A Blink of the Screen: Collected Short Fiction
Page 22
‘—and I certainly didn’t do any—’
Granny’s head turned as the slap came.
For the moment no one breathed, no one moved.
She lifted a hand slowly and rubbed her cheek.
‘You know you could have done it easily!’
It seemed to Nanny that Letice’s scream echoed off the mountains.
The cup dropped from her hands and crunched on the stubble.
Then the tableau unfroze. A couple of her sister witches stepped forward, put their hands on Letice’s shoulders and she was pulled, gently and unprotesting, away.
Everyone else waited to see what Granny Weatherwax would do. She raised her head.
‘I hope Mrs Earwig is all right,’ she said. ‘She seemed a bit … distraught.’
There was silence. Nanny picked up the abandoned cup and tapped it with a forefinger.
‘Hmm,’ she said. ‘Just plated, I reckon. If she paid ten dollars for it, the poor woman was robbed.’ She tossed it to Gammer Beavis, who fumbled it out of the air. ‘Can you give it back to her tomorrow, Gammer?’
Gammer nodded, trying not to catch Granny’s eye.
‘Still, we don’t have to let it spoil everything,’ Granny said pleasantly. ‘Let’s have the proper ending to the day, eh? Traditional, like. Roast potatoes and marshmallows and old stories round the fire. And forgiveness. And let’s let bygones be bygones.’
Nanny could feel the sudden relief spreading out like a fan. The witches seemed to come alive, at the breaking of the spell that had never actually been there in the first place. There was a general straightening up and the beginnings of a bustle as they headed for the saddlebags on their broomsticks.
‘Mr Hopcroft gave me a whole sack of spuds,’ said Nanny, as conversation rose around them. ‘I’ll go and drag ’em over. Can you get the fire lit, Esme?’
A sudden change in the air made her look up. Granny’s eyes gleamed in the dusk.
Nanny knew enough to fling herself to the ground.
Granny Weatherwax’s hand curved through the air like a comet and the spark flew out, crackling.
The bonfire exploded. A blue-white flame shot up through the stacked branches and danced into the sky, etching shadows on the forest. It blew off hats and overturned tables and formed figures and castles and scenes from famous battles and joined hands and danced in a ring. It left a purple image on the eye that burned into the brain—
And settled down, and was just a bonfire.
‘I never said nothin’ about forgettin’,’ said Granny.
When Granny Weatherwax and Nanny Ogg walked home through the dawn, their boots kicked up the mist. It had, on the whole, been a good night.
After some while, Nanny said, ‘That wasn’t nice, what you done.’
‘I done nothin’.’
‘Yeah, well … it wasn’t nice, what you didn’t do. It was like pullin’ away someone’s chair when they’re expecting to sit down.’
‘People who don’t look where they’re sitting should stay stood up,’ said Granny.
There was a brief pattering on the leaves, one of those very brief showers you get when a few raindrops don’t want to bond with the group.
‘Well, all right,’ Nanny conceded. ‘But it was a little bit cruel.’
‘Right,’ said Granny.
‘And some people might think it was a little bit nasty.’
‘Right.’
Nanny shivered. The thoughts that’d gone through her head in those few seconds after Pewsey had screamed—
‘I gave you no cause,’ said Granny. ‘I put nothin’ in anyone’s head that weren’t there already.’
‘Sorry, Esme.’
‘Right.’
‘But … Letice didn’t mean to be cruel, Esme. I mean, she’s spiteful and bossy and silly, but—’
‘You’ve known me since we was girls, right?’ Granny interrupted. ‘Through thick and thin, good and bad?’
‘Yes, of course, but—’
‘And you never sank to sayin, “I’m telling you this as a friend”, did you?’
Nanny shook her head. It was a telling point. No one even remotely friendly would say a thing like that.
‘What’s empowerin’ about witchcraft anyway?’ said Granny. ‘It’s a daft sort of a word.’
‘Search me,’ said Nanny. ‘I did start out in witchcraft to get boys, to tell you the truth.’
