Lords And Ladies

'We shall have to find out,' said Granny, setting her face in a grim smile. 'Now help me up with the poor man.'

Nanny Ogg bent to the task.

'Coo, he's heavy. We could've done with young Magrat up here.'

'No. Flighty,' said Granny Weatherwax. 'Head easily turned.'

'Nice girl, though.'

'But soppy. She thinks you can lead your life as if fairy stories work and folk songs are really true. Not that I don't wish her every happiness.'

'Hope she does all right as queen,' said Nanny.

'We taught her everything she knows,' said Granny Weatherwax.

'Yeah,' said Nanny Ogg, as they disappeared into the bracken. 'D'you think. . . maybe. . . ?'

'What?'

'D'you think maybe we ought to have taught her everything we know?'

'It'd take too long.'

'Yeah, right.'

It took a while for letters to get as far as the Archchancellor. The post tended to be picked up from the University gates by anyone who happened to be passing, and then left lying on a shelf somewhere or used as a pipe lighter or a bookmark or, in the case of the Librarian, as bedding.

This one had only taken two days, and was quite intact apart from a couple of cup rings and a bananary fingerprint. It arrived on the table along with the other post while the faculty were at breakfast. The Dean opened it with a spoon.

'Anyone here know where Lancre is?' he said.

'Why?' said Ridcully, looking up sharply.

'Some king's getting married and wants us to come.'

'Oh dear, oh dear,' said the Lecturer in Recent Runes. 'Some tinpot king gets wed and he wants us to come?'

'It's up in the mountains,' said the Archchancellor, quietly 'Good trout fishin' in those parts, as I recall. My word. Lancre. Good grief. Hadn't thought about the place in years. You know, there's glacier lakes up there where the fish've never seen a rod. Lancre. Yes.'

'And it's far too far,' said the Lecturer in Recent Runes.

Ridcully wasn't listening. 'And there's deer. Thousands of head of deer. And elk. Wolves all over the place. Mountain lions too, I shouldn't wonder. I heard that Ice Eagles have been seen up there again, too.'

His eyes gleamed.

'There's only half a dozen of 'em left,' he said.

Mustrum Ridcully did a lot for rare species. For one thing, he kept them rare.

'It's the back of beyond,' said the Dean. 'Right off the edge of the map.'

'Used to stay with my uncle up there, in the holidays,' said Ridcully, his eyes misty with distance. 'Great days I had up there. Great days. The summers up there . . . and the sky's a deeper blue than anywhere else, it's very . . . and the grass. . . and. . .'

He returned abruptly from the landscapes of memory.

'Got to go, then,' he said. 'Duty calls. Head of state gettin' married. Important occasion. Got to have a few wizards there. Look of the thing. Nobblyess obligay.'

'Well, I'm not going,' said the Dean. 'It's not natural, the countryside. Far too many trees. Never could stand it.'

'The Bursar could do with an outing,' said Ridcully. 'Seems a bit jumpy just lately, can't imagine why.' He leaned forward to look along the High Table. 'Bursaaar!'

The Bursar dropped his spoon into his oatmeal.

'See what I mean?' said Ridcully. 'Bundle o' nerves the whole time. I WAS SAYING YOU COULD DO WITH SOME FRESH AIR, BURSAR.' He nudged the Dean heavily. 'Hope he's not going off his rocker, poor fella,' he said, in what he chose to believe was a whisper. 'Spends too much time indoors, if you get my drift.'

The Dean, who went outdoors about once a month, shrugged his shoulders.

'I EXPECT YOU'D LIKE A LITTLE TIME AWAY FROM THE UNIVERSITY, EH?' said the Archchancellor, nodding and grimacing madly. 'Peace and quiet? Healthy country livin'?'

'I, I, I, I should like that very much, Archchancellor,' said the Bursar, hope rising in his face like an autumn mushroom.

'Good man. Good man. You shall come with me,' said Ridcully, beaming.

The Bursar's expression froze.

'Got to be someone else, too,' said Ridcully. 'Volunteers, anyone?'

The wizards, townies to a man, bent industriously over their food. They always bent industriously over their food in any case, but this time they were doing it to avoid catching Ridcully's eye.

'What about the Librarian?' said the Lecturer in Recent Runes, throwing a random victim to the wolves.

There was a sudden babble of relieved agreement.

'Good choice,' said the Dean. 'Just the thing for him. Countryside. Trees. And. . . and. . . trees.'

'Mountain air,' said the Lecturer in Recent Runes.

'Yes, he's been looking peaky lately,' said the Reader in Invisible Writings[7].

'It'd be a real treat for him,' said the Lecturer in Recent Runes.

'Home away from home, I expect,' said the Dean. 'Trees all over the place.'

They all looked expectantly at the Archchancellor.

'He doesn't wear clothes,' said Ridcully. 'And he goes 'ook' all the time.'

'He does wear the old green robe thing,' said the Dean.

'Only when he's had a bath.'

Ridcully rubbed his beard. In fact he quite liked the Librarian, who never argued with him and always kept himself in shape, even if that shape was a pear shape. It was the right shape for an orang-utan.

The thing about the Librarian was that no one noticed he was an orang-utan anymore, unless a visitor to the University happened to point it out. In which case someone would say, 'Oh, yes. Some kind of magical accident, wasn't it? Pretty sure it was something like that. One minute human, next minute an ape. Funny thing, really . . . can't remember what he looked like before. I mean, he must have been human, I suppose. Always thought of him as an ape, really. It's more him.'

And indeed it had been an accident among the potent and magical books of the University library that had as it were bounced the Librarian's genotype down the evolutionary tree and back up a different branch, with the significant difference that now he could hang on to it upside down with his feet.

'Oh, all right,' said the Archchancellor. 'But he's got to wear something during the ceremony,' if only for the sake of the poor bride.'

There was a whimper from the Bursar.

All the wizards turned toward him.

His spoon landed on the floor with a small thud. It was wooden. The wizards had gently prevented him from having metal cutlery since what was now known as the Unfortunate Incident At Dinner.

'A-a-a-a,' gurgled the Bursar, trying to push himself away from the table.

'Dried frog pills,' said the Archchancellor. 'Someone fish 'em out of his pocket.'

Wizards didn't rush this. You could find anything in a wizard's pocket-peas, unreasonable things with legs, small experimental universes, anything. . .

The Reader in Invisible Writings craned to see what had unglued his colleague.

'Here, look at his porridge,' he said.

There was a perfect round depression in the oatmeal.

'Oh dear, another crop circle,' said the Dean.

The wizards relaxed.