forced his way onward.

Someone was sitting in the  big  chair. There  was a child on his knee. The figure was ... strange.

It  was  definitely  in  something  like a  Hogfather  costume  but  Mr Crumley's eye kept slipping, it  wouldn't focus, it skittered away and tried to put the figure on the very edge of vision. It was like trying to  look at your own ear.

'What's going on here? What's going on here?' Crumley demanded.

A  hand took  his shoulder firmly.  He turned round and looked into the face  of a  Grotto Pixie. At least, it was wearing  the costume of  a Grotto Pixie, although somewhat askew, as if it had been put on in a hurry.

'Who are you?'

The pixie took the soggy cigarette end  out of its mouth  and leered at him.

'Call me Uncle Heavy,' he said.

'You're not a pixie!'

'Nah, I'm a fairy cobbler, mister.'

Behind Crumley, a voice said:

AND WHAT DO YOU WANT FOR HOGSWATCH, SMALL HUMAN?

Mr Crumley turned in horror.

In front of - well, he had to think of it as  the usurping Hogfather  - was  a  small child of  indeterminate sex  who seemed to be  mostly  woollen bobble hat.

Mr Crumley knew how it was supposed to go. It was  supposed  to go like this: the child was always  struck dumb and  the attendant mother would lean forward and catch the Hogfather's eye and say very pointedly, in that  voice adults use when they're conspiring against children:

'You want a Baby  Tinkler Doll, don't  you,  Doreen? And the  Just Like Mummy Cookery  Set you've got in the window. And the  Cut-Out Kitchen  Range Book. And what do you say?'

And  the stunned child would murmur "nk you' and get given a balloon or an orange.

This time, though, it didn't work like that.

Mother got as far as 'You want a ...'

WHY ARE YOUR HANDS ON BITS OF STRING, CHILD?

The child  looked  down the  length of its arms to the dangling mittens affixed to its sleeves. It held them up for inspection.

'Clubs,' it said.

I SEE. VERY PRACTICAL.

'Are you weal?' said the bobble hat.

WHAT DO YOU THINK?

The bobble  hat sniggered.  'I saw  your piggie do a wee!' it said, and implicit in  the  tone  was  the  suggestion  that this was unlikely  to  be dethroned as the most enthralling thing the bobble hat had ever seen.

OH. ER ... GOOD.

'It had a gwate big ...'

WHAT DO YOU WANT FOR HOGSWATCH? said the Hogfather hurriedly.

Mother took her economic cue again, and said briskly: 'She wants a ...'

The  Hogfather  snapped his  fingers  impatiently.  The  mother's mouth slammed shut.

The  child  seemed  to  sense  that  here  was  a  once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and spoke quickly.

'I wanta narmy. Anna big castle wif pointy bits,' said the child. 'Anna swored.'

WHAT DO YOU SAY? prompted the Hogfather.

'A big swored?' said the child, after a pause for deep cogitation.

THAT'S RIGHT.

Uncle Heavy nudged the Hogfather.

'They're supposed to thank you,' he said.

ARE YOU SURE? PEOPLE DON'T, NORMALLY.

'I  meant  they thank  the Hogfather,'  Albert hissed. 'Which  is  you, right?'

YES, OF COURSE. AHEM. YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO SAY THANK YOU.

' 'nk you.'

AND BE GOOD. THIS IS PART OF THE ARRANGEMENT.

' 'es.'

THEN  WE  HAVE A  CONTRACT.

The  Hogfather  reached into his  sack  and produced:

- a very  large model castle with, as correctly interpreted, pointy blue cone roofs on turrets suitable for princesses to be locked in

- a box of several hundred assorted knights and warriors

- and a sword. It was four feet long and glinted along the blade.

The mother took a deep breath.

'You can't give her that!' she screamed. 'It's not safe!'

IT'S A SWORD, said the Hogfather. THEY'RE NOT MEANT TO BE SAFE.

'She's a child!' shouted Crumley.

IT'S EDUCATIONAL.

'What if she cuts herself?'

THAT WILL BE AN IMPORTANT LESSON.

Uncle Heavy whispered urgently.

REALLY? OH, WELL. IT'S NOT FOR ME TO ARGUE, I SUPPOSE.

The blade went wooden.

'And  she doesn't want all that other  stuff!' said Doreen's mother, in the face of  previous testimony. 'She's  a  girl! Anyway, I can't afford big posh stuff like that!'

I THOUGHT I GAVE IT AWAY, said the Hogfather, sounding bewildered.

'You do?' said the mother.

'You  do?'  said  Crumley, who'd  been listening in horror. 'You don't! That's our Merchandise! You can't give it away! Hogswatch isn't about giving it all away! I mean ... yes, of course, of course things are given away,' he corrected himself, aware that people were watching, 'but  first they have to be bought, d'you see, I mean ... haha.'  He laughed  nervously, increasingly aware of the strangeness around him and the rangy look of Uncle Heavy. 'It's not as though the toys are made by little elves at the Hub, ahaha . - .'

'Damn right,' said Uncle Heavy sagely. 'You'd have to be a maniac  even to think of giving an elf a chisel, less'n you want their initials carved on your forehead.'

'You mean this is all free?' said Doreen's  mother sharply, not  to  be budged from what she saw as the central point.

Mr Crumley looked helplessly at  the toys. They certainly  didn't  look like any of his stock.

Then he  tried to  look hard at  the  new  Hogfather. Every cell in his brain was telling him that here was a fat jolly man in a red and white suit.

Well ... nearly every cell. A few of the sparkier ones were saying that his eyes  were reporting something else, but they couldn't  agree on what. A couple had shut down completely.

The words escaped through his teeth.

'It ... seems to be,' he said.

Although  it  was  Hogswatch  the University buildings  were  bustling. Wizards didn't go to bed early in any case,[14] and of course there was  the Hogswatchnight Feast to look forward to at midnight.

It would give some idea of the scale of the Hogswatchnight Feast that a light snack at UU consisted of a mere three or  four courses,  not counting the cheese and nuts.

Some of  the  wizards  had  been practising  for  weeks.  The  Dean  in particular could now lift  a twenty-pound turkey on one fork. Having to wait until midnight merely put a healthy edge on appetites already professionally honed.

There  was a general air  of  pleasant  expectancy about the  place,  a general sizzling  of salivary glands,  a  general careful assembling  of the pills and  powders against the time, many hours ahead, when eighteen courses would gang up somewhere below the ribcage and mount a counterattack.

Ridcully stepped out into the snow and turned up his collar. The lights were all on in the High Energy Magic Building.

'I don't know, I don't know,' he muttered.  'Hogswatchnight and they're still working.  It's just  not  natural. When  I was a student I'd have been sick twice by now...'

In fact  Ponder Stibbons and his group of research students had  made a concession  to Hogswatchnight. They'd draped holly over Hex and  put a paper hat on the big glass dome containing the main ant heap.

Every time he  came in here, it seemed to Ridcully, something -more had been done to  the ...  engine,  or thinking  machine,  or  whatever it  was. Sometimes  stuff turned up  overnight. Occasionally, according  to Stibbons, Hex hims itself would draw plans for extra bits that he - it  needed. It all gave Ridcully  the willies, and an additional willy was engendered right now when he saw the  Bursar  sitting in front of the thing. For a moment, he forgot all about verrucas.

'What're you  doing  here, old chap?'  he said. 'You should be  inside, jumping up and down to make more room for tonight.'

'Hooray for the pink, grey and green,' said the Bursar.

'Er ... we thought Hex might be of . . . you

know  . . . help, sir,' said  Ponder Stibbons,  who liked to  think  of himself as the University's token sane person.

'With the Bursar's  problem.  We  thought  it might be a nice Hogswatch present for him.'

'Ye gods,  Bursar's got  no problems,'  said Ridcully, and  patted  the aimlessly smiling man on the head while mouthing the words 'mad as a spoon'. 'Mind just wanders a bit, that's all. I said MIND WANDERS A BIT, eh? Only to be expected, spends far too much time  addin' up numbers. Doesn't get out in the fresh air. I said, YOU DON'T GET OUT IN THE FRESH AIR, OLD CHAP!'

'We thought, er, he might like someone to talk to,' said Ponder.

'What? What? But I talk to him all the time! I'm always  trying to take him  out  of himself,'  said  Ridcully. 'It's  important  to stop him mopin' around the place.'

'Er ... yes ... certainly,' said Ponder diplomatically. He recalled the Bursar as  a man whose idea of an exciting  time had once been a soft-boiled egg. 'So ... er ...  well,  let's  give it  another  try, shall  we? Are you ready, Mr Dinwiddie?'

'Yes, thank you,  a green  one  with  cinnamon if  it's  not  too  much trouble.'

'Can't  see how  he  can talk to a machine,' said Ridcully, in a sullen voice. 'The thing's got no damn ears.'

'Ah, well, in fact we made it one ear,' said Ponder. 'Er...'

He pointed to a large drum in a maze of tubes.

'Isn't  that old Windle Poons' ear  trumpet sticking  out  of the end?' said Ridcully suspiciously.

'Yes,  Archchancellor.' Ponder  cleared his throat.  'Sound,  you  see, comes in waves ...'

He stopped.  Wizardly  premonitions  rose in his  mind.  He  just  knew Ridcully was going  to assume he was  talking about the sea. There was going to be  one  of those huge bottomless misunderstandings that  always occurred whenever anyone  tried to explain anything to the Archchancellor. Words like 'surf, and probably 'ice cream' and 'sand' were just ...

'It's all done by magic, Archchancellor,' he said, giving up.

'Ah. Right,' said Ridcully. He sounded a little disappointed. 'None  of that  complicated  business with springs and  cogwheels and tubes and stuff, then.'

'That's right, sir,' said  Ponder. 'Just  magic.  Sufficiently advanced magic.'

'Fair enough. What's it do?'

'Hex can hear what you say.'

'Interesting. Saves  all  that  punching  holes  in bits  of  cards and hitting keys you lads are forever doing, then ...'

'Watch this, sir,' said Ponder. 'All right, Adrian, initialize the GBU

'How do you do that, then?' said Ridcully, behind him.

'It ... it means pull the great big lever,' Ponder said, reluctantly.

'Ah. Takes less time to say.'

Ponder sighed. 'Yes, that's right, Archchancellor.'

He nodded to one of the students, who pulled  a large  red lever marked 'Do Not Pull'. Gears spun, somewhere inside Hex. Little trap-doors opened in the ant farms and millions of ants  began  to scurry  along the networks  of glass tubing. Ponder tapped at the huge wooden keyboard.

'Beats me how you fellows remember how to do all this stuff,' said Ridcully, still watching  him with what Ponder considered to be amused interest.

'Oh,  it's largely  intuitive, Archchancellor,' said Ponder. 'Obviously you  have  to spend a  lot of time  learning  it first,  though. Now,  then, Bursar,' he added. 'If you'd just like to say something...'

'He says, SAY SOMETHING, BURSAAAR!' yelled Ridcully helpfully, into the Bursar's ear.

'Corkscrew? It's a tickler, that's what Nanny says,' said the Bursar.

Things  started to  spin  inside  Hex. At  the back of the room a  huge converted waterwheel covered with sheep skulls began to turn, ponderously.

And the quill pen in its network of springs and guiding arms started to write:

+++ Why Do You Think You Are A Tickler? +++

For a moment the Bursar hesitated. Then he said, 'I've got  a spoon of my own, you know.'

+++ Tell Me About Your Spoon +++

'Er ... it's a little spoon. . .'

+++ Does Your Spoon Worry You? +++

The  Bursar  frowned.  Then he seemed to  rally. 'Whoops, here comes Mr Jelly,' he said, but he didn't sound as though his heart was in it.

+++ How Long Have You Been Mr Jelly? +++

The Bursar glared.'Are you making fun of me?' he said.

'Amazin'!'  said Ridcully.  'It's got him stumped! 's better than dried frog pills! How did you work it out?'

'Er said Ponder. 'It sort of just happened

'Amazin',' said Ridcully. He knocked the ashes out of his pipe on Hex's 'Anthill  Inside' sticker, causing Ponder to wince. '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.' He paused, and  then  reached  into  his  pocket. 'I  knew  I'd  come here  for something,' he added. 'This here chappie is the Verruca Gnome-'

'Hello,' said the Verruca Gnome shyly.

-who seems to have popped  into existence  to be with us  here tonight. And,  you know, I thought:  this is  a bit  odd. Of  course, there's  always something a bit unreal  about Hogswatchnight,' said Ridcully. 'Last night of the year and so on. The Hogfather whizzin' around  and so forth. Time of the darkest  shadows and so on. All the  old year's  occult  rubbish pilin'  up. Anythin'  could happen. I just thought you fellows might check  up on  this. Probably nothing to worry about.'

'A Verruca Gnome?' said Ponder.

The gnome clutched his sack protectively.

'Makes  about  as much sense  as  a lot  of  things, I  suppose,'  said Ridcully. 'After all,  there's a Tooth Fairy,  ain' there? You might as well wonder why we have a God of Wine and not a God of Hangovers---'

He stopped.

'Anyone else hear that noise just then?' he said.

'Sorry, Archchancellor?'

'Sort of glingleglingleglingle? Like little tinkly bells?'

'Didn't hear anything like that, sir.'

'Oh.' Ridcully shrugged. 'Anyway ... what was  I saying ... yes  ... no one's ever heard of a Verruca Gnome until tonight.'

'That's  right,'  said the  gnome. 'Even  I've never  heard of me until tonight, and I'm me.'

'We'll  see  what   we  can  find  out,  Archchancellor,'  said  Ponder diplomatically.

'Good man.' Ridcully put the gnome  back in his pocket and looked up at Hex.

'Amazin','  he said  again. 'He  just looks  as  though  he's thinking, right?'

'Er ... yes.'

'But he's not actually thinking?'

'Er ... no.'

'So ... he just gives the impression of thinking but really it's just a show?'

'Er ... yes.'

'Just like everyone else, then, really,' said Ridcully.

'... something,' he added. 'This here chappie is the Verruca Gnome ...'

'Hello,' said the Verruca Gnome shyly.

' ... who seems to have popped  into existence to be with us here tonight. And,  you  know, I thought:  this is  a  bit odd. Of course,  there's always something a bit unreal about Hogswatchnight,'  said Ridcully. 'Last night of the year  and so on. The Hogfather whizzin' around and so forth. Time of the darkest  shadows and so on.  All the  old  year's  occult rubbish pilin' up. Anythin' could  happen. I just thought you  fellows might check up  on this. Probably nothing to worry about.'

'A Verruca Gnome?' said Ponder.

The gnome clutched his sack protectively.

'Makes about  as much  sense  as  a lot  of  things, I  suppose,'  said Ridcully. 'After  all, there's a Tooth Fairy, ain'  there? You might as well wonder why we have a God of Wine and not a God of Hangovers...'

He stopped.

'Anyone else hear that noise just then?' he said.

'Sorry, Archchancellor?'

'Sort of glingleglingleglingle? Like little tinkly bells?'

'Didn't hear anything like that, sir.'

'Oh.' Ridcully shrugged. 'Anyway ... what was  I saying  ... yes ... no one's ever heard of a Verruca Gnome until tonight.'

'That's  right,'  said the  gnome.  'Even I've never heard of  me until tonight, and I'm me.'

'We'll  see  what  we  can   find  out,  Archchancellor,'  said  Ponder diplomatically.

'Good man.' Ridcully put the gnome back in his pocket and looked  up at Hex.

'Amazin','  he  said  again. 'He  just  looks as though  he's thinking, right?'

'Er ... yes.'

'But he's not actually thinking?'

'Er ... no.'

'So ... he just gives the impression of thinking but really it's just a show?'

'Er ... yes.'

'Just like everyone else, then, really,' said Ridcully.

The  boy  gave the Hogfather an appraising stare as  he sat down on the official knee.

'Let's be absolutely clear. I know  you're just someone dressed up,' he said. 'The Hogfather is a biological and  temporal impossibility.  I hope we understand one another.'

AH. SO I DON'T EXIST?

'Correct. This  is just a bit of  seasonal frippery  and,  I  may  say, rampantly  commercial. My mother's already bought my  presents. I instructed her as to the right ones, of course. She often gets things wrong.'

The Hogfather glanced briefly at the smiling, worried image of maternal ineffectiveness hovering nearby.

HOW OLD ARE YOU, BOY?

The  child rolled his eyes. 'You're not supposed to say that,' he said. 'I have done this before, you know. You have to start by asking me my name.'

AARON FIDGET, 'THE PINES', EDGEWAY ROAD, ANKHMORPORK.

'I expect someone told you,' said Aaron. 'I expect these people dressed up as pixies get the information from the mothers.'

AND YOU  ARE  EIGHT,  GOING  ON  ...  OH,  ABOUT  FORTY-FIVE, said  the Hogfather.

'There's forms to fill in when they pay, expect,' said Aaron.

AND YOU WANT WALNUT'S INOFFENSIVE REPTILES OF THE STO PLAINS, A DISPLAY CABINET, A COLLECTOR'S ALBUM, A KILLING  JAR AND A LIZARD PRESS.  WHAT IS  A LIZARD PRESS?

'You can't glue  them in  when they're still fat,  or  didn't you  know that? I expect she told you about  them when I was momentarily distracted by the  display of pencils. Look, shall  we end this charade? just give  me  my orange and we'll say no more about it.'

I CAN GIVE FAR MORE THAN ORANGES.

'Yes, yes, I saw all that. Probably  done in collusion with accomplices to  attract gullible customers. Oh dear, you've  even got a  false beard. By the way, old chap, did you know that your pig...'

YES.

'All done by mirrors and string and pipes, I expect. It all looked very artificial to me.'

The Hogfather snapped his fingers.

'That's  probably a  signal,  I expect,'  said  the boy,  getting down. 'Thank you very much.'

HAPPY HOGSWATCH, said the Hogfather as the boy walked away.

Uncle Heavy patted him on the shoulder.

'Well done, master,' he said. 'Very patient. I'd have given him a clonk athwart the earhole, myself.'

OH,  I'M SURE HE'LL SEE THE ERROR  OF HIS WAYS.  The red hood turned so that only Albert could see into its depths. RIGHT AROUND THE TIME HE OPENS THOSE BOXES HIS MOTHER WAS CARRYING ... HO. HO. HO.

'Don't tie it so tight! Don't tie it so tight!'

SQUEAK.

There  was  a bickering behind Susan as she sought along the shelves in the canyons of Death's huge library, which was so big that clouds would form in it if they dared.

'Right, right,'  said the voice she was trying to ignore. 'That's about right. I've got to be able to move my wings, right?'

SQUEAK.

'Ah,' said Susan, under her breath. 'The Hogfather...'

He had several shelves, not  just one book. The first  volume seemed to be written on a roll of animal skin. The Hogfather was old.

`OK, OK. How does it look?'

SQUEAK.

'Miss?' said the raven, seeking a second opinion.

Susan looked up. The raven bounced past, its breast bright red.

'Twit, twit,' it said. 'Bobbly bobbly bob. Hop hop hopping along . . .'

'You're  fooling no  one but  yourself,'  said  Susan. 'I  can  see the string.'

She unrolled the scroll.

'Maybe I should sit on  a  snowy log,' mumbled  the  raven behind  her. 'Thats probably the trick, right enough.'

'I can't read this!' said Susan. 'The letters are all ... odd. . .'

'Ethereal runes,'  said the raven.  'The  Hogfather  ain't human, after all.'

Susan ran her hands over the thin leather. The ... shapes flowed around her fingers.

She couldn't read them but  she  could  feel them. There was the sharp smell of snow, so vivid  that  her breath  condensed in  the air. There were sounds, hooves, the snap of branches in a freezing forest...

A bright shining ball ...

Susan jerked awake  and  thrust the scroll aside. She unrolled the next one,  which  looked as though it  was  made  of  strips of  bark. Characters hovered over the surface. Whatever they were,  they had  never been designed to  be  read by  the eye; you could  believe they were  a  Braille  for  the touching mind. Images ribboned across her  senses - wet  fur,  sweat,  pine, soot, iced  air, the  tang of damp  ash, pig ... manure, her  governess mind hastily corrected. There was  blood ... and the taste of ... ..beans? It was all images without words. Almost ... animal.

'But none of this is right! Everyone knows he's a jolly old fat man who hands out presents to kids!' she said aloud.

'Is. Is. Not was. You know how it is,' said the raven.

'Do I?'

'It's like, you  know,  industrial re-training,' said  the  bird. 'Even gods have to  move  with  the times,  am  I  right?  He  was probably  quite different thousands of years ago. Stands to  reason. No  one wore stockings, for one thing.' He. scratched at his beak.

'Yersss,'  he continued expansively, 'he  was probably just your  basic winter  demi-urge. You know  ... blood on the snow, making the sun  come up. Starts  off  with  animal sacrifice, y'know, hunt  some  big hairy animal to death, that  kind of stuff. You know there's some people  up on the  Ramtops who  kill  a wren at Hogswatch and  walk around from house to  house singing about it? With a whack-fol-oh- diddle-dildo. Very folkloric, very myffic.'

'A wren? Why?'

'I dunno.  Maybe someone  said, hey, how'd you like to  hunt  this evil bastard of an eagle with  his big sharp beak and great ripping talons,  sort of thing, or how about  instead you hunt this wren, which is basically about the  size of a pea and goes "twit"? Go on, you choose. Anyway, then later on it sinks  to the  level of religion and  then they start this business where some  poor bugger  finds a  special bean in his tucker, oho,  everyone says, you're  king, mate,  and  he thinks "This is a bit  of  all right" only they don't say  it wouldn't  be a  good idea to  start any long  books, 'cos next thing  he's legging it  over the snow with a dozen other buggers chasing him with holy sickles so's  the earth'll come to life again and all this snow'll go away. Very,  you  know ...  ethnic. Then some bright spark thought,  hey, looks like that  damn sun comes  up  anyway,  so how come we're giving those druids  all  this  free grub? Next  thing you know, there's  a job  vacancy. That's the thing about gods. They'll always find a way to, you know ... hang on.'

'The damn sun comes up anyway,' Susan repeated. 'How do you know that?'

'Oh, observation. It happens every morning. I seen it.'

'I meant all that stuff about holy sickles and things.'

The raven contrived to look smug.

'Very occult bird, your  basic  raven,'  he said. 'Blind Io the Thunder God used  to have these  myffic  ravens  that flew everywhere  and  told him everything that was going on.'

'Used to?'

'WeeeW  ... you  know how  he's not got eyes in  his face,  just these, like,  you  know, free-floating eyeballs  that go and zoom around ...' The raven  coughed  in  species embarrassment.  'Bit of  an accident  waiting to happen, really.'

'Do you ever think of anything except eyeballs?'

'Well ... there's entrails.'

SQUEAK.

'He's right, though,' said Susan. 'Gods don't die. Never completely die ...'

There's always somewhere, she told herself. Inside some stone, perhaps, or the words  of a song, or  riding the  mind of  some animal, or maybe in a whisper on the wind. They  never entirely go, they hang on to  the world by the tip of a fingernail, always  fighting to find a  way back. Once  a  god, always a god. Dead, perhaps, but only like the world in winter

'All right,' she said. 'Let's see what happened to him ...'

She reached out for the last book and tried to open it at random ...

The feeling lashed at her out of the book, like a whip ...

... hooves, fear, blood, snow, cold, night . . .

She dropped the scroll. It slammed shut.

SQUEAK?

'I'm. . . all right.'

She looked  down at the book and knew that she'd been given  a friendly warning, such  as a pet  animal might give when it  was crazed with pain but just  still  tame enough not to claw  and bite  the hand that fed it -  this time. Wherever the Hogfather was - dead, alive, somewhere -  he wanted to be left alone ...

She  eyed  the Death of  Rats. His little  eye sockets flared blue in a disconcertingly familiar way.

SQUEAK. EEK?

'The rat says, if he wanted to find out about the Hogfather, he'd go to the Castle of ...'

'Oh, that's just a nursery tale,' said Susan. 'That's where the letters are  supposed  to  go that are posted up  the  chimney. That's  just  an old story.'

She turned. The rat and the raven were staring at her. And she realized that she'd been too normal.

SQUEAK?

'The rat says, "What d'you mean, just?"' said the raven.

Chickenwire sidled towards Medium Dave in the garden. If you could call it a  garden.  It was the land round  the ... house. If  you could call it a house.  No one  said much  about it, but every  so often you just had to get out. It didn't feel right, inside.

He shivered. 'Where's himself?' he said.

'Oh, up  at  the top,' said Medium Dave.  'Still  trying to  open  that room.'

'The one with all the locks?'

'Yeah.'

Medium Dave was rolling a cigarette. Inside the house ... or tower,  or both,  or  whatever  ...  you couldn't smoke, not properly. When  you smoked inside it tasted horrible and you felt sick.

'What for? We done  what we came  to do, didn't  we? Stood there like a bunch of kids and watched  that wet wizard do all his chanting it  was all I could do to keep a straight face. What's he after now?'

'He just said if it was locked that bad he wanted to see inside.'

'I thought we were supposed to do what we came for and go!'

'Yeah? You tell him. Want a roll-up?'

Chickenwire  took the bag of  tobacco  and relaxed. 'I've seen some bad places in my time, but this takes the serious biscuit.'

'Yeah.'

'It's  the cute that wears  you down. And  there's got to be  something else to eat than apples.'

'Yeah.'

'And that damn sky. That damn sky is really getting on my nerves.'

'Yeah.'

They  kept  their eyes averted from that damn  sky. For some reason, it made you feel that it was about to fall  on you. And it was worse if you let your eyes stray  to  the gap where a  gap shouldn't be.  The effect was like getting toothache in your eyeballs.

In the distance Banjo was swinging on a swing. Odd, that, Dave thought. Banjo seemed perfectly happy here.

'He  found  a  tree that  grows lollipops yesterday,' he  said moodily. 'Well, I say yesterday, but how can you tell? And he follows the man  around like a  dog. No one ever laid a punch on Banjo since our mam died. He's just like  a little  boy,  you know. Inside. Always  has been.  Looks  to  me for everything. Used to be, if I told him "punch someone", he'd do it.'

'And they stayed punched.'

'Yeah. Now he follows him around everywhere. It makes me sick.'

'What are you doing here, then?'

'Ten thousand dollars. And he says there's more, you know. More than we can imagine.'

He was always Teatime.

'He ain't just after money.'

-7

'Yeah, well, I didn't sign up for world domination,' said  Medium Dave. 'That sort of thing gets you into trouble.'

'I  remember your  mam  saying  that sort  of thing,' said Chickenwire.

Medium  Dave rolled  his  eyes.  Everyone  remembered  Ma  Lilywhite.  'Very straight lady, was your ma. Tough but fair.'

'Yeah ... tough.'

'I  recall that  time  she  strangled Glossy  Ron with  his  own  leg,' Chickenwire went on. 'She had a wicked right arm on her, your mam.'

'Yeah. Wicked.'

'She wouldn't have stood for someone like Teatime.'

'Yeah,' said Medium Dave.

'That was a lovely funeral you boys gave her. Most of the Shades turned up.  Very  respectful. All  them  flowers. An' everyone looking  so  ...' Chickenwire floundered'... happy. In a sad way, o' course.'

'Yeah.'

'Have you got any idea how to get back home?'

Medium Dave shook his head.

'Me neither. Find the place again, I suppose.' Chickenwire shivered. 'I mean, what he did to that carter ... I  mean, well, I wouldn't even act like that to me own dad ...'

'Yeah.'

'Ordinary  mental, yes, I can  deal with that.  But  he can be talking quite normal, and then-'

'Yeah.'

'Maybe the both of us could creep up on him and ...'

'Yeah, yeah. And how long'll we live? In seconds!

'We could get lucky ... ' Chickenwire began.

'Yeah? You've  seen him. This isn't  one of those  blokes who threatens you. This is one of those blokes who'd kill you soon as look at you. Easier, too. We got to hang on, right? It's like that saying about riding a tiger.'

'What saying about riding a tiger?' said Chickenwire suspiciously.

'Well ...' Medium Dave hesitated.  'You ...  well,  you get branches slapping you in the face, fleas, that sort of thing. So you got to  hang on. Think of the money. There's bags of it in there. You saw it.'

'I keep thinking of. that glass eye watching me. I keep thinking it can see right in my head.'

'Don't worry, he doesn't suspect you of anything.,

'How d'you know?'

'You're still alive, yeah?'

In the Grotto of the Hogfather, a round-eyed child.

HAPPY  HOGSWATCH. HO.  HO.  HO.  AND  YOUR NAME IS ...  EUPHRASIA COAT, CORRECT?

'Go on, dear, answer the nice man.'

' 's.'

AND YOU ARE SIX YEARS OLD.

'Go on, dear. They're all the same at this age, aren't they . . .'

' 's.'

AND YOU WANT A PONY

' 's.' A  small hand pulled  the Hogfather's hood  down to mouth level. Heavy Uncle Albert heard a  ferocious whispering. Then  the Hogfather leaned back.

YES, I KNOW. WHAT A NAUGHTY PIG IT WAS, INDEED.

His shape flickered for a moment, and then a hand went into the sack.

HERE IS A BRIDLE FOR YOUR PONY, AND A SADDLE, AND A RATHER STRANGE HARD HAT  AND  A PAIR OF  THOSE TROUSERS THAT MAKE  YOU LOOK AS THOUGH YOU HAVE A LARGE RABBIT IN EACH POCKET.

'But we can't have a pony, can we, Euffie, because we live on the third floor . .

OH, YES. IT'S IN THE KITCHEN.

'I'm  sure  you're  making  a  little  joke, Hogfather,'  said  Mother, sharply.

HO. HO. YES.  WHAT  A JOLLY FAT  MAN I AM. IN THE KITCHEN? WHAT A JOKE. DOLLIES AND SO ON WILL BE DELIVERED LATER AS PER YOUR LETTER.

'What do you say, Euffie?'

' ' nk you.'

' 'ere, you didn't really put a pony in their  kitchen, did you?'  said Heavy Uncle Albert as the line moved on.

DON'T BE FOOLISH, ALBERT. I SAID THAT TO BE JOLLY.

'Oh, right. Hah, for a minute ...'

IT'S IN THE BEDROOM.

'Ah . .

MORE HYGIENIC.

'Well,  it'll  make  sure of  one  thing,'  said  Albert. 'Third floor?

They're going to believe all right.'

YES. YOU KNOW, I THINK I'M GETTING THE HANG OF THIS. HO. HO. HO.

At the Hub of the Discworld, the snow burned blue and green. The Aurora Corealis  hung in  the sky,  curtains of  pale  cold fire  that circled  the central mountains and cast their spectral light over the ice.

They billowed,  swirled and then trailed  a  ragged arm on  the  end of which  was  a tiny dot that became, when the eye of imagination drew nearer, Binky.

He trotted to a halt and stood on the air. Susan looked down.

And then found what  she was  looking  for.  At the end of a valley  of snow-mounded trees something gleamed brightly, reflecting the sky.

The Castle of Bones.

Her  parents had sat her down one day when she  was about  six or seven and explained  how  such things  as the Hogfather did not  really exist, how they were pleasant little stories that it was fun to know, how they were not real. And she had believed it. All the fairies and bogeymen, all those stories from the  blood and bone of humanity, were not really real.

They'd  lied.  A  seven-foot  skeleton   had  turned  out   to  be  her grandfather.  Not   a  flesh  and  blood  grandfather,  obviously. But  a grandfather, you could say, in the bone.

Binky touched down and trotted over the snow.

Was the Hogfather a god? Why not? thought Susan. There were sacrifices, after all. All that  sherry  and  pork pie.  And  he made  commandments  and rewarded the  good  and he  knew what  you were doing. If you believed, nice things happened to you. Sometimes you found  him 'm a grotto, and  sometimes he was up there in the sky ...

The  Castle  of  Bones loomed over her now.  It certainly deserved  the capital letters, up this close.

She'd  seen a picture of it in one of the children's books. Despite its name, the woodcut artist had endeavoured to make it look ... sort of jolly.      It  wasn't  jolly. The pillars  at the entrance  were hundreds  of feet high.  Each  of the  steps leading up was taller than a man. They  were  the greygreen of old ice.

Ice. Not  bone. There  were  faintly familiar  shapes  to the  pillars, possibly a suggestion of femur or skull, but it was made of ice.

Binky was not challenged by the high stairs. It wasn't that he flew. It was simply that he walked on a ground level of his own devising.

Snow  had  blown over the  ice. Susan looked down  at the drifts. Death left no tracks, but there were the faint outlines of booted footprints. She'd be prepared to bet they belonged to Albert. And ... yes, half obscured by the  snow ... it looked as though a sledge had stood here. Animals had milled around. But the snow was covering everything.

She dismounted.  This was  certainly  the place described, but it still wasn't  right.  It  was  supposed to  be a blaze  of  light and  abuzz  with activity, but it looked like a giant mausoleum.

A little way beyond the  pillars was a very large slab of  ice, cracked into pieces.  Far above, stars were visible through the hole  it had left in the  roof. Even as  she stared up, a few small  lumps of ice thumped into  a snowdrift.

The raven popped into existence and fluttered wearily  on to a stump of ice beside her.

'This place is a morgue,' said Susan.

' 's got to  be mine, if I  do ... any more flyin' tonight,' panted the raven, as the Death of Rats got off its back'I never signed up  for all this long-distance, faster'n time stuff. I  should be back in a forest somewhere, making excitingly decorated constructions to attract females.'

'That's bower birds,' said Susan. 'Ravens don't do that.'

'Oh,  so it's type-casting  now, is it?' said the  raven.  'I'm missing meals here, you do know that?'

It swivelled its independently sprung eyes.

'So where's all  the lights?' it said. 'Where's all  the noise? Where's all the jolly little buggers in pointy hats and red and green suits, hitting wooden toys unconvincingly yet rhythmically with hammers?'

'This is more like the temple of some old thunder god,' said Susan.

SQUEAK.

'No' I read the map right. Anyway, Albert's been here too.  There's fag ash all over the place.'

The rat jumped down and walked around for a moment, bony snout near the ground. After a  few moments of snuffling it gave a squeak  and  hurried off into the gloom.

Susan  followed.  As  her  eyes  grew  more  accustomed  to  the  faint blue-green light she  made out  something  rising out of the floor. It was a pyramid of steps, with a big chair on top.

Behind her, a pillar groaned and twisted slightly.

SQUEAK.

'That rat  says  this  place reminds him of  some old  mine,'  said the raven.  'You  know,  after  it's been  deserted  and no  one's  been  paying attention to the roof supports and so on? We see a lot of them.'

At  least  these  steps were human sized, Susan  thought,  ignoring the chatter.  Snow  had  come  in through  another  gap  in  the roof.  Albert's footprints had stamped around quite a lot here.

'Maybe the old Hogfather crashed his sleigh,' the raven suggested.

SQUEAK?

'Well, it could've happened. Pigs are not notably aerodynamic,  are  they?  And  with  all  this  snow,  you  know,  poor visibility, big  cloud ahead turns out too  late to be a  mountain,  there's buggers in saffron robes looking down at you, poor  devil tries  to remember whether  you're  supposed to  shove someone's head  between your  legs, then WHAM, and it's  all over bar some lucky mountaineers making an awful  lot of sausages and finding the flight recorder.'

SQUEAK!

'Yes, but he's an old man. Probably shouldn't be in the sky at his time of life.'

Susan pulled at something half buried in the snow.

It was a red-and-white-striped candy cane.

She kicked the snow aside elsewhere  and  found a wooden toy soldier in the  kind  of uniform that  would only be inconspicuous  if you wore it in a nightclub for chameleons on hard  drugs. Some further probing found a broken trumpet.

There was some more groaning in the darkness.

The raven cleared its throat.

'What the rat meant about this place being like a mine,'  he said, 'was that abandoned  mines  tend to creak and groan in the same way, see? No  one looking after  the pit props. Things fall in.  Next thing  you know you're a squiggle in the sandstone. We shouldn't hang around is what I'm saying.'

Susan walked further in, lost in thought.

This was all wrong. The place looked as though - it had been deserted for years, which couldn't be true.

The column nearest her creaked and twisted slightly. A fine haze of ice crystals dropped from the roof.

Of course, this wasn't  exactly a normal place.  You  couldn't build an ice palace this big. It was a bit like Death's house. If he abandoned it for too  long all those  things that  had been suspended, like time and physics, would roll over it. It would be like a dam bursting.

She turned to leave and heard the groan again.  It wasn't dissimilar to the tortured  sounds  being made by the  ice, except that  ice,  afterwards, didn't moan. 'Oh, me ...'

There was a figure lying in a snowdrift. She'd almost missed it because it  was wearing a  long  white robe.  It was spreadeagled, as though it  had planned to make snow angels and had then decided against it.

And it wore a little crown, apparently of vine leaves.

And it kept groaning.

She  looked up. The  roof was  open here, too. But  no one  could  have fallen that far and survived.

No one human, anyway.

He looked human and, in theory, quite young. But it was only  in theory because, even by the second-hand light of the  glowing snow, his face looked like someone had been sick with it.

'Are you all right?' she ventured.

The recumbent figure opened its eyes and stared straight up.

'I wish I was dead ...' it moaned. A piece of ice the size of a house fell down  in the  far depths of the  building  and exploded in a  shower of sharp little shards.

'You may have come to the right place,' said Susan. She grabbed the boy under his arms and hauled him out  of the  snow. 'I think leaving would be a very good idea around now, don't you? This place is going to fall apart.'

'Oh, me ...'

She managed to get one of his arms around her neck.

'Can you walk?'

'Oh, me ...'

'It might help if you stopped saying that and tried walking.'

'I'm sorry, but I seem to have too many legs. Ow.'

Susan did  her best to prop him up as, swaying and slipping, they  made their way back to the exit.

'My head,'  said  the boy. 'My head. My  head. My head. Feels awful. My head. Feels like someone's hitting it. My head. With a hammer.'

Someone was.  There  was a small  green and purple imp sitting amid the damp curls and holding a very large mallet. It gave Susan a friendly nod and brought the hammer down again.

'Oh, me ...'

'That wasn't necessary!' said Susan.

'You  telling  me my job?'  said the imp.  'I suppose  you  could do it better, could you?'

'I wouldn't do it at all!'

'Well, someone's got to do it,' said the imp.

'He's part. Of the. Arrangement,' said the boy.

'Yeah, see?' said the imp. 'Can you hold the hammer while I go and coat his tongue with yellow gunk?'

'Get down right now!'

Susan  made a grab for the creature. It leapt away, still clutching the hammer, and grabbed a pillar.

'I'm part of the arrangement, I am!' it yelled.

The boy clutched his head.

'I  feel awful,' he said. 'Have  you got  any ice?'  Whereupon, because there are conventions stronger than mere physics, the building fell in.

The collapse of the Castle  of  Bones was  stately and  impressive  and seemed to go on for a long time. Pillars fell in, the slabs of the roof slid down, the ice crackled and  splintered. The air  above the tumbling wreckage filled with a haze of snow and ice crystals.

Susan watched from the trees. The boy, who she'd leaned against a handy trunk, opened his eyes.

'That was amazing,' he managed.

'Why, you mean the way it's all turning bark into snow?'

'The way you just picked me up and ran.

'Oh, that.'

The  grinding  of the  ice continued. The  fallen  pillars didn't  stop moving when they collapsed, but went on tearing themselves apart.

When the fog of ice settled there was nothing but drifted snow.

'As though it was  never there,' said Susan, aloud. She  turned  to the groaning figure.

'All right, what were you doing there?'

'I don't know. I just opened my. Eyes and there I was.'

'Who are you?'

'I  ... think  my name  is Bilious.  I'm the  ...  I'm the  oh  God  of Hangovers.'

'There's a God of Hangovers?'

'An oh  god,'  he corrected. 'When  people witness me,  you  see,  they clutch their  head and say, "Oh God  ..."  How  many of you are  standing here?'

'What? There's just me!'

'Ah. Fine. Fine.'

'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! Ow! But who  is it who ends up head  down  in  the privy every morning?  Arrgh.' He stopped and clutched at his  head.  'Should your skull feel like it's lined with dog hair?'

'I don't think so.'

'Ah.' 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  chill Just once, I mean just  once, I'd like to open my eyes in the  morning without  my head sticking to something.' He  paused. 'Are there any giraffes in this wood?'

'Up here? I shouldn't think so.'

He looked nervously past Susan's head.

'Not even indigo-coloured  ones which are sort of  stretched  and  keep flashing on and off?'

'Very unlikely.'

'Thank goodness  for  that.' He swayed back  and forth.  'Excuse  me, I think Im about to throw up my breakfast.'

'It's the middle of the evening!'

'Is it? In that case, I think I'm about to throw up my dinner.'

He folded up gently in the snow behind the tree.

'He's a long streak of widdle, isn't he?' said a

voice from a branch. It was the raven. 'Got a neck with a knee in it.'

The oh god reappeared after a noisy interlude.

'I know I must  eat,'  he  mumbled.  'It's just  that the only  time  I remember seeing my food it's always going the other way ...'

'What were you doing in there?' said Susan.

`Ouch! Search me,' said the oh god. 'It's only a mercy I wasn't holding a traffic sign and wearing a ...' he winced and paused ' ... having some kind of women's underwear  about  my person.' He sighed. 'Someone somewhere has a lot of fun,' he said wistfully. 'I wish it was me.'

'Get a drink inside you, that's my  advice,'  said the raven.  'Have  a hair of the dog that bit someone else.'

'But why there?' Susan insisted.

The oh god stopped h-ling to glare at the  raven. 'I  don't know, where was there exactly?'

Susan looked back at where the castle had been. It was entirely gone.

'There was a very important building there a moment ago,' she said.

The oh god nodded carefully.

'I often see things  that weren't there  a  moment ago,' he said.  'And they often aren't there a  moment later. Which is a blessing  in most cases, let me tell you. So I don't usually take a lot of notice.'

He folded up and landed in the snow again.

There's just snow now, Susan thought.  Nothing but  snow and the  wind. There's not even a ruin.

