Terry Pratchett. Soul music
страница №9
...ians.''We don't like musicians in Scrote,' said another voice.
There seemed to be more and more figures in the gloom.
'Er ... what do you like in Scrote?' said Asphalt.
'Well,' said the barman, now a mere outline in the gathering darkness,
'round about this time of year we generally have a barbecue down by the
rockery.'
Buddy sighed.
It was the first time he'd made a sound since they'd arrived in the
town.
'I guess we'd better show them what we play,' he said. There was a
twang in his voice.
It was some time later.
Glod looked at the door handle. It was a door handle. You got hold of
it with your hand. But what was supposed to happen next?
'Door handle,' he said, in case that would help.
'Y'r sposed do s'ning w'vit,' said Cliff, from somewhere near the
floor.
Buddy leaned past the dwarf and turned the handle.
'Am'zing,' said Glod, and stumbled forward. He levered himself off the
floor and looked around.
'Wh's the?'
'The tavern keeper said we could stay here for free,' said Buddy.
'S'mess,' said Glod. 'Some'ne fetch me a brm and a scr'bing brsh this
min't.' Asphalt wobbled in, carrying the luggage and with Cliff's sack of
rocks in his teeth. He dropped the lot on the floor.
'Well, that was astonishing, sir,' he said. 'The way you just went into
that barn and said, and said ... what was it you said?'
'Let's do the show right here,' said Buddy, lying down on a straw
mattress.
'Amazing! They must have been coming in from miles around!'
Buddy stared at the ceiling and played a few chords.
'And that barbecue!' said Asphalt, still radiating enthusiasm. 'The
sauce!'
'The be'f!' said Glod.
'The charcoal,' murmured Cliff happily. There was a wide black ring
around his mouth.
'And who'davthought,' said Glod, 'that you could brew a beer l'ke that
outa cauliflowers?'
'Had a great head on it,' said Cliff.
'I thought we were going to be in a bit of trouble there, before you
played,' said Asphalt, shaking the beetles out of another mattress. 'I don't
know how you got them dancing like that.'
'Yes,' said Buddy.
'And we din't even get paid,' murmured Glod. He slumped back. Shortly
there were snores, given a slightly metallic edge by the reverberation in
his helmet.
When the others were asleep Buddy put the guitar down on the bed,
quietly opened the door and crept downstairs and into the night.
It would have been nice if there had been a full moon. Or even a
crescent. A full moon would have been better. But there was just a half
moon, which never appears in romantic or occult paintings despite the fact
that it is indeed the most magical phase.
There was a smell of stale beer, dying cabbages, barbecue embers and
insufficient sanitation.
He leaned against Seth's livery stable. It shifted slightly.
It was fine when he was on stage or, as it had been tonight, on an old
barn door set on a few bricks. Everything was in bright colours. He could
feel white hot images arcing across his mind. His body felt as though it
were on fire but also, and this was the important bit, as if it was meant to
be on fire. He felt alive.
And then, afterwards, he felt dead.
There was still colour in the world. He could recognize it as colour,
but it seemed to be wearing Cliff's smoked glasses. Sounds came as if
through cotton wool. Apparently the barbecue had been good, he had Glod's
word for that; but to Buddy it had been texture and not much else.
A shadow moved across the space between two buildings ...
On the other hand, he was the best. He knew it, not as some matter of
pride or arrogance, but simply as a matter of fact. He could feel the music
flowing out of him and into the audience ...
'This one, sir?' whispered a shadow beside the livery stable, as Buddy
wandered along the moonlit street.
'Yes. This one first and then into the tavern for the other two. Even
the big troll. There's a spot on the back of the neck.'
'But not Dibbler, Sir?'
'Strangely, no. He's not here.'
'Shame. I bought a meat pie off him once.'
'It's an attractive suggestion, but no one's paying us for Dibbler.'
The Assassins drew their knives, the blades blackened to avoid the tell
tale shine.
'I could give you twopence, sir, if that'd help.'
'It's certainly tempting-'
The senior Assassin pressed himself against the wall as Buddy's
footsteps grew louder.
He gripped his knife at waist height. No one who knew anything about
knives ever used the famous over arm stabbing motion so beloved of
illustrators. It was amateurish and inefficient. A professional would strike
upwards; the way to a man's heart was through his stomach.
He drew his hand back and tensed
An hourglass, glowing faintly blue, was suddenly thrust in front of his
eyes. LORD ROBERT SELACHII? Said a voice by his ear. THIS IS YOUR LIFE.
He squinted. There was no mistaking the name engraved on the glass. He
could see every little grain of sand, pouring into the past ...
He turned, took one look at the hooded figure, and ran for it.
His apprentice was already a hundred yards away, and still
accelerating.
'Sorry? Who's that?'
Susan tucked the hourglass back into her robe and shook out her hair.
Buddy appeared.
'You?'
'Yes. Me,' said Susan.
Buddy took a step nearer.
'Are you going to fade away again?' he said.
'No. I have actually just saved your life, as a matter of fact.'
Buddy looked around at the otherwise empty night.
'From what?'
Susan bent down and picked up a blackened knife.
'This?' she said.
'I know we've had this conversation before, but who are you? Not my
fairy godmother, are you?'
'I think you have to be a lot older,' said Susan. She backed away. 'And
probably a lot nicer, too. Look, I can't tell you any more. You're not even
supposed to see me. I'm not supposed to be here. Neither are you ,
'You're not going to tell me to stop playing again, are you?' said
Buddy angrily. 'Because I won't! I'm a musician! If I don't play, what am I
then? I might as well be dead! Do you understand? Music is my life!'
He took a few steps nearer.
