The Dean had been annoying him lately.
‘For the last time,’ shouted the Dean, ‘I am
not–‘
He stopped.
There was a glingleglingleglingle noise.
‘I wish I knew where that was coming from,’ said Ridcul y.
‘Er . . .’ the Dean began. ‘Is there … something on my head?’
The other wizards stared.
Something was moving under his hat.
Very careful y, he reached up and removed it.
The very smal gnome sitting on his head had a chimp of the Dean’s hair in each
hand. It blinked guiltily in the light.
‘Is there a problem?’ it said.
‘Get it off me!’ the Dean yel ed.
The wizards hesitated. They were al vaguely aware of the theory that very smal
creatures could pass on diseases, and while the gnome was larger than such
creatures were general y thought to be, no one wanted to catch Expanding Scalp
Sickness.
Susan grabbed it.
‘Are you the Hair Loss Fairy?’ she said.
Àpparently,’ said the gnome, wriggling in her grip.
The Dean ran his hands desperately through his hair.
‘What have you been doing with my hair?’ he demanded.
‘Welt some of it I think I have to put on hairbrushes,’ said the gnome, ‘but sometimes
I think I weave it into little mats to block up the bath with.’
‘What do you mean, you think?’ said Ridcul y.
‘Just a minute,’ said Susan. She turned to the oh god. ‘Where exactly were you
before I found you in the snow?’
‘Er . . . sort of … everywhere, I think,’ said the oh god. ‘Anywhere where drink had
been consumed in beastly quantities some time previously, you could say.’
‘Ah- ha,’ said Ridcul y. ‘You were an immanent vital force, yes?’
‘I suppose I could have been,’ the oh god conceded.
‘And when we joked about the Hair Loss Fairy it suddenly focused on the Dean’s
head,’ said Ridcul y, ‘where its operations have been noticeable to al of us in recent
months although of course we have been far too polite to pass comment on the
subject.’
‘You’re cal ing things into being,’ said Susan.
‘Things like the Give the Dean a Huge Bag of Money Goblin?’ said the Dean, who
could think very quickly at times. He looked around hopeful y. ‘Anyone hear any fairy
tinkling?’
‘Do you often get given huge bags of money, sir?’ said Susan.
‘Not on what you’d cal a daily basis, no,’ said the Dean. ‘But if—‘
‘Then there probably isn’t any occult room for a Huge Bags of Money Goblin,’ said
Susan.
‘I personal y have always wondered what
happens to my socks,’ said the Bursar cheerful y. ‘You know how there’s always one
missing? When I was a lad I always thought that something was taking them . . .’
The wizards gave this some thought. Then they al heard it – the little crinkly tinkling
noise of magic taking place.
The Archchancel or pointed dramatical y skywards.
‘To the laundry!’ he said.
‘It’s downstairs, Ridcul y,’ said the Dean.
‘Down to the laundry!’
‘And you know Mrs Whitlow doesn’t like us going in there,’ said the Chair of Indefinite
Studies.
‘And who is Archchancel or of this University, may I ask?’ said Ridcul y. ‘Is it Mrs
Whitlow? I don’t think so! Is it me? Why, how amazing, I do believe it is!’
‘Yes, but you know what she can be like,’ said the Chair.
‘Er, yes, that’s true–‘ Ridcul y began.
‘I believe she’s gone to her sister’s for the holiday,’ said the Bursar.
‘We certainly don’t have to take orders from any kind of housekeeper!’ said the
Archchancel or. ‘To the laundry!’
The wizards surged out excitedly, leaving Susan, the oh god, the Verruca Gnome
and the Hair Loss Fairy.
‘Tel me again who those people were,’ said the oh god.
‘Some of the cleverest men in the world,’ said Susan.
‘And I’m sober, am W
‘Clever isn’t the same as sensible,’ said Susan, ‘and they do say that if
you wish to walk the path to wisdom then for your first step you must become as a
smal child.’
‘Do you think they’ve heard about the second step?’
Susan sighed. ‘Probably not, but sometimes they fal over it while they’re running
around shouting.’
‘Ah.’ The oh god looked around. ‘Do you think they have any soft drinks here?’ he
said.
The path to wisdom does, in fact, begin with a single step.
