The Truth (Discworld #25)

The Truth (Discworld #25) Page 10

'Shall I give you the headlines?' said Sacharissa, as he entered.

'You'd better,' said William, sitting down at his crowded desk.

'Engravers Offer Dwarfs One Thousand Dollars For Press.'

'Oh, no...'

'Vampire Iconographer and Hard-Working Writer Tempted with 500 Dollar Salaries,' Sacharissa went on.

'Oh, really...'

'Dwarfs Buggered For Paper.'

'What?

'That's a direct quote from Mr Goodmountain,' said Sacharissa. 'I don't pretend to know exactly what it means, but I understand

they've got enough for only one more edition.'

'And if we want any more it's five times the old price,' said Goodmountain, coming up. 'The Engravers are buying it up. Supply and demand, King says.'

'King?' William's brow wrinkled. 'You mean Mr King?'

'Yeah, King of the Golden River,' said the dwarf. 'And, yeah, we could just about pay that but if them across the road are going to sell their sheet for 2p we'll be working for practically nothing.'

'Otto told the man from the Guild that he'd break his pledge if he saw him here again,' said Sacharissa. 'He was very angry because the man was angling to find out how he was taking printable iconographs.'

'What about you?'

'I'm staying. I don't trust them, especially when they're so sneaky. They seemed very... low-class people,' said Sacharissa. 'But what are we going to do?'

William bit his thumbnail and stared at his desk. When he moved his feet a boot fetched up against the money chest with a reassuring thud.

'We could cut down a bit, I daresay,' said Goodmountain.

'Yes, but then people won't buy the paper,' said Sacharissa. 'And they ought to buy our paper, because it's got real news in it.'

The news in the Inquirer looks more interesting, I have to admit,' said Goodmountain.

That's because it doesn't actually have to have any facts in it!' she snapped. 'Now, I don't mind going back to a dollar a day and Otto says he'd work for half a dollar if he can go on living in the cellar.'

William was still staring at nothing. 'Apart from the truth,' he said in a distant voice, 'what have we got that the Guild hasn't got? Can we print faster?'

'One press against three? No,' said Goodmountain. 'But I bet we can set type faster.'

'And that means... ?'

'We can probably beat them in getting the first paper on to the street.'

'O-kay. That might help. Sacharissa, do you know anyone who wants a job?'

'Know? Haven't you been looking at the letters?'

'Not as such

'Lots of people want a job! This is Ankh-Morpork!'

'All right, find the three letters with the fewest spelling mistakes and send Rocky round to hire the writers.'

'One of them was Mr Bendy,' Sacharissa warned. 'He wants more work. Not many interesting people are dying. Did you know he attends meetings for fun and very carefully writes down everything that's said?'

'Does he do it accurately?'

'I'm sure he does. He's exactly that sort of person. But I don't think we've got the space--'

Tomorrow morning we'll go to four pages. Don't look like that. I've got more stuff about Vetinari, and we've got, oh, twelve hours to get some paper,'

'I told you, King won't sell us any more paper at a decent price,' said Goodmountain.

There's a story right there, then,' said William.

'I mean--'

'Yes, I know. I've got some stuff to write, and then you and I will go to see him. Oh, and send someone to the semaphore tower, will you? I want to send a clacks to the King of Lancre. I think I met him once.'

'Clacks cost money. Lots of money.'

'Do it anyway. We'll find the money somehow,' William leaned over towards the cellar ladder. 'Otto?'

The vampire emerged to waist height. He was holding a half-dismantled iconograph in his hand.

'Vot can I do for you?'

'Can you think of anything extra we can do to sell more papers?'

'Vot do you vant now? Pictures that jump out of zer page? Pictures zat talk? Pictures vhere zer eyes follow you around zer room?'

There's no need to take offence,' said William. 'It wasn't as if I asked for colour or anything--'

'Colour?' said the vampire. 'Is that all? Colour iss easy-peasy. How soon do you vant it?'

'Can't be done,' said Goodmountain firmly.

'Oh, zo you say? Is there somevhere here that makes coloured glass?'