'Why're you following me around? Asphalt said there'd be girls like
you!'
'What on Disc do you mean, "girls like me"?'
Buddy subsided a bit, but only a little.
'They follow actors and musicians around,' he said, 'because of, you
know, the glamour and everything-'
'Glamour? Some smelly cart and a tavern that smells of cabbages?'
Buddy held up his hands.
'Listen,' he said urgently. 'I'm doing all right. I'm working, people
are listening to me ... I don't need any more help, all right? I've got
enough to worry about, so please keep out of my life-'
There was the sound of running feet and Asphalt appeared, with the
other members of the band behind him.
'The guitar was screaming,' said Asphalt. 'Are you all right?'
'You'd better ask her,' muttered Buddy.
All three of them looked directly at Susan.
'Who?' said Cliff.
'She's right in front of you.'
Glod waved a stubby hand in the air, missing Susan by inches.
'It was probably dat cabbage,' said Cliff to Asphalt.
Susan stepped backwards quietly.
'She's right there! But she's going away now, can't you see?'
'That's right, that's right,' said Glod, taking Buddy's arm. 'She's
going away now, and good riddance, so just you come on back-'
'Now she's getting on that horse!'
'Yes, yes, a big black horse-'
'It's white, you idiot!'
Hoofprints burned red on the ground for a moment and then faded.
'And it's gone now!'
The Band With Rocks In stared into the night.
'Yes, I can see dat, now you mention it,' said Cliff. 'Days a horse dat
isn't dere, sure enough.'
'Yes, that's certainly what a horse that's gone looks like,' said
Asphalt carefully.
'None of you saw her?' said Buddy, as they manoeuvred him gently back
through the pre dawn greyness.
'I heard where musicians, really good musicians, got followed around by
these half naked young women called Muses,' said Glod.
'Like Cantaloupe,' said Cliff.
'We don't call 'em Muses,' said Asphalt, grinning. 'I told you, when I
worked for Bertie the Balladeer and His Troubadour Rascals, we used to get
any amount of young women hanging arou-'
'Amazing how legends get started, when you come to think about it,'
said Glod.
'Just you come along now, my lad.'
'She was there,' Buddy protested. 'She was there.'
'Cantaloupe?' said Asphalt. 'You sure, Cliff?'
'Read it in a book once,' said the troll. 'Cantaloupe. I'm pretty sure.
Something like that.'
'She was there,' said Buddy.
The raven snored gently on top of his skull, counting dead sheep.
The Death of Rats came through the window in an arc, bounced off a
dribbly candle, and landed on all fours on the table.
The raven opened one eye.
'Oh, it's you-'
Then a claw was round its leg, and the Death of Rats jumped off the
skull and into infinite space.
There were more cabbage fields next day, although the landscape did
begin to change a bit.
'Hey, that's interesting,' said Glod.
'What is?' said Cliff.
'There's a field of beans over there.'
They watched it until it was out of sight.
'Nice of the people to give us all this food, though,' said Asphalt. '
We shan't be wanting for cabbages, eh?'
'Oh, shut up,' said Glod. He turned to Buddy, who was sitting with his
chin resting on his arms.
'Cheer up, we'll be in Pseudopolis in a couple of hours,' he said.
'Good,' said Buddy, distantly.
Glod climbed back into the front of the cart and pulled Cliff towards
him.
'Notice the way he goes all quiet?' he whispered.
'Yup. Do you think it'll be ... you know ... done by the time we get
back?'
'You can get anything done in Ankh Morpork,' said Glod firmly. 'I must
have knocked on every damn door in the Street of Cunning Artificers. Twenty
five dollars!'
'You're complaining? It ain't your tooth dat's paying for it.'
They both turned to look at their guitarist.
He was staring out across the endless fields.
'She was there,' he muttered.
Feathers spiralled towards the ground.
'You didn't have to go and do that,' said the raven, fluttering
upright. 'You could simply ask.'
SQUEAK.
'All right, but before would have been better.' The raven ruffled its
feathers and looked around at the bright landscape under the dark sky.
'This is the place then, is it?' it said. 'You're sure you're not the
Death of Ravens too?'
SQUEAK.
'Shape doesn't mean much. Anyway, you've got a pointy snout. What was
it you were wanting?'
The Death of Rats grabbed a wing and pulled.
'All right, all right!'
The raven glanced at a garden gnome. It was fishing in an ornamental
pond. The fish were skeletal, but this didn't seem to interfere with their
enjoyment of life, or whatever it was they were enjoying. It fluttered and
hopped along after the rat.
Cut My Own Throat Dibbler stood back.
Jimbo, Crash, Noddy and Scum looked at him expectantly.
'What're all the boxes for, Mr Dibbler?' said Crash.
'Yeah,' said Scum.
Dibbler carefully positioned the tenth box on its tripod.
'You boys seen an iconograph?' he said.
'Oh, yes ... I mean, yeah,' said Jimbo. 'They've got a little demon
inside them that paints pictures of things you point it at.'
'This is like that, only for sound,' said Dibbler.
Jimbo squinted past the open lid.
'Can't see any ... I mean, can't see no demon,' he said.
'That's because there isn't one,' said Dibbler. It was worrying him,
too. He'd have been a little bit happier if there'd been a demon or some
sort of magic. Something simple and understandable. He didn't like the idea
of meddling in science.
'Now then ... Suck-' he began.
'The Surreptitious Fabric,' said Jimbo.
'What?'
'The Surreptitious Fabric,' Jimbo repeated helpfully. 'It's our new
name.'
'Why have you changed it? You haven't been Suck for twenty-four hours.'
'Yeah, but we thought the name was holding us back.'
