‘I’ve seen it,’ said Rincewind.
‘From the top?’
‘No, obviously not from the top—’
‘We haven’t got time for this, Archchancellor,’ said a small wizard. ‘Let’s send this wozza back to Hell and find something better.’
‘Excuse me?’ said Rincewind. ‘By “Hell” do you mean some hot red place?’
‘Yes!’
‘Really? How do Ecksians know when they’ve got there? The beer’s warmer?’
‘No more arguing. This one turned up very fast when we did the summoning, so this is the one we need,’ said the Archchancellor. ‘Come along, Boring. This won’t take a minute.’
Ponder shook his head and wandered over to the fire. Mrs Whitlow was sitting demurely on a rock. In front of her, getting as close to the fire as possible, was the Librarian. He was still extremely small. Maybe his temporal gland had to take longer to work itself out, Ponder thought.
‘What are the gentlemen doing?’ said Mrs Whitlow. She had to raise her voice above the argument, but Mrs Whitlow would still have said, ‘Is there some difficulty?’ if she saw the wizards out on the lawn throwing fireballs at the monsters from the Dungeon Dimensions. She liked to be told these things.
‘They’ve found a man drawing the most alive-looking pictures I’ve ever seen,’ said Ponder. ‘So now they’re trying to teach him Art. By committee.’
‘The gentlemen always take an interest,’ said Mrs Whitlow.
‘They always interfere,’ said Ponder. ‘I don’t know what it is about wizards, they can’t just watch. So far they’re arguing about how to draw a duck and frankly I don’t think a duck has four legs, which is what it’s got so far. Honestly, Mrs Whitlow, they’re like kittens in a feather-plucking shed … What’s that?’
The Librarian had tipped up the leather bag lying by the fire and was testing the contents for taste, in the way of young mammals everywhere.
He picked up a flat, bent piece of wood, painted in lines of many colours — far more pigments than the old man had been using to paint, and Ponder wondered why. He tested it for palatability, banged it on the ground in a vaguely hopeful way, and threw it away. Then he pulled out a flat oval of wood on a piece of string, and tried chewing the string.
‘Is that a yo-yo?’ said Mrs Whitlow.
‘We used to call them bullroarers when I was a kid,’{83} said Ponder. ‘You whirl it around over your head to make a funny noise.’ He waved his hand vaguely in the air.
‘Eeek?’
‘Ooh, isn’t that sweet? He’s trying to do what you do!’
The Librarian tried to whirl the string, wrapped it round his face and hit himself on the back of the head.
‘Oh, the poor little thing! Take it off him, Mister Stibbons, do.’
The Librarian bared some small fangs as Ponder unwound the string.
‘I hope he’s going to grow up soon,’ he said. ‘Otherwise the Library will be filled up with cardboard books about bunnies …’
It really was a very stubby tower. The base was stonework, but about halfway the builders had got fed up and resorted to rusted tin sheets nailed on to a wooden framework. One rickety ladder led up.
‘Very impressive,’ sighed Rincewind.
‘The view’s even better from the top. Go on up.’
The ladder shook under Rincewind’s weight until he pulled himself up on to the planks, where he lay down and panted. Must be the beer and the excitement, he told himself. One short ladder shouldn’t do this to me.
‘Bracing air up here, isn’t it?’ said the Archchancellor, walking to the edge and waving a hand towards the city.
‘Oh, certainly,’ said Rincewind, tottering towards the corrugated battlements. ‘Why, I expect you can see all the way to the gr — Aaargh!’
The Archchancellor grabbed him and pulled him back.
‘That’s— It’s—’ Rincewind gasped.
‘Want to go back down again?’
Rincewind glared at the wizard and inched his way carefully back to the stairs. He looked down, ready at an instant’s notice to draw his head back, and carefully counted the steps.
Then he walked back gingerly to the parapet and risked looking over the edge.
There was the fiery speck of the burning brewery. There was Bugarup, and its harbour …
Rincewind raised his gaze.
There was the red desert, glittering under the moonlight.
‘How high is this?’ he croaked.
‘On the outside? About half a mile, we think,’ said the Archchancellor.
‘And on the inside?’
‘You climbed it. Two storeys.’
‘You’re trying to tell me you’ve got a tower that’s taller at the top than it is at the bottom?’{84}
‘Good, isn’t it?’ said the Archchancellor happily.
‘That’s … very clever,’ said Rincewind.
‘We’re a clever country—’{85}
‘Rincewind!’
The voice came from below. Rincewind looked very carefully down the steps. It was one of the wizards.
‘Yes?’ he said.
‘Not you,’ snapped the wizard. ‘I want the Archchancellor!’
‘I’m Rincewind,’ said Rincewind.
The Archchancellor tapped him on the shoulder. ‘That’s a coincidence,’ he said. ‘So am I.’
Ponder very carefully handed the bullroarer back to the little Librarian.
‘There, you can have it,’ he said. ‘I’m giving it to you and, in return, perhaps you can take your teeth out of my leg.’
From the other side of the rock came the voice of reason: ‘There’s no need to fight, gentlemen. Let’s vote on it: now, all those who think a duck has webbed feet, raise your hands …’
The Librarian swung the thing a few more times.
‘Doesn’t seem to be a very good one,’ said Ponder. ‘Not much of a noise … honestly, how much longer are they going to be?’
… whum …
‘Eek!’
‘Yes, yes, very good …’
… whum … whum … whUUMMMMM …
Ponder looked up as yellow light spread across the plain.
There was a circle of blue sky opening above. The rain was stopping.
‘Eek?’
It occurred to Ponder to wonder what a little old man was doing painting pictures in a bare landscape on a whole new continent …
And then there was darkness.
The old man smiled with something like satisfaction, and turned away from the drawing he’d just completed. It had a lot of pointy hats in it, and it had faded right into the rock.
And he was as happy as anything, and had drawn all the spiders and several possums before he found out what was missing.
He never even knew about the very strange and unhappy duck-billed creature that slid silently into the river a little way off.
‘Got to be at least some kind of cousins,’ said the Archchancellor. ‘It’s not a common name. Have another beer.’
‘I had a look through the Unseen records once,’ said Rincewind morosely. ‘They never had a Rincewind before.’ He upended the can of beer and finished the dregs. ‘Never had a relative before, come to that. Never ever.’ He pulled the top off another can. ‘No one to do all those little things relatives are s’posed to do, like … like … like send you some horrible cardigan at Hogswatch, stuff like that.’
‘You got a first name? Mine’s Bill.’
‘’s a good name, Bill Rincewind. Dunno if I’ve even got a first name.’
‘What do people usually call you, mate?’