The Wit & Wisdom of Discworld - By Terry Pratchett Page 0,51
are you talking about, Carrot?’
‘The Dwarf Bread Museum. I promised Mr Hopkinson’s sister that I’d tidy it up. I just thought it might cheer you up, but I appreciate that bread isn’t everyone’s cup of tea.’
Detritus was particularly good when it came to asking questions. He had three basic ones. They were the direct (‘Did you do it?’), the persistent (‘Are you sure it wasn’t you what done it?’) and the subtle (‘It was you what done it, wasn’t it?’). Although they were not the most cunning questions ever devised, Detritus’s talent was to go on patiently asking them for hours on end, until he got the right answer, which was generally something like: Yes! Yes! I did it! I did it!
Now please tell me what it was I did!’
It is a pervasive and beguiling myth that the people who design instruments of death end up being killed by them. There is almost no foundation in fact. Colonel Shrapnel wasn’t blown up, M. Guillotin died with his head on, Colonel Gatling wasn’t shot. If it hadn’t been for the murder of cosh and blackjack maker Sir William Blunt-Instrument in an alleyway, the rumour would never have got started.
The Ankh-Morpork view of crime and punishment
was that the penalty for the first offence should prevent the possibility of a second offence.
IT’S the night before Hogswatch. And it’s too quiet.
Where is the big jolly fat man? Why is Death creeping down chimneys and trying to say Ho Ho Ho? The darkest night of the year is getting a lot darker…
Susan the gothic governess has got to sort it out by morning, otherwise there won’t be a morning. Ever again…
The 20th Discworld novel is a festive feast of darkness and Death (but with jolly robins and tinsel too).
As they say: You’d better watch out…
Everything starts somewhere, although many physicists disagree.
*
The senior wizards of Unseen University stood and looked at the door.
There was no doubt that whoever had shut it wanted it to stay shut. Dozens of nails secured it to the door frame. Planks had been nailed right across. And finally it had, up until this morning, been hidden by a bookcase that had been put in front of it.
‘And there’s the sign, Ridcully’ said the Dean. ‘You have read it, I assume. You know? The sign which says “Do not, under any circumstances, open this door”?’
‘Of course I’ve read it,’ said Ridcully. ‘Why d’yer think I want it opened?’
*
Lord Downey was an assassin. Or, rather, an Assassin. The capital letter was important. It separated those curs who went around murdering people for money from the gentlemen who were occasionally consulted by other gentlemen who wished to have removed, for a consideration, any inconvenient razorblades from the candyfloss of life.
*
The members of the Guild of Assassins considered themselves cultured men who enjoyed good music and food and literature. And they knew the value of human life. To a penny, in many cases.
*
It was a quiet day for Susan, although on the way to the park Gawain trod on a crack in the pavement. On purpose.
‘Gawain?’ she said, eyeing a nervous bear who had suddenly spotted her and was now trying to edge away nonchalantly.
Yes?’
You meant to tread on that crack so that I’d have to thump some poor creature whose only fault is wanting to tear you limb from limb.’
‘I was just skipping—’
‘Quite. Real children don’t go hop-pity-skip unless they are on drugs.’
He grinned at her.
‘If I catch you being twee again I will knot your arms behind your head,’ said Susan levelly
*
Susan reads a bedtime story:
‘… and then Jack chopped down the beanstalk, adding murder and ecological vandalism to the theft, enticement and trespass charges already mentioned, but he got away with it and lived happily ever after without so much as a guilty twinge about what he had done. Which proves that you can be excused just about anything if you’re a hero, because no one asks inconvenient questions.’
*
Death in person did not turn up upon the cessation of every life. It was not necessary. Governments govern, but prime ministers and presidents do not personally turn up in people’s homes to tell them how to run their lives, because of the mortal danger this would present. There are laws instead.
*
It was the night before Hogswatch. All through the house …
… one creature stirred. It was a mouse.
And someone, in the face of all appropriateness, had baited a trap. Although, because it was the festive season, they’d used a piece of pork crackling.