The certainty stole over  her again  that the Hogfather's castle wasn't simply not there any  more. No ...  it  had never been there. There  was  no ruin, no trace.

It  had  been an  odd  enough place. It was  where the Hogfather lived, according  to  the legends. Which was  odd,  when you  thought about  it. It didn't look like the kind of place a cheery old toymaker would live in.

The  wind  soughed  in the trees behind them.  Snow slid  off branches. Somewhere in the dark there was a flurry of hooves.

A spidery little figure leapt off a snowdrift and landed on the oh gods head. It turned a beady eye up towards Susan.

'All right by you,  is it?'  said the  imp, producing its  huge hammer. 'Some of us have a job to do,  you  know, even if  we are of a metaphorical, nay, folkloric persuasion.'

'Oh, go away.'

'If  you  think I'm bad, wait until you see the little pink elephants,' said the imp.

'I don't believe you.'

'They  come out  of  his ears  and fly around his head making  tweeting noises.'

'Ah,' said the raven, sagely. 'That sounds more like robins. I wouldn't put anything past them.'

The oh god grunted.

Susan  suddenly felt that she didn't want to  leave him. He was  human. Well, human shaped.

Well, at least he had two arms and legs. He'd freeze to  death here. Of course,  gods,  or even oh  gods, probably couldn't, but humans didn't think like that.  You couldn't just leave someone. She prided herself on this  bit of normal thinking.

Besides,  he might have some answers, if  she could make him stay awake enough to understand the questions.

From the edge of the frozen forest.. animal eyes watched them go.

Mr Crumley sat  on  the  damp stairs and sobbed.  He couldn't  get  any nearer to the toy department. Every time he tried he got lifted off his feet by the mob and dumped at the edge of the crowd by the current of people.

Someone  said, 'Top of the evenin', squire,' and he looked up  blearily at the small yet irregularly formed figure that had addressed him thusly.

'Are you one of the pixies?' he said, after mentally exhausting all the other possibilities.

'No, sir. I am not in fact a pixie, sir, I am in fact Corporal Nobbs of the Watch. And this is Constable Visit, sir.' The creature looked at a piece of paper in its paw. 'You Mr Crummy?'

'Crumley!'

'Yeah, right. You sent a runner to the Watch  House  and we have hereby responded with  commendable  speed, sir,' said  Corporal Nobbs. 'Despite  it being Hogswatchnight and there being a  lot of strange things happening  and most importantly it being the occasion of our Hogswatchly piss-up, sir. But this is  all right because Washpot, that's Constable Visit here, he  doesn't drink,  sir, it being against his religion, and although I do drink,  sir, I volunteered to come  because  it  is  my civic duty, sir.'

Nobby  tore off a salute,  or what he  liked to  believe  was a  salute. He did not add,  'And turning out  for  a  rich bugger such as your good self is  bound to put the officer  concerned in the  way  of a  seasonal  bottle or  two or some other tangible  evidence of  gratitude,' because his entire stance said it for him Even Nobby's ears could look suggestive.

Unfortunately, Mr  Crumley wasn't in the right receptive frame of mind. He stood up and waved a shaking finger towards the top of the stairs.

'I want you to go up there,' he said, 'and arrest him!'

'Arrest who, sir?' said Corporal Nobbs.

'The Hogfather!'

'What for, sir?'

'Because he's sitting up there as bold as brass in  his  Grotto, giving away presents!'

Corporal Nobbs thought about this.

'You  haven't  been having  a festive drink, have  you,  sir?'  he said hopefully.

'I do not drink!'

'Very wise, sir,' said Constable Visit.  'Alcohol is the tarnish of the soul. Ossory, Book Two, Verse Twentyfour.'

'Not  quite  up to  speed here,  sir,'  said  Corporal  Nobbs,  looking perplexed. 'I thought the

Hogfather  is  s'posed  to give away stuff,  isn't  he?' This  time  Mr Crumley had to stop  and  think. Up until now  he hadn't quite sorted things out in his head, other than recognizing their essential wrongness.

'This one is an Impostor!'  he declared. 'Yes, that's right! He smashed his way into here!'

'Y'know, I always thought  that,' said  Nobby. 'I thought,  every year, the Hogfather spends a fortnight sitting in  a wooden  grotto in a  shop  in Ankh-Morpork? At his busy time, too? Hah! Not likely! Probably just some old man in a beard, I thought.'

'I  meant ... he's not the  Hogfather  we usually have,' said  Crumley, struggling for firmer ground. 'He just barged in here"

'Oh, a different impostor? Not the real impostor at all?'

'Well ... yes ... no. . .'

'And started giving stuff away?' said Corporal Nobbs.

'That's what I said! That's got to be a Crime, hasn't it?'

Corporal Nobbs rubbed his nose.

'Well, nearly,' he  conceded, not  wishing to  totally  relinquish  the chance of  any festive remuneration.  Realization dawned.  'He's giving away your stuff, sir?'

'No! No, he brought it in with him!'

'Ah? Giving  away your stuff, now,  if he was doing  that, yes, I could see the problem. That's a sure sign of crime, stuff going missing. Stuff turning up,  weerlll, that's a tricky  one. Unless it's stuff like arms and legs, o'  course. We'd be on safer ground if he was  nicking stuff, sir, to tell you the truth.'

'This  is a shop,' said Mr  Crumley, finally getting to the root of the problem.  'We do not give Merchandise away. How can we expect people  to buy things  if some Person is giving them away? Now please go and get him out of here.'

'Arrest the Hogfather, style of thing?'

'Yes!'

'On Hogswatchnight?'

'Yes!'

'In your shop?'

'Yes!'

'In front of all those kiddies?'

'Y...'  Mr Crumley hesitated. To his horror, he realized  that  Corporal Nobbs, against all expectation, had a point. 'You think that will look bad?' he said.

'Hard to see how it could look good, sir.'

'Could you not do it surreptitiously?' he said.

'Ah, well, surreptition, yes, we could  give that a try,' said Corporal Nobbs. The sentence hung in the air with its hand out.

'You won't find me ungrateful,' said Mr Crumley, at last.

'Just you leave it to us,' said Corporal Nobbs, magnanimous in victory. 'You just nip down to your office  and treat yourself to a  nice cup  of tea and we'll sort this out in no time. You'll be ever so grateful.'

Crumley  gave him a look  of a man  in the  grip of serious doubt,  but staggered away nonetheless. Corporal Nobbs rubbed his hands together.

'You don't have Hogswatch back where you come from do you, Washpot?' he said, as they climbed  the stairs to the  first floor. 'Look at this carpet, you'd think a pig'd pissed on it ...'

'We call it the  Fast of St Ossory,' said Visit,  who was  from  Omnia. 'But it  is not  an occasion  for  superstition and  crass commercialism. We simply get together in family groups for a prayer meeting and a fast.'

'What, turkey and chicken and that?'

'A fast, Corporal Nobbs. We don't eat anything.'

'Oh, right.  Well, each to his own,  I  s'pose. And at least  you don't have to get up early in the morning and find  that the nothing you've got is too big to fit in the oven. No presents neither?'

They stood  aside hurriedly as two  children scuttled  down the  stairs carrying a large toy boat between them.

'It  is sometimes appropriate to exchange new  religious pamphlets, and of course there are usually copies of the Book of  Ossory for the children,' said  Constable  Visit.  'Sometimes  with  illustrations,'  he added, in the guarded way of a man hinting at licentious pleasures.

A small  girl  went past carrying a teddy bear larger than herself.  It was pink.

'They always gives me bath salts,' complained Nobby. 'And bath soap and bubble bath and herbal bath lumps and tons of bath stuff and I can't think why, 'cos it's not as if I  hardly ever has  a bath. You'd think they'd take the hint, wouldn't you?'

'Abominable, I call it,' said Constable Visit.

The first floor was a mob.

'Huh, look at them. Mr Hogfather never brought me anything when I was a kid,' said  Corporal Nobbs, eyeing the children gloomily. 'I used to hang up my stocking every Hogswatch, regular. All that ever happened was  my dad was sick in it once.' He removed his helmet.

Nobby was not by any measure a hero, but there was the  sudden gleam in his eye  of someone who'd seen altogether too many empty stockings  plus one rather full and  dripping one. A scab had been knocked off some wound in the corrugated little organ of his soul.

'I'm going in,' he said.

In between the University's Great Hall and  its main door is  a  rather smaller  circular  hall  or  vestibule   known  as  Archchancellor  Bowell's Remembrance, although no one  now knows why,  or why an extant bequest pays. for one small currant bun and one copper penny to be placed on a high stone shelf on one  wall every second  Wednesday.[15] Ridcully stood in the middle of the floor, looking upwards.

'Tell  me,  Senior   Wrangler,  we  never  invited  any  women  to   the Hogswatchnight Feast, did we?'

'Of course not, Archchancellor,' said the Senior Wrangler. He looked up in the dust-covered rafters, wondering what had caught Ridcully's eye. 'Good heavens, no. They'd spoil everything. I've always said so.'

'And all the maids have got the evening off until midnight?'

'A very generous custom,  I've always said,' said the  Senior Wrangler, feeling his neck crick.

'So why, every year,  do  we hang  a damn  great bunch of  mistletoe up there?'

The Senior Wrangler turned in a circle, still staring upwards.

'Welt er ... it's ... well, it's ... it's symbolic, Archchancellor.'

'Ah?'

The Senior Wrangler felt that something more  was expected.  He  groped around in the dusty attics of his education.

'Of  ...  the  leaves, d'y'see ... they're  symbolic  of ...  of green, d'y'see whereas  the berries,  in  fact, yes, the  berries symbolize  ... symbolize white. Yes. White and green. Very ... symbolic.'

He waited. He was not, unfortunately, disappointed.

'What of?'

The Senior Wrangler coughed.

'I'm not sure there has to be an of,' he said.

'Ah? So,' said the Archchancellor, thoughtfully,

'It could be said that. the white and green symbolize a small parasitic plant?'

'Yes, indeed,' said the Senior Wrangler.

'So mistletoe, in fact, symbolizes mistletoe?'

'Exactly,  Archchancellor,' said the Senior Wrangler, who  was now just hanging on.

'Funny thing, that,'  said  Ridcully,  in  the  same thoughtful tone of voice. 'That statement is either  so deep it would take a  lifetime to fully comprehend every particle of its meaning, or it is  a load of absolute tosh. Which is it, I wonder?'

'It could be both,' said the Senior Wrangler desperately.

'And  that comment,' said Ridcully, 'is either very perceptive, or very trite.'

'It might be bo...'

'Don't push it, Senior Wrangler.'

There was a hammering on the outer door.

'Ah, that'll be the wassailers,' said  the Senior  Wrangler, happy  for the distraction. 'They call on us first every year. I personally have always liked "The Lily-white Boys", you know.'

The Archchancellor glanced up  at the mistletoe, gave the beaming man a sharp look, and opened the little hatch in the door.

'Well, now, wassailing you fellows ...' he began. 'Oh.  Well, I  must  say you might've picked a better time ...'

A hooded figure stepped  through the wood of the  door, carrying a limp bundle over its shoulder.

The Senior Wrangler stepped backwards quickly.

'Oh ... no, not tonight ...'

And then he noticed that what he had  taken for a  robe had lace around the bottom, and  the hood,  while quite definitely a hood,  was nevertheless rather more stylish than the one he had first mistaken it for.

'Putting down or taking away?' said Ridcully.

Susan pushed back her hood.

'I need your help, Mr Ridcully,' she said.

'You're ... aren't you Death's granddaughter?' said Ridcully. 'Didn't I meet you a few ...'

'Yes,' sighed Susan.

'And ...  are you  helping out?' said Ridcully.  His waggling  eyebrows indicated the slumbering figure over her shoulder.

'I need you to wake him up,' said Susan.

'Some sort of miracle, you mean?' said the Senior  Wrangler, who  was a little behind.

'He's not dead,' said Susan. 'He's just resting.'

'That's what they all say,' the Senior Wrangler quavered.

Ridcully, who  was somewhat  more  practical, lifted the oh god's head. There was a groan.

'Looks a bit under the weather,' he said.

'He's the God of Hangovers,' said Susan. 'The Oh God of Hangovers.'

'Really?' said Ridcully. 'Never had one of those myself. Funny thing, I can drink all night and feel as fresh as a daisy in the morning.'

The oh god's eyes opened. Then he soared towards Ridcully and started beating him on the chest with both fists.

'You utter, utter bastard! I hate you hate you hate you hate you-'

His eyes shut, and he slid down to the floor.

'What was all that about?' said Ridcully.

'I  think   it  was  some  kind   of  nervous  reaction,'   said  Susan diplomatically. 'Something nasty's happening tonight. I'm hoping he can tell me what it is. But he's got to be able to think straight first.'

'And you brought him here?' said Ridcully.

HO. HO. HO. YES INDEED, HELLO, SMALL CHILD CALLED VERRUCA LUMPY, WHAT A LOVELY NAME, AGED  SEVEN, I BELIEVE? GOOD. YES,  I KNOW IT DID. ALL OVER THE NICE CLEAN  FLOOR, YES.  THEY DO,  YOU KNOW. THAT's ONE OF THE  THINGS ABOUT REAL PIGS.  HERE  WE ARE, DON'T MENTION IT.  HAPPY HOGSWATCH AND BE GOOD.  I WILL KNOW IF YOU'RE GOOD OR BAD, YOU KNOW. HO. HO. HO.

'Well,  you brought some  magic into that little life,' said Albert, as the next child was hurried away.

IT'S THE EXPRESSION ON THEIR LITTLE FACES I LIKE, said the Hogfather.

'You mean sort of fear and awe  and not knowing whether to laugh or cry or wet their pants?'

YES. NOW THAT IS WHAT I CALL BELIEF.

The oh god was carried into the Great Hall and laid out on a bench. The senior  wizards gathered round, ready  to  help those  less  fortunate  than themselves remain that way.

'I know what's good for a hangover,' said  the Dean, who was feeling in a party mood.

They looked at him expectantly.

'Drinking heavily the previous night!' he said.

He beamed at them.

'That was a good word joke,' he said, to break the silence.

The silence came back.

'Most  amusing,' said Ridcully.  He turned back and stared thoughtfully at the oh god.

'Raw eggs are said to  be good ...' he glared at the Dean '...I mean  bad for a hangover,' he said. 'And fresh orange juice.'

- 'Klatchian coffee,' said the Lecturer in Recent Runes, firmly.

'But  this  fellow  hasn't just got his hangover, he's  got  everyone's hangover,' said Ridcully.

'I've  tried  it,' mumbled the oh god.  'It just makes me feel suicidal and sick.'

'A mixture of mustard and horseradish?'  said  the  Chair of Indefinite Studies. 'In cream, for preference. With anchovies.'

'Yoghurt' said the Bursar.

Ridcully looked at him, surprised.

'That sounded almost relevant,' he said.  'Well done. I should leave it at that if I were you, Bursar. Hmm. Of course, my uncle always used to swear at Wow-Wow Sauce,' he added.

'You mean swear by, surely?' said the Lecturer in Recent Runes.

'Possibly both,' said Ridcully. 'I know he once drank a whole bottle of it as  a hangover cure  and it certainly seemed to cure him. He looked  very peaceful when they came to lay him out.'

'Willow bark' said the Bursar.

'That's a  good idea,'  said  the  Lecturer in  Recent Runes.  'It's an analgesic.'

'Really? Well, possibly, though it's probably better to give it to  him by mouth,' said Ridcully. 'I say, are you feeling yourself, Bursar? You seem somewhat coherent.'

The oh god opened his crusted eyes.

'Will all that stuff help?' he mumbled.

'It'll probably kill you,' said Susan.

'Oh. Good.'

'We could add Englebert's Enhancer,' said the Dean. 'Remember when Modo put some on his peas? We could only manage one each!'

'Can't  you do something  more,  well, magical?' said Susan. 'Magic the alcohol out of him or something?'

'Yes, but it's not alcohol by  this time, is it?' said Ridcully. 'It'll have turned  into a  lot of  nasty  little poisons  all dancin' round on his liver.'

'Spold's Unstirring Divisor  would  do it,' said the Lecturer in Recent Runes. 'Very simply, too.  You'd end up with a large beaker full  of all the nastiness. Not difficult at all, if you don't mind the side effects.'

'Tell me  about  the side  effects,'  said Susan,  who had  met wizards before.

'The main one is that the rest of him would end up in a somewhat larger beaker,' said the Lecturer in Recent Runes.

'Alive?'

The Lecturer in Recent Runes screwed up his face and waggled his hands. 'Broadly, yes,' he said. 'Living tissue, certainly. And definitely sober.'

'I think we had  in  mind something that would leave him the same shape and still breathing,' said Susan.

'Well, you might've said . . .'

Then  the Dean repeated the mantra that has had such a marked effect on the progress of knowledge throughout the ages.

'Why don't we  just mix up absolutely everything and see what happens?' he said.

And Ridcully responded with the traditional response.

'It's got to be worth a try,' he said.

The big glass beaker for  the cure had been placed on a pedestal in the middle of the  floor. The wizards liked to make a ceremony  of everything in any  case,  but felt  instinctively that  if they  were going,  to cure  the biggest hangover in the world it needed to be done with style.

Susan and  Bilious watched as  the ingredients  were added. Round about halfway the mixture,  which was  an orange- brown colour, went gloop. 'Not a lot of improvement, I feel,' said the Lecturer in Recent Runes.

Englebert's Enhancer was the penultimate ingredient.  The  Dean dropped in a greenish ball of light that sank under the surface. The  only apparent effect was  that  it  caused purple bubbles to creep  over  the sides of the beaker and drip onto the floor.

'That's it?' said the oh god.

'I think the yoghurt probably wasn't a good idea,' said the Dean.

'I'm not drinking that,'  said Bilious firmly, and then clutched at his head.

'But gods are practically unkillable, aren't they?' said the Dean.

'Oh, good,' muttered Bilious. 'Why not stick my legs in a meat grinder, then?'

'Well, if you think it might help ...'

'I  anticipated a certain  amount of resistance from the patient,' said the  Archchancellor. He removed his  hat and fished out a small crystal ball from a pocket in the lining. 'Let's see what the God of Wine is up to at the moment, shall we? Shouldn't be  too difficult to locate a funloving god like him on an evening like this ...'

He blew on the glass and polished it. Then he brightened up.

'Why, here he is, the  little  rascal! On Dunmanifestin, I  do believe. Yes ... yes ... reclining on his couch, surrounded by naked maenads.'

'What? Maniacs?' said the Dean.

'He means ... excitable  young women,' said Susan. And it seemed to her that  there was a  general  ripple  of movement among the wizards, a sort of nonchalant drawing towards the glittering ball.

'Can't quite see what he's doing said

Ridcully.

'Let me see if I can make it out,' said the Chair of Indefinite Studies hopefully. Ridcully half turned to keep the ball out of his reach.

'Ah., yes,' he said. 'It looks like he's drinking ... yes, could very wen be lager and blackcurrant, if I'm any judge ...'

'Oh, me . . .' moaned the oh god.

'These young women, now--' the Lecturer in Recent Runes began.

'I  can see there's some bottles  on  the table,'  Ridcully  continued. 'That one,  hmm,  yes,  could be  scumble which, as  you  know, is made from apple ...'

'Mainly  apples,' the Dean  volunteered. 'Now,  about  these  poor  mad girls ...'

The oh god slumped to his knees.

'...  and there's ... that  drink, you know, there's  a  worm  in the bottle ...'

'Oh, me ...'

'... and ... there's an empty glass,  a big one, can't quite see what it contained, but  there's  a paper umbrella in it.  And some cherries  on a stick. Oh, and an amusing little monkey.'

'ooohhh ...'

'... of course, there's a lot of other bottles too,'  said Ridcully, cheerfully. 'Different coloured drinks, mainly. The sort made from  melons  and  coconuts and chocolate and suchlike,  don'tcherknow. Funny thing is, all the glasses on the table are pint mugs ...'

Bilious fell forward.

'All right,' he murmured. 'I'll drink the wretched stuff.'

'It's not quite ready yet,' said Ridcully. 'Ah, thank you, Modo.'

Modo tiptoed in, pushing a trolley. There was a large metal bowl on it, in which a small bottle stood in the middle of a heap of crushed ice.

'Only just made this for  Hogswatch dinner,' said Ridcully. 'Hasn't had much time to mature yet.'

He put down the crystal and fished a pair  of heavy  gloves out  of his hat.

The wizards  spread  like  an  opening flower.  One  moment  they  were gathered around Ridcully, the next they were standing close to various items of heavy furniture.

Susan  felt she  was present at a  ceremony  and hadn't  been  told the rules.

'What's that?' she said, as Ridcully carefully lifted up the bottle.

'Wow-Wow Sauce,' said Ridcully. 'Finest condiment known to man. A happy accompaniment to  meat, fish, fowl, eggs and many types of vegetable dishes. It's  not safe  to drink  it when  sweat's still condensing on  the  bottle, though.' He peered at the bottle,  and then rubbed at it, causing a glassy, squeaky noise. 'On the other hand,' he said brightly, 'if it's a kill-or-cure remedy then we are, given that the patient is practically  immortal, probably on to a winner.'

He placed. a thumb over the cork and shook the bottle vigorously. There was a crash as the Chair of Indefinite Studies and the Senior Wrangler tried to get under the same table.

'And these fellows  seem to have taken  against it for some reason,' he said, approaching the beaker.

'I  prefer  a sauce that doesn't  mean  you mustn't  make  any  jolting movements for half an hour after using it,' muttered the Dean.

'And  that can't be used for breaking up small rocks,'  said the Senior Wrangler.

'Or getting rid of tree roots,' said the Chair of Indefinite Studies.

'And which isn't actually outlawed in three cities,' said  the Lecturer in Recent Runes.

Ridcully  cautiously uncorked  the  bottle. There was  a brief  hiss of indrawn air.

He allowed a few drops to splash into the beaker. Nothing happened.

A more  generous helping  was allowed  to  fall.  The  mixture remained irredeemably inert.

Ridcully sniffed suspiciously at the bottle.

'I wonder if I added enough grated wahooni?' he said, and then upturned the sauce and let most of it slide into the mixture.

It merely went gloop.

The  wizards began to stand up  and  brush themselves  off, giving  one another the  rather  embarrassed grins of people who  know that they've just been part of a synchronized makinga-fool-of-yourself team.

'I  know  we've had that asafoetida rather a long time,' said Ridcully. He turned the bottle round, peering at it sadly.

Finally he  tipped it up for the last  time and thumped it  hard on the base.

A trickle of sauce arrived on the lip of the bottle and glistened there for a moment. Then it began to form a bead.

As if drawn  by invisible  strings, the  heads of the wizards turned to look at it.

Wizards wouldn't be wizards if they couldn't see a  little way into the future.

As the bead swelled and started to  go pearshaped they turned and, with a surprising turn of speed for men so wealthy in years and waistline, began to dive for the floor.

The drop fen.

It went gloop.

And that was all.

Ridcully, who'd been standing like a statue, sagged in relief.

'I don't know,' he said,  turning away,  'I wish you fellows would show some backbone ...'

The fireball lifted him off his feet. Then it rose to the ceiling where it   spread  out  widely  and  vanished  with  a  pop,  leaving a perfect chrysanthemum of scorched plaster.

Pure white light filled the room. And there was a sound.

TINKLE. TINKLE. FIZZ.

The wizards risked looking around.

The beaker  gleamed.  It was filled with a liquid  glow, which  bubbled gently and sent out sparkles like a spinning diamond.

'My word ...' breathed the Lecturer in Recent Runes.

Ridcully picked himself up off the floor. Wizards tended  to roll well, or in any case are well. padded enough to bounce.

Slowly,  the flickering.  brilliance  casting their long shadows on the walls, the wizards gravitated towards the beaker.

'Well, what is it?' said the Dean.

'I  remember  my  father  tellin' me  some  very valuable  advice about drinks,' said Ridcully.  'He said, "Son, never drink any drink with a  paper umbrella in it, never  drink any drink with a humorous name, and never drink any drink that  changes colour when the last ingredient goes in. And  never, ever, do this ..." '

He dipped his finger into the beaker.

It came out with one glistening drop on the end.

'Careful, Archchancellor,'  warned the Dean. 'What you have there might represent pure sobriety.'

Ridcully paused with the finger halfway to his lips.

'Good point,' he said. 'I don't want to start being sober at my time of life.' He looked around. '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.'

'Ah, good point.'

'I'll try it,' the oh god mumbled.

'Something these  clo- gentlemen have cooked up?' said Susan. 'It might kill you!'

'You've never had a hangover,  I expect,' said the  oh  god. `Otherwise you wouldn't talk such rot.'

He staggered up to the beaker, managed to grip it on the second go, and drank the lot.

'There'll  be  fireworks now,'  said the raven, from  Susan's shoulder. 'Flames  coming out  of the mouth, screams, clutching at  the  throat, lying down under the cold tap, that sort of thing ...'

Death found, to his amazement, that dealing  with  the queue  was  very enjoyable. Hardly anyone had ever been pleased to see him before.

NEXT! AND WHAT'S YOUR NAME, LITTLE ... He  hesitated,  but rallied, and continued ... PERSON?

'Nobby Nobbs, Hogfather,' said Nobby. Was it  him, or  was this knee he was sitting on a lot bonier than it should be? His buttocks argued with  his brain, and were sat on.

AND HAVE YOU BEEN  A GOOD BO ... A GOOD  DWA ... A GOOD GNO ...  A GOOD INDIVIDUAL?

And suddenly Nobby found he had no control at all of his tongue. Of its own accord, gripped by a terrible compulsion, it said:

' 's.'

He struggled for self-possession as the  great voice went  on: SO  I EXPECT YOU'LL WANT A PRESENT FOR A GOOD MON ... A GOOD HUM ... A GOOD MALE?

Aha,  got you bang to  rights,  you'll be coming along with me,  my old chummy, I  bet you don't  remember the cellar at the  back  of the  shoelace maker's in Old Cobblers, eh, all those Hogswatch mornings with a little hole in my world, eh?

The  words rose  in  Nobby's throat  but  were overridden by  something ardent  before  they  reached  his  voice  box,  and  to his  amazement were translated into:

' 's.'

SOMETHING NICE?

' 's.'

There was hardly anything left of Nobby's conscious will now. The world consisted of nothing but his  naked soul and  the  Hogfather, who filled the universe.

AND YOU WILL OF COURSE BE GOOD FOR ANOTHER YEAR?

The tiny remnant of basic Nobbyness wanted to say, 'Er, how  exactly do you define "good", mister? Like, suppose there was  just some stuff  that no one'd miss, say? Or, f 'r instance, say a friend of mine was on patrol, sort of thing, and found a shopkeeper had left his  door  unlocked at night. I mean, anyone could walk  in, right, but suppose this friend  took  one or  two  things, sort  of like, you  know,  a gratuity,  and  then called the shopkeeper out and got him to  lock up, that counts as "good", does it?'

Good and bad were, to Nobby's way of thinking, entirely relative terms. Most  of  his  relatives,  for example,  were  criminals.  But,  again, this invitation to philosophical  debate was ambushed  somewhere  in his  head by sheer dread of the big beard in the sky.

' 's,' he squeaked.

NOW, I WONDER WHAT YOU WOULD LIKE?

Nobby  gave up, and sat  mute.  Whatever was going  to happen next  was going to happen, and there was not  a thing he could do about it . . . Right now, the light at the end of his mental tunnel showed only more tunnel.

AH, YES ...

The Hogfather reached into his sack and pulled out an  awkwardly shaped present  wrapped in festive  Hogswatch  paper  which, owing to  some  slight confusion on the  current Hogfather's part, had merry ravens on it. Corporal Nobbs took it in nervous hands.

WHAT DO YOU SAY?

' nk you.'

OFF YOU GO.

Corporal Nobbs slid down  gratefully  and  barged his way  through  the crowds, stopping only when he was fielded by Constable Visit.

'What happened? What happened? I couldn't see!'

'I dunno,' mumbled Nobby. 'He gave me this.'

'What is it.'

'I dunno . .

He clawed at the raven-bedecked paper.

'This is disgusting, this whole business,' said Constable  Visit. 'It's the worship of idols ...'

'It's a genuine   Burleigh and Stronginthearm doubleaction triple-cantilever crossbow with a polished walnut  stock and engraved silver facings!'

'... a crass commercialization of a  date which is purely of astronomical significance,' said  Visit,  who  seldom  paid  attention  when  he  was  in mid-denounce. 'If it is to be celebrated at all, then ...'

'I saw this in Bows  and Ammo!  It got Editor's Choice in the  'What to Buy  When  Rich Uncle Sidney  Dies" category!  They  had to  break  both the reviewer's arms to get him to let go of it!'

' ...ought to be commemorated in a small service of...'

'It must cost more'n a year's salary! They  only make 'em to order! You have to wait ages!'

'...religious significance.' It dawned on Constable Visit that  something behind him was amiss.

'Aren't we going to arrest this impostor, corporal?' he said.

Corporal Nobbs looked blearily  at him through  the mists of possessive pride.

'You're foreign, Washpot,' he said. 'I can't expect you to know the real meaning of Hogswatch.'

The oh god blinked.

'Ah,'  he  said.  'That's better. Oh, yes. That's  a lot better.  Thank you.'

The wizards,  who shared the  raven's belief in the essential narrative conventions of life, watched him cautiously.

'Any minute now,' said the Lecturer in Recent Runes confidently, 'it'll probably start with some kind of amusing yell...'

'You know,' said  the oh god, 'I  think  I could  just  possibly eat  a soft-boiled egg.'

'...or maybe the cars spinning round...'

'And perhaps drink a glass of milk' said the oh god.

Ridcully looked nonplussed.

'You really feel better?' he said.

'Oh,  yes,'  said  the oh god. 'I  really think  I  could  risk a smile without the top of my head falling off.'

'No, no, no,'  said the Dean. 'This can't be right. Everyone knows that a  good hangover  cure  has  got  to  involve  a lot  of  humorous shouting, ekcetra.'

'I could possibly tell you a joke,' said the oh god carefully.

'You don't  have this pressing urge to  run outside and stick your head in a water butt?' said Ridcully.

'Er ...  not really,'  said the oh god. 'But I'd like  some toast, if that helps.'

The Dean took  off  his hat and  pulled a thaumameter out of the point. 'Something happened,' he said. 'There was a massive thaumic surge.'

'Didn't it even taste a bit ... well, spicy?' said Ridcully.

'It didn't taste of anything, really,' said the oh god.

'Oh, look, it's obvious,' said  Susan. 'When the  God  of Wine  drinks, Bilious here gets the aftereffects, so when the God of  Hangovers  drinks  a hangover cure then the effects must jump back across the same link.'

'That could be right,' said the  Dean. 'He is,  after  all, basically a conduit.'

'I've always thought of myself as more of a tube,' said the oh god.

'No, no, she's right,' said Ridcully. 'When  he drinks,  this  lad here gets the nasty result. So, logically, when our  friend here takes a hangover cure the side effects should head back the same way--'

'Someone mentioned a crystal ball just now,' said the oh god in a voice suddenly clanging with vengeance. 'I want to see this ...'

It was  a big drink.  A very  big  and a very long drink. It was one of those  special cocktails where  each very sticky, very strong ingredient  is poured in very slowly, so that they layer on top of one another.  Drinks like  this  tend  to  get  called  Traffic  Lights  or Rainbow's Revenge or, in places where truth is more highly valued, Hello and Goodbye, Mr Brain Cell.

In addition, this drink had some lettuce floating in it. And a slice of lemon and a piece of pineapple hooked coquettishly on the side of the glass, which had sugar frosted round the  rim.  There were two paper umbrellas, one pink and one blue, and they each had a cherry on the end.

And someone had taken the  trouble  to freeze ice cubes in the shape of little elephants. After that, there's no hope. You might as well be drinking in a place called the Cococobana.

The God of Wine picked it up lovingly. It was his kind of drink.

There was a rumba going on in the background. There were also a  couple of young ladies snuggling up to him. It was going to be a good night. It was always a good night.

'Happy Hogswatch, everyone!' he said, and raised the glass.

And then: 'Can anyone hear something?'

Someone blew a paper squeaker at him.

'No, seriously ... like a sort of descending note

Since no one paid this any attention he shrugged, and nudged one of his fellow drinkers.

'How about we have a couple more and go to this club I know?' he said.

And then.......

The wizards leaned back, and one or two of them grimaced.

Only the oh god stayed glued to the glass, face contorted  in a vicious smile.

'We have eructation!' he shouted, and punched the  air. 'Yes! Yes! Yes! The worm  is on  the other boot  now, eh? Hah! How do you like  them apples, huh?'

'Well, mainly apples--' said the Dean.

'Looked like a lot of other things  to me,' said Ridcully. 'It seems we have reversed the cause-effect flow . . .'

'Will it be permanent?' said the oh god hopefully.

'I shouldn't think so.  After all, you are the God  of Hangovers. It'll probably just reverse itself again when the potion wears off.'

'Then I may not have much time. Bring me ... let's see ... twenty pints of lager, some pepper vodka and a bottle of coffee liqueur! With an umbrella in it! Let's see how he enjoys that, Mr  You've Cot Room For Another  One In There!'

Susan grabbed his hand and pulled him over to a bench.

'I didn't have you sobered up just so  you could go on a binge!' she said.

He blinked at her. 'You didn't?'

'I want you to help me!'

'Help you what?'

'You said you'd never been human before, didn't you?'

'Er ...' The oh god looked down at himself. 'That's right,'  he said. 'Never.'

'You've never incarnated?' said Ridcully.

'Surely that's a rather personal question, isn't it?' said the Chair of Indefinite Studies.

'That's ...  right,'  said  the  oh god. 'Odd, that. I  remember always having headaches ... but never having a head. That can't be right, can it?'

'You existed in potentia?' said Ridcully.

'Did what?'

'Did he?' said Susan.

Ridcully paused. 'Oh dear,'  he said. 'I  think  I did  it, didn't I? I said something to young Stibbons about  drinking and hangovers, didn't I ... ?'

'And you created him just like that?' said the Dean. 'I  find that very hard to  believe,  Mustrum. Hah! Out of thin air? I suppose  we can  all  do that, can we? Anyone care to think up some new pixie?'

'Like the  Hair Loss  Fairy?'  said the Lecturer  in  Recent Runes. The other wizards laughed.

'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' bashful  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,"' said the Lecturer in Recent Runes. The Dean had been annoying him lately.

'For the last time,' shouted the Dean, 'I am not...'

He stopped.

There was a glingleglingleglingle noise.

'I wish I knew where that was coming from,' said Ridcully.

'Er . . .' the Dean began. 'Is there ... something on my head?'

The other wizards stared.

Something was moving under his hat.

Very carefully, he reached up and removed it.

The very small gnome sitting on his head had a chimp of the Dean's hair in each hand. It blinked guiltily in the light.

'Is there a problem?' it said.

'Get it off me!' the Dean yelled.

The wizards hesitated. They were  all vaguely  aware of the theory that very small creatures could pass on diseases, and  while the gnome was larger than  such creatures were generally  thought to be,  no  one wanted to catch Expanding Scalp Sickness.

Susan grabbed it.

'Are you the Hair Loss Fairy?' she said.

`Apparently,' said the gnome, wriggling in her grip.

The Dean ran his hands desperately through his hair.

'What have you been doing with my hair?' he demanded.

'Welt some of it I think I have to put on hairbrushes,' said the gnome, 'but sometimes I think I weave it into little mats to block up the bath with.'

'What do you mean, you think?' said Ridcully.

'Just a minute,' said Susan. She  turned to the oh god.  'Where exactly were you before I found you in the snow?'

'Er ... sort of ... everywhere,  I think,' said the oh god. 'Anywhere where drink had  been  consumed in beastly quantities some time  previously, you could say.'

'Ah-ha,' said Ridcully. 'You were an immanent vital force, yes?'

'I suppose I could have been,' the oh god conceded.

'And when we joked about the Hair Loss Fairy it suddenly focused on the Dean's head,' said Ridcully,  'where its operations  have been noticeable to all of us in recent months although of course we have been far too polite to pass comment on the subject.'

'You're calling things into being,' said Susan.

'Things like the Give  the Dean a Huge Bag  of  Money Goblin?' said the Dean,  who could think  very  quickly at times. He looked  around hopefully. 'Anyone hear any fairy tinkling?'

'Do you often get given huge bags of money, sir?' said Susan.

'Not on what you'd call a daily basis, no,' said the Dean. 'But if...'

'Then  there probably  isn't any  occult room for  a Huge Bags of Money Goblin,' said Susan.

'I personally have always wondered what happens to my socks,' said the Bursar cheerfully. 'You know how there's always  one missing? When I was  a  lad I  always thought that something was taking them . . .'

The wizards gave this some thought. Then they all heard it - the little crinkly tinkling noise of magic taking place.

The Archchancellor pointed dramatically skywards.

'To the laundry!' he said.

'It's downstairs, Ridcully,' said the Dean.

'Down to the laundry!'

'And you know Mrs Whitlow doesn't like  us  going  in there,' said  the Chair of Indefinite Studies.

'And  who  is  Archchancellor  of  this University, may  I  ask?'  said Ridcully. 'Is it Mrs Whitlow? I don't think so! Is it  me? Why, how amazing, I do believe it is!'

'Yes, but you know what she can be like,' said the Chair.

'Er, yes, that's true...' Ridcully began.

'I  believe she's  gone to  her sister's for  the  holiday,'  said  the Bursar.

'We certainly don't have to  take orders from any kind of housekeeper!' said the Archchancellor. 'To the laundry!'

The  wizards  surged out excitedly,  leaving Susan,  the  oh  god,  the Verruca Gnome and the Hair Loss Fairy.

'Tell me again who those people were,' said the oh god.

'Some of the cleverest men in the world,' said Susan.

'And I'm sober, am I? But I'm not getting...'

'Clever isn't the same  as sensible,' said Susan, 'and they do say that if you  wish to walk the path to wisdom then for  your first step you must become as a small child.'

'Do you think they've heard about the second step?'

Susan  sighed.  'Probably not, but sometimes  they  fall over it  while they're running around shouting.'

'Ah.' The oh god looked around. 'Do you think they have any soft drinks here?' he said.

The path to wisdom does, in fact, begin with a single step.

Where people  go wrong is in  ignoring all the thousands of other steps that come after it. They make the single step of deciding to become one with the universe, and for some reason  forget to  take the logical  next step of living  for  seventy  years  on  a mountain and  a daily  bowl  of  rice and yak-butter tea that would give it any kind of  meaning.  While evidence says that the road to Hell is paved with good intentions, they're probably all on first steps.

The  Dean was always at  his best at times like this.  He led  the  way between  the huge, ardent  copper  vats, prodding with his  staff  into dark corners and going 'Hut! Hut!' under his breath.

'Why would it turn up here?' whispered the Lecturer in Recent Runes.

'Point  of reality instability,'  said Ridcully, standing  on tiptoe to look into a bleaching cauldron.  'Every damn thing turns up here. You should know that by now.'

'But why now?' said the Chair of Indefinite Studies.

'No talking!' hissed the  Dean, and leapt  out  into the next alleyway, staff held protectively in front of him.

'Hall!' he screamed, and then looked disappointed

' Er, how  big would  this  sock-stealing thing  be?'  said  the Senior Wrangler.

'Don't know,'  said Ridcully. He peered  behind  a stack of washboards. 'Come to think of it, I must've lost a ton of socks over the years.'

'Me too,' said the Lecturer in Recent Runes.

'So ... should we be looking in small places or very large places?' the Senior Wrangler went on, in the voice of one whose train of thought has just entered a long dark tunnel.

'Good point,' said Ridcully. 'Dean, why do you keep referring to  sheds all the time?'

'It's "hut", Mustrum,' said the Dean. 'It means ... it means...'

'Small wooden building?' Ridcully suggested.

'Welt  sometimes, agreed, but other times ... well, you just have  to say "hut".'

'This sock creature ... does it just steal them, or does it eat them?' said the Senior Wrangler.

'Valuable  contribution' that  man,' said  Ridcully,  giving tip on the Dean. 'Right, pass  the  word  along:  no  one  is  to  look  like  a  sock, understand?'

'How can you...' the Dean began, and stopped.

They all heard it.

... grnf, grnf, grnf ...

It was a busy sound, the sound of something with  a serious appetite to satisfy.

'The Eater of Socks,' moaned the Senior Wrangler, with his eyes shut.

'How many  tentacles would you expect it to have?' said the Lecturer in Recent Runes. 'I mean, roughly speaking?'

'It's a very large sort of noise, isn't it?' said the Bursar.

'To the nearest dozen, say,' said the  Lecturer in Recent Runes, edging backwards.

... grnf, grnf, grnf ...

'It'd probably tear our socks  off as soon  as look at us ...' wailed the Senior Wrangler.

'Ah. So at least five  or six tentacles, then, would you say?' said the Lecturer in Recent Runes.

'Seems to  me it's coming from  one of the  washing engines,' said  the Dean.

The engines  were each two storeys high, and usually only used when the University's population soared during term time. A  huge treadmill connected to a couple  of  big bleached wooden paddles  in each vat, which were heated via the fireboxes underneath. In full production the washing engines needed at least half a dozen people to  manhandle the loads, maintain the fires and oil  the scrubbing  arms. Ridcully had  seen them at work once, when  it had looked like a  picture of  a very dean and hygienic Hell,  the kind of place soap might go to when it died.

The Dean stopped by the door to the boiler area.

'Something's in here,' he whispered. 'Listen!'

..grnf...

It's stopped! It knows we're here!' he hissed. "All right? Ready? Hut!'

'No!' squeaked the Lecturer in Recent Runes.

'I'll open the door and you be ready to stop it! One ... two ... three! Oh ...'

The sleigh soared into the snowy sky.

ON THE WHOLE, I THINK THAT WENT VERY WELL, DON'T YOU?

'Yes, master,' said Albert.

I WAS RATHER PUZZLED BY THE LITTLE BOY IN THE CHAIN MAIL, THOUGH.

