BUT SHE BELIEVES IN THE HOGFATHER?
‘She'd believe in anything if there was a dolly in it for her. But you're not going to leave without telling me—’
Death hung the stockings back on the mantelpiece.
NOW WE MUST BE GOING. HAPPY HOGSWATCH. ER… OH, YES: HO. HO. HO.
‘Nice sherry,’ said Albert, wiping his mouth.
Rage overtook Susan's curiosity. It had to travel quite fast.
‘You've actually been drinking the actual drinks little children leave out for the actual Hogfather?’ she said.
‘Yeah, why not? He ain't drinking 'em. Not where he's gone.’
‘And how many have you had, may I ask?’
‘Dunno, ain't counted,’ said Albert happily.
ONE MILLION, EIGHT HUNDRED THOUSAND, SEVEN HUNDRED AND SIX, said Death. AND SIXTY EIGHT THOUSAND, THREE HUNDRED AND NINETEEN PORK PIES. AND ONE TURNIP.
‘It looked pork-pie shaped,’ said Albert. ‘Everything does, after a while.’
‘Then why haven't you exploded?’
‘Dunno. Always had a good digestion.’
TO THE HOGFATHER, ALL PORK PIES ARE AS ONE PORK PIE. EXCEPT THE ONE LIKE A TURNIP. COME, ALBERT. WE HAVE TRESPASSED ON SUSAN'S TIME.
‘Why are you doing this?’ Susan screamed.
I AM SORRY. I CANNOT TELL YOU. FORGET YOU SAW ME. IT'S NOT YOUR BUSINESS.
‘Not my business? How can—’
AND NOW… WE MUST BE GOING…
‘Nighty-night,’ said Albert.
The clock struck, twice, for the half-hour. It was still half past six.
And they were gone.
The sledge hurtled across the sky.
‘She'll try to find out what this is all about, you know,’ said Albert.
OH DEAR.
‘Especially after you told her not to.’
YOU THINK SO?
‘Yeah,’ said Albert.
DEAR ME. I STILL HAVE A LOT TO LEARN ABOUT HUMANS, DON'T I?
‘Oh… I dunno…’ said Albert.
OBVIOUSLY IT WOULD BE QUITE WRONG TO INVOLVE A HUMAN IN ALL THIS. THAT IS WHY, YOU WILL RECALL, I CLEARLY FORBADE HER TO TAKE AN INTEREST.
‘Yeah… you did…’
BESIDES, IT'S AGAINST THE RULES.
‘You said them little grey buggers had already broken the rules.’
YES, BUT I CAN'T JUST WAVE A MAGIC WAND AND MAKE IT ALL BETTER. THERE MUST BE PROCEDURES. Death stared ahead for a moment and then shrugged. AND WE HAVE SO MUCH TO DO. WE HAVE PROMISES TO KEEP.
‘Well, the night is young,’ said Albert, sitting back in the sacks.
THE NIGHT IS OLD. THE NIGHT IS ALWAYS OLD.
The pigs galloped on. Then, ‘No, it ain't.’
I'M SORRY?
‘The night isn't any older than the day, master. It stands to reason. There must have been a day before anyone knew what the night was.’
YES, BUT IT'S MORE DRAMATIC.
‘Oh. Right, then.’
Susan stood by the fireplace.
It wasn't as though she disliked Death. Death considered as an individual rather than life's final curtain was someone she couldn't help liking, in a strange kind of way.
Even so …
The idea of the Grim Reaper filling the Hogswatch stockings of the world didn't fit well in her head, no matter which way she twisted it. It was like trying to imagine Old Man Trouble as the Tooth Fairy. Oh, yes. Old Man Trouble… now there was a nasty one for you…
But honestly, what kind of sick person went round creeping into little children's bedrooms all night?
Well, the Hogfather, of course, but…
There was a little tinkling sound from somewhere near the base of the Hogswatch tree.
The raven backed away from the shards of one of the glittering balls.
