reconsider! It’s a Johnson!’
There was something of a pause, because even Ridcul y had to adjust his mind
around this.
The late (or at least severely delayed) Bergholt Stuttley Johnson was general y
recognized as the worst inventor in the world, yet in a very specialized sense. Merely
bad inventors made things that failed to operate. He wasn’t among these smal fry. Any
fool could make something that did absolutely nothing when you pressed the button.
He scorned such fumble-fingered amateurs. Everything he built worked. It just didn’t do
what it said on the box. If you wanted a smal ground-to-air missile, you asked Johnson
to design an ornamental fountain. It amounted to pretty much the same thing. But this
never discouraged him, or the morbid curiosity of his clients. Music, landscape
gardening, architecture – there was no start to his talents.
Nevertheless, it was a little bit surprising to find that Bloody Stupid had turned to
bathroom design. But, as Ridcul y said, it was known that he had designed and built
several large musical organs and, when you got right down to it, it was al just
plumbing, wasn’t it?
The other wizards, who’d been there longer than the Archchancel or, took the view
that if Bloody Stupid Johnson had built a ful y functional bathroom he’d actual y meant
it to be something else.
‘Y’know, I’ve always felt that Mr Johnson was a much maligned man,’ said Ridcul y,
eventual y.
‘Wel , yes, of course he was,’ said the Lecturer in Recent Runes, clearly
exasperated. ‘That’s like saying that jam attracts wasps, you see.’
‘Not everything he made worked badly,’ said Ridcul y stoutly, flourishing his
scrubbing brush. ‘Look at that thing they use down in the kitchens for peelin’ the
potatoes, for example.’
‘Ah, you mean the thing with the brass plate on it saying “Improved Manicure
Device”, Archchancel or?’
‘Listen, it’s just water,’ snapped Ridcul y. ‘Even Johnson couldn’t do much harm with
water. Modo, open the sluices!’
The rest of the wizards backed away as the gardener turned a couple of ornate brass
wheels.
‘I’m fed up with groping around for the soap like you fel ows!’ shouted the
Archchancel or, as water gushed through hidden channels. ‘Hygiene. That’s the ticket!’
‘Don’t say we didn’t warn you,’ said the Dean, shutting the door.
‘Er, I stil haven’t worked out where al the pipes lead, sir,’ Modo ventured.
‘We’l find out, never you fear,’ said Ridcul y happily. He removed his hat and put on
a shower cap of his own design. In deference to his profession, it was pointy. He
picked up a yel ow rubber duck.
‘Man the pumps, Mr Modo. Or dwarf them, of course, in your case.’
‘Yes, Archchancel or.’
Modo hauled on a lever. The pipes started a hammering noise and steam leaked out
of a few joints.
Ridcul y took a last look around the bathroom.
It was a hidden treasure, no doubt about it. Say what you like, old Johnson must
sometimes have got it right, even if it was only by accident. The entire room, including
the floor and ceiling, had been tiled in white, blue and green. In the centre, under its
crown of pipes, was Johnson’s Patent ‘Typhoon’ Superior Indoor Ablutorium with
Automatic Soap Dish, a sanitary poem in mahogany, rosewood and copper.
He’d got Modo to polish every pipe and brass tap until they gleamed. It had taken
ages.
Ridcul y shut the frosted door behind him.
The inventor of the ablutionary marvel had decided to make a mere shower a ful y
control able experience, and one wal of the large cubicle held a marvel ous panel
covered with brass taps cast in the shape of mermaids and shel s and, for some
reason, pomegranates. There were separate feeds for salt water, hard water and soft
water and huge wheels for accurate control of temperature. Ridcul y inspected them
with care.
Then he stood back, looked around at the tiles and sang, ‘Mi, mi, mi!’
His voice reverberated back at him.
‘A perfect echo!’ said Ridcul y, one of nature’s bathroom baritones.
He picked up a speaking tube that had been instal ed to al ow the bather to
communicate with the engineer.
‘Al cisterns go, Mr Modo!’
‘Aye, aye, sir!’
