Making Money - Terry Pratchett [136]
Mr. Slant nodded automatically, remembered himself, and fumbled with his notes. He had lost his place.
“And now we come to, er, the matter of the bank—”
“Mrs. Lavish, a lady many of us were privileged to know, recently confided in me that she was dying,” said Vetinari. “She asked me for advice on the future of the bank, given that her obvious heirs were, in her words, ‘as nasty a bunch of weasels as you could ever hope not to meet—’”
All thirty-one of the Lavish lawyers stood up and spoke at once, incurring a total cost to their clients of $AM119.28p.
Mr. Slant glared at them.
Mr. Slant did not, despite what had been said, have the respect of Ankh-Morpork’s legal profession. He commanded its fear. Death had not diminished his encyclopedic memory, his guile, his talent for corkscrew reasoning, and the vitriol of his stare. Do not cross me this day, it advised the lawyers. Do not cross me, for if you do I will have the flesh from your very bones and the marrow therein. You know those leather-bound tomes you have on the wall behind your desk to impress your clients? I have read them all, and I wrote half of them. Do not try me. I am not in a good mood.
One by one, they sat down.
“If I may continue?” said Vetinari. “I understand that Mrs. Lavish subsequently interviewed Mr. Lipwig and considered that he would be a superb chairman in the very best traditions of the Lavish family and the ideal guardian for the dog Mr. Fusspot, who is, by the custom of the bank, its chairman.”
Cosmo rose slowly to his feet and stepped out into the center of the floor. “l object most strongly to the suggestion that this scoundrel is in the best traditions of my—” he began. Mr. Slant was on his feet as though propelled by a spring. Quick as he was, Moist was faster.
“I object!” he said.
“How do you dare object,” Cosmo spat, “when you have admitted to being an arrogant scofflaw?”
“I object to Lord Vetinari’s allegation that I have had anything to do with the fine traditions of the Lavish family,” said Moist, staring into eyes that now seemed to be weeping green tears. “For example, I have never been a pirate or traded in slaves—”
There was a great rising of lawyers.
Mr. Slant glared. There was a great seating.
“They admit it,” said Moist. “It’s in the bank’s own official history!”
“That is correct, Mr. Slant,” said Vetinari. “I have read it. Volenti non fit injuria clearly applies.”
The whirring started again. Mr. Fusspot was coming back the other way. Moist forced himself not to look.
“Oh, this is low indeed!” snarled Cosmo. “Whose history could withstand this type of malice!”
Moist raised a hand. “Oooh, oooh, I know this one!” he said. “Mine can. The worst I ever did was rob people who thought they were robbing me, but I never used violence and I gave it all back. Okay, I robbed a couple of banks, well, defrauded, really, but only because they made it so easy—”
“Gave it back?” said Slant, looking for some kind of response from Vetinari. But the Patrician was staring over the heads of the crowd, who were almost all engrossed in the transit of Mr. Fusspot, and merely raised a finger in either acknowledgment or dismissal.
“Yes, you may recall that I saw the error of my ways last year when the gods—” Moist began.
“‘Robbed a couple of banks’?” said Cosmo. “Vetinari, are we to believe that you knowingly put the most important bank in the city into the charge of a known bank robber?”
The mass ranks of the Lavishes arose, united in the defense of the money. Vetinari still stared at the ceiling.
Moist looked up. A disc, something white, skimmed through the air near the ceiling, descended as it circled, and hit Cosmo between the eyes. A second one swooped on over the head of Moist and landed in the bosoms of the Lavishes.