'How could it be holding you back? You aren't moving.' Dibbler glared
at them and shrugged. 'Anyway, whatever you call yourselves ... I want you
to sing your best song, what am I saying, in front of these boxes. Not yet
... not yet ... wait a moment . ..'
Dibbler retired to the furthest corner of the room and pulled his hat
down over his ears.
'All right, you can start,' he said.
He stared in blissful deafness at the group for several minutes until a
general cessation of movement suggested that whatever they had been
perpetrating had been committed.
Then he inspected the boxes. The wires were vibrating gently, but there
was barely any sound.
The Surreptitious Fabric clustered around.
'Is it working, Mr Dibbler?' said Jimbo.
Dibbler shook his head.
'You boys don't have what it takes,' he said.
'What does it take, Mr Dibbler?'
'You've got me there. You've got something,' he said, at the sight of
their dejected faces, 'but not a lot of it, whatever it is.'
'Er ... this doesn't mean we're not allowed to play at the Free
Festival, does it, Mr Dibbler?' said Crash.
'Maybe,' said Dibbler, smiling benevolently.
'Thanks a lot, Mr Dibbler!'
The Surreptitious Fabric wandered out into the street.
'We need to get it together if we're going to wow them at the
Festival,' said Crash.
'What, you mean ... like ... learn to play?' said Jimbo.
'No! Music With Rocks In just happens. If you go around learning you'll
never get anywhere,' said Crash. 'No, I mean ...' He looked around. 'Better
clothes, for one thing. Did you see about them leather coats, Noddy?'
'Sort of,' said Noddy.
'What do you mean, sort of?'
'Sort of leather. I went down the tannery in Phedre Road and they had
some leather all right, but it's a bit ... whiffy ...
'All right, we can get started on them tonight. And how about those
leopardskin trousers, Scum? You know we said leopardskin trousers'd be a
great idea.'
A look of transcendental worry crossed Scum's face.
'I kind of got some,' he said.
'You either got them or you ain't,' said Crash.
'Yeah, but they're kind of ...' said Scum. 'Look, I couldn't find a
shop that'd heard of anything like that but, er, you know that circus that
was here last week? Only I had a word with the guy in the top hat and, well,
it was a kind of a bargain and-'
'Scum,' said Crash quietly, 'what have you bought?'
'Look at it this way,' said Scum with sweating brightness, 'it's sort
of leopardskin trousers and a leopardskin shirt and a leopardskin hat.'
'Scum,' said Crash, his voice low with resigned menace, 'you've bought
a leopard, haven't you?'
'Sort of leopardy, yes.'
'Oh, good grief-'
'But sort of a real steal for twenty dollars,' said Scum. 'Nothing
important wrong with it, the man said.'
'Why'd he get rid of it, then?' Crash demanded.
'It's sort of deaf. Can't hear the lion tamer, he said.'
'Well, that's no good to us!'
'Don't see why. Your trousers don't have to listen.'
SPARE A COPPER, YOUNG SIR?
'Push off, grandad,' said Crash easily.
GOOD LUCK TO YOU.
'Too many beggars around these days, my father says,' said Crash, as
they pushed past. 'He says the Beggars' Guild ought to do something about
it.'
'But the beggars all belong to the Guild,' said Jimbo.
'Well, they shouldn't allow so many people to join.'
'Yes, but it's better than being on the streets.'
Scum, who out of the whole group had the least amount of cerebral
activity to get between him and true observation of the world, was trailing
behind. He had an uneasy feeling that he'd just walked over someone's grave.
'That one looked a bit sort of thin,' he muttered.
The others weren't paying any attention. They were back to the usual
argument.
`I'm fed up with being Surreptitious Fabric,' said Jimbo. 'It's a silly
name.'
'Really, really thin,' said Scum. He felt in his pocket.
'Yeah, I liked it best when we were The Whom,' said Noddy.
'But we were only The Whom for half an hour!' said Crash.[25]
'Yesterday. In between bein' The Blots and Lead Balloon, remember?'
Scum located a tenpenny piece and turned back.
'There's bound to be some good name,' said Jimbo. 'I just bet we'll
know it's right just as soon as we see it.'
'Oh, yeah. Well, we've got to come up with some name we don't start
arguing about after five minutes,' said Crash. 'It's not doing our career
any good if people don't know who we are.'
'Mr Dibbler says it definitely is,' said Noddy.
'Yes, but a rolling stone gathers no moss, my father says,' said Crash.
'There you go, old man,' said Scum, back down the street.
THANK YOU, said the grateful Death.
Scum hurried to catch up with the others, who were back on the subject
of leopards with hearing difficulties.
'Where did you put it, Scum?' said Crash.
'Well, you know your sort of bedroom-'
'How do you kill a leopard?' said Noddy.
'Hey, here's an idea,' said Crash, gloomily. 'We let it choke to death
on Scum.'
The raven inspected the hallway clock with the prac-tised eye of one
who knows the value of good props.
As Susan had noted, it was not so much small as dimensionally
displaced; it looked small, but in the same way that something very big a
long way away looks small that is to say, the mind keeps reminding the eyes
that they are wrong.
But this was up close as well. It was made of some dark, age blackened
wood.
There was a pendulum, which oscillated slowly.
The clock had no hands.
'Impressive,' said the raven. 'That scythe blade on the pendulum. Nice
touch. Very Gothic. No one could look at that clock and not think-'
SQUEAK!
'All right, all right, I'm coming.' The raven flut-tered across to an
ornamental door frame. There was a skull and bones motif on it.
'Excellent taste,' it said.
SQUEAK. SQUEAK.