'Yeah, I know the dwarf who runs the stained-glass works in Phedre Road,' said Goodmountain. 'They do hundreds of shades, but--'

'I vish to see samples right now. And of inks, too. You can get coloured inks alzo?'

'That's easy,' said the dwarf, 'but you'd need hundreds of different ones... wouldn't you?'

'No, ziss is not so. I vill make you a list of vot I reqvire. I cannot promise a Burleigh & Ztronginzerarm job first cat out of zer bag, off course. I mean you should not ask me for zer subtle play of light on autumn leafs or anyzing like zat. But zomething with stronk shades should be fine. Zis vill be okay?'

'It'd be amazing.'

'Zank you.'

William stood up. 'And now,' he said, 'let's go and see the King of the Golden River.'

'I've always been puzzled why people call him that,' said Sacharissa. 'I mean, there's no river of gold around here, is there?'

'Gentlemen.'

Mr Slant was waiting in the hall of the empty house. He stood up when the New Firm entered and clutched his briefcase. He looked as if he was in an unusually bad temper.

'Where have you been?'

'Getting a bite, Mr Slant. You didn't turn up this morning, and Mr Tulip gets hungry.'

'I told you to maintain a very low profile.'

'Mr Tulip isn't good at low profiles. Anyway, it all went off well. You must have heard. Oh, we nearly got killed because you didn't tell us a lot of stuff, and that's going to cost you but, hey, who cares about us? What's the problem?'

Mr Slant glared at them. 'My time is valuable, Mr Pin. So I will not spin this out. What did you do with the dog?'

'No one said anything to us about that dog,' said Mr Tulip, and Mr Pin knew he'd got the tone wrong.

'Ah, so you encountered the dog,' said Mr Slant. 'Where is it?'

'Gone. Ran off. Bit our --ing legs and ran off.'

Mr Slant sighed. It was like the wind from an ancient tomb.

'I did tell you that the Watch has a werewolf on the staff,' he said.

'Well? So what?' said Mr Pin.

'A werewolf would have no difficulty in talking to a dog.'

'What? You're telling us people will listen to a dog?' said Mr Pin.

'Unfortunately, yes,' said Mr Slant. 'A dog has got personality. Personality counts for a lot. And the legal precedents are clear. In the history of this city, gentlemen, we have put on trial at various times seven pigs, a tribe of rats, four horses, one flea and a swarm of bees. Last year a parrot was allowed as a prosecution witness in a serious murder case, and I had to arrange a witness protection scheme for it. I believe it is now pretending to be a very large budgerigar a long way away.' Mr Slant shook his head. 'Animals, alas, have their place in a court of law. There are all kinds of objections that could be made but the point is, Mr Pin, that Commander Vimes will build a case on it. He will start questioning... people. He already knows things are not right, but he has to work within the bounds of proof and evidence, and he has neither. If he finds the dog, I think things will unravel.'

'Slip him a few thousand dollars,' said Mr Pin. 'That always works with watchmen.'

'I believe that the last person who tried to bribe Vimes still doesn't have full use of one of his fingers,' said Mr Slant.

'We did everything you --ing told us!' shouted Mr Tulip, pointing a sausage-thick finger.

Mr Slant looked him up and down, as if seeing him for the first time.

'"Kill the Cook!!!"' he said. 'How amusing. However, I understood that we were employing professionals.'

Mr Pin had seen this one coming and once again caught Mr Tulip's fist in mid-air, being momentarily lifted off his feet.

The envelopes, Mr Tulip,' he sang. This man knows things

'Hard to know any --ing thing when you're dead,' snarled Mr Tulip.

'Actually the mind becomes crystal clear,' said Mr Slant. He stood up and Mr Pin noticed how a zombie rises, using pairs of muscles in turn, not so much standing as unfolding upwards.

'Your... other assistant is still safe?' Slant said.

'Back down in the cellar, drunk as a skunk,' said Mr Pin. 'I don't see why we don't just scrag him right now. He nearly turned and ran when he saw Vetinari. If the man hadn't been so surprised we'd have been in big trouble. Who'd notice one more corpse in a city like this?'

'The Watch, Mr Pin. How many times must I tell you this? They are uncannily good at noticing things.'

'Mr Tulip here won't leave 'em much to notice--' Mr Pin stopped. The Watch frighten you that much, do they?'

