The Discworld Series (№20) - Hogfather

Everyone, it is said, has a book inside them. In this library, everyone was inside a book.

The squeaking got louder. It had a rhythmical, circular quality.

Book on book, shelf on shelf ... and in every one, at the page of the ever-moving now, a scribble of handwriting following the narrative of every life ...

The squeaking came round the corner.

It was issuing from what looked like a very rickety edifice, several storeys high. It looked rather like a siege tower, open at the sides. At the base, between the wheels, was a pair of geared treadles which moved the whole thing.

Susan dung to the railing of the topmost platform.

'Can't you hurry up?' she said. 'We're only at the Bi's at the moment.'

'I've been pedalling for ages!' panted the oh god.

'Well, "A" is a very popular letter.'

Susan stared up at the shelves. A was for Anon, among other things. All those people who, for one reason or another, never officially got a name.

They tended to be short books.

'M ... Bo ... Bod ... Bog ... turn left . .

The library tower squeaked ponderously around the next corner.

'Ah, Bo ... blast, the Bots are at least twenty shelves up.'

'Oh, how nice,' said the oh god grimly.

He heaved on the lever that moved the drive chain from one sprocket to another, and started to pedal again.

Very ponderously, the creaking tower began to telescope upwards.

'Right, we're there,' Susan shouted down, after a few minutes of slow rise. 'Here's ... let's see ... Aabana Bottler. . .'

'I expect Violet will be a lot further,' said the oh god, trying out irony.

'Onwards!'

Swaying a little, the tower headed down the Bs until.

'Stop!'

It rocked as the oh god kicked the brake block against a wheel.

'I think this is her,' said a voice from above. 'OK, you can lower away.'

A big wheel with ponderous lead weights on it spun slowly as the tower concertina'd back, creaking and grinding. Susan climbed down the last few feet.

'Everyone's in here?' said the oh god, as she thumbed through the pages.

'Yes.'

'Even gods?'

'Anything that's alive and self-aware,' said Susan, not looking up. 'This is ... odd. It looks as though she's in some sort of ... prison. Who'd want to lock up a tooth fairy?'

'Someone with very sensitive teeth?'

Susan flicked back a few pages. 'It's all ... hoods over her head and people carrying her and so on. But . . .' she turned a page '... it says the last job she did was on Banjo and ... yes, she got the tooth ... and then she felt as though someone was behind her and ... there's a ride on a cart ... and the hood's come off ... and there's a causeway ... and. . .'

'All that's in a book?'

'The autobiography. Everyone has one. It writes down your life as you go along.'

'I've got one?'

'I expect so.'

'Oh, dear. "Got up, was sick, wanted to die." Not a gripping read, really.'

Susan turned the page.

'A tower,' she said. 'She's in a tower. From what she saw, it was tall and white inside ... but not outside? It didn't look real. There were apple trees around it, but the trees, the trees didn't look right. And a river, but that wasn't right either. There were goldfish in it ... but they were on top of the water.'

'Ah. Pollution,' said the oh god.

'I don't think so. It says here she saw them swimming!

'Swimming on top of the water?'

'That's how she thinks she saw it.'

'Really? You don't think she'd been eating any of that mouldy cheese, do you?'

'And there was blue sky but ... she must have got this wrong ... it says here there was only blue sky above ...'

'Yep. Best place for the sky,' said the oh god. 'Sky underneath you, that probably means trouble.'

Susan flicked a page back and forth. 'She means ... sky overhead but not around the edges, I think No sky on the horizon.'

'Excuse me,' said the oh god. 'I'm not long in this world, I appreciate that, but I think you have, to have sky on the horizon. That's how you can tell it's the horizon.'

A sense of familiarity was creeping up on Susan, but surreptitiously, dodging behind things whenever she tried to concentrate on it.

'I've seen this place,' she said, tapping the page. 'If only she'd looked harder at the trees ... She says they've got brown trunks and green leaves and it says here she thought they were odd. And ... She concentrated on the next paragraph. 'Flowers. Growing in the grass. With big round petals.'