‘Sorry,’ it mumbled. ‘Bit of a species reaction there. You know… round, glittering sometimes you just gotta peck—’
‘That chocolate money belongs to the children!’
SQUEAK? said the Death of Rats, backing away from the shiny coins.
‘Why's he doing this?’
SQUEAK.
‘You don't know either?’
SQUEAK.
‘Is there some kind of trouble? Did he do something to the real Hogfather?’
SQUEAK.
‘Why won't he tell me?’
SQUEAK.
‘Thank you. You've been very helpful.’
Something ripped, behind her. She turned and saw the raven carefully removing a strip of red wrapping paper from a package.
‘Stop that this minute!’
It looked up guiltily.
‘It's only a little bit,’ it said. ‘No one's going to miss it.’
‘What do you want it for, anyway?’
‘We're attracted to bright colours, right? Automatic reaction.’
‘That's jackdaws!’
‘Damn. Is it?’
The Death of Rats nodded. SQUEAK.
‘Oh, so suddenly you're Mr Ornithologist, are you?’ snapped the raven.
Susan sat down and held out her hand.
The Death of Rats leapt onto it. She could feel its claws, like tiny pins.
It was just like those scenes where the sweet and pretty heroine sings a little duet with Mr Bluebird.
Similar, anyway.
In general outline, at least. But with more of a PG rating.
‘Has he gone funny in the head?’
SQUEAK. The rat shrugged.
‘But it could happen, couldn't it? He's very old, and I suppose he sees a lot of terrible things.’
SQUEAK.
‘All the trouble in the world,’ the raven translated.
‘I understood,’ said Susan. That was a talent, too. She didn't understand what the rat said. She just understood what it meant.
‘There's something wrong and he won't tell me?’ said Susan.
That made her even more angry.
‘But Albert is in on it too,’ she added.
She thought: thousands, millions of years in the same job. Not a nice one. It isn't always cheerful old men passing away at a great age. Sooner or later, it was bound to get anyone down.
Someone had to do something. It was like that time when Twyla's grandmother had started telling everyone that she was the Empress of Krull and had stopped wearing clothes.
And Susan was bright enough to know that the phrase ‘Someone ought to do something’ was not, by itself, a helpful one. People who used it never added the rider ‘and that someone is me’. But someone ought to do something, and right now the whole pool of someones consisted of her, and no one else.
Twyla's grandmother had ended up in a nursing home overlooking the sea at Quirm. That sort of option probably didn't apply here. Besides, he'd be unpopular with the other residents.
She concentrated. This was the simplest talent of them all. She was amazed that other people couldn't do it. She shut her eyes, placed her hands palm down in front of her at shoulder height, spread her fingers and lowered her hands.
When they were halfway down she heard the clock stop ticking. The last tick was long-drawn-out, like a death rattle.
Time stopped.
But duration continued.
She'd always wondered, when she was small, why visits to her grandfather could go on for days and yet, when they got back, the calendar was still plodding along as if they'd never been away.
Now she knew the why, although probably no human being would ever really understand the how. Sometimes, somewhere, somehow, the numbers on the clock did not count.
Between every rational moment were a billion irrational ones. Somewhere behind the hours there was a place where the Hogfather rode, the tooth fairies climbed their ladders, jack Frost drew his pictures, the Soul Cake Duck laid her chocolate eggs. In the endless spaces between the clumsy seconds Death moved like a witch dancing through raindrops, never getting wet.
Humans could liv— No, humans couldn't live here, no, because even whe
n you diluted a glass of wine with a bathful of water you might have more liquid but you still have the same amount of wine. A rubber band was still the same rubber band no matter how far it was stretched.
Humans could exist here, though.
It was never too cold, although the air did prickle like winter air on a sunny day. But out of human habit Susan got her cloak out of the closet.
SQUEAK.
‘Haven't you got some mice and rats to see to, then?’
‘Nah, 's pretty quiet just before Hogswatch,’ said the raven, who was trying to fold the red paper between his claws. ‘You get a lot of gerbils and hamsters and that in a few days, mind. When the kids forget to feed them or try to find out what makes them go.’