'This is Ankh-Morpork,' snapped the lawyer. 'We are a very cosmopolitan city. Being dead in Ankh-Morpork is sometimes only an inconvenience, do you understand? We have wizards, we have mediums of all sizes. And bodies do have a habit of turning up. We want nothing that is going to give the Watch a clue, do you understand?'

'They'd listen to a --ing dead man?' said Mr Tulip.

'I don't see why not. You are,' said the zombie. He relaxed a little. 'Anyway, it is always possible that there may be further use for your... colleague. Some further little outing to convince the unconvinced. He is too valuable an asset to...etire just yet.'

'Yeah, okay. We'll keep him in a bottle. But we want extra for the dog,' said Mr Pin.

'It's only a dog, Mr Pin,' said Slant, raising his eyebrows. 'Even Mr Tulip could out-think a dog, I expect.'

'Got to find the dog first,' said Mr Pin, stepping smartly in front of his colleague. 'Lots of dogs in this town.'

The zombie sighed again. 'I can add another five thousand dollars in jewels to your fee,' he said. He held up a hand. 'And please don't insult both of us by saying "ten" automatically. The task is not hard. Lost dogs in this town either end up running with one of the feral packs or begin a new life as a pair of gloves,'

'I want to know who's giving me these orders,' said Mr Pin. He could feel the weight of the Dis-organizer inside his jacket.

Mr Slant looked surprised. 'Me, Mr Pin.'

'Your clients, I meant,'

'Oh, really!'

'This is going to get political,' Mr Pin persisted. 'You can't fight politics. I'm going to need to know how far we've got to run when people find out what happened. And who's going to protect us if we're caught,'

'In this city, gentlemen,' said Mr Slant, 'the facts are never what they seem. Take care of the dog, and... others will look after you. There are plans afoot. Who can say what really happened? People are easily confused, and here I speak as one who has spent centuries in court rooms. Apparently, they say, a lie can run round the world before the truth has got its boots on. What an obnoxious little phrase, don't you think? So... do not panic, and all will be well. And do not be stupid, either. My... clients have long memories and deep pockets. Other killers can be hired. Do you understand me?' He snapped the catches on his case. 'Good day to you,'

The door swung to behind him.

There was a rattling behind Mr Pin as Mr Tulip pulled out his set of stylish executive barbecue tools.

'What are you doing?'

That --ing zombie is going to end up on the end of a couple of --ing handy and versatile kebab skewers,' said Mr Tulip. 'An' then I'm gonna put an edge on this --ing spatula. An' then... then I'm gonna get medieval on his arse.'

There were more pressing problems, but this one intrigued Mr Pin.

'How, exactly?' he said.

'I thought maybe a maypole,' said Mr Tulip reflectively. 'An' then a display of country dancing, land tillage under the three-field system, several plagues and, if my --ing hand ain't too tired, the invention of the --ing horse collar,'

'Sounds good,' said Mr Pin. 'Now let's find that damn dog,'

'How we gonna do that?'

'Intelligently,' said Mr Pin.

'I hate that --ing way.'

He was called King of the Golden River. This was a recognition of his wealth and achievements and the source of his success, which •was not quite the classical river of gold. It was a considerable advance on his former nickname, which was Piss Harry.

Harry King had made his fortune by the careful application of the old adage: where there's muck there's brass. There was money to be made out of things that people threw away. Especially the very human things that people threw away.

The real foundations of his fortune came when he started leaving empty buckets at various hostelries around the city centre, especially those that were more than a gutter's length from the river. He charged a very modest fee to take them away when they were full. It became part of the life of every pub landlord; they'd hear a clank in the middle of the night and turn over in their sleep content in the knowledge that one of Piss Harry's men was, in a small way, making the world a better-smelling place.

They didn't wonder what happened to the full buckets, but Harry King had learned something that can be the key to great riches: there is very little, however disgusting, that isn't used somewhere in some industry. There are people out there who want large quantities of ammonia and saltpetre. If you can't sell it to the alchemists then the farmers probably want it. If even the farmers don't want it then there is nothing, nothing, however gross, that you can't sell to the tanners.