She stared unseeing at the oh god again.

'This isn't a proper landscape,' she said.

'It doesn't sound too unreal to me,' said the oh god. 'Sky. Trees. Flowers. Dead fish.'

'Brown tree trunks? Really they're mostly a sort of greyish mossy colour. You only ever see brown tree trunks in one place,' said Susan. 'And it's the same place where the sky is only ever overhead. The blue never comes down to the ground.'

She looked up. At the far end of the corridor was one of the very tall, very thin windows. It looked out on to the black gardens. Black bushes, black grass, black trees. Skeletal fish cruising 'm the black waters of a pool, under black water lilies.

There was colour, in a sense, but it was the kind of colour you'd get if you could shine a beam of black through a prism. There were hints of tints, here and there a black you might persuade yourself was a very deep purple or a midnight blue. But it was basically black, under a black sky, because this was the world belonging to Death and that was all there was to it.

The shape of Death was the shape people had created for him, over the centuries. Why bony? Because bones were associated with death. He'd got a scythe because agricultural people could spot a decent metaphor. And he lived in a sombre land because the human imagination would be rather stretched to let him live somewhere nice with flowers.

People like Death lived in the human imagination, and got their shape there, too. He wasn't the only one ...

... but he didn't like the script, did he? He'd started to take an interest in people. Was that a thought, or just a memory of something that hadn't happened yet?

The oh god followed her gaze.

'Can we go after her?' said the oh god. 'I say we, I think I've just got drafted in because I was in the wrong place.'

'She's alive. That means she is mortal,' said Susan. 'That means I can find her, too.' She turned and started to walk out of the library.

'If she says the sky is just blue overhead, what's between it and the horizon?' said the oh god, running to keep up.

'You don't have to come,' said Susan. 'It's not your problem.'

'Yes, but given that my problem is that my whole purpose in life is to feel rotten, anything's an improvement.'

'It could be dangerous. I don't think she's there of her own free will. Would you be any good in a fight?'

'Yes. I could be sick on people.'

It was a shack, somewhere out on the outskirts of the Plains town of Scrote. Scrote had a lot of outskirts, spread so widely — a busted cart here, a dead dog there that often people went through it without even knowing it was there, and really it only appeared on the maps because cartographers get embarrassed about big empty spaces.

Hogswatch came after the excitement of the cabbage harvest when it was pretty quiet in Scrote and there was nothing much to look forward to until the fun of the sprout festival.

This shack had an iron stove, with a pipe that went up through the thick cabbage-leaf thatch.

Voices echoed faintly within the pipe.

THIS IS REALLY, REALLY STUPID.

'I think the tradition got started when everyone had them big chimneys, master.' This voice sounded as though it was coming from someone standing on the roof and shouting down the pipe.

INDEED? IT'S ONLY A MERCY IT'S UNLIT.

There was some muffled scratching and banging, and then a thump from within the pot belly of the stove.

DAMN.

'What's up, master?'

THE DOOR HAS NO HANDLE ON THE INSIDE. I CALL THAT INCONSIDERATE.

There were some more bumps, and then a scrape as the stove lid was lifted up and pushed sideways. An arm came out and felt around the front of the stove until it found the handle.

It played with it for a while, but it was obvious that the hand did not belong to a person used to opening things.

In short, Death came out of the stove. Exactly how would be difficult to describe without folding the page. Time and space were, from Death's point of view, merely things that he'd heard described. When it came to Death, they ticked the box marked Not Applicable. It might help to think of the universe as a rubber sheet, or perhaps not.

'Let us in, master,' a pitiful voice echoed down from the roof. 'It's brass monkeys out here.'

Death went over to the door. Snow was blowing underneath it. He peered nervously at the woodwork. There was a thump outside and Albert's voice sounded a lot closer.

'What's up, master?'

Death stuck his head through the wood of the door.

THERE'S THESE METAL THINGS

'Bolts, master. You slide them,' said Albert, sticking his hands under his armpits to keep them warm.