Of course, she'd be leaving the children. But it wasn't as if anything could happen to them. There wasn't any time for it to happen to them in.
She hurried down the stairs and let herself out of the front door.
Snow hung in the air. It was not a poetic description. It hovered like the stars. When flakes touched Susan they melted with little electric flashes.
There was a lot of traffic in the street, but it was fossilized in Time. She walked carefully between it until she reached the entrance to the park.
The snow had done what even wizards and the Watch couldn't do, which was clean up Ankh-Morpork. It hadn't had time to get dirty. In the morning it'd probably look as though the city had been covered in coffee meringue, but for now it mounded the bushes and trees in pure white.
There was no noise. The curtains of snow shut out the city lights. A few yards into the park and she might as well be in the country.
She stuck her fingers into her mouth and whistled.
Yknow, that could've been done with a bit more ceremony,’ said the raven, who'd perched on a snowencrusted twig.
‘Shut up.’
‘'s good, though. Better than most women could do.’
‘Shut up.’
They waited.
‘Why have you stolen that piece of red paper from a little girl's present?’ said Susan.
‘I've got plans,’ said the raven darkly.
They waited again.
She wondered what would happen if it didn't work. She wondered if the rat would snigger. It had the most annoying snigger in the world.
Then there were hoofbeats and the floating snow burst open and the horse was there.
Binky trotted round in a circle, and then stood and steamed.
He wasn't saddled. Death's horse didn't let you fall.
If I get on, Susan thought, it'll all start again. I'll be out of the light and into the world beyond this one. I'll fall off the tightrope.
But a voice inside her said, You want to, though don't you …?
Ten seconds later, there was only the snow.
The raven turned to the Death of Rats.
‘Any idea where I can get some string?’
SQUEAK.
She was watched.
One said, Who is she?
One said, Do we remember that Death adopted a daughter? The young woman is her daughter.
One said, She is human?
One said, Mostly.
One said, Can she be killed?
One said, Oh, yes.
One said, Well, that's all right, then.
One said, Er… we don't think we're going to get into trouble over this, do we? All this is not exactly… authorized. We don't want questions asked.
One said, We have a duty to rid the universe of sloppy thinking.
One said, Everyone will be grateful when they find out.
Binky touched down lightly on Death's lawn.
Susan didn't bother with the front door but went round the back, which was never locked.
There had been changes. One significant change, at least.
There was a cat-flap in the door.
She stared at it.
After a second or two a ginger cat came through the flap, gave her an I'm-not-hungry-and-you're-not-interesting look, and padded off into the gardens.
Susan pushed open the door into the kitchen.
Cats of every size and colour covered every surface. Hundreds of eyes swivelled to watch her.
It was Mrs Gammage all over again, she thought. The old woman was a regular in Biers for the company and was quite gaga, and one of the symptoms of those going completely yoyo was that they broke out in chronic cats. Usually cats who'd mastered every detail of feline existence except the whereabouts of the dirt box.
Several of them had their noses in a bowl of cream.
Susan had never been able to see the attraction in cats. They were owned by the kind of people who liked puddings. There were actual people in the world whose idea of heaven would be a chocolate cat.
‘Push off, the lot of you,’ she said. ‘I've never known him have pets.’
The cats gave her a look to indicate that they were intending to go somewhere else in any case and strolled off, licking their chops.
The bowl slowly filled up again.
They were obviously living cats. Only life had colour here. Everything else was created by Death. Colour, along with plumbing and music, were arts that escaped the grasp of his genius.
She left them in the kitchen and wandered along to the study.
There were changes here, too. By the look of it, he'd been trying to learn to play the violin again. He'd never been able to understand why he couldn't play music.
The desk was a mess. Books lay open, piled on one another. They were the ones Susan had never learned to read. Some of the characters hovered above the pages or moved in complicated little patterns as they read you while you read them.
Intricate devices had been scattered across the top. They looked vaguely navigational, but on what oceans and under which stars?