Harry felt like the only man in a mining camp who knows what gold looks like.

He started taking on whole streets at a time, and branched out. In the well-to-do areas the householders paid him, paid him, to take away night soil, the by now established buckets, the horse manure, the dustbins and even the dog muck. Dog muck? Did they have any idea how much the tanners paid for the finest white dog muck? It was like being paid to take away squishy diamonds.

Harry couldn't help it. The world fell over itself to give him money. Someone, somewhere, would pay him for a dead horse or two tons of prawns so far beyond their best-before date it couldn't be seen with a telescope, and the most wonderful part of all was that someone had already paid him to take them away. If anything

absolutely failed to find a buyer, not even from the catmeat men, not even from the tanners, not even from Mr Dibbler himself, there were his mighty compost heaps downstream of the city, where the volcanic heat of decomposition made fertile soil ('10p a bag, bring your own bag...') out of everything that was left including, according to rumour, various shadowy businessmen who had come second in a takeover battle ('... brings up your dahlias a treat').

He'd kept the woodpulp-and-rags business closer to home, though, along with the huge vats that contained the golden foundations of his fortune, because it was the only part of his business that his wife Effie would talk about. Rumour had it that she had also been behind the removal of the much-admired sign over the entrance to his yard, which said: H. King - Taking the Piss Since 1961. Now it read: H. King - Recycling Nature's Bounty.

A small door within the large gates was opened by a troll. Harry was very forward-looking when it came to employing the non-human races, and had been among the first employers in the city to give a job to a troll. As far as organic substances were concerned, they had no sense of smell.

'Yus?'

I'd like to speak to Mr King, please.'

'Whatabaht?'

'I want to buy a considerable amount of paper from him. Tell him it's Mr de Worde.'

'Right.'

The door slammed shut. They waited. After a few minutes the door opened again.

'Der King will see you now,' the troll announced.

And so William and Goodmountain were led into the yard of a man who, rumour said, was stockpiling used paper hankies against the day somebody found a way of extracting silver from bogeys.

On either side of the door huge black Rottweilers flung themselves against the bars of their day cages. Everyone knew Harry let them have the run of the yard at night. He made sure that everyone knew. And any nocturnal miscreant would have to be really good with dogs unless they wanted to end up as a few pounds of Tanners' Grade 1 (White).

The King of the Golden River had his office in a two-storey shed overlooking the yard, from where he could survey the steaming mounds and cisterns of his empire.

Even half hidden by his big desk Harry King was an enormous man, pink and shiny faced, with a few strands of hair teased across his head; it was hard to imagine him not in shirtsleeves and braces, even when he wasn't, or not smoking a huge cigar, which he'd never been seen without. Perhaps it was some kind of defence against the odours which were, in a way, his stock in trade.

"evenin', lads,' he said amiably. 'What can I do for you? As if I didn't know.'

'Do you remember me, Mr King?' said William.

Harry nodded. 'You're Lord de Worde's son, right? You put a piece in that letter of yourn last year when our Daphne got wed, right? My Effie was that impressed, all those nobs reading about our Daphne.'

'It's a rather bigger letter now, Mr King.'

'Yes, I did hear about that,' said the fat man. 'Some of 'em's already turnin' up in our collections. Useful stuff, I'm getting the lads to store it sep'rate.'

His cigar shifted from one side of his mouth to the other. Harry could not read or write, a fact which had never stopped him besting those who could. He employed hundreds of workers to sort through the garbage; it was cheap enough to employ a few more who could sort through words.

'Mr King--' William began.

'I ain't daft, lads,' said Harry. 'I know why you're here. But business is business. You know how it is.'

'We won't have a business without paper!' Goodmountain burst out.

The cigar shifted again. 'And you'd be--?'

This is Mr Goodmountain,' said William. 'My printer.'

'Dwarf, eh?' said Harry, looking Goodmountain up and down. 'Nothing against dwarfs, me, but you ain't good sorters. Gnolls don't cost much but the grubby little buggers eat half the rubbish. Trolls are okay. They stop with me 'cos I pays 'em well. Golems is best - they'll sort stuff all day and all night. Worth their weight in

gold, which is bloody near what they want payin' these days.' The cigar began another journey back across the mouth. 'Sorry, lads. A deal's a deal. Wish I could help you. Sold right out of paper. Can't.'