'I think that was a Watchman, master.'

REALLY? WELL, HE WENT AWAY HAPPY, AND THAT's THE MAIN THING.

'Is  it,  master?' There  was  worry in Albert's voice. Death's osmotic nature tended to pick up new ideas altogether too quickly. Of course, Albert understood why they had to do all this, but  the  master  ... well, sometimes the master  lacked  the necessary mental equipment to work out what should be true and what shouldn't ...

AND I THINK I'VE GOT THE LAUGH WORKING REALLY WELL NOW. HO. HO. HO.

'Yeah, sir, very jolly,'  said  Albert.  He looked down  at  the  list. 'Still, work  goes  on, eh? The  next one's pretty dose, master, so I should keep them down low if I was you.'

JOLLY GOOD. HO. HO. HO.

'Sarah the  little  match girl, doorway of Thimble's  Pipe and  Tobacco Shop, Money Trap Lane, it says here.'

AND WHAT DOES SHE WANT FOR HOGSWATCH? HO. HO. HO.

'Dunno. Never sent a letter. By  the way, just a tip, you don't have to say "Ho, ho, ho, " all  the time,  master. Let's see  ... It  says  here...' Albert's lips moved as he read.

I  EXPECT  A  DOLL  IS  ALWAYS  ACCEPTABLE.  OR  A  SOFT  TOY  OF  SOME DESCRIPTION. THE SACK SEEMS TO KNOW. WHAT'VE WE GOT FOR HER, ALBERT? HO. HO. HO.

Something small was dropped into his hand.

'This,' said Albert.

OH.

There  was  a moment  of horrible  silence as they both  stared at  the lifetimer.

'You're for life, not just for Hogswatch,' prompted Albert. 'Life  goes on, master. In a manner of speaking.'

BUT THIS IS HOGSWATCHNIGHT.

'Very  traditional  time  for this sort of  thing, I  understand,' said Albert.

I THOUGHT IT WAS THE SEASON TO BE JOLLY, said Death.

'Ah,  well, yes, you see, one of the  things that makes folks even more jolly  is  knowing  there're   people  who   ain't,'   said  Albert,   in  a matter-of-fact voice. 'That's how it goes, master. Master?'

NO.

Death stood up.

THIS IS HOW IT SHOULDN'T GO.

The University's Great Hall had  been set for the Hogswatchnight Feast. The  tables  were already groaning under the weight of  the  cutlery, and it would be hours before any real food  was put  on  them. It was hard  to  see where  there would be space  for any  among  the drifts  of ornamental fruit bowls and forests of wine glasses.

The oh god picked up a menu and turned to the fourth page.

'Course four: molluscs and crustaceans. A medley of lobster, crab, king crab,  prawn,  shrimp,  oyster,  clam,  giant  mussel, green-lipped  mussel, thin-lipped mussel and Fighting Tiger Limpet. With a herb and butter dipping sauce. Wine: "Three Wizards"  Chardonnay, Year of  the Talking  Frog.  Beer: Winkles' Old Peculiar.' He put it down. 'That's one course?' he said.

'They're big men in the food department,' said Susan.

He turned the menu over. On the cover was the University's coat of arms and, over it, three large letters in ardent script:  "E B P"

'Is this some sort of magic word?'

'No.' Susan sighed. 'They  put it on all their menus. You might call it the unofficial motto of the University.'

'What's it mean?'

'Eta Beta Pi.'

Bilious gave her an expectant look.

'Yes . . .?'

'Er ... like, Eat a Better Pie?' said Susan.

'That's what you just said, yes,' said the oh god.

'Urn. No. You see, the letters are Ephebian characters which just sound a bit like "eat a better Pie".

'Ah.' Bilious nodded wisely. 'I can see that might cause confusion.'

Susan  felt  a  bit  helpless  in  the  face  of  the look  of  helpful puzzlement. 'No,' she said, 'in fact they are supposed to cause a little bit of confusion, and  then you laugh. It's called a pune or play  on words. Eta Beta Pi.' She eyed  him carefully. 'You laugh,' she said. 'With your  mouth. Only,  in  fact,  you don't  laugh, because you're not supposed to laugh  at things like this.'

'Perhaps I could  find that glass of milk,' said the oh god helplessly, peering at  the huge array  of jugs and bottles.  He'd  clearly given up  on sense of humour.

'I gather the Archchancellor won't have milk in the University,' said Susan. 'He says  he knows  where it comes from and it's  unhygienic. And that's  a  man who eats  three  eggs for breakfast every day, mark you. How do you know about milk, by the way?'

'I've got ... memories,' said the oh god. 'Not exactly of anything, er, specific. just, you know, memories. Like, I know trees usually grow greenend up ... that sort of thing. I suppose gods just know things.'

'Any special god-like powers?'

'I might be able to turn water into  an enervescent drink.' He  pinched the bridge of his nose. 'Is that any help? And it's just possible I can give people a blinding headache.'

'I need to find out why my grandfather is ... acting strange.'

'Can't you ask him?'

'He won't tell me!'

'Does he throw up a lot?'

'I shouldn't think so. He doesn't often eat. The occasional curry, once or twice a month.'

'He must be pretty thin.'

'You've no idea.'

'Well, then ... Does he  often stare  at himself in the mirror  and say "Arrgh"? Or stick out his tongue and wonder why it's  gone  yellow? You see, it's possible  I might  have some  measure of  influence over people who are hung over. If he's been drinking a lot, I might be able to find him.'

'I can't see him doing any of those things. I think I'd better tell you ... My grandfather is Death.'

'Oh, I'm sorry to hear that.'

'I said Death.'

'Sorry?'

'Death. You know ... Death?'

'You mean the robes, the ...'

'...scythe, white horse, bones . . .. yes. Death.'

'I just want to  make  sure I've  got this dear,' said the oh god  in a reasonable tone of voice. 'You think your grandfather is Death and you think he's acting strange?'

The Eater of Socks looked up  at the wizards, cautiously. Then its jaws started to work again.

... grnf, grnf ...

'Here, thats one of mine!' said the Chair of Indefinite Studies, making a grab. The Eater of Socks backed away hurriedly.

It looked like a very small elephant with a very wide, flared trunk, up which one of the Chair's socks was disappearing.

'Funny lookin'  little  thing, ain't it?'  said  Ridcully, leaning  his staff against the wall.

'Let go, you wretched creature!' said the Chair, making a  grab for the sock. 'Shoo!'

The sock eater tried  to  get  away while  remaining where it was. This should  be  impossible,  but it is in  fact  a move  attempted by many small animals when they are caught eating  something forbidden.  The legs scrabble hurriedly but the neck and  feverishly working jaws merely stretch  and pivot around  the food. Finally the last of the sock  disappeared  up  the  snout with a faint sucking noise and the creature lumbered off behind one of the boilers. After a while it poked one suspicious eye around the corner to watch them.

'They're expensive, you know, with  the flaxreinforced heel,'  muttered the Chair of Indefinite Studies.

Ridcully pulled open a drawer in  his hat  and extracted his pipe and a pouch of  herbal tobacco.  He struck a  match  on  the side  of the  washing engine. This was turning  out  to be a far more  interesting evening than he had anticipated.

'We've  got  to get  this sorted out,'  he said, as the first few puffs filled  the washing  hall  with  the scent of autumn bonfires.  'Can't  have creatures just popping into existence because someone's thought  about them. It's unhygienic.'

The sleigh slewed around at the end of Money Trap Lane.

COME ON, ALBERT.

'You know  you're not supposed to do  this sort of  thing, master.  You know what happened last time.'

THE HOGFATHER CAN DO IT, THOUGH.

'But  ... little  match girls  dying in  the snow  is part  of what the Hogswatch spirit is all about, master,' said Albert desperately. 'I  mean,  people hear  about it  and say, "We  may be  poorer than a disabled  banana and only  have mud  and old boots to  eat,  but  at least  we're better off than the  poor little  match girl," master. It makes them feel happy and grateful for  what  they've got, see.'

I KNOW WHAT THE SPIRIT OF HOGSWATCH IS, ALBERT.

'Sorry, master. But, look, it's all right, anyway, because she wakes up and  it's all  bright  and shining and  tinkling  music and  there's angels, master.'

Death stopped.

AH. THEY TURN UP AT THE LAST MINUTE WITH WARM CLOTHES AND A HOT DRINK?

Oh dear, thought Albert. The  master's really in one of his funny moods now.

'Er. No. Not exactly at the last minute, master. Not as such.'

WELL?

'More sort of just after the last minute.' Albert coughed nervously.

YOU MEAN AFTER SHE'S...

'Yes. That's how the story goes, master, 's not my fault.'

WHY NOT TURN UP BEFORE? AN ANGEL HAS QUITE A LARGE CARRYING CAPACITY.

'Couldn't say, master. I suppose people  think it's more ... satisfying the other way ...' Albert hesitated, and then frowned. 'You know, now that I come to tell someone . .

Death looked  down at the shape under the falling snow. Then he set the lifetimer on the air and touched it with a finger. A spark flashed across.

'You ain't really allowed to do that,' said Albert, feeling wretched.

THE  HOGFATHER CAN.  THE  HOGFATHER GIVES  PRESENTS.  THERE'S NO BETTER PRESENT THAN A FUTURE.

'Yeah, but...'

ALBERT.

'All right, master.'

Death scooped up the girl and strode to the end of the alley.

The  snowflakes  fen like angel's feathers.  Death stepped out into the street and accosted two figures who were tramping through the drifts.

TAKE  HER  SOMEWHERE WARM  AND  GIVE HER A  GOOD DINNER, he  commanded, pushing the bundle into the arms of one of them. AND I MAY WELL BE CHECKING UP LATER.

Then he turned and disappeared into the swirling snow.

Constable Visit looked down at the little girl in his arms, and then at Corporal Nobbs.

'What's all this about, corporal?'

Nobby pulled aside the blanket.

'Search me,' he said. 'Looks like we've been chosen  to  do  a  bit  of charity.'

'I don't call it  very charitable, just dumping someone on people  like this.'

'Come on, there'll still be  some grub  left in  the  Watchhouse,' said Nobby. He'd  got  a very deep and certain  feeling that this was expected of him.  He  remembered  a  big man  in a  grotto, although  he  couldn't quite remember the face. And he couldn't quite remember the face of the person who had handed over the girl, so that meant it must be the same one.

Shortly afterwards  there was some tinkling  music  and  a very  bright light  and  two  rather  affronted  angels appeared  at the other end of the alley, but Albert threw snowballs at them until they went away.

Hex worried Ponder Stibbons. He didn't know how it worked, but everyone else assumed that he did. Oh, he had  a good  idea about some parts, and  he was pretty certain  that Hex  thought about things by  turning them all into numbers and crunching them (a clothes wringer from the laundry, or CWL,  had been plumbed in for this very purpose), but why did it  need a lot  of small religious pictures? And there was the  mouse. It didn't seem to do much, but whenever they  forgot  to give it its cheese Hex stopped working. There were all  those ram skulls. The ants wandered over to them  occasionally but they didn't seem to do anything.

What Ponder  was worried about was the fear that he was  simply engaged in a cargo cult. He'd read  about them.  Ignorant[16] and credulous[17]  people, whose island might once have been visited by some itinerant merchant vessel  that  traded pearls and coconuts for such fruits of civilization as glass beads, mirrors, axes and sexual diseases,  would later make big model ships out of bamboo in the hope  of once again attracting this magical cargo. Of course,  they were far too ignorant and credulous to know that just because you built the shape you didn't get the substance ...

He'd built the shape of Hex and, it occurred to him, he'd built it in a magical  university  where the border between  the real  and 'not  real' was stretched  so  thin  you could almost see through it.  He got  the  horrible suspicion that,  somehow, they  were merely making solid  a sketch  that was hidden somewhere in the air.

Hex knew what it ought to be.

All that  business  about the electricity, for  example. Hex had raised the subject one night, not long after it'd asked for the mouse.

Ponder  prided himself that he knew  pretty much all  there was to know about  electricity. But  they'd  tried rubbing balloons and glass rods until they'd been able to stick Adrian  onto the  ceiling,  and it  hadn't had any effect on Hex. Then they'd tried tying a lot of. cats to a wheel which, when revolved against some beads  of amber, caused any amount of  electricity all over the place. The wretched  stuff  hung  around for days, but there didn't seem any way of ladling it into Hex and anyway no one could stand the noise.

So far the Archchancellor had vetoed the lightning rod idea.

All this depressed Ponder. He was  certain that the world ought to work in a more efficient way.

And now even  the things that he  thought  were  going right were going wrong.

He  stared glumly at Hex's quill  pen in  its tangle  of springs  and wire.

The door was thrown open. Only one person could make a door bang on its hinges like that. Ponder didn't even turn round.

'Hello again, Archchancellor.'

'That  thinking engine of yours working?' said Ridcully. 'Only  there's an interesting little...'

'It's not working,' said Ponder.

'It ain't. What's this, a half-holiday for Hogswatch?'

'Look' said Ponder.

Hex wrote: +++ Whoops! Here Comes The  Cheese! +++MELON MELON MELON +++ Error   At   Address:   14,   Treacle Mine Road, AnkhMorpork+++   !!!!! +++Oneoneoneoneoneone +++ Redo From Start +++

'What's going on?' said Ridcully, as the others pushed in behind them.

'I know it sounds stupid,  Archchancellor, but  we think it might have caught something off the Bursar.'

'Daftness, you mean?'

'That's ridiculous, boy!'  said the Dean. 'Idiocy is not a communicable disease.'

Ridcully puffed his pipe.

'I used  to think that, too,' he said. 'Now Im not so sure. Anyway, you can catch wisdom, can't you?'

'No,  you can't,'  snapped the  Dean.  'It's  not  like 'flu, Ridcully. Wisdom is ... well, instilled.'

'We bring students here and hope they  catch wisdom off us, don't  we?' said Ridcully.

'Well, metaphorically,' said the Dean.

'And if you hang around with a bunch of  idiots  you're bound to become pretty daft yourself,' Ridcully went on.

'I suppose in a manner of speaking . .

'And you've only got to talk  to  the poor old Bursar for  five minutes and you think you're going a bit potty yourself, am I right?'

The  wizards  nodded  glumly.  The  Bursar's  company,  although  quite harmless, had a habit of making one's brain squeak.

'So  Hex  here  has caught daftness  off  the  Bursar,'  said Ridcully. 'Simple. Real stupidity beats artificial intelligence every time.' He banged his pipe  on  the  side of  Hex's  listening tube and shouted:  'FEELING ALL RIGHT, OLD CHAP?'

Hex  wrote: +++ Hi Mum  Is  Testing  +++ MELON MELON  MELON +++ Out  Of Cheese Error +++ !!!!! +++ Mr Jelly! Mr Jelly! +++

'Hex  seems perfectly  able  to work  out anything  purely to  do  with numbers but when it tries anything else it does this,' said Ponder.

'See? Bursar Disease,' said Ridcully. 'The bee's knees when it comes to adding up, the pig's  ear at everything else.  Try  giving  him  dried  frog pills?'

'Sorry, sir, but  that  is a  very uninformed suggestion,' said Ponder. 'You can't give medicine to machines.'

'Don't see  why not,'  said  Ridcully. He banged on the  tube again and bellowed, 'SOON  HAVE YOU BACK ON  YOUR ... your ...  yes, indeed, old chap! Where's that board with all the letter and  number buttons, Mr Stibbons? Ah, good.'  He sat  down  and  typed,  with one finger, as slowly as  a  company chairman:

D-R-Y-D-F-R-O-R-G-?-P-I-L-L-S

Hex's pipes jangled.

'That can't possibly work sir,' said Ponder.

'It ought to,' said Ridcully. 'If he can get the idea of being ill, he can get the idea of being cured.'

He typed: L-O-T-S-O-F-D-R-Y-D-F-R-O-R-C-P- ?-L-L-S

'Seems to  me' ' he  said, `that  this thing  believes  what it's told, right?'

'Well, it's  true that Hex has, if you want to put it that way, no idea of an untruth.'

`Right.  Well, I've  just told  the  thing it's had a lot of dried frog pills. It's not going to call me a liar, is it?'

There was some clickings and whirrings within the structure of Hex.

Then  it wrote: +++ Good Evening,  Archchancellor. I Am Fully Recovered And Enthusiastic About My Tasks +++

'Not mad, then?'

+++ I Assure You I Am As Sane As The Next Man +++

'Bursar, just move away from the machine, will you?' said Ridcully. 'Oh well, I expect it's the best we're going to get. Right, let's get  all  this sorted out. We want to find out what's going on.'

'Anywhere  specific  or  just   everywhere?'  said  Ponder,  a shade sarcastically.

There was a scratching noise from Hex's  pen.  Ridcully glanced down at the paper.

'Says here "Implied  Creation Of  Anthropomorphic Personification",' he said. 'What's that mean?'

'Er ... I think Hex has tried to work out the answer,' said Ponder.

'Has it, bigods? I hadn't even worked out what the question was yet ...'

'It heard you talking, sir.'

Ridcully raised his eyebrows. Then he leaned down  towards the speaking tube.

'CAN YOU HEAR ME IN THERE?'

The pen scratched.

+++ Yes +++

'LOOKIN' AFTER YOU ALL RIGHT, ARE THEY?'

'You don't have to shout, Archchancellor,' said Ponder.

'What's this Implied Creation, then?' said Ridcully.

'Er, I think I've heard of  it, Archchancellor,' said Ponder. 'It means the  existence  of some  things  automatically brings  into existence  other things. If some things exist, certain other things have to exist as well.'

'Like...  crime and  punishment, say?'  said  Ridcully.  'Drinking  and hangovers ... of course. .

'Something like that, sir, yes.'

'So  ...  if there's a Tooth Fairy there has  to be  a  Verruca Gnome?' Ridcully stroked his beard. 'Makes a sort of sense, I suppose. But why not a Wisdom Tooth  Goblin? You know, bringing them extra ones?  Some little devil with a bag of big teeth?'

There was silence. But in the depths of  the silence there was a little tingly fairy bell sound.

'Er ... do you think I might have---' Ridcully began.

'Sounds logical to me,' said the Senior Wrangler. 'I remember the agony I had when my wisdom teeth came through.'

'Last week?' said the Dean, and smirked.

'Ah,' said Ridcully.  He didn't look  embarrassed because  people  like Ridcully are never,  ever embarrassed about  anything, although often people are embarrassed on their behalf. He bent down to the ear Hex again.

'YOU STILL IN THERE?'

Ponder Stibbons rolled his eyes.

'MIND TELLING US WHAT THE REALITY IS LW ROUND HERE?'

The pen wrote: +++ On A Scale Of One To Ten Query +++

FINE,' Ridcully shouted.

++ Divide By Cucumber Error. Please Reinstall Universe And Reboot +++

'Interestin',' said Ridcully. 'Anyone know what that means?'

'Damn,' said Ponder. 'It's crashed again.'

Ridcully looked mystified. 'Has it? I never even saw it take off.'

'I mean its ... its sort of gone a little bit mad,' said Ponder.

'Ah,' said Ridcully. 'Well, we're experts at that around here.'

He thumped on the drum again.

'WANT SOME MORE DRIED FROG PILLS, OLD CHAP?' he shouted.

'Er, I should  let us sort it out, Archchancellor,' said Ponder, trying to steer him away.

'What does "divide by cucumber" mean?' said Ridcully.

'Oh,  Hex  just  says that if it comes up with an answer  that it knows can't possibly be real,' said Ponder.

'And this "rebooting" business? Give it a good kicking, do you?'

'Oh, no, of course,  we ... that  is ...  well,  yes,  in  fact,'  said Ponder.  'Adrian goes round the back and ... er ... prods it with  his foot. But in a technical way,' he added.

'Ah. I think  I'm getting the hang of  this thinkin' engine  business,' said Ridcully cheerfully. 'So it reckons the universe needs a  kicking, does it?'

Hex's  pen  was  scratching  across  the paper. Ponder  glanced at  the figures.

'It must do. These figures can't be right!'

Ridcully grinned again. 'You mean either the whole world has gone wrong or your machine is wrong?'

'Yes!'

'Then  I'd  imagine  the  answer's  pretty  easy,  wouldn't you?'  said Ridcully.

'Yes. It  certainly  is. Hex  gets  thoroughly tested every day,'  said Ponder Stibbons.

'Good point, that  man,' said  Ridcully. He banged  on Hex's  listening tube once more.

'YOU DOWN THERE...'

'You really don't need to shout, Archchancellor,' said Ponder.

...what's this Anthropomorphic Personification, then?'

+++  Humans  Have  Always  Ascribed   Random,  Seasonal,   Natural   Or Inexplicable Actions  To HumanShaped Entities. Such Examples Are jack Frost, The Hogfather, The Tooth Fairy And Death +++

'Oh, them. Yes, but they exist,' said  Ridcully. 'Met  a couple of  'em myself.'

+++ Humans Are Not Always Wrong +++

'All right, but I'm  damn sure there's  never been an Eater of Socks or God of Hangovers.'

+++ But There Is No Reason Why There Should Not Be +++

'The thing's right, you know,' said  the  Lecturer in  Recent Runes. 'A little man who carries verrucas around  is  no more ridiculous than  someone who takes away children's teeth for money, when you come to think about it.'

'Yes, but what about the Eater of  Socks?' said the Chair of Indefinite Studies. 'Bursar just said he always thought  something was eating his socks and, bingo, there it was.'

'But  we all believed him, didn't we? I know I did. Seems like the best possible explanation for all the socks I've lost over the years.  I mean, if they'd  just fallen  down the  back  of the drawer or something there'd be a mountain of the things by now.'

'I know what you mean,' said Ponder. 'It's  like  pencils. I  must have bought hundreds of pencils over the years, but how many have I ever actually worn down to the  stub? Even  I've caught myself thinking  that  something's creeping up and eating them ...'

There was a faint glingleglingle noise. He froze. 'What  was that?'  he said. 'Should I look round? Will I see something horrible?'

'Looks like a very puzzled bird,' said Ridcully.

'With a very odd-shaped beak,' said the Lecturer in Recent Runes.

'I  wish I  knew who's  making that bloody  tinkling noise,'  said  the Archchancellor.

The oh god  listened attentively. Susan  was amazed. He didn't seem  to disbelieve  anything. She'd never been able to talk  like this  before,  and said so.

'I think that's because I haven't got any preconceived ideas,' said the oh god. 'It comes of not having been conceived, probably.'

'Well,  that's  how  it is, anyway,' said  Susan. 'Obviously I  haven't inherited . . . physical characteristics. I suppose I just look at the world in a certain way.'

'What way?'

'It ... doesn't always present barriers. Like this, for example.'

She dosed  her eyes. She felt  better  if she didn't see what  she  was doing. Part of her would keep on insisting it was impossible.

All she felt was a faintly cold, prickling sensation.

'What did I just do?' she said, her eyes still shut.

'Er . . . you waved your hand through the table,' said the oh god.

'You see?'

'Um ... I assume that most humans can't do that?'

'No!"

'You don't have to shout. I'm not very experienced about  humans, am I? Apart from around the point the sun shines through the gap in the curtains. And  then they're mainly wishing that the ground would  open up  and swallow them. I mean the humans, not the curtains.'

Susan leaned back in her chair - and knew that a tiny part of her brain was  saying, yes, there is a  chair here, it's  a real thing, you can sit on it.

'There's other things,'  she said.  'I can remember things. Things that haven't happened yet.'

'Isn't that useful?'

'No! Because I never know what  they -  look, it's like  looking at the future through a keyhole. You see bits of  things  but you never really know what they mean until you  arrive where they are  and  see where the bit fits in.'

'That could be a problem,' said the oh god politely.

'Believe  me. Its the waiting that's  the worst part. You keep watching out for one of the bits to go past. I mean I don't usually remember anything useful  about  the future, just twisted  little  dues that don't  make sense until it's too late.  Are  you sure you don't know why you turned  up at the Hogfather's castle?'

'No. I just remember being a ... well, can you      understand what I mean by a disembodied mind?'

'Oh, yes.'

'Good. Now  can you understand what I mean by a  disembodied headache? And  then, next moment, I was lying on a back I didn't used to have in a lot of cold white stuff I'd never  seen before. But I suppose if you're going to pop into existence, you've got to do it somewhere.'

'Somewhere where someone else,  who should have existed, didn't,'  said Susan, half to herself.

'Pardon?'

'The Hogfather wasn't there.' said Susan. 'He shouldn't have been there anyway, not tonight,  but  this time  he wasn't there  not  because  he  was somewhere else but  because he wasn't anywhere any more. Even his castle was vanishing.'

'I  expect I  shall  get the hang of  this incarnation business as I go along,' said the oh god.

'Most  people ...' Susan began. A shudder ran through her body. 'Oh, no. What's he doing? WHAT'S HE DOING?'

A JOB WELL DONE, I FANCY.

The sleigh thundered across the night. Frozen fields passed underneath.

'Hmph,' said Albert. He sniffed.

WHAT DO YOU CALL THAT WARM FEELING YOU GET INSIDE;

'Heartburn!' Albert snapped.

DO I DETECT A NOTE OF UNSEASONAL

GRUMPINESS? said Death. NO SUGAR PIGGYWIGGY FOR YOU, ALBERT.

'I don't want  any present,  master.' Albert sighed.  'Except  maybe to wake up and find it's all back  to normal. Look, you know  it  always  goes, wrong when you start changing things...'

BUT  THE  HOGFATHER CAN CHANGE  THINGS.  LITTLE  MIRACLES ALL  OVER THE PLACE,  WITH MANY  A MERRY HO,  HO, HO. TEACHING PEOPLE THE REAL MEANING  OF HOGSWATCH, ALBERT.

'What, you mean  that the pigs and cattle have all been slaughtered and with any luck everyone's got enough food for the winter?'

WELL, WHEN I SAY THE REAL MEANING

'Some wretched devil's had his head  chopped  off in a  wood  somewhere 'cos he found a bean in his dinner and now the summer's going to come back?'

NOT EXACTLY THAT, BUT ...

'Oh, you  mean that they've chased down some poor beast and shot arrows up into their apple trees and now the shadows are going to go away?'

THAT IS DEFINITELY A MEANING, BUT I ...

'Ah, then you're  talking about the one  where they light  a bloody big bonfire to give the sun a hint and tell it to stop lurking under the horizon and do a proper day's work?'

Death paused, while the hogs hurtled over a range of hills.

YOU'RE NOT HELPING, ALBERT.

'Well, they're all the real meanings that I know.'

I THINK YOU COULD WORK WITH ME ON THIS.

'It's all about the sun, master. White snow and red blood  and the sun. Always has been.'

VERY  WELL, THEN. THE HOGFATHER CAN TEACH  PEOPLE THE UNREAL MEANING OF HOGSWATCH.

Albert spat over the side of the sleigh. 'Hah! "Wouldn't It Be  Nice If Everyone Was Nice", eh?

THERE ARE WORSE BATTLE CRIES.

'Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear ...

EXCUSE ME ...

Death reached into his robe and pulled out an hourglass.

TURN THE SLEIGH AROUND, ALBERT. DUTY CALLS.

'Which one?'

A  MORE POSITIVE ATTITUDE WOULD ASSIST AT THIS POINT, THANK YOU SO VERY MUCH.

'Fascinatin'. Anyone got another pencil?' said Ridcully.

'It's had four already,' said the Lecturer in Recent Runes. 'Right down to the stub, Archchancellor. And you know we buy our own these days.'

It was a sore  point. Like most people with no grasp whatsoever of real economics, Mustrum  Ridcully  equated  'proper financial  control' with  the counting of paperclips. Even senior  wizards had to produce a pencil stub to him before they were allowed a  new one out of the locked cupboard below his desk. Since of course hardly anyone retained a half-used pencil, the wizards      had been reduced  to  sneaking out and  buying  new ones with their own money.

The  reason for  the dearth of short  pencils was  perched in  front of them, whirring away as it chewed an HB down to the eraser on the end,  which it spat at the Bursar.

Ponder Stibbons had been making notes.

'I think  it works like  this,' he  said. 'What  we're getting  is  the personification  of forces,  just  like Hex  said. But it only  works if the thing is  ... well, logical.' He swallowed. Ponder was a  great believer  in logic, in the face of all the local evidence, and he hated having to use the word  in this  way. 'I don't mean it's logical that there's a  creature that eats  socks,  but  it ... a ... it makes a sort of sense . . . I mean it's a working hypothesis.'

'Bit like the Hogfather,' said Ridcully. 'When you're a kiddie, he's as good an explanation as any, right?'

'What's not logical about there being a goblin that brings me huge bags of  money?' said  the  Dean  sulkily. Ridcully  fed the  Stealer of  Pencils another pencil.

'Welt sir ... firstly, you've never  mysteriously received huge bags of money and needed to find a hypothesis to  explain them, and secondly, no one else would think it at all likely.'

'Huh!'

'Why's  it happening now?'  said  Ridcully. 'Look its  hopped  onto  my finger! Anyone got another pencil?'

'Well, these ... forces have always been here,' said  Ponder.  'I mean, socks and  pencils  have always inexplicably gone missing, haven't they? But why they're suddenly getting personified like  this  ... I'm afraid I  don't know.'

'Well, we'd better find out,  hadn't  we?'  said Ridcully.  'Can't have this sort of thing going on. Daft anti-gods and miscellaneous whatnots being created  just because  people've  thought about  'em? We could have anything turn  up, anyway.  Supposing  some  idiot  says  there  must  be  a  god  of indigestion, eh?'

Glingleglingleglingle.

'Er . . . I think someone just did, sir,' said Ponder.

'What's the matter? What's the matter?' said the oh  god. He took Susan by the shoulders.

They felt bony under his hands.

'DAMN,' said Susan. She  pushed him away and  steadied herself  on  the table, taking care that he didn't see her face.

Finally, with a  measure of the self-control she'd taught herself  over the last few years, she managed to get her own voice back.

'He's slipping out of character,' she muttered, to the hall in general. 'I can feel him doing it. And that drags me in. What's he doing it all for?'

'Search me,' said the oh god, who'd backed away hurriedly. 'Er ... just then ...  before you turned your face away ... it looked as though  you were wearing very dark eye shadow ... only you weren't ...'

'Look, it's  very simple,' said Susan, spinning round.  She  could feel her hair restyling  itself, which it  always did when  it  was anxious. 'You know how stuff runs  in families? Blue eyes, buck teeth, that sort of thing? Well, Death runs in my family.'

'Er ... in everybody's family, doesn't it?' said the oh god.

'Just shut up, please, don't gabble,' said Susan. ,I didn't mean death, I meant Death with a capital D. I remember things that haven't happened  yet and  I  Can  TALK  THAT  TALK  and  stalk  that stalk  and ...  if  he  gets sidetracked,  then I'll have to do it. And he  does get sidetracked. I don't know what's really happened to the real Hogfather or why Grandfather's doing his job, but I know a  bit about how he thinks and he's got no ... no mental shields like we have. He doesn't know how to forget things or ignore things. He takes everything literally and logically and doesn't understand why  that doesn't always work ...'

She saw his bemused expression.

'Look ... how would you make sure everyone in  the world was well fed?' she demanded.

'Me? Oh,  well, I...'  The oh god  spluttered for a  moment. 'I suppose you'd have to think about the prevalent  political systems,  and the  proper division and cultivation of arable land, and ...'

'Yes, yes. But he'd just give everyone a good meat' said Susan.

'Oh, I see.  Very impractical. Hah, it's as silly  as saying  you could clothe the naked by, well, giving them some clothes.'

'Yes! I mean, no. Of course not!  I mean, obviously you'd give... oh, you know what I mean!'

'Yes, I suppose so.'

'But he wouldn't.'

There was a crash beside them.

A burning wheel always rolls out  of flaming wreckage. Two men carrying a large sheet of glass always cross  the road in  front of any comedy  actor involved in a crazy car chase. Some narrative conventions are so strong that equivalents happen even on planets where the rocks boil at noon. And  when a fully  laden table collapses,  one  miraculously unbroken plate always rolls across the floor and spins to a halt.

Susan and the oh god watched it, and then turned their attention to the huge figure now lying  in what  remained of an enormous  centrepiece made of fruit.

'He just ... came right out of the air,' whispered the oh god.

'Really?  Don't just  stand there. Give me a hand to help  him up, will you?' said Susan, pulling at a large melon.

'Er, that's a bunch of grapes behind his ear ...'

'Well?'

'I don't like even to think about grapes ...'

'Oh, come on.'

Together they managed to get the newcomer on to his feet.

'Toga, sandals ... he looks  a bit  like you,' said Susan, as the fruit victim swayed heavily.

'Was I that green colour?'

'Close.'

'Is ... is there a privy nearby?' mumbled their  burden, through clammy lips.

'I believe it's through that arch  over there,' said Susan. 'I've heard it's not very pleasant, though.'

'That's  not  a  rumour, that's a  forecast,' said the fat figure,  and lurched off. 'And then can  I please have a glass of water and one  charcoal biscuit. . .'

They watched him go.

'Friend of yours?' said Susan.

'God  of Indigestion,  I think. Look ... I ...  er  ... I  think  I  do remember something,' said the oh god- 'Just before I, um, incarnated. But it sounds stupid. .

'Well?'

'Teeth,' said the oh god.

Susan hesitated.

'You don't mean something attacking you, do you?' she said flatly.

'No. Just ... a sensation of toothiness. Probably doesn't mean much. As God of Hangovers I see a lot worse, I can tell you.'

`Just teeth. Lots of teeth. But not horrible  teeth. just lots and lots of little teeth. Almost ... sad?'

'Yes! How did you know?'

'Oh, I ... maybe I remember you telling me before you told me. I don't know. How about a big shiny red globe?'

The oh  god looked  thoughtful for a  moment and  then said, 'No, can't help you there, I'm afraid. It's just teeth. Rows and rows of teeth.'

'I  don't  remember rows,'  said  Susan.  'I just felt ...  teeth  were important.'

'Nah,  it's amazing what you can do with a beak,' said the raven, who'd been investigating the laden table and had succeeded in levering a lid off a jar.

'What have you got there?' said Susan wearily.

'Eyeballs,' said  the raven. 'Hah, wizards know how to live all right," eh? They don't want for nothing around here, I can tell you.'

'They're olives,' said Susan.

'Tough luck,' said the raven. 'They're mine now.'

'They're a kind of fruit! Or a vegetable or something!'

'You sure?'  The raven swivelled one  doubtful  eye on the jar  and the other on her.

'Yes!'

The eyes swivelled again.

'So you're an eyeball expert all of a sudden?'

'Look they're green, you stupid bird!'

'They could be very old eyeballs,' said the raven defiantly. 'Sometimes they go like that ...'

SQUEAK, said the Death of Rats, who was halfway through a cheese.

'...And  not  so much  of  the  stupid,'  said the  raven.  'Corvids  are exceptionally bright with reasoning      and, in the case of some forest species, tool-using abilities!'

'Oh, so you are an expert on ravens, are you?' said Susan.

'Madam, I happen to be a ...'

SQUEAK, said the Death of Rats again.

They both turned. It was pointing at its grey teeth.

'The Tooth Fairy?' said Susan. 'What about her?'

SQUEAK.

`Rows of teeth,' said the oh god  again. 'Like ... rows,  you  know? What's the Tooth Fairy?'

'Oh, you  see  her around a  lot  these days,'  said Susan.  'Or  them, rather. Its a sort of franchise operation. You get the ladder, the moneybelt and the pliers and you're set up.'

'Pliers?'

'If she  can't make change she has  to take an extra tooth  on account. But, look, the tooth fairies are harmless  enough. I've met  one  or  two of them. They're just working girls. They don't menace anyone.'

SQUEAK.

'I just hope Grandfather doesn't take it into his head to do  their job as well. Good grief, the thought of it ...'

'They collect teeth?'

'Yes. Obviously.'

'Why?'

'Why? It's their job.'

'I meant why, where do they take the teeth after they collect them?'

'I don't  know! They just ... well, they just  take the teeth and leave the money,' said Susan. 'What sort of question is that - 'Where do they take the teeth?'?'

'I just wondered, that's all. Probably  all humans  know, I'm  probably very silly for asking, it's probably a wellknown fact.'

Susan looked thoughtfully at the Death of Rats.

'Actually ... where do they take the teeth?'

SQUEAK?

'He says search  him,' said the raven. 'Maybe they sell 'em?' It pecked at another jar. 'How about these, these look nice and wrinkl...'

'Pickled  walnuts,'  said Susan  absently.  'What  do they  do with the teeth? What  use is there for a lot  of teeth? But ... what harm can a tooth fairy do?'

'Have we got time to find one and ask her?' said the oh god.

'Time isn't the problem,' said Susan.

There are those who believe knowledge is something that is acquired - a precious ore hacked, as it were, from the grey strata of ignorance.

There are those who  believe that knowledge  can only be recalled, that there was some Golden Age in the distant past when  everything was known and the stones fitted together so you could hardly put a knife between them, you know, and it's  obvious  they had  flying machines, right, because of the way the earthworks can only be seen from above, yeah? and there's this museum I read about where they found a pocket calculator under the  altar of this  ancient temple, you know what I'm saying? but the government hushed it up ... [18]

Mustrum  Ridcully believed that knowledge could be acquired by shouting at people, and was endeavouring to do  so.  The wizards were sitting  around the Uncommon Room table, which was piled high with books.

'It  is  Hogswatch,   Archchancellor,'  said  the  Dean  reproachfully, thumbing through an ancient volume.

'Not until midnight,' said  Ridcully. 'Sortin'  this  out will give you fellows an appetite for your dinner.'

'I think  I might have something,  Archchancellor,' said the Chair of Indefinite Studies. 'This is Woddeley's Basic Gods. There's some stuff  here about lares and penates that seems to it the bill.'

'Lares  and  penates?  What were  they  when they  were  at home?' said Ridcully.

'Hahaha,' said the Chair.

'What?' said Ridcully.

'I  thought you were making a rather  good joke, Archchancellor,'  said the Chair.

'Was I? I didn't mean to,' said Ridcully.

'Nothing new there,' said the Dean, under his breath.

'What was that, Dean?'

'Nothing, Archchancellor.'

'I thought  you made the reference "at home" because they are, in fact, household gods. Or were, rather. They  seemed  to have faded away  long ago. They were ... little spirits of the house, like, for example ...'

Three of the  other wizards, thinking  quite fast for wizards, clapped their hands over his mouth.

'Careful!'  said Ridcully.  'Careless  talk creates lives!  That's  why we've got  a big fat God of Indigestion being ill in the privy. By the way, where's the Bursar?'

'He was  in  the  privy, Archchancellor,'  said the Lecturer  in Recent Runes.

'What, when the ...?'

'Yes, Archchancellor.'

'Oh,  well,  Im  sure  he'll  be  all  right,' said  Ridcully,  in  the matter-of-fact  voice of  someone  contemplating something  nasty  that  was happening to someone else out  of  earshot.  'But we  don't want any more of these ... what're they, Chair?'

'Lares and penates, Archchancellor, but I wasn't suggesting ...'

'Seems dear to  me. Something's  gone wrong and these little devils are coming back.  All  we have to do  is find out  what's gone wrong  and put it right.'

'Oh, well, I'm glad that's all sorted out,' said the Dean.

'Household gods,' said  Ridcully. 'That's  what  they are,  Chair?'  He opened the drawer in his hat and took out his pipe.

'Yes, Archchancellor. It says  here they  used  to  be  the  ...  local spirits,  I suppose.  They  saw to it  that  the bread rose  and  the butter churned properly.'

'Did  they eat pencils?  What  was  their   attitude  in  the  socks department?'

'This was  back in  the  time of the  First Empire,' said the Chair of Indefinite Studies. 'Sandals and togas and so on.'

'Ah. Not noticeably socked?'

'Not  excessively so, no. And it  was nine  hundred  years before Osric Pencillium first discovered, in  the graphiterich sands of the remote island of Sumtri, the small bush which, by dint of careful cultivation, he induced to produce the long...'

'Yes, we can all see you've got the encyclopaedia open under the table, Chair,' said Ridcully. 'But I daresay things have changed a  bit. Moved with the times. Bound to have been a few developments. Once they looked after the bread rising, now  we have things  that eat pencils and socks and  see to it that you can never find a dean towel when you want one...'

There was a distant tinkling.

He stopped.

'I just said that, didn't P' he said.

The wizards nodded glumly.

'And this is the first time anyone's mentioned it?'

The wizards nodded again.

'Well, dammit, it's amazing, you can never find a dean towel when---'

There was a rising  wheeee noise. A towel  went  by at shoulder height. There was a suggestion of many small wings.

'That was  mine,' said the Lecturer in  Recent Runes reproachfully. The towel disappeared in the direction of the Great Hall.

'Towel Wasps,' said the Dean. 'Well done, Archchancellor.'

'Well,  I  mean,  dammit, it's human nature,  isn't it?'  said Ridcully hotly. 'Things  go wrong,  things get  lost, it's natural  to invent  little creatures that - all right, all right, I'll be careful. I'm just  saying man is naturally a mythopoeic creature.'

'What's that mean?' said the Senior Wrangler. 'Means  we make things up as we go along,' said the Dean, not looking up.

'Um  ...  excuse  me,  gentlemen,' said Ponder Stibbons, who  had  been scribbling  thoughtfully  at  the end of  the table. 'Are we suggesting that things are coming back? Do we think that's a viable hypothesis?'

The wizards looked at one another around the table.

'Definitely viable.'

`Viable, right enough.' - 'Yes, that's the stuff to give the troops.'

'What is? Whats the stuff to give the troops?'

'Well  ... tinned rations? Decent weapons, good  boots ... that sort of thing.'

'What's that got to do with anything?'

'Don't ask me. He was the one who started talking about giving stuff to the troops.'

'Will you lot shut up? No one's giving anything to the troops!'

'Oh, shouldn't they have something? It's Hogswatch, after all.'