'Well, anyone can do plumbing, I expect,' said the raven. 'Interesting
fact. Did you know the lavatory was actually named after Sir Charles
Lavatory? Not many people-'
SQUEAK.
The Death of Rats pushed at the big door leading to the kitchen. It
swung open with a creak but, here again, there was something not quite
right. A listener had the sense that the creak had been added by some-one
who, feeling that a door like that with a door surround like that ought to
creak, had inserted one.
Albert was washing up at the stone sink and staring at nothing.
'Oh,' he said, turning, 'it's you. What's this thing?'
'I'm a raven,' said the raven, nervously. 'Inciden-tally, one of the
most intelligent birds. Most people would say it's the mynah bird, but-'
SQUEAK!
The raven ruffled its feathers.
'I'm here as an interpreter,' it said.
'Has he found him?' said Albert.
The Death of Rats squeaked at length.
'Looked everywhere. No sign,' said the raven.
'Then he don't want to be found,' said Albert. He smeared the grease
off a plate with a skull pattern on it. 'I don't like that.'
SQUEAK.
'The rat says that's not the worst thing,' said the raven. 'The rat
says you ought to know what the granddaughter has been doing ...
The rat squeaked. The raven talked.
The plate shattered on the sink.
'I knew it!' Albert shouted. 'Saving him! She hasn't got the faintest
idea! Right! I'm going to sort this out. The Master thinks he can slope off,
eh? Not from old Albert! You two wait here!'
There were already posters up in Pseudopolis. News travels fast,
especially when C. M. O. T. Dibbler is paying for the horses ...
'Hello, Pseudopolis!'
They had to call out the city Watch. They had to organize a bucket
chain from the river. Asphalt had to stand outside Buddy's dressing room
with a club. With a nail in it.
Albert, in front of a scrap of mirror in his bedroom, brushed his hair
furiously. It was white. At least, long ago it was white. Now it was the
colour of a tobacco addict's index finger.
'It's my duty, that's what it is,' he muttered. 'Don't know where he'd
be without me. Maybe he does re-member the future, but he always gets it
wrong! Oh, he can go on worrying about the eternal verities, but who has to
sort it out when all's said and done ... Muggins, that's who.'
He glared at himself in the mirror.
'Right!' he said.
There was a battered shoe box under the bed. Albert pulled it out very,
very carefully and took the top off. It was half full of cotton wool;
nestling in the wool, like a rare egg, was a lifetimer.
Engraved on it was the name: Alberto Malich.
The sand inside was frozen, immobile, in mid pour. There wasn't much
left in the top bulb.
No time passed, here.
It was part of the Arrangement. He worked for Death, and time didn't
pass, except when he went into the World.
There was a scrap of paper by the glass. The figures '91' had been
written at the top, but lower numbers trailed down the page after it. 73 ...
68 ... 37 Nineteen!
He must have been daft. He'd let his life leak away by hours and
minutes, and there had been a lot more of them lately. There'd been all that
business with the plumber, of course. And shopping. The Master didn't like
to go shopping. It was hard to get served. And Albert had taken a few
holidays, because it was nice to see the sun, any sun, and feel wind and
rain; the Master did his best, but he could never get them right. And decent
vegetables, he couldn't do them properly either. They never tasted grown.
Nineteen days left in the world. But more than enough.
Albert slipped the lifetimer into his pocket, put on an overcoat, and
stamped back down the stairs.
'You,' he said, pointing to the Death of Rats, 'you can't sense a trace
of him? There must be something. Concentrate.'
SQUEAK.
'What did he say?'
'He said all he can remember is something about sand.'
`Sand,' said Albert. 'All right. Good start. We search all the sand.'
SQUEAK?
'Wherever the Master is, he'll make an impression.'
Cliff awoke to a swish swish sound. The shape of Glod was outlined in
the light of dawn, wielding a brush.
'What're you doing, dwarf?'
'I got Asphalt to get some paint,' said Glod. 'These rooms are a
disgrace.'
Cliff raised himself on his elbows and looked around.
'What do you call the colour on the door?'
'Eau de Nil.'
'Nice.'
'Thank you,' said Glod.
'The curtains are good, too.'
The door creaked open. Asphalt came in, with a tray, and kicked the
door shut behind him.
'Oh, sorry,' he said.
'I'll paint over the mark,' said Glod.
Asphalt put the tray down, trembling with ex-citement.
`Everyone's talking about you guys!' he said. 'And they're saying it
was about time they built a new theatre anyway. I've got you eggs and bacon,
eggs and rat, eggs and coke, and ... and ... what was it ... oh, yes. The
Captain of the Watch says if you're still in the city at sunrise he will
personally have you buried alive. I've got the cart all ready by the back
door. Young women have been writing things on it in lipstick. Nice curtains,
by the way.'
All three of them looked at Buddy.
'He hasn't moved,' said Glod. 'Flopped down right after the show and
out like a light.'
'He was certainly leaping around last night,' said Cliff.
Buddy continued to snore gently.
'When we get back,' said Glod, 'we ought to have a nice holiday
somewhere.'
'Days right,' said Cliff. 'If we get out of dis alive, I'm going to put
my rock kit on my back and take a long walk, and the first time someone says
to me,
'What are dem things on your back?" days where I'm gonna settle down.'
Asphalt peered down into the street.
'Can you all eat fast?' he said. 'Only there's some men in uniform out
there. With shovels.'
Back in Ankh Morpork, Mr Clete was astonished.
'But we hired you!' he said.
'The term is "retained", not "hired",' said Lord Downey, head of the
Assassins' Guild. He looked at Clete with an expression of unconcealed
distaste.
'Unfortunately, however, we can no longer entertain your contract.'
'They're musicians,' said Mr Clete. 'How hard can they be to kill?'