AH.

Death's head disappeared. Albert stamped his feet and watched his breath cloud in the air while he listened to the pathetic scrabbling on the other side of the door.

Death's head appeared again.

ER ...

'It's the latch, master,' said Albert wearily.

RIGHT. RIGHT.

'You put your thumb on it and push it down.'

RIGHT.

The head disappeared. Albert jumped up and down a bit, and waited.

The head appeared.

ER ... I WAS WITH YOU UP TO THE THUMB...

Albert sighed. 'And then you press down and pull, master.'

AH. RIGHT. GOT YOU.

The head disappeared.

Oh dear, thought Albert. He just can't get the hang of them, can he ...?

The door jerked open. Death stood behind it, beaming proudly, as Albert staggered in, snow blowing in with him.

'Blimey, it's getting really parky,' said Albert. 'Any sherry?' he added hopefully.

IT APPEARS NOT.

Death looked at the sock hooked on to the side of the stove. It had a hole in it.

A letter, in erratic handwriting, was attached to it. Death picked it up.

THE BOY WANTS A PAIR OF TROUSERS THAT HE DOESN'T HAVE TO SHARE, A HUGE MEAT PIE, A SUGAR MOUSE, 'A LOT OF TOYS' AND A PUPPY CALLED SCRUFF.

'Ah, sweet,' said Albert. 'I shall wipe away a tear, 'cos what he's gettin', see, is this little wooden toy and an apple.' He held them out.

BUT THE LETTER CLEARLY

'Yes, well, it's socio-economic factors again,

right?' said Albert 'The world'd be in a right mess if everyone got what they asked for, eh?'

I GAVE THEM WHAT THEY WANTED IN THE STORE . . .

'Yeah, and that's gonna cause a lot of trouble, master. All them "toy pigs that really work". I didn't say nothing 'cos it was getting the job done but you can't go on like that. What good's a god who gives you everything you want?'

YOU HAVE ME THERE.

'It's the hope that's important. Big part of belief, hope. Give people jam today and they'll just sit and eat it. jam tomorrow, now — that'll keep them going for ever.'

AND YOU MEAN THAT BECAUSE OF THIS THE POOR GET POOR THINGS AND THE RICH GET RICH THINGS?

' 's right,' said Albert. 'That's the meaning of Hogswatch.'

Death nearly wailed.

BUT I'M THE HOGFATHER! He looked embarrassed. AT THE MOMENT, I MEAN.

'Makes no difference,' said Albert, shrugging. 'I remember when I was a nipper, one Hogswatch I had my heart set on this huge model horse they had in the shop ...' His face creased for a moment in a grim smile of recollection. 'I remember I spent hours one day, cold as charity the weather was, I spent hours with my nose pressed up against the window ... until they heard me callin', and unfroze me. I saw them take it out of the window, someone was in there buying it, and, y'know, just for a second I thought it really was going to be for me ... Oh. I dreamed of that toy horse. It were red and white with a real saddle and everything. And rockers. I'd've killed for that horse.' He shrugged again. 'Not a chance, of course, 'cos we didn't have a pot to piss in and we even `ad to spit on the bread to make it soft enough to eat ...'

PLEASE ENLIGHTEN ME. WHAT IS SO IMPORTANT ABOUT HAVING A POT TO PISS IN?

'It's ... it's more like a figure of speech, master. It means you're as poor as a church mouse.'

ARE THEY POOR?

'Well ... yeah.'

BUT SURELY NOT MORE POOR THAN ANY OTHER MOUSE? AND, AFTER ALL, THERE TEND TO BE LOTS OF CANDLES AND THINGS THEY COULD EAT.

'Figure of speech again, master. It doesn't have to make sense.'

OH. I SEE. DO CARRY ON.

'O' course, I still hung up my stocking on Hogswatch Eve, and in the morning, you know, you know what? Our dad had put in this little horse he'd carved his very own self ...'

