The Truth

'Vot vas all zat about?' said Otto, coming up as William strode out of the room.

'Oh, he's... he's off to see his father,' said Sacharissa, still taken aback. 'Who is not a nice man, apparently. He was very... heated about him. Very upset.'

"scuse me,' said a voice. The girl turned, but there was no one behind her.

Now the invisible speaker sighed. 'No, down here,' it said. She looked down at the malformed pink poodle.

'Let's not mess around, eh?' it said. 'Yeah, yeah, dogs can't talk. Got it in one, well done. So maybe you've got some strange ment'l power. That's that sorted out, then. I couldn't help overhearin', 'cos I was listenin'. The lad's heading into trouble, right? I can smell trouble--'

'Are you some kind of verevolf?' said Otto.

'Yeah, right, I get very hairy every full moon,' said the dog dis-missively. 'Imagine how much that interferes with my social life. Now, look--'

'But surely dogs can't talk--' Sacharissa began.

'Oh dear oh dear oh dear,' said Gaspode. 'Did I say I was talking?'

'Well, not in so many words--'

'Right. Wonderful thing, phenomenology. Now, I just seen a hundred dollars walk out the door and I want to see it walk back, right? Lord de Worde is as nasty a piece of work as you'll find in this town.'

'You know nobility?' said Sacharissa.

'A cat can look at a king, right? That's legal.'

'I suppose so--'

'So it works for dogs, too. Got to work for dogs if it works for

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ratbag moggies. I know everyone, I do. Lord de Worde used to get his butler to put down poisoned meat for the street dogs.'

'But he wouldn't hurt William, would he?'

'I'm not a betting man,' said Gaspode. 'But if he does, right, we still get the hundred dollars, yes?'

'Ve ca

Death placed the final hourglass back on to the air, where it faded away. THERE, he said, WASN'T THAT INTERESTING? WHAT NEXT, MR TULIP? ARE

YOU READY TO GO?

The figure sat on the cold sand, staring at nothing. MR TULIP? Death repeated. The wind flapped his robe, so that it streamed out a long ribbon of darkness. 'I... got to be really sorry... ?' OH YES. IT is SUCH A SIMPLE WORD. BUT HERE... IT HAS MEANING. IT

HAS... SUBSTANCE.

'Yeah. I know.' Mr Tulip looked up, his eyes red-rimmed, his face puffy. 'I reckon... to be that sorry, you got to take a --ing good run at it.'

YES.

'So... how long have I got?'

Death looked up at the strange stars.

ALL THE TIME IN THE WORLD.

'Yeah... well, maybe that'll --ing do it. Maybe there won't be no more world to go back to by then.'

I BELIEVE IT DOES NOT WORK LIKE THAT. I UNDERSTAND REINCARNATION CAN TAKE PLACE ANYWHEN. WHO SAYS LIVES ARE SERIAL?

'You savin'... I could be alive before I was born?' YES.

'Maybe I can find me and kill myself,' said Mr Tulip, staring at the sand.

NO, BECAUSE YOU WILL NEVER KNOW. AND YOU MAY BE LEADING QUITE A DIFFERENT LIFE.

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'Good...'

Death patted Mr Tulip on the shoulder, which flinched under his

touch.

I SHALL LEAVE YOU NOW----

Th't's a good scythe you got there,' said Mr Tulip, slowly and laboriously. That silverwork's craftsmanship if ever I saw it.'

THANK YOU, said Death. AND NOW, I REALLY MUST BE GOING. BUT I WILL PASS THROUGH' HERE SOMETIMES. MY DOOR, he added, is ALWAYS OPEN.

He strode off. The hunched figure fell behind into the darkness, but a new one appeared, ru

It was waving a potato on a string. It stopped when it saw Death and then, to Death's amazement, turned to look behind it. This had never happened before. Most people, upon coming face to face with Death, ceased worrying about anything behind them.

Is there anyone after me? Can you see anyone?'

ER... NO. WERE YOU EXPECTING ANYONE?

'Oh, right. No one, eh? Right!' said Mr Pin, squaring his shoulders. 'Yeah! Hah! Hey, look, I've got my potato!'

Death blinked and then took an hourglass out of his robe...MR PIN? AH. THE OTHER ONE. I HAVE BEEN EXPECTING YOU.

'That's me! And I've got my potato, look, and I'm very sorry about everything!' Mr Pin was feeling quite calm now. The mountains of madness have many little plateaux of sanity.

Death stared into the madly smiling face. You ARE VERY SORRY?

'Oh, yes!'

ABOUT EVERYTHING?

'Yep!'

AT THIS TIME? IN THIS PLACE? YOU DECLARE YOU ARE SORRY?'

'That's right. You got it. You're bright. So if you'll just show me how to get back--'

YOU WOULD NOT LIKE TO RECONSIDER?

'No arguing, I want what's due,' said Mr Pin. 'I've got my potato. Look.'

AND I SEE. Death reached into his robe and pulled out what looked to Mr Pin, at first sight, like a miniature model of himself.

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But there was a rat skull looking out from under the tiny cowl. Death gri

DO NOT PUT ALL YOUR TRUST IN ROOT VEGETABLES. WHAT THINGS SEEM MAY NOT BE WHAT THEY ARE, Said Death. YET LET NO ONE SAY I DON'T

HONOUR THE LAW. He snapped his fingers. RETURN, THEN, TO WHERE YOU

SHOULD GO...

Blue light flickered for a moment around the astonished Pin, and then he vanished. Death sighed and shook his head.

THE OTHER ONE... HAD SOMETHING IN HIM THAT COULD BE BETTER, he

said. BUT THAT ONE... He sighed deeply. WHO KNOWS WHAT EVIL LURKS

IN THE HEART OF MEN?

The Death of Rats looked up from the feast of potato.

SQUEAK, he said.

Death waved a hand dismissively. WELL, YES, OBVIOUSLY ME, he

Said. I JUST WONDERED IF THERE WAS ANYONE ELSE.

William, ducking from doorway to doorway, realized that he was taking the long way round. Otto would have said that it was because he didn't want to arrive.

The storm had abated slightly, although stinging hail still bounced off his hat. The much bigger balls from the initial onslaught filled the gutters and covered the roads. Carts had skidded, pedestrians were hanging on to the walls.

Despite the fire in his head, he took out his notebook and wrote: hlstns bggr than golf blls? and made a mental note to check one against a golf ball, just in case. Part of him was begi

He stopped on the Brass Bridge and sheltered in the lee of one of the giant hippos. Hail peppered the surface of the river with a thousand tiny sucking noises.

The rage was cooling now.

For most of William's life Lord de Worde had been a distant

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figure staring out of his study window, in a room lined with books that never got read, while William stood meekly in the middle of acres of good but threadbare carpet and listened to... well, viciousness mostly, now that he thought about it, the opinions of Mr Windling dressed up in more expensive words.

The worst part, the worst part, was that Lord de Worde was never wrong. It was not a position he understood in relation to his personal geography. People who took an opposing view were insane, or dangerous, or possibly even not really people. You couldn't have an argument with Lord de Worde. Not a proper argument. An argument, from arguer, meant to debate and discuss and persuade by reason. What you could have with William's father was a flaming row.

Icy water dripped off one of the statues and ran down William's neck.

Lord de Worde used words with a tone and a volume that made them as good as fists, but he'd never used actual violence.