'You're knocking us back, just like that?' said Goodmountain.

Harry gave him a narrow-eyed look through the haze.

'You talking to me about knocking back? Don't know what a tosheroon is, do you?' he said. The dwarf shrugged.

'Yes. I do,' said William. There's several meanings, but I think you're referring to a big caked ball of mud and coins, such as you might find in some crevice in an old drain where the water forms an eddy. They can be quite valuable.'

'What? You've got hands on you like a girl,' said Harry, so surprised that the cigar momentarily drooped. 'How come you know that?'

'I like words, Mr King.'

'I started out as a muckraker when I was three,' said Harry, pushing his chair back. 'Found me first tosheroon on day one. O' course, one of the big kids nicked it off me right there. And you tell me about being knocked back? But I had a nose for the job even then. Then I--'

They sat and listened, William more patiently than Good-mountain. It was fascinating, anyway, if you had the right kind of mind, although he knew a lot of the story; Harry King told it at every opportunity.

Young Harry King had been a mudlark with vision, combing the banks of the river and even the surface of the turbid Ankh itself for lost coins, bits of metal, useful lumps of coal, anything that had some value somewhere. By the time he was eight he was employing other kids. Whole stretches of the river belonged to him. Other gangs kept away, or were taken over. Harry wasn't a bad fighter, and he could afford to employ those who were better.

And so it had gone on, the ascent of the King through horse manure sold by the bucket (guaranteed well stamped-down) to rags and bones and scrap metal and household dust and the famous buckets, where the future really was golden. It was a kind of history of civilization, but seen from the bottom looking up.

'You're not a member of a Guild, Mr King?' said William, during a pause for breath.

The cigar travelled from one side to the other and back quite fast, a sure sign that William had hit a nerve.

'Damn Guilds,' said its owner. They said I should join the Beggars! Me! I never begged for nothin', not in my whole life! The nervel But I've seen 'em all off. I won't deal with no Guild. I pay my lads well and they stand by me.'

'It's the Guilds that are trying to break us, Mr King. You know that. I know you get to hear about everything. If you can't sell us paper, we've lost.'

'What'd I be if I broke a deal?' said Harry King. 'This is my tosheroon, Mr King,' said William. 'And the kids who want to take it off me are big.'

Harry was silent for a while and then lumbered to his feet and crossed to the big window.

'Come and look here, lads,' he said.

At one end of the yard was a big treadmill, operated by a couple of golems. It powered a creaking endless belt which crossed most of the yard. At the other end, several trolls with broad shovels fed the belt from a heap of trash that was itself constantly refilled by the occasional cart.

Lining the belt itself were golems and trolls and even the occasional human. In the flickering torchlight they watched the moving debris carefully. Occasionally a hand would dart out and pitch something into a bin behind the worker.

'Fish heads, bones, rags, paper... I got twenty-seven different bins so far, including one for gold and silver, 'cos you'd be amazed what gets thrown away by mistake. Tinkle, tinkle, little spoon, wedding ring will follow soon... That's what I used to sing to my little girls. Stuff like your paper of news goes in bin six, Low Grade Paper Waste. I sells most of that to Bob Holtely up in Five and Seven Yard.'

'What does he do with it?' said William, noting the 'Low Grade'.

'Pulps it for lavatory paper,' said Harry. 'The wife swears by it.

Pers'n'ly I cut out the middle man.' He sighed, apparently oblivious

of the sudden sag in William's self-esteem. 'Y'know, sometimes I

stand here of an evenin' when the line is rumbling and the sunset is shinin' on the settlin' tanks and, I don't mind admitting it, a tear comes to my eye.'

'To tell you the truth, it comes to mine, too, sir,' said William.

'Now then, lad... when that kid nicked my first tosheroon, I didn't go around complaining, did I? I knew I'd got an eye for it, see? I carried on, and I found plenty more. And on my eighth birthday I paid a couple of trolls to seek out the man who'd pinched my first one and slap seven kinds of snot out of him. Did you know that?'

'No, Mr King.'