Ridcul y opened the tap marked ‘Spray’ and leapt aside, because part of him was stil
wel aware that Johnson’s inventiveness didn’t just push the edge of the envelope but
often went across the room and out through the wal of the sorting office.
A gentle shower of warm water, almost a caressing mist, enveloped him.
‘My word!’ he exclaimed, and tried another tap.
‘Shower’ turned out to be a little more invigorating. ‘Torrent’ made him gasp for
breath and ‘Deluge’ sent him groping to the panel because the top of his head felt that
it was being removed. ‘Wave’ sloshed a wal of warm salt water from one side of the
cubicle to the other before it disappeared into the grating that was set into the middle
of the floor.
‘Are you al right, sir?’ Modo cal ed out.
‘Marvel ous! And there’s a dozen knobs I haven’t tried yet!’
Modo nodded, and tapped a valve. Ridcul y’s voice, raised in what he considered to
be song, boomed out through the thick clouds of steam.
‘Oh, IIIIIII knew a … er … an agricultural worker of some description, possibly a
thatcher, And I knew him wel , and he – he was a farmer, now I come to think of it – and
he had a daughter and her name I can’t recal at the moment,
And … Where was P Ah yes. Chorus:
Something something, a humorously shaped vegetable, a turnip, I believe,
something something and the sweet nightingaleeeeaarggooooooh-ARGHH oh oh oh-‘
The song shut off suddenly. Al Modo could hear was a ferocious gushing noise.
‘Archchancel or?’
After a moment a voice answered from near the ceiling. It sounded somewhat high
and hesitant.
‘Er . . . I wonder if you would be so very good as to shut the water off from out there,
my dear chap? Er … quite gently, if you wouldn’t
mind. . .’
Modo careful y spun a wheel. The gushing sound gradual y subsided.
‘Ah. Wel done,’ said the voice, but now from somewhere nearer floor level. ‘Wel .
Jol y good job. I think we can definitely cal it a success. Yes, indeed. Er. I wonder if
you could help me walk for a moment. I inexplicably feel a little unsteady on my feet . .
. ‘Modo pushed open the door and helped Ridculy out and onto a bench. He looked
rather pale.
‘Yes, indeed,’ said the Archchancel or, his eyes a little glazed. ‘Astoundingly
successful. Er. Just a minor point, Modo-‘
‘Yes, sir?’
‘There’s a tap in there we perhaps should leave alone for now,’ said Ridcul y. ‘I’d
esteem it a service if you could go and make a little sign to hang on it.’
‘Yes, sir?’
‘Saying “Do not touch at al “, or something like that.’
‘Right, sir.’
‘Hang it on the one marked “Old Faithful”.’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘No need to mention it to the other fel ows.’
‘Yes. sir.’
‘Ye gods, I’ve never felt so clean.’
From a vantage point among some ornamental tilework near the ceiling a smal
gnome in a bowler hat watched Ridcul y careful y.
When Modo had gone the Archchancel or slowly began to dry himself on a big fluffy
towel. As he got his composure back, so another song wormed its way under his
breath.
‘ On the second day of Hogswatch I … sent my true love back
A nasty little letter, hah, yes indeed, and a partridge in a pear tree—‘
The gnome slid down onto the tiles and crept up behind the briskly shaking shape.
Ridcul y, after a few more trial runs, settled on a song which evolves somewhere on
every planet where there are winters. It’s often dragooned into the service of some
local religion and a few words are changed, but it’s real y about things that have to do
with gods only in the same way that roots have to do with leaves.
‘- the rising of the sun, and the running of the deer—‘
Ridcul y spun. A corner of wet towel caught the gnome on the ear and flicked it onto
its back.
‘I saw you creeping up!’ roared the Archchancel or. ‘What’s the game, then? Smal –
time thief, are you?’
The gnome slid backwards on the soapy surface.
‘ ‘ ere, what’s your game, mister, you ain’t supposed to be able to see me!’
‘I’m a wizard! We can see things that are real y there, you know,’ said Ridcul y. ‘And
in the case of the Bursar, things that aren’t there, too. What’s in this bag?’
‘You don’t wanna open the bag, mister! You real y don’t wanna open the bag!’