‘Some just want cash,’ said Moist hurriedly, as if that made it better.
‘Whose fault is that, Slick? You’re the man who can tap the gods for a wad of wonga!’
‘So what shall I do with all these . . . prayers?’ said Moist.
‘Deliver them, of course. You’ve got to. You are the messenger of the gods. And they’ve got stamps on. Some of them are covered in stamps! It’s your job. Take them to the temples. You promised to do that!’
‘I never promised to—’
‘You promised to when you sold them the stamps!’
Moist almost fell off his chair. She’d wielded the sentence like a fist.
‘And it’ll give them hope,’ she added, rather more quietly.
‘False hope,’ said Moist, struggling upright.
‘Maybe not this time,’ said Miss Dearheart. ‘That’s the point of hope.’ She picked up the battered remains of Anghammarad’s armband. ‘He was taking a message across the whole of Time. You think you’ve got it tough?’
‘Mr Lipwig?’
The voice floated up from the hall, and at the same time the background noise subsided like a bad souffle.
Moist walked over to where a wall had once been. Now, with the scorched floorboards creaking underfoot, he looked right down into the hall. A small part of him thought: we’ll have to put a big picture window here when we rebuild. This is just too impressive for words.
There was a buzz of whispering and a few gasps. There were a lot of customers, too, even in the early foggy hours. It’s never too late for a prayer.
‘Is everything all right, Mr Groat?’ he called down.
Something white was waved in the air.
‘Early copy of the Times, sir!’ Groat shouted. ‘Just in! Gilt’s all over the front page, sir! Where you ought to be, sir! You won’t like it, sir!’
If Moist von Lipwig had been raised to be a clown, he’d have visited shows and circuses and watched the kings of fooldom. He’d have marvelled at the elegant trajectory of the custard pie, memorized the new business with the ladder and the bucket of whitewash and watched with care every carelessly juggled egg. While the rest of the audience watched the display with the appropriate feelings of terror, anger and exasperation, he’d make notes.
Now, like an apprentice staring at the work of a master, he read Reacher Gilt’s words on the still-damp newspaper.
It was garbage, but it had been cooked by an expert. Oh, yes. You had to admire the way perfectly innocent words were mugged, ravished, stripped of all true meaning and decency and then sent to walk the gutter for Reacher Gilt, although ‘synergistically’ had probably been a whore from the start. The Grand Trunk’s problems were clearly the result of some mysterious spasm in the universe and had nothing to do with greed, arrogance and wilful stupidity. Oh, the Grand Trunk management had made mistakes – oops, ‘well-intentioned judgements which, with the benefit of hindsight, might regrettably have been, in some respects, in error’ – but these had mostly occurred, it appeared, while correcting ‘fundamental systemic errors’ committed by the previous management. No one was sorry for anything because no living creature had done anything wrong; bad things had happened by spontaneous generation in some weird, chilly, geometrical otherworld, and ‘were to be regretted’.*
* Another bastard phrase that’d sell itself to any weasel in a tight corner.
The Times reporter had made an effort but nothing short of a stampede could have stopped Reacher Gilt in his crazed assault on the meaning of meaning. The Grand Trunk was “about people” and the reporter had completely failed to ask what that meant, exactly? And then there was this piece called “Our Mission” . . .
Moist felt the acid rise in his throat until he could spit lacework in a sheet of steel. Meaningless stupid words, from people without wisdom or intelligence or any skill beyond the ability to water the currency of expression. Oh, the Grand Trunk was for everything, from life and liberty to Mum’s home-made Distressed Pudding. It was for everything, except anything.
Through a pink mist his eye caught the line: ‘safety is our foremost consideration’. Why hadn’t the lead type melted, why hadn’t the paper blazed rather than be part of this obscenity? The press should have buckled, the roller should have cleaved unto the platen . . .
That was bad. But then he saw Gilt’s reply to a hasty question about the Post Office.
