He was lost and lonely and a long way from home. He —
There was a crunch high above him, and shards of rock spattered into the earth. High up on the face of Old Grandad a hole appeared; there was a brief sight of the Luggage’s backside as it struggled to regain its footing, and then Twoflower’s head poked out of the mouth cave.
‘Anyone down there? I say?’
‘Hey!’ shouted the wizard. ‘Am I glad to see you!’
‘I don’t know. Are you?’ said Twoflower.
‘Am I what?’
‘Gosh, there’s a wonderful view from up here!’
It took them half an hour to get down. Fortunately Old Grandad had been quite craggy with plenty of handholds, but his nose would have presented a tricky obstacle if it hadn’t been for the luxuriant oak tree that flourished in one nostril.
The Luggage didn’t bother to climb. It just jumped, and bounced its way down with no apparent harm.
Cohen sat in the shade, trying to catch his breath and waiting for his sanity to catch up with him. He eyed the Luggage thoughtfully.
‘The horses have all gone,’ said Twoflower.
‘We’ll find ’em,’ said Cohen. His eyes bored into the Luggage, which began to look embarrassed.
‘They were carrying all our food,’ said Rincewind.
‘Plenty of food in the foreshts.’
‘I have some nourishing biscuits in the Luggage,’ said Twoflower. ‘Traveller’s Digestives. Always a comfort in a tight spot.’
‘I’ve tried them,’ said Rincewind. They’ve got a mean edge on them, and —’
Cohen stood up, wincing.
‘Excushe me,’ he said flatly. ‘There’sh shomething I’ve got to know.’
He walked over to the Luggage and gripped its lid. The box backed away hurriedly, but Cohen stuck out a skinny foot and tripped up half its legs. As it twisted to snap at him he gritted his teeth and heaved, jerking the Luggage onto its curved lid where it rocked angrily like a maddened tortoise.
‘Hey, that’s my Luggage!’ said Twoflower. ‘Why’s he attacking my Luggage?’
‘I think I know,’ said Bethan quietly. ‘I think it’s because he’s scared of it.’
Twoflower turned to Rincewind, open-mouthed.
Rincewind shrugged.
‘Search me,’ he said. ‘I run away from things I’m scared of, myself.’
With a snap of its lid the Luggage jerked into the air and came down running, catching Cohen a crack on the shins with one of its brass corners. As it wheeled around he got a grip on it just long enough to send it galloping full tilt into a rock.
‘Not bad,’ said Rincewind, admiringly.
The Luggage staggered back, paused for a moment, then came at Cohen waving its lid menacingly. He jumped and landed on it, with both his hands and feet caught in the gap between the box and the lid.
This severely puzzled the Luggage. It was even more astonished when Cohen took a deep breath and heaved, muscles standing out on his skinny arms like a sock full of coconuts.
They stood locked there for some time, tendon versus hinge. Occasionally one or other would creak.
Bethan elbowed Twoflower in the ribs.
‘Do something,’ she said.
‘Um,’ said Twoflower. ‘Yes. That’s about enough, I think. Put him down, please.’
The Luggage gave a creak of betrayal at the sound of its master’s voice. Its lid flew up with such force that Cohen tumbled backwards, but he scrambled to his feet and flung himself towards the box.
Its contents lay open to the skies.
Cohen reached inside.
The Luggage creaked a bit, but had obviously weighed up the chances of being sent to the top of that Great Wardrobe in the Sky. When Rincewind dared to peek through his fingers Cohen was peering into the Luggage and cursing under his breath.
‘Laundry?’ he shouted. ‘Is that it? Just laundry?’ He was shaking with rage.
‘I think there’s some biscuits too,’ said Twoflower in a small voice.
‘But there wash gold! And I shaw it eat shomebody!’ Cohen looked imploringly at Rincewind.
The wizard sighed. ‘Don’t ask me,’ he said. ‘I don’t own the bloody thing.’
‘I bought it in a shop,’ said Twoflower defensively. ‘I said I wanted a travelling trunk.’
‘That’s what you got, all right,’ said Rincewind.
‘It’s very loyal,’ said Twoflower.
‘Oh yes,’ agreed Rincewind. ‘If loyalty is what you look for in a suitcase.’
‘Hold on,’ said Cohen, who had sagged onto a rock. Wash it one of thoshe shopsh – I mean, I bet you hadn’t noticed it before and when you went back again it washn’t there?’