AH, said Death. AND THAT WAS WORTH MORE THAN ALL THE EXPENSIVE TOY HORSES IN THE WORLD,EH?

Albert gave him a beady look. 'No!' he said. 'It weren't. All I could think of was it wasnt the big horse in the window.'

Death looked shocked.

BUT HOW MUCH BETTER TO HAVE A TOY CARVED WITH...

'No. Only grown-ups think like that,' said

Albert. 'You're a selfish little bugger when you're seven. Anyway, Dad got ratted after lunch and trod on it.'

LUNCH?

'All right, mebbe we had a bit of pork chipping tor the bread ...'

EVEN SO, THE SPIRIT OF HOGSWATCH...

Albert sighed. 'If you like, master. If you like.'

Death looked perturbed.

BUT SUPPOSING THE HOGFATHER HAD BROUGHT YOU THE WONDERFUL HORSE—

'Oh, Dad would've flogged it for a couple of bottles,' said Albert.

BUT WE HAVE BEEN INTO HOUSES WHERE THE CHILDREN HAD MANY TOYS AND BROUGHT THEM EVEN MORE TOYS, AND IN HOUSES LIKE THIS THE CHILDREN GET PRACTICALLY NOTHING.

'Huh, we'd have given anything to get practically nothing when I were a lad,' said Albert.

BE HAPPY WITH WHAT YOU'VE GOT, IS THAT THE IDEA?

'That's about the size of it, master. A good god line, that. Don't give 'em too much and tell 'em to be happy with it. jam tomorrow, see.'

THIS IS WRONG. Death hesitated. I MEAN ... IT'S RIGHT TO BE HAPPY WITH WHAT YOU'VE GOT. BUT YOU'VE GOT TO HAVE SOMETHING TO BE HAPPY ABOUT HAVING. THERE'S NO POINT IN BEING HAPPY ABOUT HAVING NOTHING.

Albert felt a bit out of his depth in this new tide of social philosophy.

'Dunno,' he said. 'I suppose people'd say they've got the moon and the stars and suchlike.'

I'M SURE THEY WOULDN'T BE ABLE TO PRODUCE THE PAPERWORK.

'All I know is, if Dad'd caught us with a big bag of pricey toys wed just have got a ding round the earhole for nicking 'em.'

IT IS ... UNFAIR.

'That's life, master.'

BUT I'M NOT.

'I meant this is how it's supposed to go, master,' said Albert.

NO. YOU MEAN THIS IS HOW IT GOES.

Albert leaned against the stove and rolled himself one of his horrible thin cigarettes. It was best to let the master work his own way through these things. He got over them eventually. It was like that business with the violin. For three days there was nothing but twangs and broken strings, and then he'd never touched the thing again. That was the trouble, really. Everything the master did was a bit like that. When things got into his head you just had to wait until they leaked out again.

He'd thought that Hogswatch was all ... plum pudding and brandy and ho ho ho and he didn't have the kind of mind that could ignore all the other stuff. And so it hurt him.

IT IS HOGSWATCH, said Death, AND PEOPLE DIE ON THE STREETS. PEOPLE FEAST BEHIND LIGHTED WINDOWS AND OTHER PEOPLE HAVE NO HOMES. IS THIS FAIR?

'Well, of course, that's the big issue ...' Albert began.

THE PEASANT HAD A HANDFUL OF BEANS AND THE KING HAD SO MUCH HE WOULD NOT EVEN NOTICE THAT WHICH HE GAVE AWAY. IS THIS FAIR?

'Yeah, but if you gave it all to the peasant then in a year or two he'd be just as snooty as the king—' began Albert, jaundiced observer of human nature.

NAUGHTY AND NICE? said Death. BUT IT'S EASY

TO BE NICE IF YOU'RE RICH. IS THIS FAIR?

Albert wanted to argue. He wanted to say, Really? In that case, how come so many of the rich buggers is bastards? And being poor don't mean being naughty, neither. We was poor when I were a kid, but we was honest. Well, more stupid than honest, to tell the truth. But basically honest.

