"Oh, this Fray business," said the skinny man. "All sorted out. There's been a treaty."
"A treaty? With Fray?" said Snibril.
"A peace treaty with the mouls, of course. Don't you know anything?"
Snibril opened his mouth. Careus gripped his arm. "Oh," he said, loudly and distinctly. "Well. Isn't that nice. We won't disturb you further. Come, Snibril."
"But-!"
"I'm sure this gentleman has got some very important things to do with his paper," said the sergeant.
"Why did you do that?" said Snibril, as the sergeant hurried him out.
"Because if we want to find out things, we won't find 'em out by making that clerk eat all his little bits of paper," said Careus. "We'll spy around for a while, get the lie of the land, find out what's going on-and maybe later on we can come back and make him eat all his bits of paper."
"I haven't even seen many other soldiers!" said Snibril.
"Just a few guards," agreed Careus, as they hurried out into the street.
"The other legions can't have got here yet," said Snibril.
"Do you think they will?" said Careus.
"What do you mean?"
"We met you and the little people. If we hadn't, I don't think we would have made it," said Careus gloomily.
"You mean ... we're all there is?"
"Could be."
And we're less than a thousand of us, Snibril thought. How can you have a peace treaty with mouls? They just destroy things. How could they be here, making treaties?
The army camped out among the hairs. As one of the Deftmenes said, it was hard to feel at ease surrounded by enemies, especially when they were on your own side. But at least he grinned when he said it.
It was while groups of them picked up firewood among the hairs that they found the pones.
There were a dozen of them. Pones could hide quite easily in the Carpet. They were so big. People think that it's easiest to hide things that are small, but it's almost as easy to hide things that are too big to see. The pones just looked like mounds, except that they were chewing the cud and burping occasionally. They all turned their heads to look at their discoverers, burped, and then looked away.
They looked as if they'd been told to wait for someone.
The sign outside the shop said Apothecary, which meant that the shop was owned by a sort of early chemist, who would give you herbs and things until you got better or at least stopped getting any worse. The apothecary's name was Owlglass. He hummed to himself as he worked in his back room. He'd found a new type of blue fluff, which he was grinding down. It was probably good for curing something. He'd have to try it out on people until he found out what.
A hand touched him on the shoulder.
"Hmm?" he said.
He turned around. He peered over the top of his spectacles, which were made out of two circles of carefully-shaped varnish.
"Pismire?" he said.
"Keep your voice down! We came in the back way," said Pismire.
"My word, I expect you did," said Owlglass. "Don't worry, there's no-one in the shop." He looked past the old man, to Glurk and Bane and Brocando. "My word," he said again. "After all this time, eh? Well ... welcome. My house is your house," his brow suddenly furrowed and he looked worried, "although only in a metaphorical sense, you understand, because I would not, much as I always admired your straightforward approach, and indeed your forthright stance, actually give you my house, it being the only house I have, and therefore the term is being extended in an, as it were, gratuitous fashion-"
Owlglass was clearly having some trouble getting to the end of the sentence. Glurk tapped Pismire on the shoulder.
"He's a philosopher too, is he?" he said.
"You can tell, can't you," said Pismire. "Um, Owlglass ... thanks very much."
The apothecary gave up the struggle, and smiled.
"We need some food," said Pismire. "And most of all-"
"-we want information," said Bane. "What's happening here?"
"Which would you like first?" said Owlglass.
"Food," said Glurk. The others glared at him.
"Well, I thought he was looking at me when he asked," he said.
"Make yourself at home," said Owlglass. "Although of course when I say home I don't precisely mean-"
"Yes, yes, thank you very much," said Pismire. Owlglass bustled over to a cupboard. Glurk stared at the jars and pots that littered the back room. In some of the jars, things stared back.
"Owlglass and I went to school together," said Pismire. "And then Owlglass decided he was going to study the Carpet. What it's made of. The properties of different kinds of hair. Rare and strange animals. That sort of thing."
"And Pismire decided he was going to study people," said Owlglass, producing a loaf and some butter. "And got sentenced to death for calling the last Emperor a ... a ... what was it now?"
"Well, he deserved it," said Pismire. "He wouldn't give me any money to preserve the Library. All the books were crumbling. I was supposed to look after the Library, after all. It's knowledge. He said we didn't need a lot of old books, we knew all we needed to know. I was just trying to make the point that a civilization needs books if there's going to be a reasoned and well-informed exchange of views."
"I was trying to remember what you called him."
"An ignorant sybarite who didn't have the sense of a meat pie," said Pismire.
"Sounds pretty, nasty, sentencing someone to death just for that," said Glurk, putting the loaf on his plate. He kept turning around to look at the jar behind him. It had something hairy in it.
"Actually, he got sentenced to death for apologizing," said Owlglass.
"How can you be sentenced to death for apologizing?"
"He said he was sorry, but on reflection he realized that the Emperor had got the sense of a meat pie," said Owlglass. "He was running at the time, too."
"I think on my feet," said Pismire, proudly.
"You insulted the Emperor?" said Brocando. "Why didn't you say? I didn't know you were famous."
"And accurate," said Bane. "Targon's father was a disgrace to the Empire."
"Where have you been hiding all these years?" said Owlglass, pulling up a chair. "Of course, when I say hiding I don't mean-"
"Oh, a little place no-one's ever heard of," said Pismire.
"Do you mind if I turn that jar around?" said Glurk. "I don't like things watching me when I eat."
"What's happening here in Ware?" said Bane shortly. "There's hardly a guard on the gates. That is disgusting. Don't people know what's happening? The Empire's being attacked. My empire!"
"If no-one wants that piece of cheese, pass it along," said Glurk.
"We've heard," said Owlglass. "But the Emperor says that Ware is perfectly safe. These new advisers say so, apparently."
"Advisers?" said Pismire. The word was like a lump of grit.
"There aren't any pickles around, are there?" said Glurk.
"Advisers," said Bane. "And has anyone ... seen these advisers?"
"Don't think so," said Owlglass. "I heard that General Vagerus was demoted for calling the legions back. The Emperor said he was spreading unnecessary alarm. And the guards around the palace aren't letting anyone in."
"Is there any more of this cucumber?"
"It's how they work," said Bane. "You know it. From inside. Like Jeopard. And the High Gate Land."
"What? Cucumbers?" said Glurk.
"Yes, but not in Ware," said Pismire. "Not here. I can't believe that. Not at the centre. Surely not?"
"Who would think of looking at the centre?" said Bane.
"If it comes to that, I wouldn't have expected them in Jeopard," said Brocando.
"Is this still about cucumbers?"
"Yes, but not ... Ware," said Pismire.
"You don't think so? I would have said the same about Jeopard," said Brocando.
"Hardly anyone is allowed in the place these days," said Owlglass.
"It's not cucumbers you're talking about, is it?" said Glurk.