Several pages of parchment had been filled up with Death's own handwriting. It was immediately recognizable. No one else Susan had ever met had handwriting with serifs.
It looked as though he'd been trying to work something out.
NOT KLATCH. NOT HOWOWONDALAND. NOT THE EMPIRE.
LET US SAY 20 MILLION CHILDREN AT 2LB OF TOYS PER CHILD.
EQUALS 17,857 TONS. 1,785 TONS PER HOUR.
MEMO: DON'T FORGET THE SOOTY FOOTPRINTS. MORE PRACTICE ON THE HO HO HO.
CUSHION.
She put the paper back carefully.
Sooner or later it'd get to you. Death was fascinated by humans, and study was never a one-way thing. A man might spend his life peering at the private life of elementary particles and then find he either knew who he was or where he was, but not both. Death had picked up… humanity. Not the real thing, but something that might pass for it until you examined it closely.
The house even imitated human houses. Death had created a bedroom for himself, despite the fact that he never slept. If he really picked things up from humans, had he tried insanity? It was very popular, after all.
Perhaps, after all these millennia, he wanted to be nice.
She let herself into the Room of Lifetimers. She'd liked the sound of it, when she was a little girl. But now the hiss of sand from millions of hourglasses, and the little pings and pops as full ones vanished and new empty ones appeared, was not so enjoyable. Now she knew what was going on. Of course, everyone died sooner or later. It just wasn't right to be listening to it happening.
She was about to leave when she noticed the open door in a place where she had never seen a door before.
It was disguised. A whole section of shelving, complete with its whispering glasses, had swung out.
Susan pushed it back and forth with a finger. When it was shut, you'd have to look hard to see the crack.
There was a much smaller room on the other side. It was merely the size of, say, a cathedral. And it was lined floor to ceiling with more hourglasses that Susan could just see dimly in the light from the big room. She stepped inside and snapped her fingers.
‘Light,’ she commanded. A couple of candles spr
ang into life.
The hourglasses were… wrong.
The ones in the main room, however metaphorical they might be, were solid-looking things of wood and brass and glass. But these looked as though they were made of highlights and shadows with no real substance at all.
She peered at a large one.
The name in it was: OFFLER.
‘The crocodile god?’ she thought.
Well, gods had a life, presumably. But they never actually died, as far as she knew. They just dwindled away to a voice on the wind and a footnote in some textbook on religion.
There were other gods lined up. She recognized a few of them.
But there were smaller lifetimers on the shelf. When she saw the labels she nearly burst out laughing.
‘The Tooth Fairy? The Sandman? John Barleycorn? The Soul Cake Duck? The God of what?’
She stepped back, and something crunched under her feet.
There were shards of glass on the floor. She reached down and picked up the biggest. Only a few letters remained of the name etched into the glass HOGFA…
‘Oh, no… it's true. Granddad, what have you done?’
When she left, the candles winked out. Darkness sprang back.
And in the darkness, among, the spilled sand, a faint sizzle and a tiny spark of light…
Mustrum Ridcully adjusted the towel around his waist.
‘How're we doing, Mr Modo?’
The University gardener saluted.
‘The tanks are full, Mr Archchancellor sir!’ he said brightly. ‘And I've been stoking the hotwater boilers an day!’
The other senior wizards clustered in the doorway.
‘Really, Mustrum, I really think this is most unwise,’ said the Lecturer in Recent Runes. ‘It was surely sealed up for a purpose.’
‘Remember what it said on the door,’ said the Dean.
‘Oh, they just wrote that on it to keep people out,’ said Ridcully, opening a fresh bar of soap.
‘Wen, yes,’ said the Chair of Indefinite Studies. ‘That's right. That's what people do.’
‘It's a bathroom,’ said Ridcully. ‘You are all acting as if it's some kind of a torture chamber.’
‘A bathroom,’ said the Dean, ‘designed by Bloody Stupid Johnson. Archchancellor Weatherwax only used it once and then had it sealed up! Mustrum, I beg you to reconsider! It's a Johnson!’
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