‘Think I don’t know that?’
‘What did you start out to get, Esme?’
Granny stopped, and looked up at the frosty sky and then down at the ground.
‘Dunno,’ she said, at last. ‘Even, I suppose.’
And that, Nanny thought, was that.
Deer bounded away as they arrived at Granny’s cottage.
There was a stack of firewood piled up neatly by the back door, and a couple of sacks on the doorstep. One contained a large cheese.
‘Looks like Mr Hopcroft and Mr Poorchick have been here,’ said Nanny.
‘Hmph.’ Granny looked at the carefully yet badly written piece of paper attached to the second sack: ‘“Dear Misftresf Weatherwax, I would be moft grateful if you would let me name thif new championfhip variety ‘Efme Weatherwax’. Yours in hopefully good health, Percy Hopcroft.” Well, well, well. I wonder what gave him that idea?’
‘Can’t imagine,’ said Nanny.
‘I would just bet you can’t,’ said Granny.
She sniffed suspiciously, tugged at the sack’s string, and pulled out an Esme Weatherwax.
It was rounded, very slightly flattened, and pointy at one end. It was an onion.
Nanny Ogg swallowed. ‘I told him not—’
‘I’m sorry?’
‘Oh … nothing …’
Granny Weatherwax turned the onion round and round, while the world, via the medium of Nanny Ogg, awaited its fate. Then she seemed to reach a decision she was comfortable with.
‘A very useful vegetable, the onion,’ she said, at last. ‘Firm. Sharp.’
‘Good for the system,’ said Nanny.
‘Keeps well. Adds flavour.’
‘Hot and spicy,’ said Nanny, losing track of the metaphor in the flood of relief. ‘Nice with cheese—’
‘We don’t need to go that far,’ said Granny Weatherwax, putting it carefully back in the sack. She sounded almost amicable. ‘You comin’ in for a cup of tea, Gytha?’
‘Er … I’d better be getting along—’
‘Fair enough.’
Granny started to close the door, and then stopped and opened it again. Nanny could see one blue eye watching her through the crack.
‘I was right though, wasn’t I,’ said Granny. It wasn’t a question.
Nanny nodded.
‘Right,’ she said.
‘That’s nice.’
THE ANKH-MORPORK NATIONAL ANTHEM
BBC RADIO 4, 15 JANUARY 1999
In 1998, the BBC, or at least part of it, asked me if the Discworld had a national anthem.
I said no, but the city of Ankh-Morpork had one.
And they said: Would you write it for us?
And that led to the first ever national anthem of a fictional city state being played nationally on BBC Radio 4 on 15 January 1999, as the rousing close to a week of programmes about, yes, national anthems.
Carl Davis was asked to do the music and we had several long phone conversations about how the thing should sound, culminating in him ringing me up from a taxi in New York, I think, and playing a stylophone at me.
It was wonderful. It was exactly what I’d asked for – ponderous, slightly threatening, and full of the joyful pomposity of empire. I think it was the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra that played it, with a wonderful soprano who tackled it cheerfully and made ‘ner hner ner’ sound like something by Wagner.
It was never officially played again, for complicated reasons to do with money and copyright, although I think a version did end up on-line. Some people are such scallywags …
; The anthem of the sprawling mercantile city state of Ankh-Morpork was not even written by one of its sons, but by a visitor – the vampire Count Henrik Shline von Überwald (born 1703, died 1782, died again 1784, and also in 1788, 1791, 1802/4/7/8, also 1821, 1830, 1861, staked 1872). He had taken a long holiday to get away from some people who wanted earnestly to talk to him about cutting his head off, and declared himself very impressed at the city’s policy of keeping the peace by bribery, financial corruption, and ultimately by making unbeatable offers for the opponents’ weapons, most of which had been made in Ankh-Morpork in the first place.
The anthem, known affectionately as ‘We can rule you wholesale’, is the only one that formally has a second verse consisting mainly of embarrassed mumbling.