'Look it was just  a figure  of speech, all right? I just meant  I was. fully in agreement. It's just  colourful language.  Good  grief,  you surely can't think I'm actually suggesting giving stuff to the troops, at Hogswatch or any other time!'

'You weren't?'

'No!"

'That's a bit mean, isn't it?'

Ponder just let it happen. It's because their minds are so often involved with deep  and problematic matters, he told himself, that their mouths are allowed to wander around making a nuisance of themselves.

'I don't hold  with using  that thinking machine,' said the Dean. 'I've said  this before. It's meddling with the Cult. The occult  has always  been good enough for me, thank you very much.'

'On  the other  hand  it's the  only  person round here  who  can think straight and it does what it's told,' said Ridcully.

The sleigh roared through the snow, leaving rolling trails in the sky.

'Oh, what fun,' muttered Albert, hanging on tightly.

The  runners hit a roof  near the University and the pigs trotted to  a halt.

Death looked at the hourglass again.

ODD, he said.

'It's a scythe job, then?' said Albert. 'You won't be wanting the false beard  and the jolly  laugh?'  He  looked  around, and  puzzlement  replaced sarcasm. 'Hey ... how could anyone be dead up here?

Someone was. A corpse lay in the snow.

It was dear that  the man had only just died. Albert squinted up at the sky.

'There's nowhere to fall from  and there's no footprints  in the snow,' he said, as Death swung his scythe. 'So where did he come from? Looks like someone's personal guard. Been stabbed to death. Nasty knife wound there, see?'

'It's not good,' agreed the spirit of the man, looking down at himself.

Then  he  stared  from  himself  to  Albert to  Death and  his  phantom expression went from shock to concern.

'They got the teeth! All of them! They just walked in ... and ...  they ... no, wait...

He faded and was gone.

'Well, what was that all about?' said Albert.

I HAVE MY SUSPICIONS.

'See that badge on his shirt? Looks like a drawing of a tooth.'

YES. IT DOES.

'Where's that come from?'

A PLACE I CANNOT GO.

Albert  looked down at the mysterious corpse and then back up at Deaths impassive skull.

'I  keep  thinking  it  was   a  funny  thing,  us  bumping  into your grand-daughter like that,' he said.

YES.

Albert put his head on one  side. 'Given  the  large number of chimneys and kids in the world, ekcetra.'

INDEED...

'Amazing coincidence, really.'

IT JUST GOES TO SHOW.

'Hard to believe, you might say.'

LIFE CERTAINLY SPRINGS A FEW SURPRISES.

'Not just life, I reckon,' said Albert. 'And she got real worked up, didn't she? Flew right off the ole handle. Wouldn't be surprised if she started asking questions.'

THAT'S PEOPLE FOR YOU.

'But Rat is hanging around, ain't he? He'll probably keep an eye socket on her. Guide her path, prob'ly.'

HE IS A LITTLE SCAMP, ISN'T HE?

Albert knew he couldn't win. Death had the ultimate poker face.

I'M SURE SHE'LL ACT SENSIBLY.

'Oh, yeah,' said Albert, as they walked back to the sleigh. 'It runs in the family, acting sensibly.'

Like many barmen, Igor  kept  a club under the bar  to  deal with those little upsets  that occurred  around closing time,  although  in fact  Biers never closed  and no one could ever remember not seeing Igor behind the bar. Nevertheless, things sometimes got out of hand. Or paw. Or talon.

Igor's  weapon of choice  was a  little  different. It was  tipped with silver  (for werewolves), hung with garlic (for vampires) and wrapped around with a strip  of blanket  (for bogeymen). For everyone else the fact that it was two feet of solid bog-oak usually sufficed.

He'd been watching  the window.  The frost  was creeping across it. For some reason the creeping fingers were forming into a pattern of three little dogs looking out of a boot.

Then someone had tapped him on the shoulder. He spun around, club already in his hand, and relaxed.

'Oh ... it's you, miss. I didn't hear the door.'

There hadn't been the door. Susan was in a hurry.

'Have you seen Violet lately, Igor?'

'The  tooth girl?'  Igor's one  eyebrow writhed in concentration. 'Nah, haven't seen her for a week or two.`

The  eyebrow furrowed  into a V  of annoyance as he spotted the  raven, which tried to shuffle behind a halfempty display card of beer nuts.

'You can get that out of here, miss,' he said. 'You know the rule 'bout pets and familiars. If it can't turn back into human on demand, it's out.'

'Yeah, well, some of us have more brain cells than fingers,' muttered a voice from behind the beer nuts.

'Where does she live?'

'Now, miss, you know I never answers questions like that ... '

'WHERE DOES SHE LIVE, IGOR?'

'Shamlegger  Street, next to the picture framers,' said Igor automatically. The eyebrow knotted in anger as he realized what he'd said.

'Now, miss, you know the rules!  I  don't get bitten,  I don't  get  me froat torn  out and no one hides  behind me  door! And  you don't  try  your granddad's voice on me! I could ban you for messin' me about like that!'

'Sorry, it's important,' said Susan. Out of the corner of  her  eye she could see that the raven had crept on to the shelves and was pecking the top off a jar.

'Yeah,  well, suppose one  of the vampires  decides it's important he's missed his tea?' grumbled Igor, putting the club away.

There was  a plink from  the direction of  thee pickled  egg jar. Susan tried hard not to look.

' Can we go?' said the oh god. 'All this alcohol makes me nervous.'

Susan nodded and hurried out.

Igor grunted. Then he went  back to watching  the  frost,  because Igor never demanded much out of life. After a while he heard a muffled voice say:

'I 'ot 'un! I 'ot 'un!'

It was indistinct because the raven had speared a pickled egg  with its beak.

Igor sighed, and picked  up his club. And it would have  gone very hard for the raven if the Death of Rats hadn't chosen that moment to bite Igor on the ear.

DOWN THERE, said Death.

The  reins were  hauled so  sharply  so quickly that the hogs  ended up facing the other way.

Albert fought  his way out of  a drift  of teddy bears, where he'd been dozing.

'What's up? What's up? Did we hit something?' he said.

Death pointed downwards. An endless white snowfield lay below, only the occasional glow of a window  candle or a  half-covered hut indicating the presence on this world of brief mortality.

Albert squinted, and then saw what Death had spotted.

'  's  some  old  bugger  trudging through  the snow,'  he  said. 'Been gathering wood, by the look of it. A bad night to be out,' he said. 'And I'm out in it too, come to that. Look, master,  I'm sure you've done  enough now to make sure ...'

SOMETHING'S HAPPENING DOWN THERE. HO. HO. HO.

'Look, he's all  right,'  said Albert, hanging on as the sleigh tumbled downwards.  There was a brief wedge  of  light below  as  the  wood-gatherer opened the door of a snow-drifted hovel. 'See, over there, there's  a couple of blokes catching him up, look they're weighed down with parcels and stuff, see? He's going to have a decent Hogswatch after all,  no problem there. Now can we go ...'

Death's glowing eye sockets took in the scene in minute detail.

IT'S WRONG.

'Oh, no ... here we go again.'

The oh god hesitated.

'What do you  mean,  you can't walk through the door?' said Susan. 'You walked through the door in the bar.'

'That was different.  I have certain god-like powers in the presence of alcohol. Anyway, we've knocked and she hasn't answered and whatever happened to Mr Manners?'

Susan shrugged, and walked through the cheap woodwork.  She knew  she probably  shouldn't. Every  time she did something like this  she  used up  a certain amount  of,  well, normal.  And sooner or later she'd forget what doorknobs were for, just like Grandfather.

Come to think of it, he'd never found out what doorknobs were for.

She  opened the door from the inside. The oh god stepped in and  looked around.  This  did  not  take  long. It was not  a  large room. It had  been subdivided from a room that itself hadn't been all that big to start with.

'This is where the Tooth fairy  lives?' Bilious  said. 'It's  a bit ... poky, isn't it? Stuff  all over the floor  ... What're these  things hanging from this line?'

'They're . .  . women's clothes,'  said  Susan,  rummaging through  the paperwork on a small rickety table.

'They're not very big,' said the oh god. 'And a bit thin ...'

'Tell me,' said Susan, without looking up. 'These  memories you arrived here with ... They weren't very complicated, were they ... ? Ah...'

He looked over her shoulder as she opened a small red notebook.

'I've only  talked to  Violet  a few times,'  she  said.  'I think  she delivers the teeth somewhere and gets a percentage of the money.  It's not a highly paid line  of work. You know,  they say you can Earn $$$ in Your Spare Time but she says really she could  earn more money waiting on tables - All, this looks right

'What's that?'

'She said she gets given the names every week.'

'What, of the children where going to lose teeth?'

'Yes. Names and addresses,' said Susan, flicking through the pages.

'That doesn't sound very likely.'

`Pardon  me, but are you the God of Hangovers? Oh,  look here's Twyla's tooth last month.'  She smiled at the  neat  grey writing.  'She practically hammered it out because she needed the half-dollar.'

'Do you like children?' said the oh god.

She  gave him a look. 'Not raw,' she said. `Other people's are OK. Hold on ...'

She flicked some pages back and forth.

'There's  just  blank  days,' she  said. 'Look, the last few days,  all unticked. No  names.  But if you go back a  week or  two,  look  they're all properly marked off  and the money added up at the bottom  of the page, see? And ... this can't be right, can it?'

There were only five names entered on the first unticked night, for the previous week. Most children instinctively knew when to push their  luck and only the greedy or dentally improvident called  out  the Tooth Fairy  around Hogswatch.

'Read the names,' said Susan.

'William Wittles, a.k.a. Willy (home), Tosser (school),

2nd flr bck bdrm, 68 Kicklebury Street;

Sophie Langtree, a.k.a. Daddy's Princess, attic bdrm,

5 The Hippo;

The Hon. Jeffrey Bibbleton, a.k.a. Trouble in Trousers

(home), Foureyes (school), 1st fir bck, Scrote

Manor, Park Lane...'

He stopped. 'I say, this is a bit intrusive, isn't it?'

' It's a whole new world,' said Susan. 'You haven't got there yet. Keep going.'

'Nuhakme  Icta, a.k.a.  Little Jewel, basement,  The  Laughing Falafel, Klatchistan Take-Away and All

Nite Grocery, cnr. Soake and Dimwell;

Reginald Lilywhite, a.k.a. Banjo, The Park Lane Bully,

Have You Seen This Man? , The Goose Gate

Grabber, The Nap Hill Lurker, Rm 17, YMPA.

'YMPA?'

'It's what we generally call the Young-Men's-Reformed-Cultists-of-the-Ichor-God-Bel-Shamharoth-Association,' said  Susan.

'Does that  sound to you  like  someone who'd expect  a  visit  from a tooth fairy?'

'No.'

'Me  neither.  He  sounds like someone  who'd  expect  a visit from the Watch.'

Susan looked  around. It really  was a crummy room, the sort rented  by someone who probably took  it never intending to  stay Iong, the sort  where walking across the floor  in the middle of the night would be accompanied by the crack of cockroaches in a death flamenco. It was amazing how many people  spent their whole fives in  places where  they never intended to stay.

Cheap, narrow bed, crumbling plaster, tiny window

She opened the window and fished around below the ledge, and felt satisfied when her questing fingers dosed on a piece of string which was attached to an oilcloth bag. She hauled it in.

'What's that?' said the oh god, as she opened it on the table.

'Oh, you see  them a lot,' said Susan, taking out some packages wrapped in  second-hand  waxed  paper.   'You  live  alone,  mice  and  roaches  eat everything, there's nowhere to store food - but outside the window it's cold and safe. More or  less  safe. It's an old  trick.  Now ...  look  at  this. Leathery bacon, a green loaf and a bit of cheese you could shave. She hasn't been back home for some time, believe me.'

'Oh dear. What now?'

'Where would she  take the teeth?' said Susan, to the  world in general but mainly to herself. 'What the hell does the Tooth Fairy do with ...'

There was a knock at the door. Susan opened it.

Outside  was a small  bald man in a long brown coat. He was  holding  a clipboard and blinked nervously at the sight of her.

'Er...' he began.

'Can I help you?' said Susan.

'Er, I saw the light, see. I thought Violet was in,'  said the little man. He twiddled the pencil  that was attached to his clipboard by a piece of string. 'Only she's a bit behind  with the teeth and  there's a bit of money owing  and Ernie's cart ain't come back and it's got  to go in  my report and I come round in case ... in  case she was W  or something, it not being nice being alone and ill at Hogswatch ...'

'She's not here,' said Susan.

The man gave her a worried look and shook his head sadly.

'There's  nearly  thirteen dollars  in  pillow money, see. I'll have to report it.'

'Who to?'

'It has to go higher  up,  see.  I just  hope it's not going to be like that business in Quirm where the girl started robbing houses. We never heard the end of that one ...'

'Report to who?'

'And there's the ladder and the pliers,' the man  went on, in a  litany against a world that  had no understanding of what it meant  to have to fill in an AF17 report in triplicate. 'How can  I keep track  of stocktaking if people  go  around taking stock?' He shook his head. 'I  dunno, they get the job, they think it's all nice sunny nights,  they get a bit of sharp weather and suddenly it's goodbye Charlie I'm off  to be a waitress in the warm. And then there's Emie.  I  know him. It's a nip  to keep out the cold, and  then another one  to keep it company,  and then a third in case the other two get lost ... It's all going to have to go down in my report, you know, and who's going to get the blame? M tell you ...'

'It's  going  to  be  you,  isn't  it?'  said  Susan.  She  was  almost hypnotized. The man even had  a fringe of worried hair and a  small, worried moustache.  And the voice suggested exactly  that here was a man who, at the end of the world, would worry that it would be blamed on him.

'That's right,' he said, but in a slightly grudging voice.  He  was not about to allow a bit of understanding to lighten his day. 'And the girls all go on about the job but I tell them they've got it easy,  it's just basic'ly ladder  work, they don't have to spend their evenings knee-deep in paper and making shortfalls good out of their own money, I might add ...'

'You  employ the  tooth fairies?'  said Susan  quickly. The  oh god was still vertical but his eyes had glazed over.

The  little  man preened slightly. 'Sort of,' he said. 'Basic'Iy I  run Bulk Collection and Despatch...'

'Where to?'

He stared at her. Sharp, direct questions weren't his forte.

'I just sees to it they gets on the cart,' he mumbled. 'When they're on the cart and Ernie's signed the CV19 for 'em,  that's it done  and finished, only like I said he ain't turned up this week and ...'

'A whole cart for a handful of teeth?'

'Well, there's the food for the guards, and ...'

'ere, who are you, anyway? What're you doing here?'

Susan straightened up.  'I don't have  to put up  with this,'  she said sweetly, to no one in particular. She leaned forward again.

WHAT CART ARE WE TALKING ABOUT HERE,  CHARLIE?' The oh god jolted away. The man m  the  brown coat shot backwards and splayed  against the  corridor wall as Susan advanced.

'Comes Tuesdays,' he panted. "ere, what ...'

' AND WHERE DOES IT GO?'

'Dunno! Like I said, when he's ...'

'Signed  the  GV19 for them it's you done and finished,' said Susan, in her  normal  voice. 'Yes. You  said. What's Violet's  full  name?  She never mentioned it.'

The man hesitated.

' I SAID...'

'Violet Bottler!'

'Thank you.'

'An'  Emie's  gorn  too,' said  Charlie,  continuing  more  or less  on auto-pilot. 'I call that suspicious. I mean, he's got a wife and everything. Won't be the  first  man to get his head turned  by thirteen  dollars  and a pretty  ankle and, o'  course, no one thinks about muggins who  has to carry the can, I mean, supposing we was all to get it in our heads to run off with young wimmin?'

He gave Susan the stem look of one who, if it was not for the fact that the  world needed  him, would  even  now be  tiring of painting naked  young ladies on some tropical island somewhere.

' What happens to the teeth?' said Susan.

He blinked  at  her.  A bully, thought  Susan. A very small, weak, very dull bully,  who  doesn't manage any real bullying  because  there's  hardly anyone  smaller  and weaker than him, so he just makes everyone's lives just that little bit more difficult ...

'What sort of question is that?' he managed, in the face of her stare.

'You never  wondered?' said Susan, and added  to herself, I didn't. Did anyone?

'Well, 's not my job, I just-'

'Oh, yes. You said,' said Susan. 'Thank you. You've been very  helpful. Thank you very much.'

The man stared at her, and then turned and ran down the stairs.

'Drat,' said Susan.

'That's a very unusual swearword,' said the oh god nervously.

'It's so easy,'  said  Susan. 'If I want to, I can find anybody. It's a family trait.'

'Oh. Good.'

'No. Have you any idea how hard it is to be normal? The things you have to  remember? How to go  to sleep? How to forget  things? What doorknobs are for?'

Why ask him, she thought, as she looked at his shocked face. All that's normal for him is remembering to throw up what someone else drank.

'Oh, come on,' she said, and hurried towards the stairs.

It was so easy to slip into immortality, to ride the  horse,  to  know everything.  And every time  you  did, it brought closer the day when you could never get off and never forget.

Death was hereditary.

You got it from your ancestors.

'Where are we going now?' said the oh god.

'Down to the YMPA,' said Susan.

The old  man in  the  hovel looked uncertainly at  the  feast spread in front of him. He sat on his stool as curled up on himself  as  a spider in a flame.

'I'd got a bit of a mess of beans cooking,' he mumbled, looking at  his visitors through filmy eyes.

'Good  heavens, you  can't  eat  beans at Hogswatch,', said  the  king, smiling hugely.  'That's terribly unlucky,  eating  beans  at Hogswatch.  My word, yes!'

'Di'nt know that,' the old man  said, looking down  desperately at  his lap.

'We've brought you this magnificent spread. Don't you think so?'

'I bet you're incredibly grateful for it, too,' said the page, sharply.

'Yes, well, o' course, it's  very  kind of you gennelmen,' said the old man, in a  voice the  size of a mouse. He blinked,  uncertain of  what to do next.

'The turkey's  hardly been  touched, still plenty of meat on  it,' said the king. 'And do have some

of this cracking good widgeon stuffed with swan's liver.'

'...only I'm partial to a bowl  of beans and I've  never been beholden to no one nor nobody,' the old man said, still staring at his lap.

'Good heavens, man, you  don't need to worry about that,' said the king heartily. 'It's Hogswatch! I was only just now looking out of the window and I  saw  you plodding through the snow and  I  said to young  Jermain here, I said, `Who's that chappie?" and he said, "Oh, he's some  peasant  fellow who lives up by the forest," and I said, "Well, I couldn't eat another thing and it's Hogswatch, after all," and so we just bundled everything up and here we are!'

'And  I expect  you're pathetically thankful,' said the page. 'I expect we've brought a ray of light into your dark tunnel of a life, hmm?'

' ...yes, well, o'  course, only I'd been savin' 'em for weeks, see, and there's some bakin' potatoes under the fire, I found  'em in the  cellar 'n' the mice'd hardly touched 'em.' The old man never raised  his eyes from knee level. 'W our dad brought me up never to ask for ...'

'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'.

Grandfather always got things wrong. He saw life from outside and never quite understood.

'That looks dangerous,' said the oh god.

Susan sheathed the sword.

'I hope so,' she said.

'Er ... where are we going? Exactly?'

'Somewhere  under  an overhead sky,' said Susan. 'And ...  I've seen it before. Recently. I know the place.'

They walked out to the stable yard. Binky was waiting.

'I said you  don't have  to come,' said Susan, grasping the  saddle. 'I mean, you're a ... an innocent bystander.'

'But I'm a god of hangovers who's been cured of hangovers,' said the oh god. 'I haven't really got any function at all.'

He looked so forlorn when he said this that she relented.

'All right. Come on, then.'

She pulled him up behind her.

'Just  hang  on,'  she said.  And  then  she  said,  `Hang on somewhere differently, I mean.'

'I'm sorry, was that a problem?' said the oh god, shifting his grip.

'It might take too long to explain and you probably  don't know all the words. Around the waist, please.'

Susan  took out  Violet's hourglass and held it up. There was  a lot of sand left to run, but she couldn't be certain that was a good sign.

All  she could be certain of was that the horse of Death could go anywhere.

The sound of Hex's  quill  as  it scrabbled across the paper was like a frantic spider trapped in a matchbox.

Despite his dislike  of what was  going on, there  was a part of Ponder Stibbons that was very, very impressed.

In  the past, when  Hex  had been recalcitrant about its  calculations, when it  had got  into a  mechanical  sulk  and  had started  writing things like'+++ Out  of Cheese Error +++'and'+++  Redo From Start  +++' Ponder  had tried to sort things out calmly and logically.

It had never, ever occurred  to him to contemplate hitting  Hex with  a mallet. But this was, in fact, what Ridcully was threatening to do.

What was impressive, and also more than a little worrying, was that Hex seemed to understand the concept.

'Right,' said Ridcully,  putting the mallet aside. 'Let's have  no more of this "Insufficient  dates" business, shallwe?  There's boxes of the  damn things back in the Great Hall. You can have the lot as far as Im concerned...'

'It's data, not dates,' said Ponder helpfully.

'What? You mean like ... more than dates? Extra sticky?'

'No, no, data is Hex's word for ... well, facts,' said Ponder.

'Ridiculous way to  behave,' said Ridcully brusquely. 'If  he's stumped for  an answer, why  can't he  write "You've got  me there" or "Damned  if I know," or "That's a bit of a puzzler and no mistake"?  All  this   "Insufficient   data"  business  is  just   pure contrariness, to my mind.  It's just  swank-' He turned back to Hex. 'Right, you. Hazard a guess.'

The  quill  started to write  '+++  Insuff '  and  then  stopped. After quivering for a moment it went down a line and started again.

+++ This Is Just Calculating Aloud, You Understand +++

'Fair enough,' said Ridcully.

.+++  The Amount Of Belief In The  World  Must Be  Subject To An  Upper Limit +++

'What an odd question,' said the Dean.

'Sounds sensible,' said Ridcully. 'I suppose people just ... believe in stuff. Obviously  there's  a limit to what you can believe in.  I've  always said so. So what?'

.+++ Creatures Have Appeared That Were Once Believed In +++

'Yes. Yes, you could put it like that.'

+++ They Disappeared Because They Were Not Believed In +++

'Seems reasonable,' said Ridcully.

+++ People Were Believing In Something Else Query? +++

Ridcully looked at the other wizards. They shrugged.

'Could  be,' he  said  guardedly. 'People can only believe  in so  many things.'

... It  Follows That If A Major  Focus Of Belief Is Removed, There Will Be Spare Belief ...

Ridcully stared at the words.

'You mean ... sloshing around?'

The big wheel  with the ram skulls on it began to turn ponderously. The scurrying ants in the .glass tubes took on a new urgency.

'What's happening?' said Ridcully, in a loud whisper.

'I think Hex is looking up  the word "sloshing",' said  Ponder. 'It may be in long-term storage.'

A large hourglass came down on the spring.

'What's that for?' said Ridcully.

'Er ... it shows Hex is working things out.'

'Oh. And that buzzing noise? Seems to be coming from the other side  of the wall.'

Ponder coughed.

'That is the long-term storage, Archchancellor.'

'And how does that work?'

'Er ... well, if you think of memory as a series of  little shelves or, or, or holes, Archchancellor, in which you can put things, well, we found  a way of making a sort  of memory which, er, interfaces  neatly with the ants, in fact, but more  importantly  can expand its size depending on how much we give it to remember and, er, is possibly a bit slow but...'

'It's a very loud buzzing,' said the Dean. 'Is it going wrong.

'No, that shows it's working,' said Ponder. 'It's, er, beehives.'

He coughed.

'Different  types of pollen, different thicknesses  of honey, placement of the eggs ... It's actually amazing how much information you can store on one honeycomb.'

He  looked at their faces. 'And it's  very secure because anyone trying to tamper with it will get stung  to death  and Adrian believes that when we shut it down in the summer holidays we should get a nice lot of honey, too.' He coughed again. 'For our ... sand ... wiches,' he said.

He felt himself getting smaller and hotter under their gazes.

Hex came to his rescue. The hourglass  bounced away  and  the quill pen was jerked in and out of its inkwell.

+++ Yes. Sloshing Around. Accreting +++

'That  means forming around new centres,  Archchancellor,' said  Ponder helpfully.

'I  know that,' said Ridcully.  'Blast.  Remember  when we had all that life force all over  the place? A man couldn't call his trousers his own! So ... there's spare belief sloshing around, thank you, and these little devils are taking advantage of it? 'Coming back? Household gods?'

+++ This Is Possible +++

'All right, then, so what are people not believing in all of a sudden?'

+++ Out Of Cheese Error +++ MELON MELON MELON +++ Redo From Start +++

'Thank you. A simple "I  don't know" would have been sufficient,'  said Ridcully, sitting back.

'One of the major gods?' said the Chair of Indefinite Studies.

'Hah, we'd soon know about it if one of those vanished.'

'It's Hogswatch,' said the Dean. 'I suppose the Hogfather is around, is he?'

'You believe in him?' said Ridcully.

'Well, he's for kids, isn't he?' said  the Dean. 'But I'm sure they all believe in him. I certainly did. It wouldn't be  Hogswatch when I was  a kid without a pillowcase hanging by the fire ...'

'A pillowcase?' said the Senior Wrangler, sharply.

'Well, you can't get much in a stocking,' said the Dean.

'Yes, but a whole pillowcase?' the Senior Wrangler insisted.

'Yes. What of it?'

'Is it just me, or is  that a  rather greedy and selfish way to behave? In my family we just hung up very small socks,' said the Senior Wrangler. 'A sugar  pig, a toy soldier, a couple of  oranges and that was it.  Hah, turns out people with whole pillowcases were cornering the market, eh?'

'Shut up and stop squabbling, both  of you,' said Ridcully. 'There must be a simple way to check up. How can you tell if the Hogfather exists?'

'Someone's  drunk  the sherry,  there's sooty footprints on the carpet, sleigh tracks on the roof and your pillowcase is full of presents,' said the Dean.

'Hah, pillowcase,' said the Senior Wrangler darkly. 'Hah. I expect your family were the stuck-up  sort  that  didn't  even  open  their  presents  until  after Hogswatch dinner, eh? One  of them with a big snooty  Hogswatch tree in  the hall?'

'What if ...' Ridcully began, but he was too late.

'Well?' said the Dean. 'Of course we waited until after lunch...'

'You know, it really  used to wind  me right up, people with big snooty Hogswatch  trees.  And  I  just  bet  you  had one  of  those  swanky  fancy nutcrackers  like a big thumbscrew,' said the Senior  Wrangler. 'Some people had to make do with the coal hammer out of the  outhouse, of course. And had dinner in the middle  of the  day  instead  of lah-di-dah posh dinner in the evening.'

'I can't help it if my family had money,' said the Dean, and that might have defused things a bit had he not added, 'and standards.'

'And  big pillowcases!'  shouted the  Senior Wrangler, bouncing up  and down in rage. 'And I bet you bought your holly, eh?'

The Dean raised his eyebrows. 'Of course! We didn't go creeping  around the country pinching it out of other people's hedges, like some people did,' he snapped.

'That's traditional! That's part of the fun!'

'Celebrating Hogswatch with stolen greenery?'

Ridcully put his hand over his eyes.

The  word for  this,  he had heard, was 'cabin fever'.  When people had been  cooped up for too long in  the dark  days of  the winter, they  always tended to get on one another's  nerves, although there was probably a school of thought that would hold that  spending your time in a university with more than five thousand known rooms, a huge library, the best kitchens in the city, its own brewery,  dairy, extensive wine cellar, laundry,  barber shop, cloisters and skittle alley was  testing the definition of 'cooped up' a little. Mind you, wizards could  get  on one  another's nerves  in opposite  corners of a very large field.

'Just shut up, will you?' he 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.'

'It's not really bad,' said the Lecturer in Recent Runes. 'I mean, not  proper Hogswatch bad, unless everyone's wearing  a paper  hat. There's always that  bit, isn't  there, when  someone's horrible great-aunt puts on a paper hat and smirks at everyone because she's being so bohemian.'

'I'd forgotten  about  the paper hats,'  said the  Chair of  Indefinite Studies. 'Oh, dear.'

'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!'

'Right!'

'Er . . .'  said  Ponder,  who rather  suspected that  he had been that child.

'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 earwax.'

Ridcully sat in  horrified  amazement.  He'd always enjoyed  Hogswatch, every bit of  it. He'd  enjoyed seeing ardent  relatives,  he'd enjoyed  the food,  he'd been good at games like Chase My  Neighbour  Up The  Passage and Hooray Jolly  Tinker. He was  always the first  to don a paper  hat. He felt that  paper  hats lent a special festive air to the occasion. And  he always very carefully read the messages on Hogswatch cards and found time for a few kind thoughts about the sender.

Listening to his  wizards was like watching someone kick apart a doll's house.

'At least the Hogswatch cracker mottoes are fun...?' he ventured.

They all turned to look at him, and then turned away again.

'If you have the sense of humour of a wire coathanger,' said the Senior Wrangler.

'Oh dear,' said Ridcully. 'Then perhaps there isn't a Hogfather if  all you chaps are sitting  around with  long  faces. He's not  the  sort  to let people go around being miserable!'

'Ridcully, he's just some  old winter god,'  said  the  Senior Wrangler wearily. 'He's not the Cheerful Fairy or anything.'

The Lecturer  in  Recent Runes raised his chin  from his  hands.  'What Cheerful Fairy?'

'Oh, its just something my granny used to  go on about if it was  a wet afternoon  and  we were  getting on her  nerves,' said  the Senior Wrangler. 'She'd  say "I'll call  the  Cheerful  Fairy  if you're..." ' He stopped, looking guilty.

The  Archchancellor  held a hand to his ear  in  a  theatrical  gesture denoting 'Hush. What was that I heard?'

'Someone tinkled,' he said. 'Thank you, Senior Wrangler.'

'Oh no,' the Senior Wrangler moaned. 'No, no, no!'

They listened for a moment.

'We might have got away  with it,' said Ponder. 'I didn't hear anything...'

'Yes, but you  can  just  imagine her,  can't you?' said the Dean. 'The moment you said  it,  I had this  picture in my mind. She's  going to have a whole bag of word games, for one thing. Or she'll suggest we go outdoors for our health.'

The wizards shuddered. They weren't against the outdoors, it was simply their place in it they objected to.

'Cheerfulness has always got me down,' said the Dean.

'Welt if  some wretched little ball of cheerfulness turns  up I  shan't have it  for one,' said the  Senior Wrangler, folding his arms. 'I've put up with monsters and trolls and big green things with teeth, so I'm not sitting still for any kind of...'

'Hello!! Hello !!'

The  voice  was  the  kind  of  voice  that  reads  suitable stories to children. Every vowel was beautifully rounded. And they could hear the extra exclamation marks, born of a sort of desperate despairing jollity, slot into place. They turned.

The Cheerful Fairy was quite short and plump in a tweed skirt and shoes so  sensible  they could do their  own tax returns, and was pretty much like the first  teacher you get  at school, the one who  has special training  in dealing with nervous incontinence and little boys whose contribution  to the wonderful  world  of  sharing  consists largely  of  hitting  a  small  girl repeatedly  over  the head with a wooden horse. In  fact,  this picture  was helped  by  the whistle on a string around her neck and a general impression that at any moment she would clap her hands.

The  tiny gauzy wings just visible  on her back were probably just  for show, but the wizards kept on staring at her shoulder.

'Hello...' she  said again, but a lot more  uncertainly. She gave them a suspicious look. 'You're rather big  boys,' she said, as if they'd become so in order to spite her. She blinked. 'It's my job to chase those blues away,' she added, apparently following a memorized script. Then she seemed to rally a bit and  went on.  'So  chins up, everyone,  and lets see a lot  of bright shining faces!!'

Her  gaze met that of the Senior Wrangler, who had probably never had a bright shining face in

his entire life. He specialized  in  dull, sullen ones.  The one he was wearing now would have won prizes.

'Excuse me,  madam,' said  Ridcully. 'But  is that  a chicken  on  your shoulder?'

'It's, er, its, er, it's the Blue Bird of Happiness,' said the Cheerful Fairy. Her voice now  had the slightly  shaking tone  of someone who doesn't quite believe what she has just said but is going to go on saying it anyway, just in case saying it will eventually make it true.

'I  beg  your  pardon,  but  it  is  a  chicken. A live  chicken,' said Ridcully. 'It just went cluck.'

'It is blue,' she said hopelessly.

'Well, that at least is true,' Ridcully conceded, as kindly as he could manage.  'Left  to  myself, I  expect  I'd  have  imagined  a slightly  more streamlined Blue Bird of Happiness, but I can't actually fault you there.'

The Cheerful Fairy coughed nervously and fiddled  with the  buttons  on her sensible woolly jumper.

'How  about  a  nice game  to get us  all in the  mood?'  she said.  'A guessing  game, perhaps? Or a painting  competition? There  may  be  a small prize for the winner.'

'Madam,  we're  wizards,'  said  the  Senior  Wrangler.  'We  don't  do cheerful.'

'Charades?' said the Cheerful  Fairy. 'Or perhaps  you've been  playing them already? How about a sing-song? Who knows "Row Row Row Your Boat"?'

Her bright  little smile hit  the group scowl of the assembled wizards. 'We don't want to be Mr Grumpy, do we?' she added hopefully.

'Yes,' said the Senior Wrangler.

The Cheerful Fairy sagged, and then patted frantically at her shapeless sleeves  until she  tugged out a balled-up  handkerchief.  She dabbed at her eyes.

'It's all going wrong  again, isn't it?' she said, her chin  trembling. 'No one ever wants to be cheerful these days, and I really do try. I've made a Joke Book and I've got three boxes of clothes for charades and ... and ... and  whenever I  try to cheer people up they all  look  embarrassed  ... and really I do make an effort . .

She blew her nose loudly.

Even the Senior Wrangler had the grace to look embarrassed.

'Er ...' he began.

'Would  it  hurt  anyone just  occasionally  to  try to be a little bit cheerful?' said the Cheerful Fairy.

'Er ... in what way?' said the Senior Wrangler, feeling wretched.

'Well,  there's so many nice  things  to be cheerful about,'  said  the Cheerful Fairy, blowing her nose again.

'Er ... raindrops and sunsets and that sort  of thing?' said the Senior Wrangler, managing some sarcasm, but they could tell his heart wasn't in it. 'Er, would you like to borrow my handkerchief? It's nearly fresh.'

'Why don't you get the lady a nice sherry?' said Ridcully. 'And some corn for her chicken ...'

'Oh, I never drink alcohol,' said the Cheerful Fairy, horrified.

'Really?' said Ridcully. 'We find  it's something to be cheerful about. Mr Stibbons ... would you be so kind as to step over here for a moment?'

He beckoned him up close.

'There's got  to be  a  lot of  belief sloshing  around to  let  her be created,' he said. 'She's a  good  fourteen stone,  if I'm any judge.  If we wanted to contact  the  Hogfather,  how would  we  go about  it?  Letter  up chimney?'

'Yes, but not tonight, sir,' said Ponder. 'He'll be out delivering.'

'No telling where he'll be, then,' said Ridcully. 'Blast.'

'Of course, he might not have come here yet,' said Ponder.

'Why should he come here?' said Ridcully.

The Librarian pulled the blankets over himself and curled up.

As an orang-utan he  hankered for  the warmth  of  the rainforest.  The problem was that he'd never even seen a rainforest,  having been turned into an  orang-utan when  he  was already a  fully  grown human. Something in his bones knew about it, though, and didn't like the cold of winter at  all. But he was also a librarian in those same bones and  he  flatly refused to allow fires to be lit in the library. As a result, pillows and blankets went missing  everywhere else  in the University and ended up in a sort of cocoon in the reference section, in which the ape lurked during the worst of the winter.

He turned over and wrapped himself in the Bursar's curtains.

There was a creaking outside his nest, and some whispering.

'No, don't fight the lamp.'

'I wondered why I hadn't seen him all evening.'

'Oh, he goes to bed early on Hogswatch Eve, sir. Here we are . . .'

There was some rustling.

'We're in luck. It hasn't been  filled,'  said Ponder. 'Looks like he's used one of the Bursar's.'

'He puts it up every year?'

'Apparently.'

'But it's not as though he's a child. A certain child- like simplicity, perhaps.'

'It might be different for orang-utans, Archchancellor.'

'Do they do it in the jungle, d'you think?'

'I don't imagine so, sir. No chimneys, for one thing.'

'And  quite  short  legs, of course. Extremely  underfunded in the sock area, orang-utans.  They'd be quids  in if  they could hang  up  gloves,  of course. Hogfather'd be on double shifts if they could  hang up their gloves. On account of the length of their arms.'

'Very good, Archchancellor.'

'I say, what's  this on the... my  word, a glass of sherry. Well, waste not, want not.' There was a damp glugging noise in the darkness.

'I think that was supposed to be for the Hogfather, sir.'

'And the banana?'

'I imagine that's been left out for the pigs, sir.'

'Pigs?'

'Oh, you know, sir. Tusker and Snouter and  Gouger and Rooter. I mean,' Ponder stopped,  conscious  that a grown man shouldn't be  able  to remember this sort of thing, 'that's what children believe.'

'Bananas  for pigs?  That's  not traditional,  is it? I'd have  thought acorns, perhaps. Or apples or swedes.'

'Yes, sir, but the Librarian likes bananas, sir.'

'Very nourishin' fruit, Mr Stibbons.'

'Yes, sir. Although, funnily enough it's not actually a fruit, sir.'

'Really?'

'Yes,  sir. Botanically, it's  a  type of  fish, sir.  According  to my theory it's cladistically associated with  the Krullian pipefish, sir, which of course is also yellow and goes around in bunches or shoals.'

'And lives in trees?'

'Well, not usually,  sir.  The  banana  is  obviously exploiting a  new niche.'

'Good heavens, really? It's  a  funny thing, but  I've never much liked bananas  and I've always  been a bit suspicious of fish, too. That'd explain it.'

'Yes, sir.'

'Do they attack swimmers?'

'Not that I've heard, sir. Of course, they may be clever enough to only attack swimmers who're far from land.'

'What, you mean sort of... high up? In the trees, as it were?'

'Possibly, sir.'

'Cunning, eh?'

'Yes, sir.'

'Well, we might as well make ourselves comfortable, Mr Stibbons.'

'Yes, sir.'

A match flared in the darkness as Ridcully lit his pipe.

The Ankh-Morpork wassailers had practised for weeks.

The  custom was referred  to by Anaglypta Huggs, organizer of the  best and  most select group of the city's singers, as an  occasion for fellowship and good cheer.

One should always be wary of people who talk unashamedly of 'fellowship and good  cheer' as if it were something that can be  applied to life like a poultice. Turn your  back for a moment and they  may well organize a Maypole dance  and, frankly, there's no  option then but to  try and make it  to the treeline.

The singers were  halfway down Park  Lane now, and halfway through 'The Red Rosy Hen' in marvellous  harmony.[19] Their collecting tins were  already full of donations for the poor of the city,  or at least those sections  of the poor who in Mrs Huggs'  opinion were  suitably picturesque and not too smelly and could be relied upon to  say thank you.  People had come to  their  doors to listen. Orange light spilled on to  the snow.  Candle  lanterns glowed among the tumbling flakes. If you could  have taken the lid off the  scene,  there would  have  been  chocolates  inside. Or  at  least an interesting  biscuit assortment.

Mrs Huggs had heard  that wassailing  was  an ardent  ritual,  and  you didn't need anyone to tell you what that meant, but she felt she'd carefully removed all those elements that would affront the refined ear.

And it was only gradually that the singers became aware of the discord.

Around  the corner, slipping and sliding on the ice,  came another band of singers.

Some  people march to a different drummer. The drummer in question here must have been trained elsewhere, possibly by a different species on another planet.

In front of the group was a legless man on a small wheeled trolley, who was singing at the top of  his voice and banging two saucepans together. His name was Arnold Sideways. Pushing him along was Coffin Henry, whose croaking progress through an  entirely  different  song was punctuated  by  bouts  of off-the-beat coughing. He  was  accompanied by a perfectly  ordinary-looking man  in torn, dirty  and yet expensive clothing,  whose pleasant tenor voice was drowned  out by the quacking of a duck  on his head.  He answered to the name of Duck Man, although he never  seemed to understand why, or why he was always surrounded by people who seemed to see ducks where no ducks could be. And finally, being towed along by a small grey dog on a string, was Foul Ole Ron, generally regarded in AnkhMorpork as  the  deranged  beggars'  deranged beggar. He was probably incapable of singing, but at least he was attempting to swear in time to the beat, or beats.

The wassailers stopped and watched them in horror.

Neither party  noticed, as  the beggars oozed and ambled up the street, that  little  smears  of black and grey were spiralling  out  of  drains and squeezing out from under  tiles and buzzing off into the night.  People have always  had the urge to sing and clang things  at the dark stub of the year, when all sorts of psychic nastiness has taken  advantage  of  the long  grey days and the deep shadows to lurk and breed. Lately people had taken to singing harmoniously, which rather lost the effect.  Those who really understood just clanged something and shouted.

The  beggars were not  in fact  this well versed in folkloric practice. They  were just  making a din in the wellfounded hope that people would give them money to stop.

It was just possible to make out a consensus song in there somewhere.

Hogswatch is coming,

The pig is getting fat,

Please put a dollar in the old man's hat

If you ain't got a dollar a penny will do...

'And if you  ain't got a penny,' Foul  Ole Ron  yodelled, solo, 'then - fghfgh yffg mftnfmf...'

The Duck Man had, with great presence of mind, damped a hand over Ron's mouth.

'So sorry about this,'  he  said, 'but this time I'd like people not to slam their doors on us. And it doesn't scan, anyway.'

The nearby doors slammed regardless. The other  wassailers fled hastily to a more salubrious location.  Goodwill to  all men was a phrase  coined by someone who hadn't met Foul Ole Ron.

The beggars stopped singing,  except for Arnold Sideways, who tended to live in his own small world.

' ...nobody knows how good we can live, on boots three times a day...'

Then the change in the air penetrated even his consciousness.