He didn't argue, though. The master wasn't in any mood for it. He always did what needed to be done.

'You did say we just had to do this so's people'd believe... ' he began, and then stopped and started again. 'When it comes to fair, master, you yourself...'

I AM EVEN-HANDED TO RICH AND POOR ALIKE, snapped Death. BUT THIS SHOULD NOT BE A SAD TIME. THIS IS SUPPOSED TO BE THE SEASON TO BE JOLLY. He wrapped his red robe around him. AND OTHER THINGS ENDING IN OLLY, he added.

'There's no blade,' said the oh god. 'It's just a sword hilt.'

Susan stepped out of the light and her wrist moved. A sparkling blue line flashed in the air, for a moment outlining an edge too thin to be seen.

The oh god backed away.

'What's that?'

'Oh, it cuts tiny bits of the air in half. It can cut the soul away from the body, so stand back, please.'

'Oh, I will, I will.'

Susan fished the black scabbard out of the umbrella stand.

Umbrella stand! It never rained here, but Death had an umbrella stand. Practically no one else Susan knew had an umbrella stand. In any list of useful furniture, the one found at the bottom would be the umbrella stand.

Death lived in a black world, where nothing was alive and everything was dark and his great library only had dust and cobwebs because he'd created them for effect and there was never any sun in the sky and the air never moved and he had an umbrella stand. And a pair of silverbacked hairbrushes by his bed. He wanted to be something more than just a bony apparition. He tried to create these flashes of personality but somehow they betrayed themselves, they tried too hard, like an adolescent boy going out wearing an aftershave called 'Rampant'.

Grandfather always got things wrong. He saw life from outside and never quite understood.

'That looks dangerous,' said the oh god.

Susan sheathed the sword.

'I hope so,' she said.

'Er ... where are we going? Exactly?'

'Somewhere under an overhead sky,' said Susan. 'And ... I've seen it before. Recently. I know the place.'

They walked out to the stable yard. Binky was waiting.

'I said you don't have to come,' said Susan, grasping the saddle. 'I mean, you're a ... an innocent bystander.'

'But I'm a god of hangovers who's been cured of hangovers,' said the oh god. 'I haven't really got any function at all.'

He looked so forlorn when he said this that she relented.

'All right. Come on, then.'

She pulled him up behind her.

'Just hang on,' she said. And then she said, `Hang on somewhere differently, I mean.'

'I'm sorry, was that a problem?' said the oh god, shifting his grip.

'It might take too long to explain and you probably don't know all the words. Around the waist, please.'

Susan took out Violet's hourglass and held it up. There was a lot of sand left to run, but she couldn't be certain that was a good sign.

All she could be certain of was that the horse of Death could go anywhere.

The sound of Hex's quill as it scrabbled across the paper was like a frantic spider trapped in a matchbox.

Despite his dislike of what was going on, there was a part of Ponder Stibbons that was very, very impressed.

In the past, when Hex had been recalcitrant about its calculations, when it had got into a mechanical sulk and had started writing things like'+++ Out of Cheese Error +++'and'+++ Redo From Start +++' Ponder had tried to sort things out calmly and logically.

It had never, ever occurred to him to contemplate hitting Hex with a mallet. But this was, in fact, what Ridcully was threatening to do.

What was impressive, and also more than a little worrying, was that Hex seemed to understand the concept.

'Right,' said Ridcully, putting the mallet aside. 'Let's have no more of this "Insufficient dates" business, shallwe? There's boxes of the damn things back in the Great Hall. You can have the lot as far as Im concerned...'

'It's data, not dates,' said Ponder helpfully.

'What? You mean like ... more than dates? Extra sticky?'

'No, no, data is Hex's word for ... well, facts,' said Ponder.

'Ridiculous way to behave,' said Ridcully brusquely. 'If he's stumped for an answer, why can't he write "You've got me there" or "Damned if I know," or "That's a bit of a puzzler and no mistake"? All this "Insufficient data" business is just pure contrariness, to my mind. It's just swank-' He turned back to Hex. 'Right, you. Hazard a guess.'