The Count, who visited many countries in the course of his travels, noted that all real patriots can never remember more than one verse of their anthem, and get through the subsequent verses by going ‘ner hner ner’ until they reach an outcrop of words they recognize, which they sing very boldly to give the impression that they really had been singing all the other words as well but had been drowned out by the people around them.
In classical renditions, the singing is normally led by a large soprano wearing a sheet and carrying the flame of something or other and holding a large fork.
When dragons belch and hippos flee
My thoughts, Ankh-Morpork, are of thee
Let others boast of martial dash
For we have boldly fought with cash
We own all your helmets, we own all your shoes
We own all your generals – touch us and you’ll lose
Morporkia! Morporkia!
Morporkia owns the day!
We can rule you wholesale
Touch us and you’ll pay
We bankrupt all invaders, we sell them souvenirs
We ner ner ner ner ner, hner ner hner by the ears
Er hner we sing ner ner ner ner
Ner ner her ner ner ner hner the ner
Er ner ner hner ner, nher hner ner ner
Ner hner ner, your gleaming swords
We mortaged to the hilt
Morporkia! Morporkia!
Hner ner ner ner ner ner
We can rule you wholesale
Credit where it’s due.
MEDICAL NOTES
NAC MAC PROGRAMME BOOK, DISCWORLD CONVENTION, AUGUST 2002
What can I say? Various conventions ask for stuff like this as part of the whole business: it’s part of how the whole thing works, and usually they get it, and occasionally – possibly – it’s good.
FROM HOUSEHOLD MEDICINE, HAIR CARE, AND SIMPLE SURGERY, PUBLISHED BY THE ANKH-MORPORK GUILD OF BARBER-SURGEONS, AM$2
Discworld, while hosting a large number of well-known plagues and other ailments, also boasts – if that is the word – a number of medical conditions of its own. In Ankh-Morpork in particular, population pressure has helped create a whole range of completely original yet curiously familiar complaints, such as:
ATTENTION SURPLUS SYNDROME
Teachers find this just as bad as the other sort. No one likes a child who pays attention too hard, whose eyes follow your every move, and who listens very carefully to everything you say. It’s like talking to a great big bottomless ear.
Advanced cases correct spelling and pronunciation in a clear piping voice, and point out errors of fact to the rest of the class. They also have the infuriating habit of reading all the way to the end of the classroom reader on the first day of term, instead of having the decency to read at the geological speed considered correct for the rest of their age group. Expel at the earliest opportunity.
FLORABUNDI’S SYNDROME
Erratic and uncontrollable attacks of politeness and good manners. This may not at first sight appear to be an affliction at all, but can be deadly if you are a fish porter, a prisoner, a trooper, or a member of some other profession where incivility is bloody well expected. So called after Sergeant-Major Charles ‘Blossom’ Florabundi, who in times of stress lost control of his vocabulary and, for example, refused to fire on any enemy that he hadn’t been introduced to. He was pensioned off when the entire barracks mutinied after being called ‘you quite vexing gentlemen’. As Corporal Harry ‘Sharpey’ Pointer said afterwards, ‘No one minds being called a “—ing —er of a —ing ——”, but that sounded like he —ing meant it! What does —ing “vexing” mean, anyway?’
ANNOIA, OR PARANOIA INVERSA
The belief that you are out to get everyone. This is extremely rare amongst people who are not Dark Lords or similar, since those that by profession are indeed ‘out to get everyone’ do not count. However, Mrs Everita Pewter, of Dolly Sisters, did visit her doctor complaining of feelings that she was oppressing people, spying on them, reading their mail, picking up their thoughts via strange waves, and so on.
After extensive tests at Unseen University’s Department of Invasive Medicine, it was found that Mrs Pewter had in fact been born as one of Them but had never been taught to use her powers. The Them is the secret, unknown, but certainly suspected organization of people whose job it is to interfere with everybody else, ruin their lives, and, in short, mess up the world and then go home laughing. She sought advice about declaring herself as one of Them, but once it was explained to her that doing so would involve wearing hooded black robes, conducting secret meetings in vast underground caverns, and manipulating the destiny of millions on a twenty-four-hour basis, possibly while fondling a fluffy white cat, she realized that this would mean missing bridge club on Wednesdays; and since in any case cats gave Mrs Pewter hay fever, she opted instead for a decoction of willow bark for whenever the voices in her head got too bad.