'My associates are somewhat reluctant to talk about it,' said Lord
Downey. 'They seem to feel that the clients are protected in some way.
Obviously, we will return the balance of your fee.'
'Protected,' muttered Clete, as they stepped thankfully through the
archway of the Assassins' Guild.
'Well, I told you what it was like in the Drum when-' Satchelmouth
began.
'That's just superstition,' snapped Clete. He glanced up at a wall,
where three Festival posters flaunted their primary colours.
'It was stupid of you to think Assassins would be any good outside the
city,' muttered Clete.
'Me? I never-'
'Get them more than five miles from a decent tailor and a mirror, and
they go all to pieces,' Clete added.
He stared at the poster.
'Free,' he muttered. 'Did you put it about that anyone who plays at
this
Festival is right out of the Guild?'
'Yes, sir. I don't think they're worrying, sir. I mean, some of 'em
have been getting together, sir. See, they say since there's a lot more
people want to be musicians than we'll allow in the Guild then we should-'
'It's mob rule!' said Clete. 'Banding together to force unacceptable
rules on a defenceless city!'
'Trouble is, sir,' said Satchelmouth, 'if there's a lot of them ... if
they think of talking to the palace ... well, you know the Patrician, sir
...'
Clete nodded glumly. Any Guild was powerful just so long as it self
evidently spoke for its constituency. He thought of hundreds of musicians
flocking to the palace. Hundreds of non-Guild musicians ...
The Patrician was a pragmatist. He never tried to fix things that
worked. Things that didn't work, however, got broken.
The only glimmer of hope was that they'd all be too busy messing around
with music to think about the bigger picture. It had certainly worked for
Clete.
Then he remembered that the blasted Dibbler man was involved.
Expecting Dibbler not to think about anything concerning money was like
expecting rocks not to think about gravity.
'Hello? Albert?'
Susan pushed open the kitchen door. The huge room was empty.
'Albert?'
She tried upstairs. There was her own room, and there was a corridor of
doors that didn't open and possibly never could the doors and frames had an
all in one, moulded together look. Presumably Death had a bedroom, although
proverbially Death never slept. Perhaps he just lay in bed reading.
She tried the handles until she found one that turned.
Death did have a bedroom.
He'd got many of the details right. Of course. After all, he saw quite
a lot of bedrooms. In the middle of the acres of floor was a large four
poster bed, although when Susan gave it an experimental prod it turned out
that the sheets were as solid as rock.
There was a full length mirror, and a wardrobe. She had a look inside,
just in case there was a selection of robes, but there was nothing in there
except a few old shoes in the bottom.[26]
A dressing table held a jug and basin set with a motif of skulls and
omegas, and a variety of bottles and other items.
She picked them up, one by one. After shave lotion. Pomade. Breath
freshener. A pair of silver backed hair-brushes.
It was all rather sad. Death clearly had picked up an idea of what a
gentleman should have on his dressing table, without confronting one or two
fundamental questions.
Eventually she found a smaller, narrower staircase.
'Albert?'
There was a door at the top.
'Albert? Anyone?'
It's not actually barging in if I call out first, she told herself. She
pushed open the door.
It was a very small room. Really small. It contained a few sticks of
bedroom furniture and a small narrow bed. A small bookcase contained a
handful of small uninteresting looking books. There was a piece of ancient
paper on the floor which, when Susan picked it up, turned out to be covered
with numbers, all crossed out except the last one, which was: 19.
One of the books was Gardening In Difficult Con-ditions.
She went back down to the study. She'd known that there was no one in
the house.
There was a dead feeling in the air.
There was the same feeling in the gardens. Death could create most
things, except for plumbing. But he couldn't create life itself. That had to
be added, like yeast in bread. Without it, everything was beautifully neat
and tidy and boring, boring, boring.
This is what it must have been like, she thought. And then, one day, he
adopted my mother. He was curious.
She took the path through to the orchard again.
And when I was born Mum and Dad were so afraid that I felt at home here
they brought me up to be ... welt ... a Susan. What kind of name is that for
Death's grand-daughter? A girl like that should have better cheekbones,
straight hair and a name with Vs and Xs in it.
And there, once again, was the thing he'd made for her. All by himself.
Working it all out from first principles ...
A swing. A simple swing.
It was already burning hot in the desert between Klatch and Hersheba.
The air shimmied, and then there was a pop. Albert appeared on a sand
dune.
There was a clay brick fort on the horizon.
'The Klatchian Foreign Legion,' he muttered, as sand began its
inexorable progress into his boots.
Albert trudged towards it with the Death of Rats sitting on his
shoulder.
He knocked on the door, which had a number of arrows in it. After a
while a small hatch slid back.
'What do you want, offendi?' said a voice from somewhere behind it.
Albert held up a card.
'Have you seen someone who didn't look like this?' he demanded.
There was silence.
'Then let's say: have you seen some mysterious stranger who didn't talk
about his past?' said Albert.
'This is the Klatchian Foreign Legion, offendi. People don't talk about
their past. They join up to ... to...
It dawned on Albert as the pause lengthened that it was up to him to
get the conversation going again.
'Forget?'
'Right. Forget. Yes.'
'So have you had any recent recruits who were a little, shall we say,
odd?'
'Might have done,' said the voice slowly. 'Can't remember.'
The hatchway slammed shut.
Albert hammered on it again. The hatchway opened. 'Yes, what is it?'
'Are you sure you can't remember?'
'Remember what?'
Albert took a deep breath.
'I demand to see your commanding officer!'
The hatch shut. The hatch opened.
'Sorry. It appears that I am the commanding officer. You're not a D'reg
or a Hershebian, are you?'