Snow thumped off the trees as a contrary wind brushed them. There was a whirl of  flakes and it was just possible, since  the beggars did not always have  their mental  compasses pointing due  Real,  that they  heard a  brief snatch of conversation.

'It just ain't that simple, master, that's all I'm saying... '

IT IS BETTER TO GIVE THAN TO RECEIVE, ALBERT.

'No, master, it's just a lot more expensive. You can't just go around-'

Things rained down on the snow.

The beggars looked at them. Arnold Sideways carefully picked up a sugar pig and bit  its nose off. Foul  Ole Ron peered suspiciously  into a cracker that had bounced off his hat, and then shook it against his ear.

The Duck Man opened a bag of sweets.

'Ah, humbugs?' he said.

Coffin Henry unlooped a string of sausages from around his neck.

'Buggrit?' said Foul Ole Ron.

'It's a cracker,' said the dog, scratching its ear. 'You pull it.'

Ron waved the cracker aimlessly by one end.

'Oh,  give  it here,' said the dog, and gripped the  other end  in  its teeth.

'My word,' said the Duck Man, fishing in a snowdrift.  'Here's a whole roast pig! And a big dish of roast potatoes, miraculously uncracked! And... look...  isn't this caviar in the jar? Asparagus! Potted shrimp! My goodness! What were we going to have for Hogswatch dinner, Arnold?'

'Old boots,' said Arnold.  He opened a fallen box of cigars and  licked them.

'Just old boots?'

'Oh, no. Stuffed with mud,  and with roast mud. 's good mud, too. I bin saving it up.'

'Now we can have a merry feast of goose!'

'All right. Can we stuff it with old boots?'

There was a pop  from the direction of the cracker. They heard Foul Ole Ron's thinkingbrain dog growl.

'No,  no, no, you  put the hat on your  head and you  read the hum'rous mottar.'

'Millennium hand and shrimp?'  said Ron, passing the scrap of  paper to the Duck Man. The Duck Man was regarded as the intellectual of the group.

He peered at the motto.

'Ah, yes, let's see now... It says "'Help  Help Help Ive  Fallen in the Crakker  Machine  I Cant Keep  Runin on this Roller Please Get me Ou...".'  He turned the paper  over  a few  times. 'That appears to be it, except for the stains.'

'Always the same ole  mottars,' said the  dog. 'Someone slap Ron on the back, will you? If he laughs  any more he'll -  oh, he has. Oh well, nothing new about that.'

The beggars spent a few more minutes picking up  hams, jars and bottles that had settled  on the  snow.  They packed them around Arnold on his trolley and set off down the street.

'How come we got all this?'

' 's Hogswatch, right?'

'Yeah, but who hung up their stocking?'

'I don't think we've got any, have we?'

'I hung up an old boot.'

'Does that count?'

'Dunno. Ron ate it.'

I'm waiting for the Hogfather, thought Ponder Stibbons. I'm in the dark waiting for the Hogfather. Me. A  believer in Natural Philosophy. I can find the square root of 27.4 in my head.[20] I shouldn't be doing this.

It's not as if I've hung a stocking up. There'd be some point if...

He sat  rigid for a  moment, and then pulled off  his pointy sandal and rolled down a sock. It helped if you thought of it as the scientific testing of an interesting hypothesis.

From out of the darkness Ridcully said, 'How long, do you think?'

'It's generally believed that all deliveries are completed  well before midnight,' said Ponder, and tugged hard.

'Are you all right, Mr Stibbons?'

'Fine.  sir. Fine. Er... do you happen to have a drawing pin about you? Or a small nail, perhaps?'

'I don't believe so.'

'Oh, it's all right. I've found a penknife.'

After a while Ridcully heard a faint scratching noise in the dark.

'How do you spell "electricity", sir?'

Ridcully thought for a while. 'You know, I don't think I ever do.'

There was silence again, and then a clang. The Librarian grunted in his sleep.

'What are you doing?'

'I just knocked over the coal shovel.'

'Why are you feeling around on the mantelpiece?'

'Oh,  just... you  know, just... just looking. A little...  experiment. After all, you never know.'

'You never know what?'

'Just... never know, you know.'

'Sometimes you know,' said Ridcully. 'I think I know quite a lot that I didn't used  to know. It's  amazing what you do end  up knowing, I sometimes think. I often wonder what new stuff I'll know.'

'Well, you never know.'

'That's a fact.'

High over the  city Albert  turned to Death, who seemed to be trying to avoid his gaze.

'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.

'I knew you put them in the sack. Where did you get them?'

THEY WERE JUST LYING AROUND.

'Whole roast pig does not, in my experience, just lie around.'

NO ONE SEEMED TO BE USING THEM, ALBERT.

'Couple of chimneys ago we were over that big posh restaurant...'

REALLY? I DON'T REMEMBER.

'And it seemed to me  you were down there  a bit longer than  usual, if you don't mind me saying so.'

REALLY.

'How  exactly  were  they just  inverted  comma lying  around  inverted comma?'

JUST... LYING AROUND. YOU KNOW. RECUMBENT.

'In a kitchen?'

THERE WAS A CERTAIN CULINARINESS ABOUT THE PLACE, I RECALL.

Albert pointed a trembling finger.

'You nicked someone's Hogswatch dinner, master!'

IT'S GOING TO BE EATEN, said Death defensively. ANYWAY, YOU THOUGHT  IT WAS A GOOD IDEA WHEN I SHOWED THAT KING THE DOOR.

'Yeah,  well,  that was a bit  different,'  said  Albert, lowering  his voice. 'But,  I mean, the Hogfather  doesn't drop down the chimney and pinch people's grub!'

THE BEGGARS WILL ENJOY IT, ALBERT.

'Well, yes, but...'

IT WASN'T STEALING. IT  WAS  JUST... REDISTRIBUTION. IT  WILL BE A GOOD DEED IN A NAUGHTY WORLD.

'No, it won't!'

THEN IT  WILL  BE  A NAUGHTY  DEED  IN A  NAUGHTY WORLD AND  WILL  PASS COMPLETELY UNNOTICED.

'Yeah, but you might at least have thought about the people whose  grub you pinched.'

THEY HAVE BEEN PROVIDED FOR, OF  COURSE. I AM NOT COMPLETELY HEARTLESS. IN A METAPHORICAL SENSE. AND NOW - ONWARDS AND UPWARDS.

'We're heading down, master.'

ONWARDS AND DOWNWARDS, THEN.

There were...  swirls. Binky  galloped easily through them, except that he did not seem to move. He might have been hanging in the air.

'Oh, me,' said the oh god weakly.

'What?' said Susan.

'Try shutting your eyes ...'

Susan shut her eyes. Then she reached up to touch her face.

'I'm still seeing. .

'I thought it was just me. It's usually just me.' The swirls vanished.

There was greenery below.

And that was odd.  It was  greenery.  Susan had flown a few  times over countryside, even swamps and jungles,  and there had never been a  green  as green as this. If green could be a primary colour, this was it.

And that wiggly thing

'That's not a river!' she said.

'Isn't it?'

'It's blue!'

The oh god risked a look down.

'Water's blue,' he said.

'Of course it's not!'

'Grass is green, water's blue... I can  remember that. It's some of the stuff I just know.'

'Well, in a way...' Susan hesitated. Everyone  knew grass was green and water was blue. Quite often it wasn't  true, but everyone knew it  in the same  way they knew the sky was blue, too.

She made the mistake of looking up as she thought that.

There was the sky.  It  was, indeed, blue. And down there was the land. It was green.

And in between was  nothing. Not white space. Not black night.  Just... nothing, all round the edges of the world. Where the brain said there should be, well,  sky and land, meeting neatly at  the horizon, there was  simply a void that sucked at the eyeball like a loose tooth.

And there was the sun.

It was under the sky, floating above the land.

And it was yellow.

Buttercup yellow.

Binky landed on the grass beside the river.  Or at  least on the green. It felt more like sponge, or moss. He nuzzled it.

Susan slid off, trying to keep her gaze low. That meant she was looking at the vivid blue of the water.

There  were  orange fish  in it. They didn't look quite  right,  as  if they'd been created by  someone who  really  did think a fish was two curved lines  and  a dot and a triangular  tail. They reminded her  of the skeletal fish  in  Death's  quiet  pool.  Fish  that  were...  appropriate  to  their surroundings. And she could see them, even though the water was just a block of colour which part of her insisted ought to be opaque...

She knelt down and dipped her hand in. It felt like water, but what poured through her fingers was liquid blue.

And now she knew where she  was. The last piece clicked  into place and the  knowledge bloomed inside her. She knew if she  saw a house just how its windows  would  be  placed, and  just how  the smoke  would come out of  the chimney.

There would almost certainly be apples  on the trees. And they would be red, because everyone knew that apples were red. And the sun was yellow. And the sky was blue. And the grass was green.

But there was another world, called the real world  by  the  people who believed in it, where the sky could be anything from off-white to sunset red to thunderstorm yellow. And the trees would be anything from bare  branches, mere scribbles against the sky, to  red flames before the frost. And the sun was white or yellow or orange. And water was brown and grey and green...

The colours here were springtime colours, and not the springtime of the world. They were the colours of the springtime of the eye.

'This is a child's painting,' she said.

The oh god slumped onto the green.

'Every time  I  look  at  the  gap my eyes water,' he  mumbled. 'I feel awful.'

'I said this is a child's painting,' said Susan.

'Oh, me... I think the wizards' potion is wearing off...'

'I've seen dozens of pictures of it,' said Susan, ignoring him. 'You put the sky overhead because the sky's above you and when you are a  couple of feet high there's not a lot of sideways to the sky in any case.  And everyone tells you grass is green and  water is blue. This is the  landscape you paint. Twyla paints like  that. I painted  like  that. Grandfather saved some of...'

She stopped.

'All  children do it, anyway,' she muttered.  'Come  on, let's find the house.'

'What house?' the oh god moaned. 'And can you speak quieter, please?'

'There'll  be  a house,'  said  Susan, standing  up.  'There's always a house. With four windows. And the smoke coming  out of the chimney all curly like a spring. Look,  this is  a place like  gr... Death's country. It's not really geography.'

The oh god walked over to the nearest tree and banged his head on it as if he hoped it was going to hurt.

'Feels like geo'fy,' he muttered.

'But have  you ever seen  a tree like that? A big green blob on a brown stick? It looks like a lollipop!' said Susan, pulling him along.

'Dunno.  Firs' time I  ever  saw a tree.  Arrgh.  Somethin' dropped  on m'head.' He blinked owlishly at the ground. ' 's red.'

'It's an apple,' she said. She sighed. 'Everyone knows apples are red.'

There were no  bushes. But  there were flowers,  each with  a couple of green leaves. They grew individually, dotted around the rolling green.

And then they were out of the trees and there, by  a bend in the river, was the house.

It didn't look  very big. There were four windows and a door. Corkscrew smoke curled out of the chimney.

'You know, it's a funny thing,' said Susan, staring at it. 'Twyla draws houses like that. And she practically lives in a mansion. I drew houses like that. And I was born in a palace. Why?'

'P'raps it's all this house,' muttered the oh. god miserably.

'What? You really think so? Kids' paintings are all of this place? It's in our heads?'

'Don't ask me, I was just making conversation,' said the oh god.

Susan hesitated.  The words What Now? loomed.  Should she  just go  and knock?

And she realized that was normal thinking...

In the glittering, clattering,  chattering atmosphere a head waiter was having a difficult time. There were a lot of people in, and the staff should have been fully stretched, putting bicarbonate of soda in  the white wine to make very expensive bubbles and cutting  the vegetables  very small to  make them cost more.

Instead they were standing in a dejected group in the kitchen.

'Where did it all  go?'  screamed the  manager. 'Someone's been through the cellar, too!'

'William said he felt a cold wind,' said the waiter. He'd  been backed  up against a hot plate, and now knew  why it was called a hot plate in a way he hadn't fully comprehended before.

'I'll give him a cold wind! Haven't we got anything?'

'There's odds and ends. .

'You don't mean odds and  ends, you  mean des  curieux  et des  bouts,' corrected the manager.

'Yeah, right, yeah. And, er, and, er . .

'There's nothing else?'

'Er... old boots. Muddy old boots.'

'Old...?'

'Boots. Lots of 'em,'  said the waiter.  He  felt  he was  beginning to singe.

'How come we've got... vintage footwear?'

'Dunno.  They just turned up, sir. The oven, s  full of old boots. So's the pantry.'

'There's a hundred people booked in! All  the shops'll be shut! Where's Chef?'

'William's trying to get him to come out of the privy, sir. He's locked himself in and is having one of his Moments.'

'Something's cooking. What's that I can smell?'

'Me, sir.'

'Old boots muttered  the  manager. 'Old boots... old  boots... Leather, are they? Not clogs or rubber or anything?'

'Looks like... just boots. And lots of mud, sir.'

The  manager  took off his jacket.  'All right. Cot any cream, have we? Onions? Garlic? Butter? Some old beef bones? A bit of pastry?'

'Er, yes...'

The  manager rubbed  his  hands together.  'Right,'  he said, taking an apron  off a hook. 'You there, get  some water  boiling!  Lots of water! And find a really large hammer!  And  you, chop  some  onions! The  rest of you, start sorting out the boots. I want the tongues out and the soles off. We'll do  them... let's  see... Mousse de la Boue dans une  Panier  de la  Pate de Chaussures...'

'Where're we going to get that from, sir?'

'Mud mousse in  a  basket of shoe pastry. Get  the idea?  It's not  our fault if even Quirmians don't understand restaurant Quirmian. It's not  like lying, after all.'

'Well,  it's  a bit  like ...' the  waiter began. He'd  been  cursed  with honesty at an early stage.

'Then there's Brodequin rфti Faзon Ombres . .

The manager sighed at the head waiter's  panicky expression. 'Soldier's boot done in the Shades fashion,' he translated.

'Er... Shades fashion?'

'In  mud. But if we cook the tongues separately we can put on Languette braisйe, too.'

'There's some ladies' shoes, sir,' said an underchef.

'Right. Add to  the menu... Let's  see now... Sole d'une Bonne Femme... and... yes... Servis dans un Coulis de Terre en I'Eau. That's mud, to you.'

'What about the laces, sir?' said another underchef.

'Good thinking. Dig out that recipe for Spaghetti Carbonara.'

'Sir?' said the head waiter.

'I started off as a  chef,' said the manager,  picking up a knife. 'How do you think I was able to afford this place? I know how it's done. Get  the look and the sauce right and you're threequarters there.'

'But it's all going to be old boots!' said the waiter.

'Prime  aged beef,' the manager corrected  him. 'It'll tenderize  in no time.'

'Anyway... anyway... we haven't got any soup

'Mud. And a lot of onions.'

'There's the puddings...'

'Mud. Let's see if we can get it to caramelize, you never know.'

'I  can't even find the coffee... Still, they probably won't last  till the coffee...'

'Mud. Cafe de Terre,' said the manager firmly. 'Genuine ground coffee.'

'Oh, they'll spot that, sir!'

'They haven't up till now,' said the manager darkly.

'We'll never get away with it, sir. Never.'

In  the country of the sky on top, Medium Dave Lilywhite hauled another bag of money down the stairs.

'There must be thousands here,' said Chickenwire.

'Hundreds of thousands,' said Medium Dave.

'And what's  all this  stuff?' said  Catseye, opening  a box. ' 's just paper.' He tossed it aside.

Medium  Dave sighed.  He was  all for class  solidarity,  but sometimes Catseye got on his nerves.

'They're title deeds,' he said. 'And they're better than money.'

Taper's better'n money?' said Catseye. 'Hah, if  you  can  burn it  you can't spend it, that's what I say.'

'Hang on,' said  Chickenwire. 'I know about them. The  Tooth Fairy owns property?'

'Cot to raise money somehow,' said Medium Dave. 'All those half-dollars under the pillow.'

'If we steal them, do they become ours?'

'Is that a trick question?' said Catseye, smirking.

'Yeah, but... ten thousand each doesn't sound such a  lot, when you see all this.'

'He won't miss a ...'

'Gentlemen...'

They turned. Teatime was in the doorway.

'We were just... we were just piling up the stuff,' said Chickenwire.

'Yes. I know. I told you to.'

'Right. That's right. You did,' said Chickenwire gratefully.

'And there's such a lot,' said  Teatime. He gave  them a smile. Catseye coughed.

' 's  got to be thousands,' said Medium Dave. 'And what about all these deeds and so on? Look, this one's for that pipe shop in Honey Trap Lane!

In Ankh-Morpork! I buy my tobacco there!  Old Thimble is always moaning about the rent, too!'

'Ah. So you opened the strongboxes,' said Teatime pleasantly.

'Well... yes...'

'Fine.  Fine,'  said  Teatime. 'I didn't ask you to, but... fine, fine.

And how did you think the Tooth Fairy made her  money? Little gnomes in some mine somewhere? Fairy gold? But that turns to trash in the morning!'

He  laughed.  Chickenwire laughed.  Even Medium Dave laughed.  And then Teatime  was on him, pushing  him irresistibly backwards  until  he hit  the wall.

There was a blur and he tried to blink and his left eyelid was suddenly a rose of pain.

Teatime's good eye  was close to him,  if you could call  it  good. The pupil was a dot.  Medium Dave could just make out his hand, right  by Medium Dave's face.

It was holding a knife. The point of the blade could only be the merest fraction of an inch from Medium Dave's right eye.

'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. You  stand in a castle of  gold and  plot to  steal  pennies. Oh, dear. What am I to do with you?'

He relaxed a little, but his hand still held the knife to Medium Dave's unblinking eye.

'You're thinking that Banjo is going to help

you,' he said. 'That's how it's always been, isn't  it? But Banjo likes me. He really does. Banjo is my friend.'

Medium Dave managed to focus beyond Teatime's ear. His brother was just standing there, with the blank face he had while he waited for another order or a new thought to turn up.

'If  I thought you  were feeling  bad  thoughts  about me I would be so downcast,' said Teatime. 'I do not have many friends left, Mr Medium Dave.'

He stood back and smiled happily. 'All friends now?' he said, as Medium Dave slumped down. 'Help him, Banjo.'

On cue, Banjo lumbered forward.

'Banjo  has  the heart of  a  little child,'  said Teatime,  the  knife disappearing somewhere about his clothing. 'I believe I have, too.'

The others were frozen  in place. They  hadn't moved  since the attack. Medium Dave was a heavy-set man and Teatime was a matchstick model, but he'd lifted Medium Dave off his feet like a feather.

'As  far as the money goes, in fact, I really have no use for it,' said Teatime,  sitting down on  a sack of silver.  'It is small change.  You  may share  it  out   amongst  yourselves,  and  no  doubt  you'll  squabble  and doublecross  one  another more  tiresomely. Oh,  dear.  It is so awful  when friends fall out.'

He kicked the  sack. It split.  Silver and copper fell  in an expensive trickle.

'And you'll swagger and spend it on drink and  women,' he said, as they watched  the coins roll  into every  corner of  the  room. 'The  thought  of investment will never cross your scarred little minds...'

There was a rumble from Banjo. Even Teatime  waited patiently until the huge man had assembled a sentence. The result was:

'I gotta piggy bank.'

'And what would you do with a million dollars, Banjo?' said Teatime.

Another rumble. Banjo's face twisted up.

'Buy... a... bigger piggy bank?'

'Well done.' The Assassin stood up. 'Let's go and see how our wizard is getting on, shall we?'

He walked out of  the room without looking back.  After a  moment Banjo followed.

The others tried not to look at  one another's faces. Then  Chickenwire said, 'Was he saying we could take the money and go?'

'Don't be bloody stupid, we wouldn't get ten yards,' said Medium  Dave, still clutching his face.  'Ugh, this hurts. I think he cut the eyelid... he cut the damn eyelid...'

'Then let's just leave the stuff and  go! I never joined up  to ride on tigers!'

'And what'll you do when he comes after you?'

'Why'd he bother with the likes of us?'

'He's got  time for his friends,' said Medium Dave bitterly. 'For gods' sakes, someone get me a clean rag or something...

'OK, but... but he can't look everywhere.'

Medium Dave  shook his  head. He'd  been through AnkhMorpork's very own university  of  the  streets  and  had  graduated   with  his  life  and  an intelligence made all the keener by constant  friction. 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.

'How come your brother likes him so much?'

Medium  Dave grimaced. Banjo had always done what  he was told,  simply because Medium Dave had told him. Up to now, anyway.

It must have been  that  punch in  the bar. Medium Dave didn't like  to think  about it.  He'd  always  promised their mother that  he'd look  after Banjo,[21] and Banjo had gone back like a falling tree. And when Medium Dave had  risen from  his  seat to  punch Teatime's  unbalanced  lights out  he'd suddenly found the Assassin already behind him, holding a knife. In front of everyone. It was humiliating, that's what it was

And then Banjo had sat up, looking puzzled, and spat out a tooth

'If it wasn't for  Banjo going  around with him  all the  time we could gang up on him,' said Catseye.

Medium Dave looked up, one hand clamping a handkerchief to his eye.

'Gang up on him?' he said.

'Yeah, it's all your fault,' Chickenwire went on.

'Oh, yeah? So it wasn't you who said, wow, ten thousand dollars,  count me in?'

Chickenwire backed away. 'I didn't know there was going to  be all this creepy stuff! I want to go home!'

Medium  Dave hesitated, despite his pain and  rage. This  wasn't normal talk for  Chickenwire,  for  all  that he  whined  and  grumbled. This was a strange place, no lie about that, and all that business  with the teeth  had been  very... odd, but  he'd  been out with Chickenwire  when  jobs had gone wrong and both the Watch and the Thieves' Guild had been after them and he'd been as cool as anyone. And if  the Guild had been the  ones  to  catch them they'd have nailed their ears to  their ankles and thrown them in the river. In Medium Dave's book, which was a simple book and largely written in mental crayon, things didn't get creepier than that.

'What's  up with you?' he  said. 'All  of you you're acting like little kids!'

'Would he deliver to apes earlier than humans?'

'Interesting  point, sir.  Possibly you're referring to my theory  that humans  may  have in fact  descended from apes, of  course,' said Ponder. 'A bold hypothesis which ought to sweep away the ignorance of centuries if the grants committee could just see their way clear to letting me hire a boat and sail around to the islands of ... '

'I just thought he might deliver alphabetically,' said Ridcully.

There was a patter of soot in the cold fireplace.

'That's presumably him now, do you think?' Ridcully went on. 'Oh, well, I thought we should check ...'

Something landed in  the ashes. The  two wizards stood  quietly  in the darkness while the figure picked itself up. There was a rustle of paper.

LET ME SEE NOW

There was a click as Ridcully's pipe fell out of his mouth.

'Who the hell are you?' he said. 'Mr Stibbons, light a candle!'

Death backed away.

I'M THE HOGFATHER, OF COURSE. ER. HO. HO.  HO. WHO WOULD YOU  EXPECT TO COME DOWN A CHIMNEY ON A NIGHT LIKE THIS, MAY I ASK?

'No, you're not!'

I AM. LOOK, I'VE GOT THE BEARD AND THE PILLOW AND EVERYTHING!

'You look extremely thin in the face!'

I'M... I... I'M NOT WELL. IT'S ALL... YES,

IT'S ALL THIS SHERRY. AND RUSHING AROUND. I AM A BIT ILL.

'Terminally, I  should say.'  Ridcully grabbed  the beard.  There was a twang as the string gave way.

'It's a false beard!'

NO IT'S NOT, said Death desperately.

'Here's the  hooks for the ears,  which must have  given  you  a bit of trouble, I must say!'

Ridcully flourished the incriminating evidence.

'What were you  doing coming down  the chimney?' he  continued. 'Not in marvellous taste, I think.'

Death waved a small grubby scrap of paper defensively.

OFFICIAL  LETTER  TO THE  HOGFATHER. SAYS  HERE... he  began,  and then looked at  the paper again. WELL, QUITE A LOT, IN FACT.  IT'S A  LONG  LIST. LIBRARY STAMPS, REFERENCE BOOKS, PENCILS, BANANAS...

'The Librarian  asked the Hogfather  for those  things?' said Ridcully. 'Why?'

I DON'T  KNOW, said  Death.  This was a  diplomatic answer. He kept his finger over  a  reference to the Archchancellor. The  orang-utan for 'duck's bottom' was quite an interesting squiggle.

'I've got plenty in my desk drawer,'  mused Ridcully. 'I'm  quite happy to give them out  to any  chap provided he can  prove  he's  used up the old one.'

THEY MUST SHOW YOU AN ABSENCE OF PENCIL?

'Of course. If he needed essential materials  he need only have come to me. No man can tell you I'm an unreasonable chap.'

Death checked the list carefully.

THAT   IS  PRECISELY   CORRECT,   he  confirmed,  with  anthropological exactitude.

'Except for the bananas, of course. I wouldn't keep fish in my desk.'

Death looked down at the list and then back up at Ridcully.

GOOD? he said, in the hope that this was the right response.

Wizards  know  when they are  going  to die.[22]  Ridcully had no  such premonitions, and to Ponder's horror prodded Death in the cushion.

'Why you?' he said. 'What's happened to the other fellow?'

I SUPPOSE I MUST TELL YOU.

In the house  of Death, a  whisper  of  shifting sand and the  faintest chink of moving glass, somewhere in the darkness of the floor...

And, in the dry shadows, the sharp smell of snow and a thud of hooves.

Sideney almost swallowed his tongue when Teatime appeared beside him.

'Are we making progress?'

'Gnk...'

'I'm sorry?' said Teatime.

Sideney  recovered  himself. 'Er...  some,'  he said.  'We think  we've worked out... er... one lock.'

Light gleamed off Teatime's eye.

'I believe there are seven of them?' said the Assassin.

'Yes, but... they're half magic and  half real  and half not there... I mean... there's parts of them that don't exist all the time...'

Mr Brown, who had been working at one of the locks, laid down his pick.

'  't's  no good, mister,'  he said. 'Can't  even get a purchase with a crowbar.  Maybe  if I went back to the city and got a  couple  of dragons we could do something. You  can melt through steel with them if you twist their necks right and feed 'em carbon.'

'I was told you were the best locksmith in the city,' said Teatime.

Behind him, Banjo shifted position.

Mr Brown looked annoyed...

'Well, yes,' he said. 'But locks  don't generally alter 'emselves while you're working on 'em, that's what I'm saying.'

'And I thought you could open any lock anyone ever made,' said Teatime.

'Made by humans,' said Mr Brown sharply. 'And most dwarfs. I dunno what made these. You never said anything about magic.'

'That's  a shame,' said Teatime.  'Then really  I have no  more need of your services. You may as well go back home.'

'I won't  be sorry.' Mr Brown started putting things back into his tool bag. 'What about my money?'

'Do I owe you any?'

'I came  along with  you.  I don't  see it's my fault that  this is all magic business. I should get something.'

'Ah, yes,  I  see your point,' said Teatime. 'Of course, you should get what you deserve. Banjo?'

Banjo lumbered forward, and then stopped.

Mr Brown's hand had come out of the bag holding a crowbar.

'You  must think I  was born yesterday, you  slimy  little  bugger,' he said. 'I know  your type.  You  think it's all some  kind of game.  You make little  jokes  to yourself and  you think no one else notices and  you think you're so smart. Well, Mr Teacup, I'm leaving, right? Right now. With what's coming to  me. And you ain't stopping me. And Banjo certainly ain't. I  knew old  Ma Lilywhite back in the good old  days. You  think  you're  nasty? You think you're mean? Ma Lilywhite'd  tear your  ears  off and spit 'em in your eye,  you cocky little devil. And I worked with her, so you don't  scare  me and nor does little Banjo, poor sod that he is.'

Mr  Brown glared  at each  of them in  turn, flourishing  the  crowbar. Sideney cowered in front of the doors.

He saw Teatime nod gracefully, as if the man had made a small speech of thanks.

'I  appreciate your point  of  view,' said Teatime.  'And,  I  have  to repeat, it's Teh-ah-tim-eh. Now, please, Banjo.'

Banjo  loomed  over  Mr Brown, reached down  and  lifted  him up by the crowbar so sharply that his feet came out of his boots.

'Here,  you  know  me,  Banjo!' the  locksmith  croaked, struggling  in mid-air.  'I  remembers  you  when you was  little, I used  to sit you on my knees, I often used to work for your ma...'

'D'you like apples?' Banjo rumbled.

Brown struggled.

'You got to say yes,' Banjo said.

'Yes!'

'D'You like pears? You got to say yes.'

'All right, yes!'

'D'you like falling down the stairs?'

Medium Dave held up his hands for quiet.

He glared at the gang.

'This place is getting to you, right? But we've all been in bad  places before, right?'

'Not this  bad,'  said Chickenwire. 'I've never been  anywhere where it hurts to look at the sky. It give me the creeps.'

'Chick's a little baby, nyer nyer nyer,' sang Careers.

They looked at him. He coughed nervously.

'Sorry... don't know why I said that. .

'If we stick together we'll be fine-'

'Teeny meeny minty me...' mumbled Catseye.

'What? What are you talking about?'

'Sorry... it just sort of slipped out...'

'What I'm trying to say,' said Medium Dave, 'is that if-- '

'Peachy keeps making faces at me!'

'I didn't!'

'Liar, liar, pants on fire!'

Two things happened  at this  point.  Medium Dave lost his temper,  and Peachy screamed.

A small wisp of smoke was rising from his trousers.

He hopped around, beating desperately at himself.

'Who did that? Who did that?' demanded Medium Dave.

'I didn't see anyone,' said Chickenwire. 'I mean, no  one was near him. Catseye said "pants on fire" and next minute...'

'Now  he's sucking his thumb!' Catseye  jeered. Nyer nyer nyer!  Crying for Mummy! You know what happens to kids who suck their thumbs, there's this big monster with scissors all ...'

'Will you stop talking like  that!' shouted Medium Dave. 'Blimey, it is like dealing with a bunch of-'

Someone screamed, high above. It went on for a  while and  seemed to be getting nearer, but then it stopped and was  replaced by  a rush of thumping and an occasional sound like a coconut being bounced on a stone floor.

Medium Dave  got to the door just  in time to see the body  of Mr Brown the locksmith tumble past, moving quite fast and not at all neatly. A moment later  his bag  somersaulted around  the curve of the stairs. It split as it bounced and there was a jangle as tools and lockpicks bounced out and followed their late owner.

He'd  been moving quite fast. He'd  probably  roll all the  way to  the bottom.

Medium Dave looked up. Two turns above him, on the opposite side of the huge shaft, Banjo was watching him.

Banjo didn't know right from wrong. He'd always left that sort of thing to his brother.

'Er... poor guy must've slipped,' Medium Dave mumbled.

'Oh, yeah... slipped,' said Peachy.

He looked up, too.

It was funny. He hadn't noticed them before. The white tower had seemed to glow from within. But now there were shadows, moving across the stone. In the stone.

'What was that?' he said. 'That sound...

'What sound?'

'It sounded... like knives scraping,' said Peachy. 'Really close.'

'There's  only us  here!'  said  Medium Dave. 'What're  you  afraid of? Attack by daisies? Come on... let's go and help him...'

She couldn't walk through the door. It simply resisted any such effort. She ended up merely bruised. So Susan turned the doorknob instead.

She heard the oh god  gasp. But she was  used to  the idea of buildings that were bigger on the inside.  Her  grandfather  had  never  been  able to  get  a handle  on dimensions.

The second thing the eye was drawn to were the staircases. They started opposite one another in what  was now a big round tower, its ceiling lost in the haze. The spirals circled into infinity.

Susan's eyes went back to the first thing.

It was a large conical heap in the middle of the floor.

It  was white. It glistened in the cool light that shone down from the mists.

'It's teeth,' she said.

'I think I'm going to throw up,' said the oh god miserably.

'There's  nothing that  scary about teeth,' said Susan. She didn't mean it. The heap was very horrible indeed.

'Did I say I was scared? I'm just hung over again... Oh, me...'

Susan advanced on the heap, moving warily.

They  were  small  teeth. Children's  teeth. Whoever  had piled them up hadn't been very careful about it,  either. A  few had been scattered across the  floor.  She  knew  because  she  trod on one, and the  slippery  little crunching sound made her desperate not to tread on any more.

Whoever had piled them up had  presumably been the  one who'd drawn the chalk marks around the obscene heap.

'There're so many,' whispered Bilious.

'At least twenty million, given the size of the average milk tooth,' said Susan. She  was shocked  to find that it came almost automatically.

'How can you possibly know that?'

'Volume  of  a cone,' said  Susan.  'Pi times the square  of the radius times the height divided by three. I bet  Miss Butts never thought it'd come in handy in a place like this.'

'That's amazing. You did it in your head?'

'This isn't right,' said Susan quietly. 'I don't think this is what the Tooth Fairy is all about. All that effort to get the teeth, and then just to dump them  like this?  No. Anyway, there's a cigarette end on  the  floor. I don't see the Tooth Fairy as someone who rolls her own.'

She stared down at the chalk marks.

Voices high above her made her look up. She thought she saw a head look over the  stair rail, and then draw back again. She  didn't see much of  the face, but what she saw didn't look fairylike.

She glanced back at  the circle of chalk around the teeth. Someone  had wanted  all the teeth  in  one place and had drawn a circle to  show  people where they had to go.

There were a few symbols scrawled around the circle.

She had  a good memory for  small details. It was another family trait. And a small detail stirred in her memory like a sleepy bee.

'Oh, no,' she breathed. 'Surely no one would try to...'

Someone shouted, someone up in the whiteness.

A body rolled down the stairs nearest her. It had been a  skinny, middle-aged  man. Technically it still was, but the long spiral staircase had not been kind.

It tumbled across the white marble and slid to a boneless halt.

Then, as she hurried towards the body, it  faded away,  leaving nothing behind but a smear of blood.

A jingle  noise made  her look back  up  the  stairs. Spinning over and over, making salmon leaps  in the air, a crowbar bounded over the last dozen steps and landed point first on a flagstone, staying upright and vibrating.

Chickenwire reached the top of the stairs, panting.

'There's  people down there, Mister Teatime!' he wheezed. 'Dave and the others've gone down to catch them, Mister Teatime!'

'Teh-ah-tim-eh,' said Teatime, without taking his eyes off the wizard.

'That's right, sir!'

'Well?' said Teatime. 'Just... do away with them.'

'Er... one of them's a girl, sir.'

Teatime still didn't look round. He waved a hand vaguely.

'Then do away with them politely.'

'Yes, Mister... yes, right...' Chickenwire coughed. 'Don't you  want to find out why they're here, sir?'

'Good heavens, no. Why should I want to do that? Now go away.'

Chickenwire stood there for a moment, and then hurried off.

As he scurried  down  the stairs he thought he heard a  creak, as of an ancient wooden door.

He went pale.

It was just a  door, said the sensible bit in front of his brain. There were  hundreds of them in this place, although, come to think of it, none of them had creaked.

The other  bit, the bit that hung around in  dark places nearly at  the top of his spinal  column, said: But it's not one of  them, and you know it, because you know which door it really is...

He hadn't heard that creak for thirty years.

He gave a little yelp and started to take the stairs four at a time.

In the hollows and corners, the shadows grew darker.

Susan ran up a flight of stairs, dragging the oh god behind her.

'Do you know what they've been doing?' she said. 'You know  why they've got all those teeth in a circle? The power... oh my...'

'I'm not going to,' said the head waiter, firmly.

'Look, I'll buy you a better pair after Hogswatch ...'

'There's two more Shoe Pastry, one for Purйe de la Terre and three more Tourte а la Boue,' said a waiter, hurrying in.

'Mud pies!' moaned the waiter. 'I can't believe we're selling mud pies. And now you want my boots!'

'With cream and sugar,  mind  you. A real  taste of AnkhMorpork. And we can get at least four helpings off  those boots. Fair's  fair. We're all  in our socks...'

'Table seven  says the steaks were  lovely  but  a bit  tough,' said  a waiter, rushing past.

'Right. Use a  larger hammer next time and boil  them for longer.'  The manager turned back to  the suffering  head waiter.  'Look, Bill,'  he said, taking him  by the shoulder. 'This isn't food. No one expects it to be food. If people wanted food they'd stay at home, isn't that so? They come here for ambience.  For  the experience. This isn't  cookery, Bill. This  is cuisine. See? And they're coming back for more.'

'Yeah, but old boots . . . '

'Dwarfs  eats rats,'  said the manager. 'And trolls  eat rocks. There's folks  in  Howondaland that  eat  insects  and folks  on  the  Counterweight Continent eat soup made out of bird spit. At least the boots  have been on a cow.'

'And mud?' said the head waiter, gloomily.

'Isn't there an old  proverb  that says a man must eat a bushel of dirt before he dies?'

'Yes, but not all at once.'

'Bill?' said the manager, kindly, picking up a spatula.

'Yes, boss?'

'Get those damn boots off right now, will you?'

When Chickenwire reached the bottom of  the tower he was trembling, and not just from the effort. He headed straight for the  door until Medium Dave grabbed him.

'Let me out! It's after me!'

'Look at his face,' said Catseye. 'Looks like he's seen a ghost!'

'Yeah, well, it  ain't a ghost,' muttered Chickenwire. 'It's  worse'n a ghost...'

Medium Dave slapped him across the face.

'Pull yourself together! Look  around!  Nothing's chasing  you! Anyway, it's not as though we couldn't put up a fight, right?'

Terror had had  time to drain away a little. Chickenwire looked back up the stairs. There was nothing there.

'Good,' said Medium Dave, watching his face. 'Now... What happened?'

Chickenwire looked at his feet.

'I thought it was the wardrobe,' he muttered. 'Go on, laugh...'

They didn't laugh.

'What wardrobe?' said Catseye.

'Oh, when I was a kid...' Chickenwire  waved his arms  vaguely. 'We had this big ole wardrobe, if you must know. Oak. It had this... this... on  the  door  there was  this... sort of... face.' He looked at  their faces,  which were equally wooden. 'I mean, not an actual face, there was... all this...  decoration  round  the keyhole, sort of flowers and  leaves and stuff, but if you looked at it in the... right way... it was a face and they put it in my room 'cos  it was so big and in the night... in the night... in the night...'

They were grown men or at least had lived for several decades, which in some societies is considered the same thing.  But you had to stare at  a man so creased up with dread.

'Yes?' said Catseye hoarsely.

'...it whispered things,' said  Chickenwire,  in a quiet  little voice, like a vole in a dungeon.

They looked at one another.

'What things?' said Medium Dave.

'I don't know! I always had my head under the pillow! Anyway, it's just something from when  I was a kid, all  right?  Our dad got rid of  it in the finish. Burned it. And I watched.'

They  mentally shook themselves, as  people  do when their minds emerge back into the light.

'It's like me and the dark,' said Catseye.

'Oh, don't you start,'  said Medium Dave.  'Anyway, you ain't afraid of the  dark.  You're famed for it.  I been  working  with you in all kinds  of cellars and  stuff. I mean, that's how you got your name. Catseye. Sees like a cat.'

'Yeah, well... you try an'  make up for  it, don't  you?' said Catseye. "Cos when you're grown you know it's just shadows and stuff.

Besides, it ain't like the dark we used to have in the cellar.'

'Oh,  they  had a special kind of a dark when you was a lad, did they?' said Medium Dave. 'Not like the kind of dark you get these days, eh?'

Sarcasm didn't work.

'No,' said Catseye, simply. 'It wasn't. In our cellar, it wasn't.'

'Our mam used to wallop us if we went down to the cellar,' said  Medium Dave. 'She had her still down there.'

'Yeah?'  said  Catseye, from somewhere far off.  'Well, our dad used to

wallop us if we tried to get out. Now shut up talking about it.'

They reached the bottom of the stairs.

There was an absence of anybody. And any body.

'He couldn't have survived that, could he?' said Medium Dave.

'I saw him as he went  past,'  said Catseye. 'Necks aren't  supposed to bend that way...'

He squinted upwards.

'Who's that moving up there?'

'How are their necks moving?' quavered Chickenwire.

'Split up!' said Medium Dave. 'And this time all take a  stairway. Then they can't come back down!'

'Who're they? Why're they here?'

'Why're we here?' said Peachy. He started, and looked behind him.

'Taking our money? After us putting up with him?'

'Yeah...'  said Peachy distantly, trailing after the others. 'Er... did you hear that noise just then?'

'What noise?'

'A sort of clipping, snipping... ?'

'No.'

'No.'

'No. You must have imagined it.'

Peachy nodded miserably.

As he walked up the stairs, little shadows raced through the stone and followed his feet.

Susan  darted  off the  stairs and dragged the oh god along a  corridor lined with white doors.

'I think they saw us,' she said. 'And if they're tooth fairies  there's been a really stupid equal opportunities policy...'

She pushed open a door.

There were no windows to the room, but it was lit perfectly well by the walls themselves. Down the middle of the room  was something  like a display case, its lid gaping open. Bits of card littered the floor.

She reached down and picked one up  and read: 'Thomas Ague, aged  4 and nearly  three quarters,  9  Castle View,  Sto Lat'.  The  writing was  in  a meticulous rounded script.

She crossed the passage to another room, where there was the same scene of devastation.

'So now we know where the teeth were,' she said. 'They  must've taken  them  out of  everywhere and  carried  them downstairs.'

'What for?'

She sighed. 'It's such old magic  it  isn't even  magic any more,'  she said.  'If you've  got a piece of someone's  hair,  or a nail clipping, or a tooth you can control them.'

The oh god tried to focus.

'That heap's controlling millions of children?'

'Yes. Adults too, by now.'

'And you... you could make them think things and do things?'

She nodded. 'Yes.'

'You could get them to open Dad's  wallet and post the contents to some address?'

'Well, I hadn't thought of that, but yes, I suppose you could...'

'Or  go downstairs  and smash all the bottles in the drinks cabinet and promise never to take a drink when they grow up?' said the oh god hopefully.

'What are you talking about?'

'It's all right for you. You don't wake up every  morning  and see your whole life flush before your eyes.

Medium  Dave  and Catseye ran  down the passage and  stopped  where  it forked.