Where people go wrong is in ignoring al the thousands of other steps that come after
it. They make the single step of deciding to become one with the universe, and for
some reason forget to take the logical next step of living for seventy years on a
mountain and a daily bowl of rice and yak-butter tea that would give it any kind of
meaning. While evidence says that the road to Hel is paved with good intentions,
they’re probably al on first steps.
The Dean was always at his best at times like this. He led the way between the
huge, ardent copper vats, prodding with his staff into dark corners and going ‘Hut! Hut!’
under his breath.
‘Why would it turn up here?’ whispered the Lecturer in Recent Runes.
‘Point of reality instability,’ said Ridcul y, standing on tiptoe to look into a bleaching
cauldron. ‘Every damn thing turns up here. You should know that by now.’
‘But why now?’ said the Chair of Indefinite Studies.
‘No talking!’ hissed the Dean, and leapt out into the next al eyway, staff held
protectively in front of him.
‘Hal !’ he screamed, and then looked disappointed
‘ Er, how big would this sock-stealing thing be?’ said the Senior Wrangler.
‘Don’t know,’ said Ridcul y. He peered behind a stack of washboards. ‘Come to think
of it, I must’ve lost a ton of socks over the years.’
‘Me too,’ said the Lecturer in Recent Runes.
‘So … should we be looking in smal places or very large places?’ the Senior
Wrangler went on, in the voice of one whose train of thought has just entered a long
dark tunnel.
‘Good point,’ said Ridcul y. ‘Dean, why do you keep referring to sheds al the time?’
‘It’s “hut”, Mustrum,’ said the Dean. ‘It means
. it means. . .’
‘Smal wooden building?’ Ridcul y suggested.
‘Welt sometimes, agreed, but other times . . . wel , you just have to say “hut”.’
‘This sock creature … does it just steal them,
or does it eat them?’ said the Senior Wrangler.
‘Valuable contribution’ that man,’ said Ridcul y, giving tip on the Dean. ‘Right, pass
the word along: no one is to look like a sock, understand?’
‘How can you—‘ the Dean began, and stopped.
They al heard it.
… grnf, grnf, grnf …
It was a busy sound, the sound of something with a serious appetite to satisfy.
‘The Eater of Socks,’ moaned the Senior Wrangler, with his eyes shut.
‘How many tentacles would you expect it to have?’ said the Lecturer in Recent
Runes. ‘I mean, roughly speaking?’
‘It’s a very large sort of noise, isn’t it?’ said the Bursar.
‘To the nearest dozen, say,’ said the Lecturer in Recent Runes, edging backwards.
… grnf, grnf, grnf …
‘It’d probably tear our socks off as soon as look at us . . .’ wailed the Senior Wrangler.
‘Ah. So at least five or six tentacles, then, would you say?’ said the Lecturer in
Recent Runes.
‘Seems to me it’s coming from one of the washing engines,’ said the Dean.
The engines were each two storeys high, and usual y only used when the
University’s population soared during term time. A huge treadmil connected to a
couple of big bleached wooden paddles in each vat, which were heated via
the fireboxes underneath. In ful production the washing engines needed at least half
a dozen people to manhandle the loads, maintain the fires and oil the scrubbing arms.
Ridcul y had seen them at work once, when it had looked like a picture of a very dean
and hygienic Hel , the kind of place soap might go to when it died.
The Dean stopped by the door to the boiler area.
‘Something’s in here,’ he whispered. ‘Listen!’
. . grnf. . .
It’s stopped! It knows we’re here!’ he hissed. “Al right? Ready? Hut!’
‘No!’ squeaked the Lecturer in Recent Runes.
‘I’l open the door and you be ready to stop it! One … two … three! Oh . . .’
The sleigh soared into the snowy sky.
ON THE WHOLE, I THINK THAT WENT VERY WELL, DON’T YOU?
‘Yes, master,’ said Albert.
I WAS RATHER PUZZLED BY THE LITTLE BOY IN THE CHAIN MAIL, THOUGH.
‘I think that was a Watchman, master.’
REALLY? WELL, HE WENT AWAY HAPPY, AND THAT’s THE MAIN THING.
‘Is it, master?’ There was worry in Albert’s voice. Death’s osmotic nature tended to
pick up new ideas altogether too quickly. Of course, Albert understood why they had to