Thief of Time - Terry Pratchett [50]
“But Shoblang is dead,” murmured Lu-Tze.
The abbot stopped blowing bubbles.
“That is sad news. And he was a friend of yours, I understand.”
“Shouldn’t’ve happened like that,” the sweeper muttered. “Shouldn’t’ve happened like that.”
“Compose yourself, Lu-Tze. I will talk to you shortly. Bikkit!” The chief acolyte, spurred on by a blow across the ear with a rubber monkey, hurried away.
The press of monks began to thin out as they went about their duties. Lu-Tze and Lobsang were left on the balcony, looking down at the rippling Mandala.
Lu-Tze cleared his throat.
“See them spinners at the end?” he said. “The little one records the patterns for a day, and then anything interesting is stored in the big ones.”
“I just premembered you were going to say that.”
“Good word. Good word. The lad has talent.” Lu-Tze lowered his voice. “Anyone watching us?”
Lobsang looked around.
“There’s a few people still here.”
Lu-Tze raised his voice again.
“You been taught anything about the Big Crash?”
“Only rumors, Sweeper.”
“Yeah, there were a lot of rumors. ‘The day time stood still,’ all that sort of thing.” Lu-Tze sighed. “Y’know, most of what you get taught is lies. It has to be. Sometimes if you get the truth all at once, you can’t understand it. You knew Ankh-Morpork pretty well, did you? Ever go to the opera house?”
“Only for pickpocket practice, Sweeper.”
“Ever wonder about it? Ever look at that little theater just over the road? Called The Dysk, I think.”
“Oh, yes! We got penny tickets and sat on the ground and threw nuts at the stage.”
“And it didn’t make you think? Big opera house, all plush and gilt and big orchestras, and then there’s this little thatched theater, all bare wood and no seats, and one bloke playing a crumhorn for musical accompaniment?”
Lobsang shrugged. “Well, no. That’s just how things are.”
Lu-Tze almost smiled.
“Very flexible things, human minds,” he said. “It’s amazing what they can stretch to fit. We did a fine job there—”
“Lu-Tze?”
One of the lesser acolytes was waiting respectfully.
“The abbot will see you now,” he said.
“Ah, right,” said the sweeper. He nudged Lobsang and whispered, “We’re going to Ankh-Morpork, lad.”
“What? But you said you wanted to be sent to—”
Lu-Tze winkled. “’Cos it is written ‘Them as asks, don’t get,’ see. There’s more than one way of choking a dangdang than stuffing it with pling, lad.”
“Is there?”
“Oh yes, if you’ve got enough pling. Now let’s see the abbot, shall we? It’ll be time for his feed now. Solids, thank goodness. At least he’s done with the wet nurse. It was so embarrassing for him and the young lady, honestly, you didn’t know where to put your face and neither did he. I mean, mentally he’s nine hundred years old…”
“That must make him very wise.”
“Pretty wise, pretty wise. But age and wisdom don’t necessarily go together, I’ve always found,” said Lu-Tze, as they approached the abbot’s rooms. “Some people just become stupid with more authority. Not His Reverence, of course.”
The abbot was in his high chair, and had recently flicked a spoonful of nourishing pap all over the chief acolyte, who was smiling like a man whose job depended on looking happy that parsnip-and-gooseberry custard was dribbling down his forehead.
It occurred to Lobsang, not for the first time, that the abbot was a little bit more than purely random in his attacks on the man. The acolyte was, indeed, the kind of mildly objectionable person who engendered an irresistible urge by any right-thinking person to pour goo into his hair and hit him with a rubber yak, and the abbot was old enough to listen to his inner child.
“You sent for me, Your Reverence,” said Lu-Tze, bowing.
The abbot upturned his bowl down the chief acolyte’s robe.
“Wahahaahaha ah, yes…Lu-Tze. How old are you now?”
“Eight hundred, Your Reverence. But that’s no age at all!”
“Nevertheless, you have spent a lot of time in the world. I understood you were looking to retire and cultivate your gardens?”
“Yes, but—”
“But,” the abbot smiled angelically, “like an old warhorse,