'You go that way, I'll...'

'Why don't we stick together?' said Catseye.

'What's got into everyone? I saw you bite the throats out of a coupla guard dogs when we did  that job in Quirm! Want me to hold your  hand? You check the doors down there, I'll check them along here.'

He walked off.

Catseye peered down the other passage.

There  weren't many doors  down  there.  It wasn't very  long.  And, as Teatime had said, there was nothing dangerous here that they  hadn't brought with them.

He heard voices coming from a doorway and sagged with relief.

He could deal with humans.

As he approached, a sound made him look round.

Shadows were racing down the passage behind him. They cascaded down the walls and flowed over the ceiling.

Where shadows met they became darker. And darker.

And rose. And leapt.

'What was that?' said Susan.

'Sounded like the start of a scream,' said Bilious.

Susan threw open the door.

There was no one outside.

There was movement, though. She saw a patch  of darkness in  the corner of a wall shrink  and fade,  and  another shadow slid around the bend of the corridor.

And there was a pair of boots in the centre of the corridor.

She hadn't remembered any boots there before.

She sniffed. The air tasted of rats, and damp, and mould.

'Let's get out of here,' she said.

'How're we going to find this Violet in all these rooms?'

'I don't know. I  should  be able to... sense  her, but I can't.' Susan peered around the end of the corridor. She could hear men shouting, some way off.

They  slipped  out on to  the stairs again  and managed another flight. There were more rooms here,  and in each one a cabinet that had been  broken open.

Shadows moved in  the corners. The effect was as  though some invisible light source was gently shifting.

'This reminds me a lot of  your... um... of your  grandfather's place,' said the oh god.

'I know,' said Susan.  'There aren't any rules except the ones he makes up as he goes along. I can't  see him being very happy if someone got in and started pulling the library apart...'

She stopped. When she spoke again her voice had a different tone.

'This is a children's place,'  she said.  'The  rules are what children believe.'

'Well, that's a relief.'

'You think so? Things aren't going to be right. In the Soul Cake Duck's country ducks can lay chocolate eggs,  in  the same  way  that  Death's country  is black and sombre because that's what people believe. He's very conventional about that sort of thing.  Skull  and bone decorations  all  over the  place. And  this place...'

'Pretty flowers and an odd sky.'

'I think it's going to be a lot worse than that. And very odd, too.'

'More odd than it is now?'

'I don't think it's possible to die here.'

'That man who fell down the stairs looked pretty dead to me.'

'Oh, you die. But not here. You... let's see... yes... you go somewhere else. Away. You're just  not seen any  more. That's about all you understand when you're three. Grandfather  said it wasn't like that fifty years ago. He said you often couldn't see the bed for everyone having a good cry. Now they just tell the  child that Grandma's gone. For three weeks  Twyla thought her uncle'd  been  buried in the sad patch  behind the  garden shed  along  with Buster and Meepo and all three Bulgies.'

'Three Bulgies?'

'Gerbils. They tend to die a lot,' said Susan. 'The trick is to replace them when she's not looking. You really don't know anything, do you?'

'Er... hello?'

The voice came from the corridor.

They worked their way round to the next room.

There, sitting on the floor and tied to the leg of a white display  case, was Violet. She  looked up  in apprehension, and then in bewilderment, and finally in growing recognition.

'Aren't you...?'

'Yes, yes, we see each other sometimes in Biers, and when you came  for Twyla's last tooth you  were so shocked that I could see  you I  had to give you  a drink  to get your nerves back,' said Susan, fumbling with the ropes. 'I don't think we've got a lot of time.'

'And who's he?'

The oh god tried to push his lank hair into place.

'Oh, he's just a god,' said Susan. 'His name's Bilious.'

'Do you drink at all?' said the oh god.

'What sort of quest-'

'He needs  to know before he decides whether he hates you or not,' said Susan. 'It's a god thing.'

'No, I don't,' said Violet. 'What an idea. I've got the blue ribbon!'

The oh god raised his eyebrows at Susan.

'That  means  she's a  member  of Offler's League  of Temperance,' said Susan.  'They  sign a pledge not to  touch alcohol. I  can't  think  why. Of course,  Offler's  a crocodile. They  don't  go in bars  much. They're  into water.'

'Not touch alcohol at all?' said the oh god.

'Never!' said Violet. 'My dad's very strict about that sort of thing!'

After a moment  Susan  felt forced to  wave  a hand across their locked gaze.

'Can we get on?' she said. 'Good. Who brought you here, Violet?'

'I don't know! I was doing  the collection as usual, and then I thought I  heard someone following me, and then it all went dark, and when I came to we were... Have you seen what it's like outside?'

'Yes.'

'Well, we were  there. The  big one was carrying me.  The one they call Banjo. He's not bad, just a bit... odd. Sort of... slow. He just watches me. The others are thugs. Watch out  for the one with the glass eye. They're all afraid of him. Except Banjo.'

'Class eye?'

'He's dressed like an Assassin. He's  called Teatime. I  think  they're trying to steal something... They  spent ages carting  the teeth out. Little teeth everywhere...  It  was horrible! Thank you,' she added  to the oh god, who had helped her on to her feet.

'They've piled them 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. She  knew  it was unkind and counterproductive of her to think like that. She also knew it was probably an accurate observation, which only made it worse.

'Yes,' she said.

'There was a wizard! He's got a pointy hat!'

'I think we should get her out of here,' said the oh god, in a tone  of voice that Susan considered was altogether too dramatic.

'Good idea,' she conceded. 'Let's go.'

Catseye's boots  had snapped their laces. It was as if he'd been pulled upwards so fast they simply couldn't keep up.

That worried Medium  Dave. So did the smell. There was no  smell at all in the  rest of  the tower,  but  just  here there  was a lingering odour of mushrooms.

His forehead wrinkled.  Medium  Dave was a thief  and  a  murderer  and therefore had a highly developed moral sense. He preferred not to steal from poor people, and not only because they never had anything worth stealing. If it  was necessary to hurt anyone, he tried  to leave wounds that would heal. And when in the course of his activities he had to kill people then  he made some effort to see  that they did  not suffer much or  at least made  as few noises as possible.

This whole business was getting on his nerves. Usually, he didn't  even notice that he had any.

There was a wrongness to everything that grated on his bones.

And a pair of boots was all that remained of old Catseye.

He drew his sword.

Above him, the creeping shadows moved and flowed away.

Susan edged up to the entrance  to the stairways and peered around into the point of a crossbow.

'Now,  all  of  you  step  out  where  I  can  see  you.'  said  Peachy conversationally. 'And don't touch that  sword, lady. You'll  probably  hurt yourself.'

Susan tried to make herself unseen, and failed. Usually it was so  easy to  do  that  that  it happened  automatically,  usually  with  embarrassing results. She could be idly reading a book while people searched the room for her. But  here,  despite  every effort, she  seemed  to  remain  obstinately visible.

'You don't own this place,' she said, stepping back.

'No, but you see this crossbow?  I own this crossbow. So  you just walk ahead of me, right, and we'll all go and see Mister Teatime.'

'Excuse me, I just  want to check something,' said Bilious.  To Susan's amazement he leaned over and touched the point of the arrow.

'Here! What did you do that for?' said Peachy, stepping back.

'I felt it, but of course a certain amount of pain  sensation would  be part of normal sensory response,' said  the oh god. 'I  warn you, there's  a  very good chance that I might be immortal.'

'Yes, but we probably aren't,' said Susan.

'Immortal, eh?' said Peachy. 'So  if I was to shoot you inna head,  you wouldn't die?'

'I suppose when you put it like that... I do know I feel pain...'

'Right. You just keep moving, then.'

'When something happens,' said  Susan, out of the corner  of her mouth, 'you two try to get downstairs and out, all right? If the worst comes to the worst, the horse will. take you out of here.'

'If something happens,' whispered the oh god.

'When,' said Susan.

Behind them, Peachy looked around. He knew  he'd feel a lot better when any of the others turned up. It was almost a relief to have prisoners.

Out of the corner of her eye  Susan saw something move on the stairs on the  opposite side  of the shaft.  For a  moment she thought she saw several flashes like metal blades catching the light.

She heard a gasp behind her.

The man  with the crossbow was  standing very still and  staring at the opposite stairs.

'Oh, noooo,' he said, under his breath.

'What is it?' said Susan.

He stared at her. 'You can see it too?'

'The thing like a lot of blades clicking together?' said Susan.

'Oh, nooo...'

'It was only there for a moment,' said Susan.

'It's gone now,' she said. 'Somewhere else,' she added.

'It's the Scissor Man . .

'Who's he?' said the oh god.

'No one!' snapped Peachy, trying to pull himself together. 'There's  no such thing as the Scissor Man, all right?'

'Ah... yes. When you were little, did you suck your thumb?' said Susan. 'Because the only Scissor  Man I know is  the  one  people used to  frighten children with. They said he'd turn up and...'

'Shutupshutupshutup!'  said Peachy, prodding  her  with  the  crossbow. 'Kids believe all kinds of crap! But I'm grown up now, right, and I can open beer bottles with other people's teeth an- oh, gods...'

Susan heard the snip, snip. It sounded very close now.

Peachy had his eyes shut.

'Is there anything behind me?' he quavered.

Susan  pushed the others aside and waved frantically towards the bottom of the stairs.

'No,' she said, as they hurried away.

'Is there anything standing on the stairs at all?'

'No.'

'Right! If you see  that one-eyed bastard you tell him he  can keep the money!'

He turned and ran.

When Susan turned to go up the stairs the Scissor Man was there.

It wasn't man-shaped. It was something like an ostrich, and  something  like  a lizard  on  its  hind legs, but almost entirely like something  made out of blades.  Every time it moved a thousand blades went snip, snip.

Its  long silver  neck curved and a head made of shears stared  down at her.

'You're not looking for me,' she said. 'You're not my nightmare.'

The blades tilted  this way  and that.  The Scissor Man  was  trying to think.

'I remember you came for  Twyla,' said  Susan, stepping  forward. 'That damn governess had told her  what  happens  to little  girls who  suck their thumbs, remember?  Remember  the poker? I bet you needed a hell of a lot  of sharpening afterwards...'

The creature lowered  its head,  stepped  carefully  around her  in  as polite  a  way as  it could manage, and  clanked on  down the  stairs  after Peachy.

Susan ran on towards the top of the tower.

Sideney  put a  green filter over his lantern and  pressed  down with a small silver  rod that had  an emerald  set on its tip. A  piece of the lock moved. There was a whirring from inside the door and something went click.

He sagged  with  relief.  It  is  said  that  the prospect  of  hanging concentrates the  mind  wonderfully,  but  it was Valium  compared  to being watched by Mister Teatime.

'I,  er, think that's the third lock,'  he  said. 'Green light  is what opens  it. I remember the fabulous lock of the Hall  of Murgle,  which could only be opened by the Hubward wind, although that was...'

'I commend your expertise,' said Teatime. 'And the other four?'

Sideney looked up nervously at the silent bulk of Banjo, and licked his lips.

'Well,  of course, if  I'm  right,  and  the  locks  depend  on certain conditions,  well,  we could be  here  for years...' he ventured. 'Supposing they can only be opened by, say, a small blond  child holding a mouse?  On a Tuesday? In the rain?'

'You can find out what the nature of the spell is?' said Teatime.

'Yes, yes,  of  course, yes.' Sideney waved his hands urgently. 'That's how  I worked out  this one.  Reverse thaumaturgy, yes,  certainly.  Er.  In time.'

'We have lots of time,' said Teatime.

'Perhaps  a  little  more  time  than  that,'  Sideney  quavered.  'The processes are very, very, very... difficult.'

'Oh, dear.  If it's too  much for you, you've  only got  to  say,' said Teatime.

'No!' Sideney yipped, and then  managed to get some self-control. 'No. No. No, I can... I'm sure I shall work them out soon...'

'Jolly good,' said Teatime.

The  student wizard  looked down. A wisp of vapour oozed from the crack between the doors.

'Do you know what's in here, Mister Teatime?' 'No.'

'Ah.  Right.'  Sideney  stared  mournfully  at  the fourth lock. It was amazing how much you remembered when someone like Teatime was around.

He gave  him a nervous look. 'There's not going to be any  more violent deaths, are  there?'  he  said. 'I  just  can't  stand the sight  of violent deaths!'

Teatime put  a  comforting arm around his shoulders. 'Don't worry,'  he said. 'I'm on your side. A violent death is the last thing that'll happen to you.'

'Mister Teatime?'

He turned. Medium Dave stepped onto the landing.

'Someone else is in  the tower,' he said. 'They've got Catseye. I don't know  how.  I've got  Peachy watching  the  stairs  and I  ain't  sure where Chickenwire is.'

Teatime looked back to Sideney, who started prodding at the fourth lock again in a feverish attempt not to die.

'Why are you telling me? I thought I was paying  you big  strong men  a lot of money to deal with this sort of thing.'

Medium Dave's  lips framed some words, but  when he  spoke he said, 'Ah right, but what are we up against here? Eh? Old  Man Trouble or the bogeyman or what?'

Teatime sighed.

'Some of the Tooth Fairy's employees, I assume,' he said.

'Not if they're like the ones that were  here,' said Medium Dave. 'They were just civilians. It looks like the ground opened  and  swallowed Catseye up.' He thought about  this. 'I mean  the ceiling,' he  corrected himself. A horrible image had just passed across his under-used imagination.

Teatime walked  across to the stairwell and looked down. Far below, the pile of teeth looked like a white circle.

'And the girl's gone,' said Medium Dave.

'Really? I thought I said she should be killed.'

Medium Dave  hesitated. The boys had been brought up by Ma Lilywhite to be respectful to women as  delicate and  fragile creatures, and were soundly thrashed if  disrespectful  tendencies  were perceived  by  Ma's  incredibly sensitive radar. And  it was  truly incredibly sensitive. Ma could hear what you were doing three rooms away, a terrible thing for a growing lad.

That sort of thing leaves a mark. Ma Lilywhite certainly  could. As for the others, they had no objections in practice to the disposal of anyone who got between them  and large  sums of money, but there was a general unspoken resentment at being told by Teatime  to kill  someone just because he had no further use for them.  It wasn't  that it was unprofessional. Only Assassins thought like that. It was just that there were things you did do, and things you didn't do. And this was one of the things you didn't do.

'We thought... well, you never know...'

'She wasn't necessary,' said Teatime. 'Few people are.'

Sideney thumbed hurriedly through his notebooks.

'Anyway, the place is a maze-' Medium Dave said.

'Sadly, this is so,' said Teatime. 'But I am sure they will be able  to find us. It's probably too much to hope that they intend something heroic.'

Violet and the oh god hurried down the stairs.

'Do you know how to get back?' said Violet.

'Don't you?'

'I think there's a... a kind of soft  place. If you walk at it  knowing it's there you go through.'

'You know where it is?'

'No! I've never  been here  before! They had  a bag on my  head when we came!  All I  ever  did was take the teeth from  under the pillows!'  Violet started to sob. 'You just get this list and about five minutes' training and they even dock you ten pence a week for the  ladder and I  know I  made that mistake  with little William  Rubin but they should of said, you're supposed to take any teeth you...'

'Er... mistake?' said Bilious, trying to get her to hurry.

'Just because he slept with his head under the pillow but they give you the pliers anyway and no one told me that you shouldn't-'

She certainly did have a pleasant voice,  Bilious  told himself. It was just that in a funny way it grated, too. It  was like listening to a talking flute.

'I  think  we'd just better  get outside,' he said.  'In case they hear us,' he hinted.

'What sort of godding do you do?' said Violet.

'Er... oh,  I...  this and that... I... er...'  Bilious  tried to think through the pounding headache. And then he had one of those ideas,  the kind that only sound good after a lot of alcohol. Someone else may have drunk the drinks, but he managed to snag the idea.

'I'm actually self-employed,' he said, as brightly as he could manage.

'How can you be a self-employed god?'

'Ah, well,  you see,  if  any  other god wants,  perhaps,  you  know, a holiday or something, I cover for them. Yes. That's what I do.'

Unwisely, in the circumstances, he let his inventiveness impress him.

'Oh, yes.  I'm very busy.  Rushed off my feet. They're always employing me. You've no idea. They  don't think twice about pushing off for a month as a big white  bull or a swan or something and it's  always, "Oh, Bilious, old chap, just take care of things while I'm  away, will you? Answer the prayers and so on." I hardly  get a minute to  myself but of course you  can't  turn down work these days.'

Violet was round-eyed with fascination.

'And are you covering for anyone right now?' she asked.

'Um, yes... the God of Hangovers, actually... 'A God  of Hangovers? How awful!'

Bilious looked down at his stained and wretched toga.

'I suppose it is...' he mumbled.

'You're not very good at it.'

'You don't have to tell me.'

'You're more cut  out to be one of the  important  gods,' said  Violet, admiringly. 'I can just see you as lo or Fate or one of those.'

Bilious stared at her with his mouth open.

'I could tell at once you  weren't right,' she went on.  'Not for  some horrible little god. You could even be Offier with calves like yours.'

'Could  I?  I  mean...  oh, yes. Sometimes.  Of course, I have to  wear fangs...'

And then someone was holding a sword to his throat.

'What's this?' said Chickenwire. 'Lover's Lane?'

'You leave  him  alone,  you!' shouted Violet. 'He's a  god! You'll  be really sorry!'

Bilious swallowed, but very gently. It was a sharp sword.

'A god, eh?' said Chickenwire. 'What of?'

Bilious tried to swallow again.

'Oh, bit o' this, bit o' that,' he mumbled.

'Cor,' said Chickenwire.  'Well, I'm  impressed. I can see I'm going to have  to  be  dead  careful  here,  eh?  Don't  want  you  smiting  me  with thunderbolts, do I? Puts a crimp in the day, that sort of thing...'

Bilious didn't dare move his head. But out of the corner of his eye  he was sure he could see shadows moving very fast across the walls.

'Dear me,  out  of thunderbolts, are we?'  Chickenwire  sneered. 'Well, y'know, I've never...'

There was a creak.

Chickenwire's face was  a few inches from  Bilious. The oh god saw  his expression change.

The man's eyes rolled. His lips said '...nur...'

Bilious risked stepping back. Chickenwire's sword didn't move. He stood there, trembling slightly, like a man who wants  to turn round to see what's behind him but doesn't dare to in case he does.

As far as Bilious was concerned, it had just been a creak.

He looked up at the thing on the landing above.

'Who put that there?' said Violet.

It was  just a wardrobe. Dark oak, a bit of fancy woodwork glued  on in an effort to  disguise the undisguisable  fact that it  was  just an upright box. It was a wardrobe.

'You didn't, you know,  try  to  cast  a  thunderbolt  and go  on a few letters too many?' she went on.

'Huh?' said Bilious, looking from the stricken  man to the wardrobe. It was so ordinary it was ... odd.

'I mean, thunderbolts begin with T and wardrobes...'

Violet's lips moved silently. Part of Bilious thought: I'm attracted to a girl who actually has to shut down all other brain  functions in  order to think about  the  order of the letters of the alphabet.  On the  other hand, she's  attracted to  someone who's wearing  a  toga that  looks  as though a family  of weasels have had a  party in it, so  maybe I'll stop this thought right here.

But the major part of his brain thought:  why's  this man making little bubbling noises? It's just a wardrobe, for my sake!

'No, no,' mumbled Chickenwire. 'I don't wanna!'

The sword clanged on the floor.

He took  a step backwards up the stairs,  but very slowly, as if he was doing it despite every effort his muscles could muster.

'Don't want to what?' said Violet.

Chickenwire spun  round. Bilious  had  never seen  that  happen before. People turned round quickly,  yes, but Chickenwire just revolved  as if some giant hand had  been placed on  his head and  twisted  a  hundred and eighty degrees.

'No. No. No,' Chickenwire whined. 'No.'

He tottered up the steps.

'You got to help me,' he whispered.

'What's  the matter?'  said Bilious. 'It's just a wardrobe,  isn't  it? It's for putting all your  old clothes in  so that there's no room for  your new clothes.'

The doors of the wardrobe swung open.

Chickenwire managed to thrust out his arms and grab the sides and, for a moment, he stood quite still.

Then  he  was pulled into  the wardrobe in one  sudden movement and the doors slammed shut.

The little brass key turned in the lock with a click.

'We ought to get him out,' said the oh god, running up the steps.

'Why?' Violet  demanded.  'They are not  very nice people! I  know that one. When he brought me food he made... suggestive comments.'

'Yes, but...' Bilious hadn't  ever seen a face  like that, outside of a mirror. Chickenwire had looked very, very sick.

He turned the key and opened the doors.

'Oh dear...'

'I don't want to see! I don't want to see!'  said  Violet, looking over his shoulder.

Bilious reached down and picked up a pair of boots that stood neatly in the middle of the wardrobe's floor.

Then he put them  back carefully and walked around the wardrobe. It was plywood. The  words  'Dratley  and  Sons,  Phedre  Road, Ankh-Morpork'  were stamped in one corner in faded ink.

'Is it magic?' said Violet nervously.

'I don't know if  something magic  has the maker's  name  on  it,' said Bilious.

'There  are  magic wardrobes,'  said Violet nervously.  'If you go into them, you come out in a magic land.'

Bilious looked at the boots again.

'Um... yes,' he said.

I THINK  I  MUST  TELL  YOU  SOMETHING, said  Death.

'Yes, I  think you should,' said  Ridcully.  'I've got little devils  running  round  the place eating socks  and pencils, earlier tonight we sobered  up someone who thinks he's a God  of Hangovers  and half my  wizards are  trying  to cheer  up the Cheerful Fairy. We thought  something must've  happened to the Hogfather. We were right, right?'

'Hex was right, Archchancellor,' Ponder corrected him.

HEX? WHAT IS HEX?

'Er... Hex  thinks  - that  is, calculates -  that  there's  been a big change in the nature of belief today,' said Ponder. He felt, he did not know why, that Death was probably not in favour of unliving things that thought.

MR HEX  WAS  REMARKABLY ASTUTE. THE HOGFATHER HAS BEEN... Death paused. THERE IS NO  SENSIBLE  HUMAN WORD. DEAD, IN  A WAY, BUT NOT EXACTLY... A GOD CANNOT  BE  KILLED.  NEVER COMPLETELY  KILLED.  HE HAS  BEEN, SHALL WE  SAY, SEVERELY REDUCED.

'Ye gods!' said Ridcully. 'Who'd want to kill off the old boy?'

HE HAS ENEMIES.

'What did he do? Miss a chimney?'

EVERY LIVING THING HAS ENEMIES.

'What, everything?'

YES.  EVERYTHING.  POWERFUL ENEMIES.  BUT  THEY HAVE CONE TOO  FAR THIS TIME. NOW THEY ARE USING PEOPLE.

'Who are?'

THOSE WHO THINK THE UNIVERSE SHOULD BE A LOT OF ROCKS MOVING IN CURVES. HAVE YOU EVER HEARD OF THE AUDITORS?

'I suppose the Bursar may have done...'

NOT  AUDITORS OF MONEY.  AUDITORS  OF REALITY. THEY THINK OF LIFE  AS A STAIN ON THE UNIVERSE. A PESTILENCE. MESSY. GETTING IN THE WAY.

'In the way of what?'

THE EFFICIENT RUNNING OF THE UNIVERSE.

'I  thought  it  was run for us...  Well, for the Professor  of Applied Anthropics,  actually, but we're allowed to tag  along,'  said Ridcully.  He scratched his chin. 'And I could certainly run a marvellous university  here if only we didn't have to have these damn students underfoot all the time.'

QUITE SO.

'They want to get rid of us?'

THEY  WANT  YOU  TO  BE...  LESS...  DAMN,  I'VE  FORGOTTEN  THE  WORD. UNTRUTHFUL?  THE HOGFATHER IS A SYMBOL OF THIS... Death snapped his fingers, causing echoes to bounce off the walls, and added, WISTFUL LYING?

'Untruthful?'  said Ridcully. 'Me? I'm  as  honest as the day  is long! Yes, what is it this time?'

Ponder  had tugged  at  his  robe and now he whispered something in his ear. Ridcully cleared his throat.

'I  am reminded that this  is in fact the shortest day of the year,' he said. 'However, this does not undermine the point that I just made, although I thank my colleague for  his  invaluable support and constant  readiness to correct minor if not downright  trivial errors.  I am a remarkably  truthful man, sir. Things said at University council meetings don't count.'

I MEAN HUMANITY IN GENERAL. ER... THE ACT OF TELLING THE UNIVERSE IT IS OTHER THAN IT is?

'You've  got me there,'  said  Ridcully. 'Anyway,  why're you doing the job?'

SOMEONE MUST. IT IS VITALLY IMPORTANT. THEY MUST BE SEEN, AND BELIEVED. BEFORE DAWN, THERE MUST BE ENOUGH BELIEF IN THE HOGFATHER.

'Why?' said Ridcully.

SO THAT THE SUN WILL COME UP.

The two wizards gawped at him.

I SELDOM JOKE, said Death.

At which point there was a scream of horror.

'That sounded like  the Bursar,' said Ridcully. 'And he's been doing so well up to now.'

The reason for the Bursar's scream lay on the floor of his bedroom.

It was a man. He was dead. No one alive had that kind of expression.

Some of the other  wizards had got there first. Ridcully pushed his way through the crowd.

'Ye gods,' he said. 'What a face! He looks as though he died of fright! What happened?'

'Well,' said the Dean,  'as  far as I can  tell, the Bursar  opened his wardrobe and found the man inside.'

'Really?  I  wouldn't have said  the  poor  old  Bursar  was  all  that frightening.'

'No, Archchancellor. The corpse fell out on him.'

The  Bursar  was  standing  in  the  corner, wearing  his old  familiar expression of good-humoured concussion.

'You all right, old fellow?' said Ridcully. 'What's eleven  per cent of 1,276?'

'One hundred and forty point three six,' said the Bursar promptly.

'Ah, right as rain,' said Ridcully cheerfully.

'I don't see why,' said the Chair of  Indefinite Studies. 'Just because he can do things with numbers doesn't mean everything else is fine.'

'Doesn't need to be,' said Ridcully. 'Numbers is what he has to do. The poor chap might be slightly yoyo, but I've been  reading about it. He's  one of these idiot servants.'

'Savants,' said the Dean patiently. 'The word is savants, Ridcully.'

'Whatever. Those chaps who can tell you  what day of the week the first of Grune was a hundred years ago...'

'...Tuesday...' said the Bursar.

'...but can't  tie their  bootlaces,' said Ridcully.  'What was  a corpse doing in his wardrobe? And

no one is to  say "Not a lot," or anythin' tasteless like that. Haven't had  a  corpse  in  a  wardrobe  since  that  business  with  Archchancellor Buckleby.'

'We all warned Buckleby that the lock was too stiff,' said the Dean.

'Just out of interest, why was the Bursar fiddling with his wardrobe at this time of night?' said Ridcully.

The wizards looked sheepish.

'We were... playing Sardines, Archchancellor,' said the Dean.

'What's that?'

'It's like Hide and Seek, but when you find someone you have to squeeze in with them,' said the Dean.

'I just want to be clear about this,' said Ridcully. 'My senior wizards have spent the evening playing Hide and Seek?'

'Oh, not the whole evening,' said  the Chair of Indefinite Studies. 'We played  Grandmother's Footsteps and I Spy for quite a while until the Senior Wrangler made a scene just because we wouldn't let him spell chandelier with an S.'

'Party games? You fellows?'

The Dean sidled closer.

'It's Miss Smith,' he  mumbled. 'When  we don't join in she bursts into tears.'

'Who's Miss Smith?'

'The Cheerful Fairy,' said the Lecturer in Recent Runes glumly. 'If you don't  say  yes to everything her  lip wobbles like a plate of  jelly.  It's unbearable.'

'We just joined  in to stop her weeping,' said the Dean. 'It's  amazing how one woman can be so soggy.'

'If  we're not cheerful she  bursts  into  tears,'  said  the Chair  of Indefinite Studies. 'The Senior Wrangler's doing some juggling  for  her  at the moment.'

'But he can't juggle!'

'I think that's cheering her up a bit.'

'What you're tellin' me, then, is that my  wizards are prancing  around playin' children's games just to cheer up some dejected fairy?'

'Er... yes.'

'I thought  you  had to clap  your  hands and say you believed in 'em,' said Ridcully. 'Correct me if I'm wrong.'

'That's just  for the little shiny  ones,' said the Lecturer in  Recent Runes.  'Not for the  ones  in  saggy  cardigans with half a  dozen  hankies stuffed up their sleeves.'

Ridcully looked at the corpse again.

'Anyone know who he is? Looks a bit of a ruffian to me. And where's his boots, may I ask?'

The Dean took  a small glass cube  from his pocket and ran it  over the corpse.

'Quite a  large  thaumic reading,  gentlemen,' he said. 'I think he got here by magic.'

He rummaged in the  man's pockets  and pulled out a  handful  of  small white things.

'Ugh,' he said.

'Teeth?' said Ridcully. 'Who goes around with a pocket full of teeth?'

'A very  bad fighter?' said the  Chair of Indefinite Studies.  'I'll go and get Modo to take the poor fellow away, shall W

'If we  can get a reading off the  thaumameter, perhaps Hex ... ' Ridcully began.

'Now,  Ridcully,' said  the Dean, 'I  really think there must be some problems that can be resolved without having to deal with that damn thinking mill.'

Death looked up at Hex.

A MACHINE FOR THINKING?

'Er...  yes, sir,'  said Ponder  Stibbons.  'You see,  when you said... well, you see,  Hex  believes everything...  but, look,  the sun really will come up, won't it? That's its job.'

LEAVE US.

Ponder backed away, and then scurried out of the room.

The ants  flowed along their tubes.  Cogwheels spun. The big wheel with the sheep skulls on it creaked around slowly. A mouse squeaked, somewhere in the works.

WELL? said Death.

After a while, the pen began to write.

+++ Big Red Lever Time +++ Query +++

NO. THEY SAY  YOU ARE A  THINKER.  EXTEND LOGICALLY THE  RESULT OF  THE HUMAN  RACE  CEASING TO BELIEVE  IN  THE  HOGFATHER. WILL  THE SUN  COME UP? ANSWER.

It took several minutes. The wheels spun. The ants  ran.  The mouse squeaked. An  eggtimer came down on a  spring. It bounced aimlessly for a while, and then jerked back up again.

Hex wrote: +++ The Sun Will Not Come Up +++

CORRECT. HOW MAY THIS BE PREVENTED? ANSWER.

+++ Regular and Consistent Belief +++

GOOD. I HAVE A TASK FOR YOU, THINKING ENGINE.

+++ Yes. I Am Preparing An Area Of WriteOnly Memory +++

WHAT IS THAT?

+++ You Would Say: To Know In Your Bones +++

GOOD. HERE IS YOUR INSTRUCTION. BELIEVE IN

THE HOGFATHER.

+++ Yes +++

DO YOU BELIEVE? ANSWER.

+++ Yes +++

DO... YOU... BELIEVE? ANSWER.

+++ YES +++

There was a change  in  the ill-assembled heap of pipes  and tubes that was Hex. The  big wheel creaked into a new position.  From the other side of the wall came the hum of busy bees.

GOOD.

Death turned to  leave the  room, but  stopped when Hex  began to write furiously. He went back and looked at the emerging paper.

+++ Dear Hogfather, For Hogswatch I Want

OH, NO. YOU CAN'T WRITE LETT... Death paused, and then said, YOU CAN, CAN'T YOU.

+++ Yes. I Am Entitled +++

Death waited until the pen had stopped, and picked up the paper.

BUT  YOU ARE  A  MACHINE. THINGS HAVE  NO  DESIRES.  A  DOORKNOB  WANTS NOTHING, EVEN THOUGH IT IS A COMPLEX MACHINE.

+++ All Things Strive +++

YOU  HAVE A POINT, said  Death. He  thought of tiny  red petals in  the black depths, and read to the end of the list.

I DON'T KNOW WHAT  MOST OF THESE  THINGS  ARE.  I DON'T  THINK THE SACK WILL, EITHER.

+++ I Regret This +++

BUT WE WILL DO THE BEST WE CAN, said Death.

FRANKLY, I  SHALL BE CLAD WHEN TONIGHT'S OVER. IT'S MUCH HARDER TO GIVE THAN TO RECEIVE. He rummaged in his sack. LET ME SEE... HOW OLD ARE YOU?

Susan crept up the stairs, one hand on the hilt of the sword.

Ponder Stibbons had been worried to find himself, as a wizard, awaiting the  arrival of  the Hogfather.  It's  amazing  how  people define roles for themselves  and  put  handcuffs  on  their  experience  and  are  constantly surprised  by the  things a roulette universe spins at them. Here am I, they say, a  mere wholesale fishmonger,  at the  controls  of  a  giant  airliner because as it turns out all the crew had the Coronation Chicken. Who'd have thought it?  Here  am  I, a  housewife  who merely went  out  this morning  to bank  the proceeds of the Playgroup Association's Car Boot Sale, on the run with one  million  in stolen cash  and a rather handsome man from the  Battery  Chickens'  Liberation Organization.  Amazing!  Here  am  I,  a perfectly ordinary hockey player, suddenly realizing I'm the Son of God with five hundred  devoted followers  in  a nice little  commune in  Empowerment, Southern California. Who'd have thought it?

Here am I,  thought Susan, a very practically minded governess  who can add up faster upside down than most people can the right way up, climbing up a toothshaped tower  belonging  to the Tooth Fairy  and armed with  a  sword belonging to Death...

Again!  I wish  one month, just one  damn  month, could  go by  without something like this happening to me.

She could hear voices above her. Someone said something about a lock.

She peered over the edge of the stairwell.

It looked as though people had been  camping  out  up here.  There were boxes and sleeping  rolls strewn around. A couple  of  men  were  sitting on boxes watching a third man who was working on a door in one curved wall. One of the  men  was the biggest Susan had ever seen,  one of those huge fat men who contrive to indicate that a lot of the fat under their shapeless clothes is muscle. The other

'Hello,' said a cheerful voice by her ear. 'What's your name?'

She made herself turn her head slowly.

First she saw the grey, glinting eye. Then the yellowwhite one with the tiny dot of a pupil came into view.

Around them was a friendly pink and white face topped by curly hair. It was  actually  quite  pretty, in  a boyish sort of  way, except  that  those mismatched eyes  staring out of it suggested  that  it  had been stolen from someone else.

She  started to move her hand but the boy was there first, dragging the sword scabbard out of her belt.

'Ah, ah!' he chided, turning and  fending her off as she tried  to grab it. 'Wen, well, well. My word. White bone handle, rather tasteless skull and bone decoration... Death himself's  second favourite weapon, am I right? Oh, my! This must be Hogswatch! And this must mean that you are Susan Sto-Helit. Nobility.  I'd  bow,'  he  added,  dancing back, 'but I'm  afraid  you'd  do something dreadful ...'

There  was  a click,  and a little gasp  of  excitement from the wizard working on the door.

'Yes! Yes! Left-handed using a wooden pick! That's simple!'

He saw that even Susan was looking at him, and coughed nervously.

'Er, I've  got  the  fifth lock  open, Mister  Teatime! Not a  problem! They're just based on Woddeley's

Occult Sequence! Any fool could do it if they knew that!'

'I know it,' said Teatime, without taking his eyes off Susan.

'Ah... '

It was not  technically  audible,  but nevertheless Susan could  almost hear the  wizard's mind  back-pedalling.  Up ahead  was the conclusion  that Teatime had no time for people he didn't need.

'...  with... inter...  est... ing subtleties,' he  said  slowly. 'Yes. Very tricky. I'll, er, just have a look at number six...'

'How do you know who I am?' said Susan.

'Oh, easy,' said  Teatime. 'Twurp's  Peerage. Family  motto Non temetis messor.  We have to read it, you know, in  class. Hah, old Mericet calls  it the Guide to the Turf. No one laughs except  him, of  course. Oh yes, I know about  you.  Quite  a lot. Your father was well  known. Went a long way very fast. As for your  grandfather...  honestly, that motto. Is that good taste? Of course, you don't need to fear him, do you? Or do you?'

Susan tried  to fade.  It  didn't work.  She could feel herself staying embarrassingly solid.

'I don't know  what you're  talking  about,' she said.  'Who  are  you, anyway?'

'I  beg  your  pardon. My name is  Teatime,  Jonathan  Teatime. At your service.'

Susan lined up the syllables in her head.

'You mean... like around four o'clock in the afternoon?' she said.

'No.  I did say Teh-ah-tim-eh,'  said  Teatime. 'I  spoke very clearly. Please  don't  try to  break  my  concentration by annoying  me. I  only get annoyed  at important things. How  are you getting  on,  Mr Sideney? If it's just  according  to  Woddeley's  sequence, number six  should be copper  and blue-green light. Unless, of course, there are any subtleties...'

'Er, doing it right now, Mister Teatime-'

'Do you think your  grandfather will try to rescue you? Do you think he will? But now I have his sword, you see. I wonder...'

There was another click.

'Sixth lock, Mister Teatime!'

'Really.'

'Er... don't you want me to start on the seventh?'

'Oh,  well,  if  you  like. Pure white  light will  be  the key,'  said Teatime, still not looking away from Susan. 'But it may not be all important now. Thank you, anyway. You've been most helpful.'

'Er...'

'Yes, you may go.'

Susan noticed that Sideney didn't even bother to pick up his books  and tools, but hurried  down the  stairs as if he expected to be called back and was trying to run faster than the sound.

'Is that all  you're here for?' she said.  'A robbery?'  He was dressed like  an  Assassin, after  all,  and there was  always one way  to  annoy an Assassin. 'Like a thief?'

Teatime danced excitedly. 'A thief? Me? I'm not a thief, madam. But if I were, I would be the kind that steals fire from the gods.'

'We've already got fire.'

'There must  be an  upgrade by  now. No,  these gentlemen are  thieves. Common  robbers.  Decent  types,  although you wouldn't necessarily  want to watch them eat,  for  example. That's Medium Dave and exhibit B is Banjo. He can talk.'

Medium  Dave nodded at Susan. She saw the look in his eyes. Maybe there was something she could use...

She'd  need  something. Even  her  hair was a mess.  She couldn't  step behind time,  she couldn't fade into  the background, and now even her  hair had let her down.

She was normal. Here, she was what she'd always wanted to be.

Bloody, bloody damn.

Sideney  prayed as  he ran down the stairs.  He  didn't  believe in any gods, since most wizards seldom like to encourage them, but he prayed anyway the fervent prayers of an atheist who hopes to be wrong.

But no one called him back. And no one ran after him.

So,  being  of  a serious  turn  of  mind  under  his normal  state  of sub-critical fear, he slowed down in case he lost his footing.

It was then that he noticed that the steps underfoot weren't the smooth whiteness they had been everywhere else but  were  very large, pitted flagstones.  And the light had changed, and then they weren't stairs any more and he staggered as he encountered flat ground where steps should have been.

His outstretched hand brushed against a crumbling brick.

And the ghosts  of the past poured in, and he knew where he was. He was in the yard of Gammer  Wimblestone's dame  school. His mother wanted  him to learn his letters and be a wizard, but she also thought that long curls on a five- year-old boy looked very smart.

This was the hunting ground of Ronnie Jenks.

Adult  memory   and   understanding   said  that  Ronnie  was  just  an unintelligent  bullet-headed  seven-year-old  bully  with muscles  where his brain  should  have  been. The  eye of childhood,  rather  more  accurately, dreaded  him as a force  like a  personalized earthquake  with  one  nostril bunged  up with bogies,  both knees scabbed,  both fists balled and all five brain cells concentrated in a kind of cerebral grunt.

Oh, gods. There was the  tree Ronnie used  to hide behind. It looked as big and menacing as he remembered it.

But... if somehow he'd ended up back  there, gods  knew  how, well,  he might be a bit on the skinny side but he was a damn sight bigger than Ronnie Jenks now. Gods, yes, he'd kick those evil little trousers all the...

And then, as a shadow blotted out  the sun, he realized  he was wearing curls.

Teatime looked thoughtfully at the door.

'I suppose I should open it,' he said, 'after coming all this way...'

'You're controlling children by their teeth,' said Susan.

'It  does sound  odd, doesn't  it,  when you  put it  like  that,' said Teatime. 'But that's sympathetic magic for you. Is your grandfather going to try to rescue you, do you think? But no... I don't think he can. Not here, I think. I don't think that he can come here. So he sent you, did he?'

'Certainly not! He...'  Susan stopped.  Oh,  he  had,  she  told herself, feeling even more of a fool. He certainly had. He was learning about humans, all right. For a walking skeleton, he could be quite clever...

But... how clever was Teatime? Just a bit too excited at his cleverness to realize  that if DeathShe tried  to stamp on  the  thought, just in  case Teatime could read it in her eyes.

'I don't think he'll try,' she said. 'He's not as clever as you, Mister Teatime.'

'Teh-ah-tim-eh,' said Teatime, automatically. 'That's a shame.'

'Do you think You're going to get away with this?'

'Oh, dear. Do people really say that?' And suddenly  Teatime was  much  closer.  'I've  got  away with it. No more Hogfather.  And that's only  the  start. We'll  keep the teeth coming in, of course. The possibilities...'

There was a rumble like an avalanche, a long way off. The dormant Banjo had awakened, causing tremors on his lower slopes. His enormous hands, which had been resting on his knees, started to bunch.

'What's dis?' he said.

Teatime stopped and, for a moment, looked puzzled.

'What's this what?'

'You said no more Hogfather,' said Banjo. He stood up, like  a mountain range rising gently  in the squeeze  between colliding continents. His hands still stayed in the vicinity of his knees.

Teatime stared at him and then glanced at Medium Dave.

'He does know what  we've been doing, does he?' he said. 'You  did tell him?'

Medium Dave shrugged.

'Dere's  got  to  be  a  Hogfather,'  said  Banjo.  'Dere's   always  a Hogfather.'