The quill started to write '+++ Insuff ' and then stopped. After quivering for a moment it went down a line and started again.

+++ This Is Just Calculating Aloud, You Understand +++

'Fair enough,' said Ridcully.

.+++ The Amount Of Belief In The World Must Be Subject To An Upper Limit +++

'What an odd question,' said the Dean.

'Sounds sensible,' said Ridcully. 'I suppose people just ... believe in stuff. Obviously there's a limit to what you can believe in. I've always said so. So what?'

.+++ Creatures Have Appeared That Were Once Believed In +++

'Yes. Yes, you could put it like that.'

+++ They Disappeared Because They Were Not Believed In +++

'Seems reasonable,' said Ridcully.

+++ People Were Believing In Something Else Query? +++

Ridcully looked at the other wizards. They shrugged.

'Could be,' he said guardedly. 'People can only believe in so many things.'

... It Follows That If A Major Focus Of Belief Is Removed, There Will Be Spare Belief ...

Ridcully stared at the words.

'You mean ... sloshing around?'

The big wheel with the ram skulls on it began to turn ponderously. The scurrying ants in the .glass tubes took on a new urgency.

'What's happening?' said Ridcully, in a loud whisper.

'I think Hex is looking up the word "sloshing",' said Ponder. 'It may be in long-term storage.'

A large hourglass came down on the spring.

'What's that for?' said Ridcully.

'Er ... it shows Hex is working things out.'

'Oh. And that buzzing noise? Seems to be coming from the other side of the wall.'

Ponder coughed.

'That is the long-term storage, Archchancellor.'

'And how does that work?'

'Er ... well, if you think of memory as a series of little shelves or, or, or holes, Archchancellor, in which you can put things, well, we found a way of making a sort of memory which, er, interfaces neatly with the ants, in fact, but more importantly can expand its size depending on how much we give it to remember and, er, is possibly a bit slow but...'

'It's a very loud buzzing,' said the Dean. 'Is it going wrong.

'No, that shows it's working,' said Ponder. 'It's, er, beehives.'

He coughed.

'Different types of pollen, different thicknesses of honey, placement of the eggs ... It's actually amazing how much information you can store on one honeycomb.'

He looked at their faces. 'And it's very secure because anyone trying to tamper with it will get stung to death and Adrian believes that when we shut it down in the summer holidays we should get a nice lot of honey, too.' He coughed again. 'For our ... sand ... wiches,' he said.

He felt himself getting smaller and hotter under their gazes.

Hex came to his rescue. The hourglass bounced away and the quill pen was jerked in and out of its inkwell.

+++ Yes. Sloshing Around. Accreting +++

'That means forming around new centres, Archchancellor,' said Ponder helpfully.

'I know that,' said Ridcully. 'Blast. Remember when we had all that life force all over the place? A man couldn't call his trousers his own! So ... there's spare belief sloshing around, thank you, and these little devils are taking advantage of it? 'Coming back? Household gods?'

+++ This Is Possible +++

'All right, then, so what are people not believing in all of a sudden?'

+++ Out Of Cheese Error +++ MELON MELON MELON +++ Redo From Start +++

'Thank you. A simple "I don't know" would have been sufficient,' said Ridcully, sitting back.

'One of the major gods?' said the Chair of Indefinite Studies.

'Hah, we'd soon know about it if one of those vanished.'

'It's Hogswatch,' said the Dean. 'I suppose the Hogfather is around, is he?'

'You believe in him?' said Ridcully.

'Well, he's for kids, isn't he?' said the Dean. 'But I'm sure they all believe in him. I certainly did. It wouldn't be Hogswatch when I was a kid without a pillowcase hanging by the fire ...'

'A pillowcase?' said the Senior Wrangler, sharply.

'Well, you can't get much in a stocking,' said the Dean.

'Yes, but a whole pillowcase?' the Senior Wrangler insisted.

'Yes. What of it?'