'Don't you know?'
'I'm ... pretty sure I must have done. Once. You know how it is ...
head like ... thing, you know ... With holes in ... You drain lettuce in it
. . . er ...'
There was the sound of bolts being pulled back, and a wicket door
opened in the gateway.
The possible officer was a sergeant, in so far as Albert was at all
familiar with Klatchian ranks. He had the look about him of someone who,
among the things he couldn't remember, would include a good night's sleep.
If he could remember to.
There were a few other Klatchian soldiers inside the fort, sitting or,
just barely, standing. Many were bandaged. And there was a rather greater
number of soldiers slumped or lying on the packed sand who'd never need a
night's sleep ever again.
'What's been happening here?' said Albert. His tone was so
authoritative that the sergeant found himself saluting.
'We were attacked by Dregs, sir,' he said, swaying slightly. 'Hundreds
of them! They outnumbered us ... er ... what's the number after nine? Got a
one in it.'
'Ten.'
'Ten to one, sir.'
'I see you survived, though,' said Albert.
'Ah,' said the sergeant. 'Yes. Er. Yes. That's where it all gets a bit
complicated, in fact. Er. Corporal? That's you. No, you just next to him.
The one with the two stripes?'
'Me?' said a small fat soldier.
'Yes. Tell him what happened.'
'Oh. Right. Er. Well, the bastards had shot us full of arrows, right?
An' it looked like it was all up with us. Then someone suggested sticking
bodies up on the battlements with their spears and crossbows and everything
so's the bastards'd think we was still up to strength-'
'It's not an original idea, mind you,' said the ser-geant. 'Been done
dozens of times.'
'Yeah,' said the corporal awkwardly. 'That's what they must've thought.
And then ... and then ... when they was galloping down the sand dunes ...
when they was almost on us, laughing and everything, say-ing stuff like
"that old trick again" ... someone shouted "Fire!" and they did.'
'The dead men ?'
'I joined the Legion to ... er ... you know, with your mind ...' the
corporal began.
'Forget?' said Albert.
'That's right. Forget. And I've been getting good at it. But I'm not
going to forget my old mate Nudger Malik stuck full of arrows and still
giving the enemy what for,' said the corporal. 'Not for a long time. I'm
going to give it a try, mind you.'
Albert looked up at the battlements. They were empty.
'Someone formed 'em up in formation and they all marched out,
afterwards,' said the corporal. 'And I went out to look just now and there
was just graves. They must have dug them for one another ...'
'Tell me,' said Albert, 'who is this "someone" to whom you keep
referring?'
The soldiers looked at one another.
'We've just been talking about that,' said the ser-geant. 'We've been
trying to remember. He was in ... the Pit ... when it started ...'
'Tall, was he?' said Albert.
'Could have been tall, could have been tall,' nodded the corporal. 'He
had a tall voice, certainly.' He looked puzzled at the words coming out of
his own mouth.
'What did he look like?'
'Well, he had a ... with ... and he was about ... more or less a ...'
'Did he look ... loud and deep?' said Albert.
The corporal grinned with relief. 'That's him,' he said. 'Private ...
Private ... Beau ... Beau ... can't quite remember his name ...'
'I know that when he walked out of the ...' the sergeant began, and
began to snap his fingers irritably, '... thing you open and shut. Made of
wood. Hinges and bolts on it. Thank you. Gate. That's right ... gate. When
he went out of the gate he said ... what was it he said, corporal?'
'He said, "EVERY LAST DETAIL", Sir.'
Albert looked around the fort.
'So he's gone.'
'Who?'
'The man you were just telling me about.'
'Oh. Yes. Er. Have you any idea who he was, offendi? I mean, it was
amazing... talk about morale ...'
'Esprit de corpse?' said Albert, who could be nasty at times. 'I
suppose he didn't say where he was going next?'
'Where who was going next?' said the sergeant, wrinkling his forehead
in honest enquiry.
'Forget I asked,' said Albert.
He took a last look round the little fort. It prob-ably didn't matter
much in the history of the world whether it survived or not, whether the
dotted line on the map went one way or the other. Just like the Master to
tinker with things...
Sometimes he tries to be human, too, he thought. And he makes a pig's
ear out of it.
'Carry on, sergeant,' he said, and wandered back into the desert.
The legionnaires watched him disappear over the dunes, and then got on
with the job of tidying up the fort.
'Who d'you think he was?'
'Who?'
'The person you just mentioned.'
'Did I?'
'Did you what?'
Albert crested a dune. From here the dotted line was just visible,
winding treacherously across the sand.
SQUEAK.
'You and me both,' said Albert.
He removed an extremely grubby handkerchief from a pocket, knotted it
in all four corners, and put it on his head.
'Right,' he said, but there was a trace of uncertainty in his voice.
'Seems to me we're not being logical about this.'
SQUEAK.
'I mean, we could be chasing him all over the place.'
SQUEAK.
'So maybe we ought to think about this.'
SQUEAK.
'Now ... if you were on the Disc, definitely feeling a bit strange, and
could go absolutely anywhere, any-where at all ... where would you go?'
SQUEAK?
'Anywhere at all. But somewhere where no one re-members your name.'
The Death of Rats looked around at the endless, featureless and above
all dry desert.
SQUEAK.
'You know, I think you're right.'
It was in an apple tree.
He built me a swing, Susan remembered.
She sat and stared at the thing.
It was quite complicated. In so far as the thinking behind it could be
inferred from the resulting con-struction, it had run like this:
Clearly a swing should be hung from the stoutest branch.
In fact safety being paramount it would be better to hang it from the
two stoutest branches, one to each rope.
They had turned out to be on opposite sides of the tree.