Susan looked down. Grey blotches were speeding across the white marble. She was  standing in a pool  of grey. So was Banjo.  And  around Teatime the dots bounced and recoiled like wasps around a pot of jam.

Looking for something, she thought.

'You don't believe in the Hogfather, do you?' said Teatime. 'A  big boy like you?'

'Yeah,' said Banjo. 'So what's dis "no more Hogfather"?'

Teatime pointed at Susan.

'She did it,' he said. 'She killed him.'

The sheer playground effrontery of it shocked Susan.

'No I didn't,' she said. 'He...'

'Did!'

'Didn't!'

'Did!'

Banjo's big bald head turned towards her.

'What's dis about the Hogfather?' he said.

'I don't think he's  dead,' said Susan. 'But Teatime has  made him very ill...'

'Who cares?' said Teatime,  dancing away.  'When this  is  over, Banjo, you'll have as many presents as you want. Trust me!'

'Dere's  got  to  be  a  Hogfather,' Banjo  rumbled.  'Else  dere's  no Hogswatch.'

'It's just another solar festival,' said Teatime. 'It-'

Medium Dave stood up. He had his hand on his sword.

'We're going,  Teatime,' he said. 'Me and Banjo are going. I don't like any of  this. I don't  mind robbing, I  don't mind  thieving, but this isn't honest. Banjo? You come with me right now!'

'What's dis about no more Hogfather?' said Banjo.

Teatime pointed to Susan.

'You grab her, Banjo. It's all her fault!'

Banjo lumbered a few steps in Susan's direction, and then stopped.

'Our mam said no hittin' girls,' he rumbled. 'No pullin' m hair...'

Teatime rolled his one good eye. Around his feet the greyness seemed to be boiling in the stone, following his feet as they moved. And it was around Banjo, too.

Searching, Susan thought. It's looking for a way in.

'I  think  I know you, Teatime,' she  said, as sweetly as she could for Banjo's sake. 'You're the mad kid they're all scared of, right?'

'Banjo?' snapped Teatime. 'I said grab her...'

'Our mam said...'

'The giggling  excitable  one even the bullies never touched because if they did he went insane and kicked and bit,' said Susan. 'The kid who didn't know  the  difference between chucking a stone  at  a cat and setting it  on fire.'

To her delight he glared at her.

'Shut up,' he said.

'I bet  no one  wanted to play with you,' said Susan. 'Not the kid with no friends. Kids know about a  mind like  yours even if they don't  know the right words for it...'

'I said shut up! Get her, Banjo!'

That was it. She could hear it in Teatime's voice. There was a touch of vibrato that hadn't been there before.

'The  kind of little boy,' she said, watching  his face, 'who  looks up dolls' dresses...'

'I didn't!'

Banjo looked worried.

'Our mam said...'

'Oh, to blazes with your mam!' snapped Teatime.

There was a whisper of steel as Medium Dave drew his sword.

'What'd you say about our mam?' he whispered.

Now he's having to concentrate on three people, Susan thought.

'I bet no one ever played with you,' she said. 'I bet there were things people had to hush up, eh?'

'Banjo! You do what I tell you!' Teatime screamed.

The monstrous man was beside her now. She could see his face twisted in an  agony  of  indecision. His enormous fists clenched and undenched and his lips moved as some kind of horrible debate raged in his head.

'Our... our mam... our mam said ...

The  grey marks flowed  across  the  floor  and formed a pool of shadow which grew  darker  and higher  with astonishing speed. It towered over  the three men, and grew a shape.

'Have you been a bad boy, you little perisher?'

The huge  woman towered over all three men. In one  meaty  hand  it was holding a bundle of birch twigs as thick as a man's arm.

The thing growled.

Medium  Dave looked up  into  the enormous face of Ma  Lilywhite. Every pore was a pothole. Every brown tooth was a tombstone.

'You  been letting  him get  into trouble,  our  Davey? You have, ain't you?'

He backed away. 'No, Mum... no, Mum. .

'You need a good hiding, Banjo? You been playing with girls again?'

Banjo sagged on to his knees, tears of misery rolling down his face.

'Sorry Mum sorry sorry Mum noooohhh Mum sorry Mum sorry sorry...'

Then the figure turned to Medium Dave again.

The sword dropped out of his hand. His face seemed to melt.

Medium Dave started to cry.

'No Mum no Mum no Mum nooooh Mum...'

He gave a gurgle and collapsed, clutching his chest. And vanished.

Teatime started to laugh.

Susan tapped him on  the shoulder and  ' as he looked round, hit him as hard as she could across the face.

That was the plan,  at  least.  His  hand moved  faster  and caught her wrist. It was like striking an iron bar.

'Oh, no,' he said. 'I don't think so.'

Out  of the corner of her eye Susan saw Banjo crawling across the floor to where his brother had been. Ma Lilywhite had vanished.

'This place gets into your head, doesn't it?' Teatime  said.  'It pokes around to find out  how to deal with you. Well, I'm in  touch with  my inner child.'

He reached out with his other hand  and grabbed  her  hair, pulling her head down.

Susan screamed.

'And it's much more fun,' he whispered.

Susan felt his grip lessen. There was a wet thump like a piece of steak hitting a slab and Teatime went past her, on his back.

'No pullin' girls' hair,' rumbled Banjo. 'That's bad.'

Teatime bounced, up like an acrobat and steadied himself on the railing of the stairwell.

Then he drew the sword.

The blade was invisible in the bright light of the tower.

'It's true what the stories say, then,' he said. 'So thin you can't see it. I'm going to have such fun with it.' He waved it at them. 'So light.'

'You wouldn't dare use it. My  grandfather  will come after you,'  said Susan, walking towards him.

She saw one eye twitch.

'He comes after everyone. But I'll be ready for him,' said Teatime.

'He's very single-minded,' said Susan, closer now.

'Ah, a man after my own heart.'

'Could be, Mister Teatime.'

He brought the sword around. She didn't even have time to duck.

And she didn't even try to when he swung the sword back again.

'It doesn't work here,' she said, as he stared at it in  astonishment.  'The blade doesn't  exist here. There's no  Death here!'

She slapped him across the face.

'Hi!' she said brightly. 'I'm the inner babysitter!'

She didn't punch. She just thrust  out an arm, palm first, catching him under the chin and lifting him backwards over the rail.

He  somersaulted.  She  never knew how.  He  somehow  managed  to  gain purchase on clear air.

His free arm grabbed at hers, her feet came off the ground, and she was over  the  rail.  She  caught it with her  other hand -  although later  she wondered if the rail hadn't managed to catch her instead.

Teatime  swung  from  her  arm,  staring  upwards   with  a  thoughtful expression. She saw him grip the sword  hilt in his teeth and reach down  to his belt

The question 'Is this person  mad enough to try to kill someone holding him?' was asked  and answered very, very fast... She kicked down and hit him on the ear.

The  cloth  of her sleeve  began to tear. Teatime  tried to get another grip.  She  kicked again  and the dress ripped. For an instant he held on to nothing and then, still wearing the  expression of someone trying to solve a complex problem, he fell away, spinning, getting smaller...

He hit the pile of teeth, sending  them splashing across the marble. He jerked for a moment...

And vanished.

A hand like a bunch of bananas pulled Susan back over the rail.

'You can get into trouble, hittin' girls,' said Banjo. 'No playin' with girls.'

There was a click behind them.

The doors had swung open. Cold white mist rolled out across the floor.

'Our mam---' said Banjo, trying to work things out. 'Our mam was here...'

'Yes,' said Susan.

'But it weren't our mam, 'cos they buried our mam...'

'Yes.'

'We watched 'em fill in the grave and everything.'

'Yes,' said Susan, and added to herself, I bet you did.

'And where's our Davey gone?'

'Er... somewhere else, Banjo.'

'Somewhere nice?' said the huge man hesitantly.

Susan  grasped with  relief  the opportunity to tell  the  truth, or at least not definitely lie.

'It could be,' she said.

'Better'n here?'

'You never know. Some people would say the odds are in favour.'

Banjo   turned   his  pink  piggy  eyes   on  her.  For   a  moment   a thirty-five-year-old   man   looked  out  through  the  pink  clouds   of  a five-year-old face.

'That's good,' he said. 'He'll be able to see our mam again.'

This much conversation seemed to exhaust him. He sagged.

'I wanna go home,' he said.

She  stared at  his big, stained face, shrugged  hopelessly,  pulled  a handkerchief out of her pocket and held it up to his mouth.

'Spit,' she commanded. He obeyed.

She  dabbed the  handkerchief over the  worst  parts and then tucked it into his hand.

'Have a good  blow,'  she suggested,  and then carefully  leaned out of range until the echoes of the blast had died away.

'You can keep the hanky. Please,' she added, meaning it wholeheartedly.

'Now tuck your shirt in.'

'Yes, miss.'

'Now, go downstairs and sweep all the teeth out  of the circle. Can you do that?'

Banjo nodded.

'What can you do?' Susan prompted.

Banjo concentrated. 'Sweep all the teeth out of the circle, miss.'

'Good. Off you go.'

Susan watched  him plod  off, and then looked at the white doorway. She was sure the wizard had only got as far as the sixth lock.

The room beyond the door was entirely white, and the mist  that swirled at knee level deadened even the sound of her footsteps.

All there was was a bed. It was a large fourposter, old and dusty.

She thought it was unoccupied and then she saw the figure, lying among the mounds of pillows. It  looked very much like a frail old lady in a mob cap.

The old woman turned her head and smiled at Susan.

'Hello, my dear.'

Susan  couldn't remember  a  grandmother. Her  father's mother had died when she was young and the other side of the family... well, she'd never had a grandmother. But this was the sort she'd have wanted.

The kind, the nasty realistic  side of her mind said, that hardly  ever existed.

Susan  thought  she heard  a  child laugh.  And another  one. Somewhere almost  out  of  hearing, children were at play. It  was  always a pleasant, lulling sound.

Always provided, of course, you couldn't hear the actual words.

'No,' said Susan.

'Sorry, dear?' said the old lady.

'You're not the Tooth Fairy.' Oh, no... there was even a damn patchwork quilt...

'Oh, I am, dear.'

'Oh, Grandma, what big teeth you have... Good grief, you've  even got a shawl, oh dear.'

'I don't understand, lovey...'

'You forgot the rocking chair,' said  Susan. 'I always  thought there'd be a rocking chair...'

There was a pop behind  her, and then  a  dying creakcreak. She  didn't even turn round.

'If you've included a kitten playing with a ball of wool it'll go  very hard with you,' she said  sternly, and picked up the candlestick by the bed. It seemed heavy enough.

'I  don't think you're real,' she  said  levelly. 'There's not a little old woman  in a shawl running this place. You're out of my head.  That's how you defend yourself... You poke around in people's heads and find the things that work...'

She swung the candlestick. It passed through the figure in the bed.

'See?' she said. 'You're not even real.'

'Oh, I am real, dear,' said the old woman, as her outline changed. 'The candlestick wasn't.'

Susan looked down at the new shape.

'Nope,' she said. 'It's horrible,  but it doesn't frighten  me. No, nor does that.'  It  changed  again,  and again. 'No,  nor  does my father. Good grief, you're scraping the bottom of the barrel, aren't you? I like spiders. Snakes don't  worry me.  Dogs?  No. Rats are fine,  I  like  rats. Sorry, is anyone frightened of that?'

She grabbed at the thing and this time the shape stayed. It looked like a small,  wizened  monkey, but with  big deep eyes  under a brow overhanging like  a balcony.  Its  hair was grey and  lank. It struggled  weakly  in her grasp, and wheezed.

'I  don't  frighten easily,'  said Susan,  'but you'd be amazed at  how angry I can become.'

The creature hung limp.

'I... I...' it muttered.

She let it down again.

'You're a bogeyman, aren't you?' she said.

It collapsed in a heap when she took her hand away.

'... Not a... The...' it said.

'What do you mean, the?' said Susan.

'The  bogeyman,'  said the bogeyman. And she saw how rangy it was,  how white and  grey streaked  its  hair,  how the skin  was stretched  over  the bones...

'The first bogeyman?'

'I...  there were...  I  do remember when the land  was different. Ice. Many  times  of...  ice.  And the...  what do  you call  them?' The creature wheezed. '... The lands, the big lands... all different...'

Susan sat down on the bed.

'You mean continents?'

'... all different.' The black sunken eyes glinted at  her and suddenly the thing reared up,  bony arms waving. 'I was  the dark in  the cave! I was the shadow  in the trees! You've  heard  about... the  primal  scream?  That was... at me! I was...' It folded up and started coughing. 'And then... that thing, you  know, that  thing... all light and bright... lightning you could carry, hot, little sunshine,  and then there was no more dark, just shadows, and then you made axes, axes in the forest, and then... and then...'

Susan  sat down on the  bed.  'There's still  plenty of  bogeymen,' she said.

'Hiding under beds! Lurking  in cupboards! But,' it fought  for breath, 'if you had seen me... in the  old days... when  they came  down into the  deep caves  to draw their hunting pictures... I  could roar  in  their heads...  so  that  their stomachs dropped out of their bottoms...'

'All the old skills are dying out,' said Susan gravely.

'...  Oh, others came  later... They never knew that first fine terror. All they knew,' even whispering, the  bogeyman managed to get a sneer in its voice, 'was dark corners. I had been the dark! I was the... first! And now I was no better  than them... frightening maids, curdling cream...  hiding  in shadows at the stub of the year... and then one night, I thought... why?'

Susan  nodded.  Bogeymen  weren't bright.  The  moment  of  existential uncertainty  probably took  a  lot  longer in heads  where  the  brain cells bounced so very slowly from one side of the skull to  the other. But ... Granddad had thought like that. You hung around  with humans long enough and you  stopped  being  what  they  imagined  you  to  be and wanted to  become something of your own. Umbrellas and silver hairbrushes...

'You thought: what was the point of it all?' she said.

'...  frightening children... lurking... and  then  I started to  watch them.  Didn't really used to be  children back  in the ice times... just big humans, little  humans,  not children...  and... and there  was  a different world in their heads... In their heads, that's where the  old days were now. The old days. When it was all young.'

'You came out from under the bed...'

'I watched over them... kept 'em safe...'

Susan tried not to shudder.

'And the teeth?'

'I... oh, you  can't  leave teeth around,  anyone  might get  them,  do terrible things. I liked them, I didn't  want anyone  to hurt  them...  ' it bubbled. 'I  never wanted to hurt  them, I just  used  to watch, I  kept the teeth  all safe... and, and, and sometimes I just sit here listening to them ... '

It  mumbled on. Susan  listened in embarrassed amazement,  not  knowing whether to take pity on the  thing or, and this was a  developing option, to tread on it.

'... and the teeth... they remember ...

It started to shake.

'The money?' Susan prompted. 'I don't see many rich bogeymen around.'

' ... money everywhere... buried in holes... old treasure... back  of sofas... it adds up... investments...  money for the  tooth, very important, part  of  the  magic,  makes  it  safe,  makes  it  proper,  otherwise  it's thieving... and I labelled 'em all, and kept 'em safe, and... and then I was old, but I  found people...' The  Tooth Fairy sniggered,  and for  a  moment Susan  felt  sorry  for  the  men  in the ancient  caves.  'They  don't  ask questions, do they?'  it bubbled. '...  You give  'em  money and they all do their jobs and they don't ask questions...'

'It's more than their job's worth,' said Susan.

I... and then they came... stealing...'

Susan gave in. Old gods do new jobs.

'You look terrible.'

... thank you very much . .

'I mean ill.'

'...very old... all those men, too much effort'

The bogeyman groaned.

'... you... don't die here,' it panted. 'Just get old, listening to the laughter...'

Susan nodded.  It  was  in  the air. She  couldn't hear words,  just  a distant chatter, as if it was at the other end of a long corridor.

'... and this place... it grew up round me...'

'The trees,' said Susan. 'And the sky. Out of their heads...'

'... dying... the little children... you've got to... I'

The figure faded.

Susan sat for a while, listening to the distant chatter.

Worlds  of belief, she  thought. Just like  oysters. A  little piece of shit gets in and then a pearl grows up around it.

She got up and went downstairs.

Banjo had found a broom  and  mop somewhere. The circle  was empty and, with surprising initiative, the man was carefully washing the chalk away.

'Banjo?'

'Yes, miss.'

'You like it here?'

'There's trees, miss.'

That probably counts as a 'yes', Susan decided. 'The sky  doesn't worry you?'

He looked at her in puzzlement.

'No, miss?'

'Can you count, Banjo?'

He looked smug.

'Yes, miss. On m'fingers, miss.'

'So  you can  count up to... ?' Susan prompted.  'Thirteen, miss,' said Banjo proudly.

She looked at his big hands.

'Good grief.'

Well, she thought, and why not? He's big and trustworthy and what other kind of life has he got?

'I think it  would  be a good idea  if you did  the  Tooth Fairy's job, Banjo.'

'Will that be all right, miss? Won't the Tooth Fairy mind?'

'You... do it until she comes back.'

'All right, miss.'

'I'll... er... get people to keep an eye on you,  until you get settled in. I think food comes in on the cart. You're  not to let people cheat you.' She looked at  his  hands and then up and up the lower slopes  until she saw the peak  of  Mount Banjo, and  added,  'Not that  I think they'll try, mind you.'

'Yes, miss. I will keep things tidy, miss. Er.

The big pink face looked at her.

'Yes, Banjo?'

'Can  I have a puppy, miss? I  had  a kitten once,  miss,  but our  mam drownded it 'cos it was dirty.'

Susan's memory threw up a name.

'A puppy called Spot?'

'Yes, miss. Spot, miss.'

'I think it'll turn up quite soon, Banjo.'

He seemed to take this entirely on trust.

'Thank you, miss.'

'And now I've got to go.'

'Right, miss.'

She looked back up  the tower. Death's land might be dark, but when you were there you never thought  anything bad was going to happen  to you.  You were beyond the places where it could. But here...

When you were grown up you  only feared, well, logical things. Poverty. Illness. Being found out. At least  you weren't mad  with terror because  of something under  the stairs. The world wasn't  full of  arbitrary light  and shade. The wonderful world of childhood? Well, it wasn't a  cut-down version of the adult one, that was certain. It was more like  the  adult one written in big heavy letters. Everything was... more. More everything.

She left Banjo to his  sweeping  and stepped  out into  the perpetually sunlit world.

Bilious and Violet  hurried towards her.  Bilious was  waving a  branch like a club.

'You don't need that,' said Susan. She wanted some sleep.

'We talked about  it and we thought  we  ought to come back  and help,' said Bilious.

'Ah. Democratic  courage,'  said Susan.  'Well,  they're all  gone.  To wherever they go.'

Bilious lowered the branch thankfully.

'It wasn't that-' he began.

'Look, you two can make yourselves useful,' said Susan. 'There's a mess in there. Go and help Banjo.'

'Banjo?'

'He's... more or less running the place now.'

Violet laughed.

'But he's-'

'He's in charge,' said Susan wearily.

'All  right,'  said Bilious. 'Anyway, I'm sure we can tell him  what to do...'

'No!  Too many  people have told him what  to do.  He knows what to do. Just help him get started, all right? But...'

If the Hogfather comes  back now, you'll vanish, won't you?  She didn't know how to phrase the question.

'I'm, er,  giving up my old job,' said Bilious. 'Er... I'm going  to go on working as a  holiday relief for the other gods.' He gave her  a pleading look.

'Really?' Susan looked  at Violet. Oh, well, maybe if  she believes  in him, at least... It might work. You never know.

'Good,' she said. 'Have fun. Now I'm going  home. This is  a hell of  a way to spend Hogswatch.'

She found Binky waiting by the stream.

The Auditors  fluttered  anxiously.  And, as  always happens  in  their species when something goes radically wrong and needs fixing instantly, they settled down to try to work out who to blame.

One said, It was...

And  then  it  stopped.  The  Auditors lived by consensus,  which  made picking scapegoats a  little problematical. It brightened up. After all,  if everyone was  to blame, then  it  was no  one's actual  fault.  That's  what collective responsibility meant, after  all. It  was more like  bad luck, or something.

Another said, Unfortunately, people might get the wrong idea. We may be asked questions.

One said, What about Death? He interfered, after all.

One said, Er... not exactly.

One said, Oh, come on. He got the girl involved.

One said, Er... no. She got herself involved.

One said, Yes, but he told her...

One said, No. He didn't. In fact he specifically did not tell--

It paused, and then said, Damn!

One said, On the other hand...

The robes turned towards it.

Yes?

One said, There's no actual evidence. Nothing written down. Some humans got  excited  and decided  to  attack the  Tooth  Fairy's country.  This  is unfortunate, but nothing to do with us. We are shocked, of course.

One said, There's still  the Hogfather. Things are going to be noticed. Questions may be asked.

They hovered for a while, unspeaking.

Eventually one said, We may have  to take... It paused,  loath even  to think the word, but managed to continue... a risk.

Bed, thought Susan, as the mists rolled past  her. And in the  morning, decent human things like coffee and porridge. And bed. Real things...

Binky stopped. She stared at his ears for a moment, and  then urged him forward. He whinnied, and didn't budge.

A skeletal hand had grabbed his bridle. Death materialized.

IT IS NOT OVER. MORE MUST BE DONE. THEY TORMENT HIM STILL.

Susan sagged. 'What is? Who are?'

MOVE FORWARD. I WILL  STEER.  Death climbed into the saddle and reached around her for the reins.

'Look, I went...' Susan began.

YES.  I  KNOW. THE CONTROL OF  BELIEF,  said Death, as  the horse moved forward again.  ONLY A VERY SIMPLE  MIND  COULD THINK OF THAT.  MAGIC SO OLD IT'S HARDLY MAGIC. WHAT A SIMPLE WAY TO MAKE MILLIONS  OF CHILDREN CEASE  TO BELIEVE IN THE HOGFATHER.

'And what were you doing?' Susan demanded.

I TOO HAVE DONE WHAT I SET  OUT TO DO. I HAVE  KEPT A  SPACE. A MILLION CARPETS  WITH SOOTY BOOTMARKS, MILLIONS OF FILLED STOCKINGS, ALL THOSE ROOFS WITH RUNNER MARKS ON THEM... DISBELIEF WILL FIND IT HARD GOING IN THE FACE OF THAT.  ALBERT SAYS HE NEVER WANTS TO DRINK ANOTHER SHERRY FOR  DAYS. THE HOGFATHER WILL HAVE SOMETHING TO COME BACK TO, AT LEAST.

'What have I got to do now?'

YOU MUST BRING THE HOGFATHER BACK.

'Oh, must  I? For peace and goodwill and  the tinkling  of fairy bells? Who  cares. He's just  some  fat old  clown  who makes people  feel smug  at Hogswatch!  I've been through all  this  for some old man  who prowls around kids' bedrooms?'

NO. SO THAT THE SUN WILL RISE.

'What has astronomy got to do with the Hogfather?'

OLD GODS DO NEW JOBS.

The Senior Wrangler wasn't attending the Feast. He got one of the maids to bring a tray  up  to his rooms, where he  was Entertaining and doing  all those things a man  does when he finds himself unexpectedly tкte-а-tкte with the opposite sex,  like  trying to shine his boots on his trousers and clean his fingernails with his other fingernails.

'A  little more  wine, Gwendoline? It's  hardly  alcoholic,'  he  said, leaning over her.

'I don't mind if I do, Mr Wrangler.'

'Oh, call me  Horace, please. And perhaps a little  something  for your chic-ken?'

'I'm  afraid  she  seems  to  have  wandered off somewhere,'  said  the Cheerful Fairy. 'I'm  afraid I'm, I'm I'm rather  dull  company...' She blew her nose noisily.

'Oh,  I  certainly  wouldn't say that,'  said the  Senior Wrangler.  He wished he'd had time to tidy up his rooms a bit, or at least get some of the more embarrassing bits of laundry off the stuffed rhinoceros.

'Everyone's been  so  kind,'  said the  Cheerful Fairy, dabbing at  her streaming eyes. 'Who was the skinny one that kept making the funny faces for me?'

'That was the Bursar. Why don't you...'

'He seemed very cheerful, anyway.'

'It's the  dried  frog pills, he eats them  by  the handful,'  said the Senior Wrangler dismissively. 'I say, why don't...'

'Oh dear. I hope they're not addictive.'

'I'm sure he wouldn't keep on eating them if they were addictive,' said the Senior Wrangler.  'Now, why  don't you have another glass of  wine,  and then... and then...'  a  happy thought struck him  '... and then... and then perhaps  I  could  show you Archchancellor  Bowell's  Remembrance?  It's got a-a-a-a very interesting ceiling. My word, yes.'

'That would be very nice,' said  the Cheerful Fairy. 'Would it cheer me up, do you think?'

'Oh,  it would, it would,' said the Senior Wrangler. 'Definitely! Good! So I'll, er, I'll just go and... just go and... I'll... ' He pointed vaguely in the direction of his  dressing room, while hopping  from one foot  to the other. 'I'll just go and, er... go... just...'

He fled into the dressing room and slammed the door behind him. His wild eyes scanned the shelves and hangers.

'Clean robe,' he mumbled. 'Comb  face, wash socks, fresh hair,  where's that Insteadofshave lotion...'

From the other side of the door came the adorable sound of the Cheerful Fairy  blowing her  nose.  From  this side  came the  sound  of  the  Senior Wrangler's muffled scream as, made careless  by haste and a very poor  sense of  smell, he mistakenly  splashed his face with the  turpentine he used for treating his feet.

Somewhere overhead a  very small  plump child with  a bow and arrow and ridiculously  unaerodynamic wings buzzed ineffectually against a shut window on which the frost was tracing the outline  of  a rather handsome  Auriental lady. The other window already had an icy picture of a vase of sunflowers.

In  the Great Hall one  of the tables had already collapsed. It was one of  the  customs of the Feast that  although  there  were many  courses each wizard went at  his  own speed, a tradition instituted to  prevent  the slow ones  holding everyone else  up.  And they  could also have seconds  if they wished, so that if  a wizard was particularly attracted to soup  he could go round and round for an hour before starting on the preliminary stages of the fish courses.

'How're you feeling now, old chap?' said the

Dean,  who  was  sitting next to the  Bursar. 'Back  on the dried  frog pills?'

'I, er, I, er,  no,  Im not  too bad,'  said  the  Bursar.  'It was, of course, rather a, rather a shock when-'

'That's a shame, because here's your Hogswatch present,' said the Dean, passing over a small box. It rattled. 'You can open it now if you like.'

'Oh, well, how nice...'

'It's from me,' said the Dean.

'What a lovely...'

'I bought it with my  own money, you know,'  said  the  Dean, waving  a turkey leg airily.

'The wrapping paper is a very nice...'

'More than a dollar, I might add.'

'My goodness...'

The Bursar pulled off the last of the wrapping paper.

'It's a box for keeping dried frog pills in. See? It's got "Dried  Frog Pills" on it, see?'

The Bursar shook  it. 'Oh, how  nice,'  he said  weakly. 'It's got some pills in it already. How thoughtful. They will come in handy.'

'Yes,' said the Dean. 'I took them off your dressing table.  After all, I was down a dollar as it was.'

The  Bursar nodded gratefully and put the little box  neatly beside his plate. They'd  actually allowed him knives  this  evening.  They'd  actually allowed him to eat other things than those things that could only be scraped up with a wooden spoon.

He eyed the nearest roast pig with nervous anticipation, and tucked his napkin firmly under his chin.

'Er, excuse me, Mr Stibbons,' he quavered. 'Would  you be so good as to pass me the apple sauce tankard-'

There was a  sound like coarse fabric ripping, somewhere in the air  in front of the  Bursar, and  a crash as something landed on  top of the  roast pig. Roast potatoes and gravy filled the air. The apple that had been in the pig's mouth was violently expelled and hit the Bursar on the forehead.

He blinked, looked down, and found he was about to plunge his fork into a human head.

'Ahaha,' he murmured, as his eyes started to glaze.

The wizards heaved aside the overturned dishes and smashed crockery.

'He just fell out of the air!'

'Is he an Assassin? Not one of their student pranks, is it?'

'Why's he holding a sword without a sharp bit?'

'Is he dead?'

'I think so!'

'I didn't even have any of that salmon mousse! Will you look at it? His foot's in it! It's all over the place! Do you want yours?'

Ponder  Stibbons  fought  his way through the throng. He knew his  more senior fellows when they  were feeling  helpful. They were  like a  glass of water to a drowning man.

'Give him air!' he protested.

'How do we know if he needs any?' said the Dean.

Ponder put his ear to the fallen youth's chest.

'He's not breathing!'

'Breathing spell,  breathing spell,' muttered the  Chair of  Indefinite Studies. 'Er... SpoIt's Forthright Respirator, perhaps? I think  I've got it written down somewhere...'

Ridcully reached through the wizards and pulled out the  black-clad man by a leg. He held him upside down in his big hand and thumped him heavily on the back.

He  met  their astonished gaze. 'Used to do this on the farm,' he said. 'Works a treat on baby goats.'

'Oh, now, really,' said the Dean, 'I don't...'

The corpse made a noise somewhere between a choke and a cough.

'Make  some space, you fellows!' the  Archchancellor bellowed, clearing an area of table with one sweep of his spare arm.

'Hey,  I hadn't  had  any of that Prawn Escoffe!'  said the Lecturer in Recent Runes.

'I didn't even know we had any,'  said the Chair of Indefinite Studies. 'Someone, and I name no names, Dean, shoved it behind the soft-shelled crabs so they could keep it for themselves. I call that cheap.'

Teatime  opened  his eyes. It said a  lot for  his constitution that it survived a very close-up view of Ridcully's nose, which filled the immediate universe like a big pink planet.

'Excuse me, excuse me,'  said Ponder, leaning over  with  his  notebook open,  'but  this  is  vitally  important for  the  advancement  of  natural philosophy.  Did you see any bright lights? Was there a shining  tunnel? Did any  deceased relatives attempt  to speak to  you? What word  most describes the...'

Ridcully pulled him away.

'What's all this, Mr Stibbons?'

'I really should talk to him, sir. He's had a near-death experience!'

'We all have. It's called  "living",' said  the Archchancellor shortly. 'Pour the poor lad a glass of spirits and put that damn pencil away.

'Uh... This must be Unseen University?' said  Teatime. 'And you are all wizards?'

'Now, just you lie still,' said Ridcully. But Teatime had already risen on his elbows.

'There was a sword,' he muttered.

'Oh, it's fallen on the floor,'  said  the Dean, reaching down. 'But it looks as though it's- Did I do that?'

The  wizards looked at  the  large curved slice  of table falling away. Something had cut through everything wood, cloth, plates, cutlery, food. The Dean swore that a candle flame that had been in the path of the unseen blade was only half a flame for a moment, until the wick realized that this was no way to behave.

The Dean raised his hand. The other wizards scattered.

'Looks like a thin blue line in the air,' he said, wonderingly.

'Excuse me, sir,' said Teatime, taking  it from  him. 'I really must be off.'

He ran from the hall.

'He won't get far,' said the Lecturer in Recent Runes. 'The main  doors are locked in accordance with Archchancellor Spode's Rules.'

'Won't  get far while holding a  sword  that appears to be  able to cut through anything,' said Ridcully, to the sound of falling wood.

'I  wonder  what  all that was  about?' said  the Chair  of  Indefinite Studies, and then turned his attention to the remains of the Feast. 'Anyway, at least this joint's been nicely carved

'Bu-bu-bu...'

They all turned.  The Bursar was  holding his hand in front of him. The cut surface of a fork gleamed at the wizards.

'Nice to know his new present will come in handy,' said the Dean. 'It's the thought that counts.'

Under  the table the  Blue Hen  of Happiness  relieved  itself  on  the Bursar's foot.

THERE  ARE...  ENEMIES,  said  Death,  as  Binky galloped  through  icy mountains.

'They're all dead...'

OTHER  ENEMIES. YOU MAY AS WELL KNOW THIS. DOWN IN THE DEEPEST KINGDOMS OF THE SEA, WHERE THERE IS NO LIGHT,  THERE LIVES A TYPE OF CREATURE WITH NO BRAIN AND NO EYES  AND  NO MOUTH.  IT  DOES NOTHING  BUT  LIVE AND PUT FORTH PETALS OF PERFECT  CRIMSON WHERE NONE ARE THERE TO SEE. IT IS NOTHING EXCEPT A  TINY YES IN THE NIGHT.  AND YET... AND YET... IT HAS ENEMIES THAT BEAR ON IT A  VICIOUS, UNBENDING MALICE, WHO WISH NOT ONLY FOR  ITS TINY LIFE  TO BE OVER BUT ALSO THAT IT HAD NEVER EXISTED. ARE YOU WITH ME SO FAR?

'Well, yes, but...'

GOOD. NOW, IMAGINE WHAT THEY THINK OF HUMANITY.

Susan  was shocked.  She  had  never  heard her  grandfather  speak  in anything other than calm tones. Now there was a cutting edge in his words.

'What are they?' she said.

WE MUST HURRY. THERE IS NOT MUCH TIME.

'I thought you always  had  time. I mean...  whatever it is you want to stop, you can go back in time and...'

AND MEDDLE?

'You've done it before ...'

THIS TIME IT IS OTHERS WHO ARE DOING IT. AND THEY HAVE NO RIGHT.

'What others?'

THEY HAVE NO NAME. CALL THEM THE AUDITORS. THEY  RUN THE UNIVERSE. THEY SEE TO IT THAT GRAVITY WORKS AND THE ATOMS SPIN, OR WHATEVER IT IS ATOMS DO. AND THEY HATE LIFE.

'Why?'

IT IS... IRREGULAR.  IT WAS NEVER SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN. THEY LIKE STONES, MOVING  IN CURVES.  AND  THEY HATE HUMANS MOST OF ALL. Death sighed. IN MANY WAYS, THEY LACK A SENSE OF HUMOUR.

'Why the Hog...'

IT IS THE THINGS  YOU BELIEVE WHICH MAKE YOU HUMAN. GOOD THINGS AND BAD THINGS, IT'S ALL THE SAME.

The mists parted. Sharp peaks were around them, lit by the glow off the snow.

'These  look like the  mountains where  the  Castle of Bones  was,' she said.

THEY ARE, said Death. IN A SENSE. HE HAS GONE BACK TO A PLACE HE KNOWS. AN EARLY PLACE...

Binky cantered low over the snow.

'And what are we looking for?' said Susan.

YOU WILL KNOW WHEN YOU SEE IT.

'Snow? Trees? I mean, could I have a clue? What are we here for?'

I TOLD YOU. TO ENSURE THAT THE SUN COMES UP.

'Of course the sun will come up!'

NO.

'There's no magic that'll stop the sun coming up!'

I WISH I WAS AS CLEVER AS YOU.

Susan stared down out of sheer annoyance, and saw something below.

Small dark  shapes moved across the whiteness, running as if  they were in pursuit of something.

'There's...  some sort of chase...'  she conceded. 'I can see some sort of animals but I can't see what they're after...'

Then she  saw  movement in  the snow, a blurred, dark shape dodging and skidding and never clear.  Binky dropped until his hooves grazed the tops of the pine  trees, which bent  in his  wake. A rumble followed  him across the forest, dragging broken branches and a smoke of snow behind it.

Now they were lower she could see the hunters clearly. They  were large dogs. Their quarry was indistinct, dodging  among snowdrifts, keeping to the cover of snow-laden bushes.

A drift exploded. Something  big  and long and blue-black  rose through the flying snow like a sounding whale.

'It's a pig!'

A BOAR. THEY DRIVE IT TOWARDS THE CLIFF. THEY'RE DESPERATE NOW.

She could hear the  panting of the creature. The dogs  made no sound at all.

Blood streamed onto the  snow from the wounds they had already  managed to inflict.

'This... boar,' said Susan. It's . .

YES.

'They want to kill the Hogf...'

NOT KILL.  HE KNOWS HOW TO DIE. OH, YES... IN THIS SHAPE, HE  KNOWS HOW TO DIE. HE'S HAD A LOT OF EXPERIENCE. NO, THEY  WANT  TO  TAKE AWAY HIS REAL LIFE, TAKE AWAY HIS SOUL, TAKE AWAY EVERYTHING. THEY MUST  NOT BE ALLOWED TO BRING HIM DOWN.

'Well, stop them!'

YOU MUST. THIS IS A HUMAN THING.

The  dogs moved  oddly. They weren't running  but flowing, crossing the snow faster than the mere movement of their legs would suggest.

'They don't look like real dogs ...

NO.

'What can I do?'

Death nodded his head towards the boar. Binky was keeping level with it now, barely a few feet away.

Realization dawned.

'I can't ride that!' said Susan.

WHY NOT? YOU HAVE HAD AN EDUCATION.

'Enough to know that pigs don't let people ride them!'

MERE ACCUMULATION OF OBSERVATIONAL EVIDENCE IS NOT PROOF.

Susan glanced ahead. The snowfield had a cut-off look.

YOU MUST, said her grandfather's voice in her head. WHEN HE REACHES THE EDGE THERE HE WILL STAND AT BAY. HE MUST NOT. UNDERSTAND? THESE ARE NOT REAL DOGS. IF THEY CATCH HIM HE WON'T JUST DIE, HE WILL... NEVER BE...

Susan leapt. For a moment she floated through the air,  dress streaming behind her, arms outstretched...

Landing on the animal's back  was like hitting a very, very firm chair. It stumbled for a moment and then righted itself.

Susan's  arms clung to  its neck  and her face was  buried in its sharp bristles. She could feel the heat under her. It was like riding a furnace.

And it stank of sweat, and blood, and pig. A lot of pig.

There was a lack of landscape in front of her.

The  boar  ploughed  into  the snow on  the  edge  of the  drop, almost flinging her off, and turned to face the hounds.

There were a lot of them. Susan was familiar with dogs. They'd had them at home like other houses had rugs. And these weren't that big floppy sort.

She rammed her heels in and grabbed  a pig's ear  in each  hand. It was like holding a pair of hairy shovels.

'Turn left!' she screamed, and hauled.

She put everything into  the command. It promised  tears before bedtime if disobeyed.

To her amazement the boar grunted, pranced on the lip  of the precipice and scrambled away, the hounds floundering as they turned to follow.

This was a plateau. From here it  seemed  to  be all edge, with no  way down except the very simple and terminal one.

The dogs were flying at the boar's heels again.

Susan  looked  around  in  the  grey, Sightless  air.  There  had to be somewhere, some way...

There was.

It was a shoulder of  rock, a giant knife-edge connecting this plain to the  hills  beyond. It was sharp and narrow, a thin line of snow with chilly depths on either side.

It was better than nothing. It was nothing with snow on it.

The boar reached  the edge and hesitated. Susan  put her head down  and dug her heels in again.

Snout  down, legs moving like pistons,  the beast plunged out  onto the ridge.  Snow sprayed up as its  trotters sought for purchase. It made up for lack of grace by  sheer manic effort, legs moving like a tap dancer climbing a moving staircase that was heading down.

'That's right, that's right, that's...'

A trotter slipped.  For a moment  the boar  seemed to stand on two, the others  scrabbling at icy rock.  Susan flung herself the other way, clinging to the neck, and felt the dragging abyss under her feet.

There was nothing there.

She told  herself, "He'll catch me if I  fall he'll catch  me if I fall, he'll catch me if I fall..."

Powdered ice made her eyes sting.  A  flailing  trotter  almost slammed against her head.

An older voice said, "No, he  won't. If I fall now I don't deserve to be caught."

The creature's eye was inches away. And then she knew...

... Out  of the depths of eyes of  all but the most unusual  of animals comes an echo. Out of the dark eye in front of her, someone looked back...

A  foot  caught the  rock and she concentrated  her  whole being on it, kicking herself upward in one last effort. Pig and woman rocked for a moment and then a trotter caught a  footing and the  boar plunged forward along the ridge.

Susan risked a look behind.

The dogs  still moved oddly.  There was a slight jerkiness about  their movements, as if they  flowed from position to position rather than moved by ordinary muscles.

Not dogs, she thought. Dog shapes.

There was  another shock underfoot. Snow flew up. The world tilted. She felt  the shape  of the boar change when its muscles  bunched  and  sent  it soaring  as  a slab of ice and rock came away and began  the long slide into darkness.

Susan  was thrown  off  when the creature landed, and tumbled into deep snow. She flailed around madly, expecting at any minute to begin sliding.

Instead her hand  found a snow-encrusted branch.  A few feet  away  the boar lay on its side, steaming and panting.

She pulled  herself upright. The spur here had widened out into a hill, with a few frosted trees on it.

The  dogs had  reached  the gap and were milling  round,  struggling to prevent themselves slipping.

They could easily clear the distance,  she could see. Even the boar had managed it with  her on  its  back. She put both hands around the branch and heaved; it came away with a crack, like a broken  icicle,  and  she waved it like a club.

'Come on,' she said. 'Jump! Just you try it! Come on!'

One did. The branch caught it  as it  landed, and  then Susan  spun and brought the branch  around on the upswing, lifted the dazed animal  off  its feet and out over the edge.

For a moment  the shape wavered  and then,  howling, it dropped out  of sight.

She danced a few steps of rage and triumph.

'Yes! Yes! Who wants some? Anyone else?'

The other dogs looked her in the eye, decided that no one did, and that there wasn't. Finally,  after one or two nervous  attempts, they  managed to turn, still sliding, and tried to make it back to the plateau.

A figure barred their way.

It  hadn't been  there a  moment ago  but  it looked permanent  now. It seemed to have been made of snow, three balls of snow piled on  one another. It had black dots for eyes. A  semi-circle of more dots formed the semblance of a mouth. There was a carrot for the nose.

And, for the arms, two twigs.

At this distance, anyway.

One of them was holding a curved stick.

A raven wearing a damp piece of red paper landed on one arm.

'Bob bob bob?' it suggested.  'Merry Solstice? Tweetie tweet?  What are you waiting for? Hogswatch?'

The dogs backed away.

The snow broke off the snowman in chunks, revealing a gaunt figure in a flapping black robe.

Death spat out the carrot.

HO. HO. HO.

The grey bodies smeared and rippled as the hounds sought desperately to change their shape.