Harry King stared at William through the smoke. William felt that he was being turned over and examined, like something found in the trash.

'My youngest daughter, Hermione... she's getting married at the end of next week,' said Harry. 'Big show. Temple of Offler. Choirs and everything. I'm inviting all the top nobs. Effie insisted. They won't come, o' course. Not for Piss Harry.'

The Times would have been there, though,' said William. 'With coloured pictures. Except we go out of business tomorrow.'

'Coloured, eh? You get someone to paint 'em in, do you?'

'No. We've... got a special way,' said William, hoping against hope that Otto was serious. He wasn't just out on a limb here, he was dangerously out of the tree.

That'd be something to see,' said Harry. He took out his cigar, stared reflectively at the end and put it back in his mouth. Through the smoke he watched William carefully.

William felt the distinct unease of a well-educated man who has to confront the fact that the illiterate man watching him could probably out-think him three times over.

'Mr King, we really need that paper,' he said, to break the thoughtful silence.

There's something about you, Mr de Worde,' said the King. 'I buy and sell clerks when I need them, and you don't smell like a clerk to me. You've got the air about you of a man who'd scrabble through a ton o' shit to find a farthin', and I'm wonderin' why that is.'

'Look, Mr King, will you please sell us some paper at the old price?' said William.

'Couldn't do that. I told you. A deal's a deal. The Engravers've paid me,' said Harry shortly.

William opened his mouth but Goodmountain laid a hand on his arm. The King was clearly working his way to the end of a line of thought.

Harry went over to the window again and stared pensively at the yard with its steaming piles. Then...

'Oh, will you look at that,' he said, stepping back from the window in tremendous astonishment. 'See that cart at the other gate down there?'

They saw the cart.

'I must've told the lads a hundred times, don't leave a cart all laden up and ready to go right by an open gate like that. Someone'll nick it, I told 'em.'

William wondered who'd steal anything from the King of the Golden River, a man with all those red-hot compost heaps.

'That's the last quarter of the order for the Engravers' Guild,' said Harry, to the world in general. I'd have to repay 'em if it got half-inched right out of my yard. I'll have to tell the foreman. He's getting forgetful these days.'

'We should be leaving, William,' said Goodmountain, grabbing William's arm again.

'Why? We haven't--'

'However can we repay you, Mr King?' said the dwarf, dragging William towards the door.

The bridesmaids'll be wearing oh-de-nill, whatever that is,' said the King of the Golden River. 'Oh, and if I don't get eighty dollars from you by the end of the month you lads will be in deep' - the cigar did a double length of the mouth - 'trouble. Head downwards.'

Two minutes later the cart was creaking out of the yard, under the curiously uninterested eyes of the troll foreman.

'No, it's not stealing,' said Goodmountain emphatically, shaking the reins. 'The King pays the bastards back their money and we pay him the old price. So we're all happy

except for the Inquirer, and who cares about them?'

'I didn't like the bit about the deep pause trouble,' said William. 'Head downwards.'

'I'm shorter'n you so I lose out either way up,' said the dwarf.

After watching the cart disappear the King yelled downstairs for one of his clerks and told him to fetch a copy of the Times from Bin Six. He sat impassively, except for the oscillating cigar, while the stained and crumpled paper was read to him.

After a while his smile broadened and he asked the clerk to read a few extracts again.

'Ah,' he said, when the man had finished. 'I reckoned that was it. The boy's a born muckraker. Shame for him he was born a long way from honest muck.'

'Shall I do a credit note for the Engravers, Mr King?'

'Aye.'

'You reckon you'll get your money back, Mr King?'

Harry King usually didn't take this sort of thing from clerks. They were there to do the adding-up, not discuss policy. On the other hand, Harry had made a fortune seeing the sparkle in the mire, and sometimes you had to recognize expertise when you saw it.

'What colour's oh-de-nill?' he said.

'Oh, one of those difficult colours, Mr King. A sort of light blue with a hint of green.'

'Could you get ink that colour?'

'I could find out. It'd be expensive.'

The cigar made its traverse from one side of Harry King to the other. He was known to dote on his daughters, who he felt had suffered rather from having a father who needed to take two baths just to get dirty.