Never go back. That was part of the logic. Always press on, step by
logical step.
So ... he'd removed about six feet from the middle of the tree's trunk,
thus allowing the swing to, well, swing.
The tree hadn't died. It was still quite healthy.
However, the lack of a major section of trunk had presented a fresh
problem.
This had been overcome by the addition of two large props under the
branches, a little further out from the ropes of the swing, keeping the
whole top of the tree at about the right height off the ground.
She remembered how she'd laughed, even then. And he'd stood there,
quite unable to see what was wrong.
And then she saw it all, all laid out.
That was how Death worked. He never understood exactly what he was
doing. He'd do something, and it would turn out wrong. Her mother; suddenly
he had a grown woman on his hands and didn't know what to do next. So he did
something else to make it right, which made it more wrong. Her father.
Death's apprentice! And when that went wrong, and its potential wrongness
was built right into it, he did something else to make it right.
He'd turned over the hourglass.
After that, it was all a matter of maths.
And the Duty.
'Hello ... hells, Glod, tell me where we are ... Sto Lat! Yay !'
It was an even bigger audience. There'd been more time for the posters
to be up, more time for the word of mouth from Ankh-Morpork. And, the band
realized, a solid core of people had followed them from Pseudopolis.
In a brief break between numbers, just before the bit where people
started leaping around on the furniture, Cliff leaned over to Glod.
'You see dat troll in der front row?' he said. 'The one Asphalt's
jumping on the fingers of?'
'The one that looks like a spoil heap?'
'She was in Pseudopolis,' said Cliff, beaming. 'She keeps looking at
me!'
'Go for it, lad,' said Glod, emptying the spit from his horn. 'In like
Flint, eh?'
'You think she's one of dem gropies Asphalt told us about?'
'Could be.'
Other news had travelled fast, too. Dawn saw another redecorated hotel
room, a royal proclamation from Queen Keli that the band was to be out of
the city in one hour on pain of pain, and one more rapid exit.
Buddy lay in the cart as it bumped over the cobbles towards Quirm.
She hadn't been there. He'd scanned the audience on both nights, and
she hadn't been there. He'd even got up in the middle of the night and
walked through the empty streets, in case she was looking for him. Now he
wondered if she existed.
If it came to that, he was only half certain that he existed, except
for the times when he was on stage.
He half listened to the conversation from the others.
'Asphalt?'
'Yes, Mr Glod?'
'Cliff and me can't help noticing something.'
'Yes, Mr Glod?'
'You've been carrying a heavy leather bag around, Asphalt.'
'Yes, Mr Glod.'
'It was a bit heavier this morning, I think.'
'Yes, Mr Glod.'
'It's got the money in it, yes?'
'Yes, Mr Glod.'
'How much?'
'Er. Mr Dibbler said I wasn't to worry you with money stuff,' said
Asphalt.
'We don't mind,' said Cliff.
'That's right,' said Glod. 'We want to worry.'
'Er.' Asphalt licked his lips. There was something deliberate in
Cliff's manner.
'About two thousand dollars, Mr Glod.'
The cart bounced on for a while. The landscape had changed a little.
There were hills, and the farms were smaller.
'Two thousand dollars,' said Glod. 'Two thousand dollars. Two thousand
dollars.
Two thousand dollars.'
'Whyd' you keep saying two thousand dollars?' said Cliff.
'I've never had a chance to say two thousand dollars.'
'Just don't say it so loud.'
'TWO THOUSAND DOLLARS!'
'Ssh!' said Asphalt, desperately, as Glod's shout echoed off the hills.
'This is bandit country!'
Glod eyed the satchel. 'You're telling me,' he said.
'I don't mean Mr Dibbler!'
'We're on the road between Sto Lat and Quirm,' said Glod patiently.
'This isn't the Ramtops road. This is civilization. They don't rob you on
the road in civilization.' He glanced darkly at the satchel again. 'They
wait until you've got into the cities. That's why it's called civilization.
Hah, can you tell me the last time anyone was ever robbed on this road?'
'Friday, I believe,' said a voice from the rocks. 'Oh, bugg-'
The horses reared up and then galloped forward. Asphalt's crack of the
whip had been an almost instinctive reaction.
They didn't slow down until they were several miles further along the
road.
'Just shut up about money, all right?' hissed Asphalt.
'I'm a professional musician,' said Glod. 'Of course I think about
money. How far is it to Quirm?'
'A lot less now,' said Asphalt. 'A couple of miles.'
And after the next hill the city lay before them, nestling in its bay.
There was a cluster of people at the town's gates, which were closed.
Afternoon sunlight glittered off helmets.
'What do you call them long sticks with axes on the end?' said Asphalt.
'Pikes,' said Buddy.
'There's certainly a lot of them,' said Glod.
'They can't be for us, can dey?' said Cliff. 'We're only musicians.'
'And I can see some men in long robes and gold chains and things,' said
Asphalt.
'Burghers,' said Glod.
'You know that horseman that passed us this morning ...' said Asphalt.
'I'm thinking that maybe news travels.'
'Yes, but we didn't break up dat theatre,' said Cliff.
'Well, you only gave them six encores,' said Asphalt.
'We didn't do all dat rioting in the streets.'
'I'm sure the men with the pointy blades will understand that.'
'Maybe dey don't want der hotels redecorated. I said it was a mistake,
orange curtains with yellow wallpaper.'
The cart came to a halt. A rotund man with a tricorn hat and a fur
trimmed cloak scowled uncomfortably at the band.
'Are you the musicians known as The Band With Rocks In?' he said.
'What seems to be the problem, officer?' said Asphalt.