PLANETS
An ailment peculiar to people working in conditions of stress in high magical environments. This can sometimes cause a breakdown in the inhibitory circuits which prevent every individual’s belief that he or she is the centre of the universe from being broadcast to the universe at large. The usual result is that small imaginary planets will appear and begin to orbit the sufferer’s head. Strictly speaking the whole universe will eventually begin to orbit them as well, but the effect is so slight that it is in practice restricted to small items within a few feet.
History records that the wizard Roraty Williams suffered from chronic planets for several years, and one of them developed quite an advanced civilization which sent a small fleet of flying ships to colonize his head. A helpful and caring man, for some years he never wore a hat.
SCROOPISM
Many people know about Thomas Bowdler, who published an edition of Shakespeare’s works with all the offensive bits cut out. Few remember Male Infant Scroop, who had an overwhelming urge to add rude bits to books and songs not originally intended to contain any. This began at quite a young age, with the scrawling of words like ‘nikkers’ and ‘bum’ in the margins of his schoolbooks (his problem was exacerbated by a lifelong inability to spell) but, after he received a large legacy at the age of 21, he was able to reprint entire books that had been ‘scrooped’. These were substituted for the publisher’s copies, which they otherwise resembled in every respect, when bookshop staff were not looking.
For several months the only result was a noticeable upsurge in the sales of several titles. Things came to a head, however, when a Miss Epetheme Slaybell’s small, privately published volume entitled Thoughts from a Country Garden won several highly contested literary awards, and was praised by a judge for its ‘bold and controversial stance on the subject of primroses’.
Mr Scroop died aged 84, and is buried in Small Gods Cemetery, Ankh-Morpork. His tombstone, including the inscription, may be inspected by private arrangement with the head gravedigger, since in deference to public opinion it is kept wrapped in plain brown paper.
SIGNITUS
A minor but chronic ailment, which causes the sufferer to groan and sometimes run away at the sight of anyone holding more than three books. Brandy has been found to relieve the sym
ptoms, possibly with the addition of more brandy.
BURSARITIS (CHRONIC CON-TINENCE)
The illusion that you have brought hundreds of people a long way in order to celebrate something that doesn’t really exist. Symptoms are manic-depression, a fixed waxy smile, and a tendency, unless physically prevented from doing so, to sell T-shirts at people. Those afflicted may shout things like ‘Only 1,978 mugs to sell before we break even!’ WARNING: sufferers may spontaneously combust if woken suddenly from their trance-like state, and it is best to humour them until they wake up of their own accord. Be kind to these people. It is not their fault.
These notes were supplied by Dr Peristyle Slack, Ankh-Morpork Guild of Barber-Surgeons – ‘Come to Us for a Close Shave’.
THUD: A HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE
THUD: THE DISCWORLD BOARD GAME, TREVOR TRURAN, 2002
We get at least one approach every month about Discworld board games. Many of them are fine, but too often the Discworld name has been pasted on to something generic, or Discworld history would need a major rewrite in order to fit the game. Letters burble: ‘In this game there is a big war between the wizards and the witches …’ Uh, no, I don’t think there is.
But Trevor Truran, who designs games the way other people breathe, came up with something good in ‘Koom Valley’ – the game’s working title. It was what I’d asked for: a true Discworld game, a game that could reasonably exist and be played there. It pitches dwarfs against trolls – a conflict hallowed by time – and, in order to play a complete game you have to play both sides, which was a specification I hadn’t laid down but which was exactly what I wanted. A game which forces you to think and play like your hereditary enemy could be extremely useful to a thoughtful author. It had the right feel, in short, and slotted neatly into Discworld history.