'Is it just me, or is that a rather greedy and selfish way to behave? In my family we just hung up very small socks,' said the Senior Wrangler. 'A sugar pig, a toy soldier, a couple of oranges and that was it. Hah, turns out people with whole pillowcases were cornering the market, eh?'

'Shut up and stop squabbling, both of you,' said Ridcully. 'There must be a simple way to check up. How can you tell if the Hogfather exists?'

'Someone's drunk the sherry, there's sooty footprints on the carpet, sleigh tracks on the roof and your pillowcase is full of presents,' said the Dean.

'Hah, pillowcase,' said the Senior Wrangler darkly. 'Hah. I expect your family were the stuck-up sort that didn't even open their presents until after Hogswatch dinner, eh? One of them with a big snooty Hogswatch tree in the hall?'

'What if ...' Ridcully began, but he was too late.

'Well?' said the Dean. 'Of course we waited until after lunch...'

'You know, it really used to wind me right up, people with big snooty Hogswatch trees. And I just bet you had one of those swanky fancy nutcrackers like a big thumbscrew,' said the Senior Wrangler. 'Some people had to make do with the coal hammer out of the outhouse, of course. And had dinner in the middle of the day instead of lah-di-dah posh dinner in the evening.'

'I can't help it if my family had money,' said the Dean, and that might have defused things a bit had he not added, 'and standards.'

'And big pillowcases!' shouted the Senior Wrangler, bouncing up and down in rage. 'And I bet you bought your holly, eh?'

The Dean raised his eyebrows. 'Of course! We didn't go creeping around the country pinching it out of other people's hedges, like some people did,' he snapped.

'That's traditional! That's part of the fun!'

'Celebrating Hogswatch with stolen greenery?'

Ridcully put his hand over his eyes.

The word for this, he had heard, was 'cabin fever'. When people had been cooped up for too long in the dark days of the winter, they always tended to get on one another's nerves, although there was probably a school of thought that would hold that spending your time in a university with more than five thousand known rooms, a huge library, the best kitchens in the city, its own brewery, dairy, extensive wine cellar, laundry, barber shop, cloisters and skittle alley was testing the definition of 'cooped up' a little. Mind you, wizards could get on one another's nerves in opposite corners of a very large field.

'Just shut up, will you?' he said. 'It's Hogswatch! That's not the time for silly arguments, all right?'

'Oh, yes it is,' said the Chair of Indefinite Studies glumly. 'It's exactly the time for silly arguments. In our family we were lucky to get through dinner without a reprise of What A Shame Henry Didn't Go Into Business With Our Ron. Or Why Hasn't Anyone Taught Those Kids To Use A Knife? That was another favourite.'

'And the sulks,' said Ponder Stibbons.

'Oh, the sulks,' said the Chair of Indefinite Studies. 'Not a proper Hogswatch without everyone sitting staring at different walls.'

'The games were worse,' said Ponder.

'Worse than the kids hitting one another with their toys, do you think? Not a proper Hogswatch afternoon without wheels and bits of broken dolly everywhere and everyone whining. Assault and battery included.'

'We had a game called Hunt the Slipper,' said Ponder. 'Someone hid a slipper. And then we had to find it. And then we had a row.'

'It's not really bad,' said the Lecturer in Recent Runes. 'I mean, not proper Hogswatch bad, unless everyone's wearing a paper hat. There's always that bit, isn't there, when someone's horrible great-aunt puts on a paper hat and smirks at everyone because she's being so bohemian.'

'I'd forgotten about the paper hats,' said the Chair of Indefinite Studies. 'Oh, dear.'

'And then later on someone'll suggest a board game,' said Ponder.

'That's right. Where no one exactly remembers all the rules.'

'Which doesn't stop someone suggesting that you play for pennies.'

'And five minutes later there's two people not speaking to one another for the rest of their lives because of tuppence.'

'And some horrible little kid...'

'I know, I know! Some little kid who's been allowed to stay up wins everyone's money by being a nasty little cut— throat swot!'