'I am the mayor of Quirm. According to the laws of Quirm, Music With
Rocks In cannot be played in the city. Look, it says so right here ...'
He flourished a scroll. Glod caught it.
`That ink looks wet to me,' he said.
'Music With Rocks In represents a public nuisance, is proven to be
injurious to health and morals and to cause unnatural gyrations of the body;
said the man, pulling the scroll back.
'You mean we can't come into Quirm?' said Glod.
'You can come in if you must,' said the mayor. 'But you're not to
play.'
Buddy stood up on the cart.
'But we've got to play,' he said. The guitar swung around on its strap.
He gripped the neck and raised his strumming hand threateningly.
Glod looked around in desperation. Cliff and Asphalt had put their
hands over their ears.
'Ah!' he said. 'I think what we have here is an occasion for
negotiation, yes?'
He got down from the cart.
'I expect what your worship hasn't heard of,' he said, 'is the music
tax.'
'What music tax?' said Asphalt and the mayor together.
'Oh, it's the latest thing,' said Glod. 'On account of the popularity
of Music With Rocks In. Music tax, fifty pence a ticket. Must have amounted
to, oh, two hundred and fifty dollars in Sto Lat, I reckon. More than twice
that in Ankh-Morpork, of course. Patrician thought it up.'
'Really? Sounds like Vetinari right enough,' said the mayor. He rubbed
his chin.
'Did you say two hundred and fifty dollars in Sto Lat? Really? And that
place is hardly any size.'
A watchman with a feather in his helmet saluted nervously.
'Excuse me, your worship, but the note from Sto Lat did say-'
'Just a minute,' said the mayor testily. 'I'm thinking ...
Cliff leaned down.
'Dis is bribery, is it?' he whispered.
'This is taxation,' said Glod.
The watchman saluted again.
'But really, sir, the guards at-'
'Captain,' snapped the mayor, still staring thoughtfully at Glod, 'this
is politics! Please!'
'As well?' said Cliff.
'And to show goodwill,' said Glod, 'it'd be a good idea if we paid the
tax before the peformance, don't you think?'
The mayor looked at them in astonishment, a man not certain he could
get his mind around the idea of musicians with money.
'Your worship, the message said-'
'Two hundred and fifty dollars,' said Glod.
'Your worship-'
'Now, captain,' said the mayor, apparently reaching a decision, 'we
know that folk are a bit odd in Sto Lat. It's only music, after all. I said
I thought it was an odd note. I can't see the harm in music. And these young
me people are clearly very successful,' he added. This obviously carried a
lot of weight with the mayor, as it does with many people. No one likes a
poor thief.
'Yes,' he went on, 'it'd be just like the Lats to try that on us. They
think we're simple just because we live out here.'
'Yes, but the Pseudopo '
'Oh, them. Stuck up bunch. Nothing wrong with a bit of music, is there?
Especially,' the mayor eyed Glod, 'when it's for the civic good. Let 'em in,
captain.'
Susan saddled up.
She knew the place. She'd even seen it once. They'd put a new fence
along the road now, but it was still dangerous.
She knew the time, too.
Just before they called it Dead Man's Curve.
'Hello, Quirm!'
Buddy struck a chord. And a pose. A faint white glow, like the glitter
of cheap sequins, outlined him.
'Uh huh huh!'
The cheering became the familiar wall of sound.
I thought we were going to get killed by people who didn't like us,
Glod thought. Now I think it's possible to be killed by people who love us
...
He looked around carefully. There were guards around the walls; the
captain had been no fool. I just hope Asphalt put the horse and cart outside
like I asked him ...
He glanced at Buddy, sparkling in the limelight.
A couple of encores and then down the back stairs and away, Glod
thought. The big leather satchel had been chained to Cliff's leg. Anyone
snatching it would find themselves towing one ton of drummer.
I don't even know what we're going to play, thought Glod. I never do, I
just blow and ... there it is. You can't tell me that's right.
Buddy whirled his arm like a discus thrower and a chord sprang away and
into the ears of the audience.
Glod raised the horn to his lips. The sound that emerged was like
burning black velvet in a windowless room.
Before the Music With Rocks In spell filled his soul, he thought: I'm
going to die. That's part of the music. I'm going to die really soon. I can
feel it.
Every day. It's getting closer ...
He glanced at Buddy again. The boy was scanning the audience, as if he
was looking for someone in the screaming throng.
They played 'There's A Great Deal Of Shaking Happening'. They played
'Give Me
That Music With Rocks In'. They played 'Pathway To Paradise' (and a
hundred people in the audience swore to buy a guitar in the morning).
They played with heart and especially with soul.
They got out after the ninth encore. The crowd was still stamping its
feet for more as they climbed through the privy window and dropped into the
alley.
Asphalt emptied a sack into the leather satchel. 'Another seven hundred
dollars!' he said, helping them onto the cart.
'Right, and we get ten dollars each,' said Glod.
'You tell Mr Dibbler,' said Asphalt, as the horses' hoofs clattered
towards the gates.
'I will.'
'It doesn't matter,' said Buddy. 'Sometimes you do it for the money,
but sometimes you do it for the show.'
'Hah! That'll be the day.' Glod fumbled under the seat. Asphalt had
stashed two crates of beer there.
'There's the Festival tomorrow, lads,' rumbled Cliff. The gate arch
passed above them. They could still hear the stamping from here.
'After that we'll have a new contract,' said the dwarf. 'With lots of
zeroes in it.'
'We got zeroes now,' said Cliff.
'Yeah, but they ain't got many numbers in front of them. Eh, Buddy?'
They looked around. Buddy was asleep, the guitar clutched to his chest.
'Out like a candle,' said Gl...