Reacher Gilt loved the Post Office and blessed its little cotton socks. He was very grateful for its assistance during this difficult period and looked forward to future co-operation, although of course the Post Office, in the real modern world, would never be able to compete on anything other than a very local level. Mind you, someone has to deliver the bills, ho ho . . .
It was masterly . . . the bastard.
‘Er . . . are you okay? Could you stop shouting?’ said Miss Dearheart.
‘What?’ The mists cleared.
Everyone in the hall was looking at him, their mouths open, their eyes wide. Watery ink dripped from Post Office pens, stamps began to dry on tongues.
‘You were shouting,’ said Miss Dearheart. ‘Swearing, in fact.’
Miss Maccalariat pushed her way through the throng, with an expression of determination.
‘Mr Lipwig, I hope never to hear such language in this building again!’ she said.
‘He was using it about the chairman of the Grand Trunk Company,’ said Miss Dearheart, in what was, for her, a conciliatory tone of voice.
‘Oh.’ Miss Maccalariat hesitated, and then remembered herself. ‘Er, in that case . . . perhaps a teensy bit quieter, then?’
‘Certainly, Miss Maccalariat,’ said Moist obediently.
‘And perhaps not the K-word?’
‘No, Miss Maccalariat.’
‘And also not the L-word, the T-word, both of the S-words, the V-word and the Y-word.’
‘Just as you say, Miss Maccalariat.’
‘“Murdering conniving bastard of a weasel” was acceptable, however.’
‘I shall remember that, Miss Maccalariat.’
‘Very good, Postmaster.’
Miss Maccalariat turned on her heel and went back to haranguing someone for not using blotting paper.
Moist handed the paper to Miss Dearheart. ‘He’s going to walk away with it,’ he said. ‘He’s just throwing words around. The Trunk’s too big to fail. Too many investors. He’ll get more money, keep the system going just this side of disaster, then let it collapse. Buy it up then via another company, maybe, at a knock-down price.’
‘I’d suspect him of anything,’ said Miss Dearheart. ‘But you sound very certain.’
‘That’s what I’d do,’ said Moist, ‘er . . . if I was that kind of person. It’s the oldest trick in the book. You get the punt— you get others so deeply involved that they don’t dare fold. It’s the dream, you see? They think if they stay in it’ll all work out. They daren’t think it’s all a dream. You use big words to tell them it’s going to be jam tomorrow and they hope. But they’ll never win. Part of them knows that, but the rest of them never listens to it. The house always wins.’
‘Why do people like Gilt get away with it?’
‘I just told you. It’s because people hope. They’ll believe that someone will sell them a real diamond for a dollar. Sorry.’
‘Do you know how I came to work for the Trust?’ said Miss Dearheart.
Because clay people are easier to deal with? Moist thought. They don’t cough when you talk to them? ‘No,’ he said.
‘I used to work in a bank in Sto Lat. The Cabbage Growers’ Co-operative—’
‘Oh, the one on the town square? With the carved cabbage over the door?’ said Moist, before he could stop himself.
‘You know it?’ she said.
‘Well, yes. I went past it, once . . .’ Oh no, he thought, as his mind ran ahead of the conversation, oh, please, no . . .
‘It wasn’t a bad job,’ said Miss Dearheart. ‘In our office we had to inspect drafts and cheques. Looking for forgeries, you know? And one day I let four through. Four fakes! It cost the bank two thousand dollars. They were cash drafts, and the signatures were perfect. I got sacked for that. They said they had to do something, otherwise the customers would lose confidence. It’s not fun, having people think you might be a crook. And that’s what happens to people like us. People like Gilt always get away with it. Are you all right?’
‘Hmm?’ said Moist.
‘You look a bit . . . off colour.’
That had been a good day, Moist thought. At least, up until now it had been a good day. He’d been quite pleased with it at the time. You weren’t supposed ever to meet the people afterwards. Gods damn Mr Pump and his actuarial concept of murder!
He sighed. Oh well, it had come to this. He’d known it would. Him and Gilt, arm-wrestling to see who was the biggest bastard.