'Yes.'
'You'd be satisfied with that Answer for your Question?'
Chester considered. 'I don't think that Answer relates.'
'So you wouldn't be satisfied!'
'No, I'd be satisfied if that were my Answer. I just don't believe it is. I am not a golem, you see.'
Bink shook his head in wonder. 'I guess I'm part golem, then. I don't think it's enough.'
'You're no golem,' Grundy said. 'You aren't smart enough.'
Some diplomacy! But Bink tried again. 'Chester, can you explain that Answer to us?'
'No, I don't understand it either.'
'But you said-'
'I said I thought it was a fair Answer. Were I a golem, I would surely appreciate its reference. Its relevance. This is certainly more likely than the notion that the Good Magician would fail to deliver in full measure.'
Bink remembered how Humfrey had told the manticora that he had a soul-in such a manner that the creature was satisfied emotionally as well as intellectually. It was a convincing argument. There must be some reason for the obscurity of the Answer for the golem.
But oh, what frustration until that reason became clear!
Near dusk they spied a house. Crombie's talent indicated that this was their residence for the night.
The only problem was the size of it. The door was ten feet tall.
'That is the domicile of a giant-or an ogre,' Humfrey said, frowning.
'An ogre!' Bink repeated. 'We can't stay there!'
'He'd have us all in his pot in a moment, and the fire high,' Chester agreed. 'Ogres consider human flesh a delicacy.'
Crombie squawked. 'The idiot claims his fool talent is never mistaken,' Grundy reported.
'Yes, but remember what his talent doesn't cover!' Bink said. 'We asked for a good place to spend the night; we didn't specify that it had to be safe.'
'I daresay a big pot of hot water is as comfortable a place to relax as any,' Chester agreed. 'Until it becomes too hot. Then the bath becomes-'
'I suppose I'll have to expend some of my valuable magic,' Humfrey complained. 'It's too late to go wandering through the woods in search of alternate lodging.' He brought out yet another little stoppered bottle and pulled out the cork. It was an ornery cork, as corks tended to be, and gave way only grudgingly, so that the process took some time.
'Uh, isn't that a demon container?' Bink asked, thinking he recognized the style. Some bottles were solider than others, and more carefully crafted, with magical symbols inscribed. 'Shouldn't you-?'
The Magician paused. 'Umph.'
'He says he was just about to, nitwit,' the golem said. 'Believe it if you will.'
The Magician scraped a pentacle in the dirt, sat the ^bottle in it, and uttered an indecipherable incantation. The cork popped out and the smoky demon issued, coalescing into the bespectacled entity Bink recognized as Beauregard.
The educated demon didn't even wait for the question. 'You routed me out for this, old man? Of course it's safe; that ogre's a vegetarian. It's your mission that's unsafe.'
'I didn't ask you about the mission!' Humfrey snapped. 'I know it's unsafe! That's why I'm along.'
'It is not like you to indulge in such foolishness, especially at the expense of your personal comfort,' Beauregard continued, pushing his spectacles back along his nose with one finger. 'Are you losing your marbles at last? Getting senile? Or merely attempting to go out in a blaze of ignominy?'
'Begone, infernal spirit! I will summon you when I need your useless conjectures.'
Beauregard shook his head sadly, then dissipated back into the bottle.
'That's another feeling spirit,' Bink said, uneasy. 'Do you have to coop him up like that, in such a little bottle?'
'No one can coop a demon,' the Magician said shortly. 'Besides, his term of service is not yet up.'
At times it was hard to follow the man's logic! 'But you had him when I first met you, more than a year ago.'
'He had a complex Question.'
'A demon of information, who answers the questions you get paid fees for, has to pay you for Answers?'
Humfrey did not respond. Bink heard a faint booming laughter, and realized after a moment that it was coming from the demon's bottle. Something was certainly funny here, but not humorous.
'We'd better move in before it gets dark,' Chester said, eyeing the ogre's door somewhat