'We shall just have to keep an eye on our little writing man,' he said. Tip off the lads, will you? I wouldn't like to see our Effie disappointed.'

The dwarfs were working on the press again, Sacharissa noticed. It seldom stayed the same shape for more than a couple of hours. The dwarfs designed as they went along.

It looked to Sacharissa that the only tools a dwarf needed were his axe and some means of making fire. That'd eventually get him a forge, and with that he could make simple tools, and with those he could make complex tools, and with complex tools a dwarf could more or less make anything.

A couple of them were rummaging around in the industrial junk that had been piled against the walls. A couple of metal mangles had been melted down for their iron already, and the rocking horses were being used to melt lead. One or two of the dwarfs had left the shed on mysterious errands, too, and had returned carrying small sacks and furtive expressions. A dwarf is also very good at making use of things other people have thrown away, even if they haven't actually thrown them away yet.

She was turning her attention to a report of the Nap Hill Jolly Pals annual meeting when a crash and some cursing in Uberwaldean, a good cursing language, made her run over to the cellar entrance.

'Are you all right, Mr Chriek? Do you want me to get the dustpan and brush?'

'Bodrozvachski zhaltziet!... oh, sorry, Miss Sacharissa! Zere has been a minor pothole on zer road to progress.'

Sacharissa made her way down the ladder.

Otto was at his makeshift bench. Boxes of demons hung on the wall. Some salamanders dozed in their cages. In a big dark jar, land eels slithered. But a jar next to it was broken.

'I vas clumsy and knocked it over,' said Otto, looking embarrassed. 'And now zer stupid eel 'as gone behind the bench.'

'Does it bite?'

'Oh no, zey are very lazy wretches--'

'What is this you've been working on, Otto?' Sacharissa said, turning to look closer at something big on the bench.

He tried to dart in front of her. 'Oh, it is all very experimental--'

The way of making coloured plates?'

'Yes, but it is just a crude lash-up--'

Sacharissa caught sight of a movement out of the corner of her eye. The escaped land eel, having got bored behind the bench, was making a very sluggish bid for new horizons where an eel could wriggle proud and horizontal.

'Please don't--' Otto began.

'Oh, it's all right, I'm not at all squeamish...'

Sacharissa's hand closed on the eel.

She came to with Otto's black handkerchief being flapped desperately in her face.

'Oh, my goodness...' she said, trying to sit up.

Otto's face was a picture of such terror that Sacharissa forgot her own splitting headache for a moment.

'What's happened to you?' she said. 'You look terrible.'

Otto jerked back, tried to stand up and half collapsed against the bench, clutching at his chest.

'Cheese!' he moaned. 'Please get me some cheese! Or a big apple! Something to bitel Pleeease!'

There's nothing like that down here--'

'Keep avay from me! And do not breathe like zat!' Otto wailed.

'Like what?'

'Zer bosoms going in and out and up and down like zat! I am a vampirel A fainting young lady, please understand, zer panting, zer heaving of zer bosoms... it calls somezing terrible from vithin With a lurch he pushed himself upright and gripped the black twist of ribbon from his lapel. 'But I vill be stronk!' he screamed. 'I vill not let everyvun down!'

He stood stiffly to attention, although slightly blurred because of the vibration shaking him from head to foot, and in a trembling voice sang: 'Oh vill you come to zer mission, vill you come, come, come, Zere's a nice cup of tea and a bun, and a bun--'

The ladder was suddenly alive with tumbling dwarfs.

'Are you all right, miss?' said Boddony, running forward with his axe. 'Has he tried anything?'

'No, no! He's--'

'--zer drink zat's in zer livink vein, Is not zer drink for me--' Sweat was running down Otto's face. He stood with one hand pressed over his heart.

That's right, Otto!' shouted Sacharissa. Tight it! Fight it!' She turned to the dwarfs. 'Have any of you got any raw meat?'

'... to life anew and temperance too. And to pure cold vater ve'll come...' Veins were throbbing on Otto's pale head.

'Got some fresh rat fillets upstairs,' muttered one of the dwarfs. 'Cost me tuppence 'You get them right now, Gowdie,' snapped Boddony. 'This looks

bad!'