YOU COULDN'T RESIST IT? IN THE END? A MISTAKE, I FANCY.

He  touched the  scythe. There  was a  click  as the blade flashed into life.

IT GETS UNDER  YOUR SKIN, LIFE, said  Death, stepping forward. SPEAKING METAPHORICALLY, OF COURSE. IT'S A HABIT THAT'S  HARD TO GIVE UP. ONE PUFF OF BREATH IS NEVER ENOUGH. YOU'LL FIND YOU WANT TO TAKE ANOTHER.

A dog started  to  slip on  the snow  and scrabbled desperately to save itself from the long, cold drop.

AND, YOU SEE,  THE  MORE YOU  STRUGGLE FOR EVERY MOMENT, THE MORE ALIVE YOU STAY... WHICH IS WHERE I COME IN, AS A MATTER OF FACT.

The  leading dog  managed,  for a moment,  to become a grey  led figure before being dragged back into shape.

FEAR,  TOO, IS AN  ANCHOR, said  Death.  ALL THOSE SENSES, WIDE OPEN TO EVERY FRAGMENT OF THE WORLD. THAT BEATING HEART. THAT RUSH OF BLOOD. CAN YOU NOT FEEL IT, DRAGGING YOU BACK?

Once again the Auditor managed to retain a shape for a few seconds, and managed to say: 'You cannot do this, there are rules!'

YES. THERE ARE RULES. BUT YOU BROKE THEM. HOW DARE YOU? HOW DARE YOU?

The scythe blade was a thin blue outline in the grey light.

Death  raised  a  thin  finger to  where his lips might have been,  and suddenly looked thoughtful.

AND NOW THERE REMAINS ONLY ONE FINAL QUESTION, he said.

He  raised  his hands, and  seemed to grow.  Light  flared  in his  eye sockets. When he spoke next, avalanches fell in the mountains.

HAVE YOU BEEN NAUGHTY... OR NICE? HO. HO. HO.

Susan heard the wails die away.

The boar lay in  white snow that was now red with blood. She knelt down and tried to lift its head.

It was dead. One eye stared at nothing. The tongue lolled.

Sobs welled up  inside her.  The tiny part of Susan that  watched,  the inner  baby-sitter,  said  it  was  just exhaustion and  excitement  and the backwash of adrenalin. She couldn't be crying over a dead pig.

The rest of her drummed on its flank with both fists.

'No, you can't! We saved you! Dying isn't how it's supposed to go!'

A breeze blew up.

Something  stirred  in the  landscape,  something under the  snow.  The branches  on  the ancient trees  shook gently, dislodging little  needles of ice.

The sun rose.

The light streamed over Susan like a silent  gale. It was dazzling. She crouched  back, raising  her forearm to  cover  her eyes. The great red ball turned frost to fire along the winter branches.

Cold light slammed into the mountain peaks, making every one a blinding, silent volcano. It rolled  onward, gushing into the valleys and thundering up the slopes, unstoppable...

There was a groan.

A man lay in the snow where the boar had been.

He was naked except for an animal skin loincloth. His hair was long and had been  woven  into a  thick plait down his back, so matted with blood and grease that  it looked like felt. And he was bleeding everywhere the  hounds had caught him.

Susan watched for  a  moment, and  then, thinking  with something other than her head, methodically tore some  strips from her petticoat  to bandage the more unpleasant wounds.

Capability,  said the  small part  of  her  mind.  A rational  head  in emergencies.

Rational something, anyway.

It's probably some kind of character flaw.

The man was tattooed. Blue  whorls and  spirals haunted his skin, under the blood.

He opened his eyes and stared at the sky.

'Can you get up?'

His gaze flicked to her. He tried moving and then fell back.

Eventually  she managed to  pull the man up into a sitting position. He swayed as she put one of his arms across her shoulders and  then heaved  him to his  feet. She  did her best to  ignore  the  sting,  which had an almost physical force.

Downhill seemed the best option.  Even if his brain wasn't working yet, his feet seemed to get the idea.

They lurched  down through the freezing woods, the snow  glowing orange in  the risen sun. Cold  blue  gloom  lurked in hollows  like little cups of winter.

Beside her, the tattooed man  made  a gurgling sound. He slipped out of her grasp and  landed on  his knees in the snow, clutching at his throat and choking. His breath sounded like a saw.

'What now? What's the matter? What's the matter?'

He rolled his eyes at her and pawed at his throat again.

'Something stuck?' She slapped him  as hard as  she  could on the back, but now he was on his hands and knees, fighting for breath.

She put her  hands under his shoulders and pulled him  upright, and put her  arms around his waist. Oh, gods, how was it supposed  to go, she'd gone to classes about it, now, didn't you have to bunch  up one fist and then put the other hand around it and then pull up and in like this...

The  man  coughed  and something bounced off a tree and landed  in  the snow.

She knelt down to have a look.

It was a small black bean.

A bird trilled, high on a branch.  She  looked up. A wren bobbed at her and fluttered to another twig.

When she looked back, the man was different. He  had clothes now, heavy furs,  with  a  fur  hood  and fur boots.  He  was  supporting  himself on a stone-tipped spear, and looked a lot stronger.

Something  hurried  through  the  wood,  barely  visible except  by its shadow.  For a  moment she glimpsed a white hare before it sprang away on  a new path.

She looked  back.  Now the furs  had gone  and  the man  looked  older, although he had the same eyes. He was wearing thick white robes, and  looked very much like a priest.

When  a  bird  called again she didn't look away. And she realized that she'd been mistaken  in  thinking that the man changed  like the  turning of pages. All the images were there at once, and many others too.  What you saw depended on how you looked.

Yes. It's a  good  job I'm cool and totally used to this sort of thing, she thought. Otherwise I'd be rather worried...

Now they were at the edge of the forest.

A little way  off, four  huge  boars stood  and steamed, in front  of a sledge that  looked as if  it  had been put together out of  crudely trimmed trees.  There were faces in the blackened  wood,  possibly  carved by stone, possibly carved by rain and wind.

The  Hogfather  climbed  aboard and sat down. He'd put on weight in the last few yards and  now  it was almost impossible to see anything other than the huge, redrobed  man, ice crystals settling here and there on  the cloth. Only in the occasional sparkle of frost was there a hint of hair or tusk.

He shifted on the seat and then reached down to extricate a false beard, which he held up questioningly.

SORRY, said a voice behind Susan. THAT WAS MINE.

The Hogfather nodded at Death, as one craftsman to another, and then at Susan. She wasn't sure if  she was being thanked -  it was more a gesture of recognition, of acknowledgement that  something that needed doing had indeed been done. But it wasn't thanks.

Then he shook the reins and clicked his teeth and the sledge slid away.

They watched it go.

'I  remember  hearing,'  said  Susan distantly, 'that the  idea of  the Hogfather wearing a red and white outfit was invented quite recently.'

NO. IT WAS REMEMBERED.

Now the Hogfather was a red dot on the other side of the valley.

'Well, that about  wraps it up for this dress,'  said Susan.  'I'd just like to ask, just out of  academic interest... you were sure I  was going to survive, were you?'

I WAS QUITE CONFIDENT.

'Oh, good.'

I WILL GIVE YOU A LIFT BACK, said Death, after a while.

'Thank you. Now... tell me . .

WHAT WOULD HAVE HAPPENED IF YOU HADN'T SAVED HIM?

'Yes! The sun would have risen just the same, yes?'

NO.

'Oh, come on. You can't expect me to believe that. It's an astronomical fact.'

THE SUN WOULD NOT HAVE RISEN.

She turned on him.

'It's been  a long night,  Grandfather! I'm tired and I need  a bath! I don't need silliness!'

THE SUN WOULD NOT HAVE RISEN.

'Really? Then what would have happened, pray?'

A MERE BALL OF FLAMING GAS WOULD HAVE ILLUMINATED THE WORLD.

They walked in silence for a moment.

'Ah,' said  Susan  dully. 'Trickery  with words.  I would have  thought you'd have been more literal-minded than that.'

I AM NOTHING IF NOT LITERAL-MINDED. TRICKERY WITH WORDS IS WHERE HUMANS LIVE.

'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.

She tried to assemble her thoughts.

THERE IS A PLACE WHERE  TWO GALAXIES HAVE  BEEN COLLIDING FOR A MILLION YEARS, said Death, apropos of nothing. DON'T TRY TO TELL ME THAT'S RIGHT.

'Yes,  but people don't think about that,'  said Susan. Somewhere there was a bed...

CORRECT. STARS EXPLODE, WORLDS COLLIDE, THERE's HARDLY ANYWHERE IN  THE UNIVERSE  WHERE HUMANS CAN LIVE WITHOUT BEING FROZEN OR  FRIED, AND  YET YOU BELIEVE THAT A... A BED IS A NORMAL THING. IT IS THE MOST AMAZING TALENT.

'Talent?'

OH, YES. A VERY SPECIAL KIND OF STUPIDITY. YOU THINK THE WHOLE UNIVERSE IS INSIDE YOUR HEADS.

'You make us sound mad,' said Susan. A nice warm bed...

NO. YOU NEED TO  BELIEVE IN THINGS THAT AREN'T  TRUE. HOW ELSE CAN THEY BECOME? said Death, helping her up on to Binky.

'These  mountains,'  said Susan,  as  the horse  rose. 'Are  they  real mountains, or some sort of shadows?'

YES.

Susan knew that was all she was going to get.

'Er... I lost the sword. It's somewhere in the Tooth Fairy's country.'

Death shrugged. I CAN MAKE ANOTHER.

'Can you?'

OH, YES. IT WILL GIVE ME SOMETHING TO DO. DON'T WORRY ABOUT IT.

The  Senior  Wrangler  hummed  cheerfully  to himself as he  ran a comb through his beard for the second time  and  liberally sprinkled it with what would turn out  to  be  a preparation  of  weasel  extract for demon removal rather than,  as he had  assumed, a  pleasant masculine Scent.[23]  Then  he stepped out into his study.

'Sorry for the delay, but...' he began.

There  was  no one there.  Only,  very  far off,  the sound of  someone blowing their nose mingling with the glingleglingleglingle of fading magic.

The fight  was already gilding the top of  the Tower of  Art when Binky trotted to a standstill on the air beside the nursery balcony. Susan climbed down onto  the fresh  snow and  stood uncertainly for a moment. When someone has  gone out of their  way to drop you home it's only courteous to ask them in. On the other hand...

WOULD YOU LIKE TO VISIT  FOR HOGSWATCH DINNER?  said  Death. He sounded hopeful. ALBERT IS FRYING A PUDDING.

'Frying a pudding?'

ALBERT UNDERSTANDS FRYING. AND I BELIEVE  HE'S MAKING JAM. HE CERTAINLY KEPT TALKING ABOUT IT.

'I... er... they're really expecting me here,' said Susan. 'The Gaiters do  a lot of entertaining. His business friends. Probably the whole day will be... I'll more or less have to look after the children...'

SOMEONE SHOULD.

'Er... would you like a drink before you go?' said Susan, giving in.

A CUP OF COCOA WOULD BE APPROPRIATE IN THE CIRCUMSTANCES.

'Right. There's biscuits in the tin on the mantelpiece.'

Susan headed with relief into the tiny kitchen.

Death sat down in the creaking wicker chair, buried his feet in the rug and  looked around with interest. He  heard the clatter of  cups, and then a sound like indrawn breath, and then silence.

Death  helped himself to a biscuit  from  the tin. There  were two full stockings hanging from the  mantelpiece.  He  prodded them with professional satisfaction, and then sat down again and observed the nursery wallpaper. It seemed to be pictures of rabbits  in waistcoats,  among  other  fauna.  He was not surprised. Death  occasionally turned  up in person even for rabbits, simply to see  that the whole process was working properly. He'd never seen one wearing a waistcoat. He wouldn't have expected waistcoats. At least, he wouldn't have expected waistcoats if he hadn't  had some experience of the way humans portrayed the universe.  As it was, it was only a blessing they hadn't been given gold watches and top hats as well.

Humans liked dancing pigs, too. And lambs  in hats. As far as Death was aware, the sole  reason for any human association with pigs and lambs was as a  prelude  to chops  and sausages.  Quite  why  they  should  dress up  for children's wallpaper as well was a mystery. Hello, little folk, this is what you're going  to eat... He felt that  if only he could find  the key  to it, he'd know a lot more about human beings.

His gaze travelled  to  the door. Susan's governess  coat and  hat were hanging on it. The  coat was grey, and so  was the  hat. Grey and round  and dull. Death didn't know many things about the human psyche, but he  did know protective coloration when he saw it.

Dullness.  Only humans could  have  invented it. What imaginations they had.

The door opened.

To his horror, Death saw a small  child of unidentifiable gender come out of the bedroom, amble  sleepily across  the floor and unhook the  stockings  from  the mantelpiece. It was halfway back before it noticed him  and  then it  simply stopped and regarded him thoughtfully.

He knew  that young  children could  see  him because they  hadn't  yet developed  that  convenient  and  selective blindness  that comes  with  the intimation of personal mortality. He felt a little embarrassed.

'Susan's gotta poker, you know,' it said, as if anxious to be helpful.

WELL, WELL. INDEED. MY GOODNESS ME.

'I fort -  thought all of  you knew  that now.  Larst -  last week  she picked a bogey up by its nose.'

Death tried to imagine this. He felt sure he'd heard the sentence wrong but it didn't sound a whole lot better however he rearranged the words.

'I'll give Gawain his stocking  and then I'll come an' watch,' said the child. It padded out.

ER... SUSAN? Death said, calling in reinforcements.

Susan backed out of the kitchen, a black kettle in her hand.

There was a figure behind her. In the half-light the sword gleamed blue along its blade. Its glitter reflected off one glass eye.

'Well, well,' said Teatime,  quietly, glancing at  Death. 'Now this  is unexpected. A family affair?'

The sword hummed back and forth.

'I wonder,' said Teatime, 'is it possible to kill Death? This must be a

very special sword and it certainly works here...' He raised a hand to his

mouth for a moment and gave  a little chuckle.  'And of course it might

well not be regarded as murder. Possibly it  is a civic act. It would be, as

they say, The Big One. Stand up,  sir. You may  have some personal knowledge

about your vulnerability but I'm pretty certain that Susan  here would quite

definitely die, so I'd rather you didn't try any last-minute stuff.'

I AM LAST-MINUTE STUFF, said Death, standing up.

Teatime circled around carefully, the sword's tip  making little curves

in the air.

From the next room came the  sound of someone trying  to blow a whistle

quietly.

Susan glanced at her grandfather.

'I  don't  remember them asking  for anything  that  made a noise,' she

said.

OH, THERE HAS TO BE SOMETHING IN THE STOCKING THAT MAKES A  NOISE, said

Death. OTHERWISE WHAT is 4.30 A.M. FOR?

'There are children?' said Teatime. 'Oh yes, of course. Call them.'

'Certainly not!'

'It will be instructive,' said  Teatime. 'Educational.  And  when  your

adversary is Death, you cannot help but be the good guy.'

He pointed the sword at Susan.

'I said call them.'

Susan glanced hopefully at her grandfather. He nodded. For a moment she

thought she saw  the  glow  in one eye socket flicker  off and  on,  Death's

equivalent of a wink. He's got a plan. He can stop time. He can do anything.

He's got a plan.

'Gawain? Twyla?'

The muffled  noises stopped  in the next room. There  was  a padding of

feet and two solemn faces appeared round the door.

'Ah, come in, come in, curly-haired tots,' said Teatime genially.

Gawain gave him a steely stare.

His  next mistake, thought Susan. If  he'd called  them little bastards

he'd have them bang on his side. But they know when you're sending them up.

'I've caught  this bogeyman,' said Teatime. 'What shall we do with him,

eh?'

The two faces turned to Death. Twyla put her thumb in her mouth.

'It's only a skeleton,' said Gawain critically.

Susan opened her  mouth, and the sword  swung towards her. She  shut it

again.

'Yes, a nasty, creepy, horrible skeleton,' said Teatime. 'Scary, eh?'

There was a very faint 'pop' as Twyla took her thumb out of her mouth.

'He's eating a bittit,' she said.

'Biscuit,'  Susan corrected  automatically.  She started to  swing  the

kettle in an absent-minded way.

'A creepy bony man in a black robe!'  said  Teatime,  aware that things

weren't going in quite the right direction.

He spun  round to face Susan. 'You're fidgeting  with that kettle,'  he

said. 'So I expect you're thinking of doing something creative. Put it down,

please. Slowly.'

Susan knelt down gently and put the kettle on the hearth.

'Huh,   that's   not  very  creepy,  it's  just   bones,'  said  Gawain

dismissively. 'And anyway  Willie the groom down at the stables has promised

me a real horse  skull. And anyway I'm going to make a  hat  out of  it like

General Tacticus had when he wanted to frighten people. And anyway it's just

standing  there. It's not  even  making woo-  woo noises. And  anyway you're

creepy. Your eye's weird.'

'Really?  Then  let's see how creepy I can be,' said Teatime. Blue fire

crackled along the sword as he raised it.

Susan closed her hand over the poker.

Teatime saw her start to turn. He stepped behind Death, sword raised...

Susan  threw  the  poker  overarm. It  made a ripping  noise as it shot

through the air, and trailed sparks.

It hit Death's robe and vanished.

He blinked.

Teatime smiled at Susan.

He turned and peered dreamily at the sword in his hand.

It fell out of his fingers.

Death turned and caught it by the handle as it  tumbled, and turned its

fall into an upward curve.

Teatime looked down at the poker in his chest as he folded up.

'Oh, no,' he said. 'It couldn't have gone

through you. There are so many ribs and things!'

There was another 'pop' as Twyla extracted her thumb and said, 'It only

kills monsters.'

'Stop time now,' commanded Susan.

Death snapped  his  fingers.  The room took  on the  greyish purple  of

stationary time. The clock paused its ticking.

'You winked at me! I thought you had a plan!'

INDEED. OH, YES. I PLANNED TO SEE WHAT YOU WOULD DO.

'Just that?'

YOU ARE VERY RESOURCEFUL. AND OF COURSE YOU HAVE HAD AN EDUCATION.

'What?'

I DID ADD THE SPARKLY STARS AND THE NOISE, THOUGH. I THOUGHT THEY WOULD

BE APPROPRIATE.

'And if I hadn't done anything?'

I DARESAY I WOULD HAVE THOUGHT OF SOMETHING. AT THE LAST MINUTE.

'That was the last minute!'

THERE IS ALWAYS TIME FOR ANOTHER LAST MINUTE.

'The children had to watch that!'

EDUCATIONAL. THE WORLD  WILL TEACH THEM ABOUT MONSTERS SOON ENOUGH. LET

THEM REMEMBER THERE's ALWAYS THE POKER.

'But they saw he's human--'

I THINK THEY HAD A VERY GOOD IDEA OF WHAT HE WAS.

Death prodded the fallen Teatime with his foot.

STOP PLAYING DEAD, MISTER TEH-AH-TIM-EH.

The  ghost  of  the  Assassin sprang  up  like  a jack-in-  thebox, all

slightly crazed smiles.

'You got it right!'

OF COURSE.

Teatime began to fade.

I'LL  TAKE  THE  BODY,  said  Death.  THAT  WILL  PREVENT  INCONVENIENT

QUESTIONS.

'What did he do it all for?' said Susan. 'I mean, why? Money? Power?'

SOME PEOPLE WILL  DO  ANYTHING FOR THE SHEER  FASCINATION OF  DOING IT,

said Death. OR FOR

FAME. OR BECAUSE THEY SHOULDN'T.

Death picked up the corpse and slung it  over his shoulder. There was a

sound of something bouncing on the hearth. He turned, and hesitated.

ER... YOU DID KNOW THE POKER WOULD GO THROUGH ME?

Susan realized she was shaking.

'Of course. In this room it's pretty powerful.'

YOU WERE NEVER IN ANY DOUBT?

Susan hesitated, and then smiled.

'I was quite confident,' she said.

All. Her grandfather  stared at her  for a  moment and she thought  she

detected just the tiniest flicker of uncertainty. OF COURSE. OF COURSE. TELL

ME, ARE YOU LIKELY TO TAKE UP TEACHING ON A LARGER SCALE?

'I hadn't planned to.'

Death turned towards the balcony, and then seemed to remember something

else. He fumbled inside his robe.

I HAVE MADE THIS FOR YOU.

She 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.

'Oh. Er. Good. Granddad?'

YES?

'Why? I mean, why did you do all this?'

He stood quite still for a moment, as if he was trying out sentences in

his mind.

I THINK IT'S  SOMETHING  TO  DO WITH HARVESTS, he  said at  last.  YES.

THAT'S  RIGHT. AND  BECAUSE HUMANS ARE SO INTERESTING THAT  THEY  HAVE  EVEN

INVENTED DULLNESS. QUITE ASTONISHING.

'Oh.'

WELL THEN... HAPPY HOGSWATCH.

'Yes. Happy Hogswatch.'

Death paused again, at the window.

AND GOOD NIGHT, CHILDREN... EVERYWHERE.

The raven fluttered down onto a log covered in snow. Its prosthetic red breast had been torn and fluttered uselessly behind it.

'Not so much as a lift home,' it muttered. 'Look at this,  willya? Snow and  frozen wastes, everywhere. I couldn't fly another  damn  inch. I  could starve to  death here, you know? Hah! People're going on about recycling the whole time, but you just try  a  bit  of practical ecology  and they just... don't... want... to... know. Hah! I bet a robin'd have a lift home. Oh yes.'

SQUEAK, said the Death of Rats sympathetically, and sniffed.

The raven watched the small hooded figure scrabble at the snow.

'So I'll just freeze to  death here, shall  l?'  it said  gloomily.  'A pathetic bundle of feathers  with my  little feet  curled up with the  cold. It's not even as if I'm gonna make  anyone a  good meal, and let me tell you it's a disgrace to die thin in my spec-'

It became  aware that under the snow was a  rather grubbier  whiteness. Further scraping by the rat exposed something that could  very possibly have been an ear.

The raven stared. 'It's a sheep!' it said.

The Death of Rats nodded.

'A whole sheep!'[24]

SQUEAK.

'Oh, wow!'  said the raven,  hopping  forward  with its eyes  spinning. 'Hey, it's barely cool!'

The Death of Rats patted it happily on a wing.

SQUEAK-EEK. EEK-SQUEAK...

'Why, thanks. And the same to you... '

Far, far away and a long, long time ago, a shop door opened. The little toymaker bustled in  from the workshop  in the rear, and then stopped,  with amazing foresight, dead.

YOU  HAVE  A  BIG  WOODEN  ROCKING  HORSE  IN THE WINDOW, said  the new customer.

'Ah,  yes,  yes,  yes.'  The  shopkeeper  fiddled  nervously  with  his square-rimmed spectacles. He  hadn't heard the  bell, and this  was worrying him.  'But  I'm  afraid  that's just for  show, that is  a special order for Lord...'

NO. I WILL BUY IT.

'No, because, you see...'

THERE ARE OTHER TOYS?

'Yes, indeed, but...'

THEN I WILL TAKE THE HORSE. HOW MUCH WOULD THIS LORDSHIP HAVE PAID YOU?

'Er, we'd agreed twelve dollars but...'

I WILL GIVE YOU FIFTY, said the customer.

The  little shopkeeper stopped  in  midremonstrate and  started  up  in mid-greed.  There  were  other  toys,  he told  himself  quickly.  And  this customer, he thought with considerable prescience, looked like  someone  who did not take no for an answer and seldom even bothered to ask the  question. Lord  Selachii  would  be  angry,  but Lord Selachii wasn't here. The stranger, on the other hand, was here. Incredibly here.

'Er... well, in the circumstances... er... shall I wrap it up for you?'

NO. I WILL TAKE IT AS IT IS. THANK  YOU. I WILL LEAVE VIA THE BACK WAY, IF IT'S ALL THE SAME TO YOU.

'Er... how  did you get in?' said the shopkeeper, pulling the horse out of the window.

THROUGH  THE  WALL.  SO MUCH  MORE CONVENIENT THAN  CHIMNEYS, DON'T YOU THINK?

The apparition dropped a small  clinking bag on the  counter and lifted the  horse  easily.  The shopkeeper  wasn't in  a position  to  hold  on  to anything. Even yesterday's dinner was threatening to leave him.

The figure looked at the other shelves.

YOU MAKE GOOD TOYS.

'Er... thank you.'

INCIDENTALLY, said  the customer, as he left, THERE  IS A SMALL BOY OUT THERE  WITH HIS  NOSE FROZEN TO THE WINDOW.  SOME  WARM  WATER SHOULD DO THE TRICK.

Death walked  out to where Binky was waiting in  the snow and  tied the toy horse behind the saddle.

ALBERT WILL BE VERY PLEASED. I CAN'T WAIT TO SEE HIS FACE. HO. HO. HO.

As the  light of Hogswatch slid  down  the towers of Unseen University, the Librarian  slipped into  the Great Hall  with  some sheet music clenched firmly in his feet.

As  the  light  of Hogswatch lit the  towers of Unseen University,  the Archchancellor sat down with a sigh in his study and pulled off his boots.

It  had been a  damn  long  night, no  doubt  about it. Lots of strange things. First  time he'd ever seen the Senior Wrangler burst into tears, for one thing.

Ridcully glanced at the door to the new bathroom. Well, he'd sorted out the  teething troubles, and a nice warm shower would be very refreshing. And then he could go along to the organ recital all nice and clean.

He removed his hat, and someone fell out of it with a tinkling sound. A small gnome rolled across the floor.

'Oh,  another one.  I  thought  we'd  got  rid  of you  fellows,'  said Ridcully. 'And what are you?'

The gnome looked at him nervously.

'Er... you know whenever there was another magical appearance you heard the sound of, er, bells?' it said. Its expression suggested it was owning up to something it just knew was going to get it a smack.

.'Yes?'

The gnome held up some rather small handbells and waved them nervously. They went glingleglingleglingle, in a very sad way.

'Good, eh? That was me. Im the Glingleglingleglingle Fairy.'

`Get out.'

'I also do sparkly fairy dust effects that go twing too, if you like...

`Go away!'

'How  about "The Bells of  St Ungulant's"?' said the gnome desperately. 'Very seasonal. Very nice. Why not join in? It goes: ''The  bells [clong] of St [clang]... " '

Ridcully scored  a direct  hit  with  the  rubber  duck, and the  gnome escaped through the bath overflow. Cursing and spontaneous handbell  ringing echoed away down the pipes.

In perfect peace at last, the Archchancellor pulled off his robe.

The organ's storage tanks were wheezing at  the rivets by the  time the Librarian  had finished  pumping. Satisfied, he knuckled his  way up to  the seat  and paused to survey, with great satisfaction, the  keyboards in front of him.

Bloody Stupid Johnson's approach to  music was similar  to his approach in every field that was caressed by his genius in the same way that a potato field is touched by  a late frost. Make it loud, he said. Make it wide. Make it allembracing.  And thus the Great Organ of Unseen University was the only one  in  the  world  where  you  could play  an entire  symphony scored  for thunderstorm and squashed toad noises.

Warm water cascaded off Mustrum Ridcully's pointy bathing cap.

Mr Johnson had, surely not on purpose, designed a perfect bathroom - at least, perfect  for singing in. Echoes  and resonating pipeways smoothed out all those little imperfections and gave even the weediest singer a  rolling, dark brown voice.

And so Ridcully sang.

' ...as I walked out one dadadadada for to something or other and to take the dadada, I did espy a fair pretty may-ay-den I think it was, and I...'

The  organ pipes hummed with pent-up  energy. The Librarian cracked his knuckles. This took some time. Then he pulled the pressure release valve.

The hum became an urgent thrumming.

Very carefully, he let in the clutch.

Ridcully stopped singing as  the tones of  the  organ came  through the wall.

Bathtime music, eh? he thought. Just the job.

It was a shame it was muffled by all the bathroom fixtures, though.

It was at this point he espied a small lever marked `Musical pipes.

Ridcully, never being a man  to wonder what any kind of switch did when it was so much easier  and quicker  to find out  by pulling  it, did so. But instead of the  music  he was expecting  he was rewarded simply with several large  panels sliding  silently  aside, revealing  row  upon  row  of  brass nozzles.

The Librarian was lost now, dreaming on the wings  of music. His hands and feet danced over the keyboards,  picking their way towards the crescendo which  ended the first movement  of Bubble's Catastrophe Suite.

One foot kicked the 'Afterburner' lever and the other spun the valve of the nitrous oxide cylinder.

Ridcully tapped the nozzles.

Nothing  happened. He  looked at  the controls again, and realized that he'd never pulled the little brass lever marked 'Organ Interlock`.

He  did  so.  This  did  not  cause  a  torrent  of  pleasant  bathtime accompaniment, however. There was merely a thud and a distant gurgling which grew in volume.

He gave up, and went back to soaping his chest.

'...running of the deer, the playing of... huh? What...'

Later that day he had the bathroom nailed up again  and a notice placed on the door, on which was written:

'Not to be used in any circumstances. This is IMPORTANT.'

However, when Modo nailed the door up he didn't hammer the nails in all the way but left just a  bit sticking up so that his pliers would grip later on,  when  he  was  told  to  remove them.  He never presumed  and  he never complained, he just had a good working knowledge of the wizardly mind.

They never did find the soap.

Ponder and his fellow students watched Hex carefully.

'It can't just, you know, stop,' said Adrian 'Mad Drongo' Tumipseed.

'The ants are just standing still,' said Ponder. He sighed. 'All right, put the wretched thing back.'

Adrian carefully  replaced  the  small  fluffy teddy bear  above  Hex's keyboard. Things immediately began to whirr. The ants started to trot again. The mouse squeaked.

They'd tried this three times.

Ponder looked again at the single sentence Hex had written.

+++ Mine! Waaaah +++

'I don't  actually think,' he said, gloomily, 'that I want to tell  the Archchancellor that this machine stops  working  if we take its fluffy teddy bear away. I just don't think I want to live in that kind of world.'

'Er,'  said  Mad  Drongo, 'you could always, you  know, sort of  say it needs to work with the FTB enabled...

'You think that's better?' said Ponder, reluctantly. It wasn't as if it was even a very realistic interpretation of a bear.

'You mean, better than "fluffy teddy bear"?'

Ponder nodded. 'It's better,' he said.

Of all the presents he got  from the Hogfather, Gawain told  Susan, the best of all was the marble.

And she'd said, what marble?

And he'd  said, the glass marble I found in  the fireplace. It wins all the games. It seems to move in a different way.

The  beggars walked their erratic and occasionally  backward walk along the city streets, while fresh morning snow began to fall.

Occasionally  one of them belched  happily.  They all  wore paper hats, except for Foul Ole Ron, who'd eaten his.

A tin  can was passed from hand to hand. It contained a mixture of fine wines and spirits and something in a can that Arnold Sideways had stolen from behind a paint factory in Phedre Road.

'The goose was good,' said the Duck Man, picking his teeth.

'I'm surprised  you et  it,  what  with that  duck on your  head,' said Coffin Henry, picking his nose.

'What duck?' said the Duck Man.

'What were that greasy stuff?' said Arnold Sideways.

'That, my  dear  fellow, was pвtй de foie gras. All the way from Genua, I'll wager. And very good, too.'

'Dun' arf make you fart, don't it?'

'Ah, the world of haute cuisine,' said the Duck Man happily.

They reached, by fits and starts, the back door of their favourite restaurant. The Duck Man looked at it dreamily, eyes filmy with recollection.

'I used to dine here almost every night,' he said.

'Why'd you stop?' said Coffin Henry.

'I... I don't  really know,' said the Duck Man. 'It's... rather a blur, I'm afraid. Back in the days when I... think I was someone else. But still,' he said, patting Arnold's head, 'as they  say,  "Better a meal of  old boots where friendship is, than  a  stalled ox  and  hatred  therewith."  Forward, please, Ron.'

They positioned Foul Ole Ron in front of the back door and then knocked on  it. When a waiter opened it Foul  Ole Ron grinned at him,  exposing what remained of his teeth and his famous halitosis, which was still all there.

'Millennium hand and shrimp!' he said, touching his forelock.

' "Compliments of the season",' the Duck Man translated.

The man went to shut the door but Arnold Sideways was ready for him and had wedged his boot in the crack.[25]

'We thought you  might like us to  come round at lunchtime and  sing  a merry Hogswatch  glee for your customers,' said the  Duck  Man. Beside  him, Coffin Henry began one of his volcanic bouts of coughing, which even sounded green. ' No charge, of course.'

'It being Hogswatch,' said Arnold.

The beggars,  despite  being too disreputable even  to  belong  to  the Beggars'  Guild, lived quite  well  by  their  own low  standards.  This was generally by  careful application of  the  Certainty Principle. People would give them all sorts of things if they were certain to go away.

A few minutes later they wandered off again, pushing a happy Arnold who was surrounded by hastily wrapped packages.

'People can be so kind,' said the Duck Man.

'Millennium hand and shrimp.'

Arnold   started  to  investigate  the  charitable  donations  as  they manoeuvred his trolley through the slush and drifts.

'Tastes... sort of familiar,' he said.

'Familiar like what?'

'Like mud and old boots.'

'Cam! That's posh grub, that is.'

'Yeah, yeah... '  Arnold chewed for  a while.  'You  don't think  we've become posh all of a sudden?'

'Dunno. You posh, Ron?'

'Buggrit.'

'Yep. Sounds posh to me.'

The snow began to settle gently on the River Ankh.

'Still... Happy New Year, Arnold.'

'Happy New Year, Duck Man. And your duck.'

'What duck?'

'Happy New Year, Henry.'

'Happy New Year, Ron.'

'Buggrem!'

'And god bless us, every one,' said Arnold Sideways.

The curtain of snow hid them from view.

'Which god?'

'Dunno. What've you got?'

'Duck Man?'

'Yes, Henry?'

'You know that stalled ox you mentioned?'

'Yes, Henry?'

'How come it'd stalled? Run out of grass, or something?'

'Ah... it was more a figure of speech, Henry.'

'Not an ox?'

'Not exactly. What I meant was-'

And then there was only the snow.

After a while, it began to melt in the sun.

THE END

Notes

1

That is  to  say, those who deserve to shed blood. Or possibly not. You never quite know with some kids.

2

This exchange  contains almost  all  you need to know  about human civilization.  At least, those bits of it that are now under the sea, fenced off or still smoking.

3

It's  a  sad and  terrible thing  that high-born folk  really have thought that  the servants would  be totally fooled if spirits were put into decanters  that  were cunningly  labelled  backwards.  And  also  throughout history  the more politically  conscious butler  has taken it on  trust, and with  rather  more justification, that  his employers will not notice if the whisky is topped up with eniru.

4

Peachy was not someone you generally asked questions of, except the sort that go like:  If-if-if-if I  give you all my  money could you possibly not break the other leg, thank you so much?'

5

Chickenwire had got his name from  his own individual  contribution to the  science of this very  specialized  'concrete overshoe' form of waste disposal. An unfortunate drawback of the process  was  the tendency for bits of the client to eventually detach and  float  to the surface,  causing much comment in  the  general population. Enough  chickenwire, he'd pointed  out, would solve  that, while  also allowing the ingress of crabs and  fish going about their vital recycling activities.

6

Ankh-Morpork's  underworld, which  was so  big  that  the overworld floated around on top of it like a very small hen trying to mother a nest of ostrich  chicks,  already had  Big Dave,  Fat Dave, Mad Dave, Wee Davey, and Lanky Dai. Everyone had to find their niche.

7

This is very similar to the suggestion  put forward by the Quirmian philosopher Ventre, who said, 'Possibly the gods exist, and possibly they do not. So why not believe in them in any case? If it's all true you'll go to a lovely place when you die, and if it isn't then you've lost nothing, right?' When he died he woke up in a circle of gods holding nasty-looking sticks and one of them said, 'We're going to show  you what we think of Mr  Clever Dick in these parts . . .'

8

He'd done his best. But black and purple and vomit yellow weren't a good colour combination  for paperchains, and no Hogswatch fairy doll should be nailed up by its head

9

Such as the Electric Drill Chuck Key Fairy.

10

Who was (according to Sideney's mother) a bit of a catch since her father owned a half-share in an eel  pie shop in Gleam Street, you must know her, got all her own teeth and a wooden leg you'd hardlynotice, got a sister called Continence, lovely girl, why didn't she invite her along for tea next time  he was over, not  that  she hardly saw her son the big wizard  at  all these days, but you never knew and if the magic thing didn't work out then a quarter-share in a thriving eel pie business was not to be sneezed at ...

11

Not, that is, things that he wanted to do, or wanted  done to him. Just things that he dreamed of, in the armpit of a bad night.

12

In fact,  when she was eight she'd found a collection  of  animal skulls in an attic, relict of some former duke of an enquiring turn of mind. Her father had  been a bit preoccupied  with affairs of state and she'd made twenty- seven  dollars  before being found out.  The hippopotamus molar had, with hindsight, been a mistake.

Skulls never frightened her, even then.

13

The  CEH  was  always  ready to  fight  for  the  rights  of  the differently tall,  and  was  not  put off by  the fact that most pixies  and gnomes weren't the least interested in dressing      up  in  little pointy hats with bells on when there were other far more interesting  things  to do. All that tinkly- wee stuff was for the old folks back home in the forest - when a tiny  man  hit  Ankh-Morpork  he preferred to  get drunk, kick  some  serious ankle,  and search for  tiny women. In fact the CEH now had to spend so much time  explaining  to people that  they  hadn't got  enough rights that  they barely had any time left to fight for them.

14

Often they lived  to a timescale  to suit  themselves. Many of the senior  ones,  of course, lived entirely in the  past, but several were like the Professor of Anthropics,  who had  invented  an  entire  temporal system based on the belief that all the other ones were a mere illusion.

Many people are aware of the Weak  and Strong Anthropic Principles. The Weak  One says, basically,  that it was  jolly amazing of the universe to be constructed in  such a  way that humans could evolve to a  point  where they make a living in, for example, universities, while the Strong One says that, on the contrary, the whole point of  the universe was that humans should not only work in universities but also write for huge sums books with words like 'Cosmic'  and 'Chaos' in the titles.

*)  The UU Professor of  Anthropics had developed the Special and Inevitable Anthropic Principle, which was that the entire reason for the existence of the  universe was the eventual  evolution of the UU Professor of Anthropics. But  this was  only a formal statement of the  theory  which  absolutely everyone,  with only  some minor details of a 'Fill in name here' nature, secretly believes to be true.

*)And they are correct. The universe dearly operates for the benefit of humanity. This can be readily seen from the convenient  way the sun comes up in the morning, when people are ready to start the day.

15

The  ceremony  still carries  on, of  course.  If  you  left  off traditions because you didn't know  why they started you'd be no better than a foreigner.

16

Ignorant: a state of not knowing what a pronoun is, or how to find the square root of 27.4, and merely knowing childish and useless things like which of the seventy almost identicallooking species of the purple sea snake are the deadly ones, how to treat the poisonous pith of the Sagosago tree to make a nourishing gruel, how to foretell the weather by the movements of the tree-climbing Burglar Crab, how to navigate  across a  thousand  miles of featureless ocean by means of  a piece of string  and a small clay  model of your grandfather, how  to  get  essential  vitamins  from  the liver  of the ferocious Ice  Bear,  and  other such trivial  matters. It's a strange thing that when everyone becomes educated, everyone knows about the pronoun but no one knows about the Sago-sago.

17

Credulous:  having  views  about  the  world,  the  universe  and humanity's place in it that are  shared only  by very unsophisticated people and the most intelligent and advanced mathematicians and physicists.

18

It's amazing how good governments are, given their track record in almost every other field, at hushing up things like alien encounters.

One reason  may be  that  the aliens  themselves are too embarrassed to talk about it.

It's not  known why most of the space-going races of the universe want to  undertake rummaging  in  Earthling  underwear as a prelude to formal contact. But representatives of several hundred races have taken  to hanging out, unsuspected  by one  another,  in rural corners of the planet and, as a result  of this, keep on abducting other would-be abductees. Some  have been in fad abducted while waiting to carry out an abduction on a couple of other aliens  trying to abduct the aliens who were,  as a result of  misunderstood instructions, trying to form cattle into circles and mutilate crops.

The planet Earth is now banned to an alien races until they can compare notes and find out how  many, if any, real humans they have actually got. It is gloomily suspected that there  is only one who is big, hairy and has very large feet.

The truth may be out there, but lies are inside your head.

19

The red rosy hen greets the dawn of the day'. In fact  the hen is not the bird traditionally  associated with heralding a new sunrise, but Mrs Huggs, while collecting many old folk songs for posterity, has taken care to rewrite them where necessary to avoid, as she put it, 'offending  those of a refined  disposition with  unwarranted coarseness'.  Much  to her  surprise, people often couldn't  spot the unwarranted  coarseness  until  it  had been pointed out to them.

Sometimes a chicken is nothing but a bird.

20

He'd have  to admit that the answer would be 'five and a bit', but at least he could come up with it.

21

It had been Ma Lilywhite's dying  wish, although she hadn't  known it at  the time. Her last words  to  her  son were 'You  try  and get to the horses, I'll try to hold  'em off on the  stairs, and if anything happens to me, take care of the dummy!'

22

They  generally  know in  time to have their best robe cleaned, do some serious damage to the  wine  cellar and  have a really good  last meal. It's a nicer version of Death Row, with the bonus of no lawyers.

23

It  was,  in fact, a pleasant  masculine scent. But only to female weasels.

24

Which  had  died in its sleep. Of natural causes. At a great  age. After a long  and  happy  life,  insofar as a sheep can  be happy. And would probably be quite pleased to know  that it could  help somebody as it passed away...

25

Arnold had  no  legs but, since  there were  many occasions when a boot was handy on the streets, Coffin Henry had  affixed one to the end of a pole for him.  He was deadly with it, and  any muggers hardpressed enough to try to rob the beggars often found themselves  kicked on the top of the head by a man three feet high.

Content

Terry Pratchett.
Hogfather

Notes