Twoflower brightened. ‘That’s right!’
‘Shopkeeper a little wizened old guy? Shop full of strange shtuff?’
‘Exactly! Never could find it again, I thought I must have got the wrong street, nothing but a brick wall where I thought it was, I remember thinking at the time it was rather —’
Cohen shrugged. ‘One of those shops[5],’ he said. That explainsh it, then.’ He felt his back, and grimaced. ‘Bloody horshe ran off with my linament!’
Rincewind remembered something, and fumbled in the depths of his torn and now very grubby robe. He held up a green bottle.
‘That’sh the shtuff!’ said Cohen. ‘You’re a marvel.’ He ooked sideways at Twoflower.
‘I would have beaten it,’ he said quietly, ‘even if you hadn’t called it off, I would have beaten it in the end.’
‘That’s right,’ said Bethan.
‘You two can make yourshelf usheful,’ he added. That Luggage broke through a troll tooth to get ush out. That wash diamond. Shee if you can find the bitsh. I’ve had an idea about them.’
As Bethan rolled up her sleeves and uncorked the bottle Rincewind took Twoflower to one side. When they were safely hidden behind a shrub he said, ‘He’s gone barmy.’
‘That’s Cohen the Barbarian you’re talking about!’ said Twoflower, genuinely shocked. ‘He is the greatest warrior that —’
‘Was,’ said Rincewind urgently. ‘All that stuff with the warrior priests and man-eating zombies was years ago. All he’s got now is memories and so many scars you could play noughts-and-crosses on him.’
‘He is rather more elderly than I imagined, yes,’ said Twoflower. He picked up a fragment of diamond.
‘So we ought to leave them and find our horses and move on,’ said Rincewind.
‘That’s a bit of a mean trick, isn’t it?’
‘They’ll be all right,’ said Rincewind heartily. ‘The point is, would you feel happy in the company of someone who would attack the Luggage with his bare hands?’
‘That is a point,’ said Twoflower.
‘They’ll probably be better off without us anyway.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Positive,’ said Rincewind.
They found the horses wandering aimlessly in the scrub, breakfasted on badly-dried horse jerky, and set off in what Rincewind believed was the right direction. A few minutes later the Luggage emerged from the bushes and followed them.
The sun rose higher in the sky, but still failed to blot out the light of the star.
‘It’s got bigger overnight,’ said Twoflower. ‘Why isn’t anybody doing something?’
‘Such as what?’
Twoflower thought. ‘Couldn’t somebody tell Great A’Tuin to avoid it?’ he said. ‘Sort of go around it?’
‘That sort of thing has been tried before,’ said Rincewind. Wizards tried to tune in to Great A’Tuin’s mind.’
‘It didn’t work?’
‘Oh, it worked all right,’ said Rincewind. ‘Only . . .’
Only there had been certain unforeseen risks in reading a mind as great as the World Turtle’s, he explained. The wizards had trained up on tortoises and giant sea turtles first, to get the hang of the chelonian frame of mind, but although they knew that Great A’Tuin’s mind would be big they hadn’t realised that it would be slow.
‘There’s a bunch of wizards that have been reading it in shifts for thirty years,’ said Rincewind. ‘All they’ve found out is that Great A’Tuin is looking forward to something.’
‘What?’
‘Who knows?’
They rode in silence for a while through a rough country where huge limestone blocks lined the track. Eventually Twoflower said, ‘We ought to go back, you know.’
‘Look, we’ll reach the Smarl tomorrow,’ said Rincewind. ‘Nothing will happen to them out here, I don’t see why —’
He was talking to himself. Twoflower had wheeled his horse and was trotting back, demonstrating all the horsemanship of a sack of potatoes.
Rincewind looked down. The Luggage regarded him owlishly.
‘What are you looking at?’ said the wizard. ‘He can go back if he wants, why should I bother?’
The Luggage said nothing.
‘Look, he’s not my responsibility,’ said Rincewind. let’s be absolutely clear about that.’
The Luggage said nothing, but louder this time.
‘Go on – follow him. You’re nothing to do with me.’
The Luggage retracted its little legs and settled down on the track.
‘Well, I’m going,’ said Rincewind. ‘I mean it,’ he added.
He turned the horse’s head back towards the new horizon, and glanced down. The Luggage sat there.
‘It’s no good trying to appeal to my better nature. You can stay there all day for all I care. I’m just going to ride off, okay?’