The Wit & Wisdom of Discworld - By Terry Pratchett Page 0,90
power of the stars, while Granny Weatherwax believed in cups of tea, dry biscuits, washing every morning in cold water and, well, she believed mostly in Granny Weatherwax.
*
Most witches liked black, but Miss Treason even had black goats and black chickens. The walls were black. The floor was black. If you dropped a stick of liquorice, you’d never find it again. And, to Tiffany’s dismay, she had to make her cheeses black, which meant painting the cheeses with shiny black wax. It did keep them moist, but Tiffany distrusted black cheeses. They always looked as though they were plotting something.
*
‘Gods, elementals, demons, spirits … sometimes it’s hard to tell ‘em apart wi’oot a map.’
*
You could hear the snow falling. It made a strange little noise, like a faint, cold sizzle.
*
The Chalk Hill Feegles were more at home with the drinkin’, stealin’ and fightin’, and Rob Anybody was good at all three. But he’d learned to read and write because Jeannie had asked him to. He did them with a lot more optimism than accuracy. When he was faced with a long sentence he tended to work out a few words and then have a great big guess.
*
The white kitten watched the snowflakes. It was called You, as in ‘You! Stop that!’ and ‘You! Get off there!’ When it came to names, Granny Weatherwax didn’t do fancy.
*
‘The important thing,’ said Miss Treason, ‘is to stay the passage of the wind. You should avoid rumbustious fruits and vegetables. Beans are the worst, take it from me.’
‘I don’t think I understand—’ Tiffany began.
‘Try not to fart, in a nutshell.’
‘In a nutshell I imagine it would be pretty unpleasant!’ said Tiffany, nervously.
*
The Feegles didn’t know the meaning of the word ‘fear’. Sometimes Tiffany wished they’d read a dictionary. They fought like tigers, they fought like demons, they fought like giants. What they didn’t do was fight like something with more than a spoonful of brain.
*
Nanny Ogg was good at listening, at least. She listened like a great big ear, and before Tiffany realized it she was telling her everything. Everything. Nanny sat on the opposite side of the big kitchen table, puffing gently at a pipe with a hedgehog carved on it. Sometimes she’d ask a little question, like ‘Why was that?’ or ‘And then what happened?’ and off they’d go again. Nanny’s friendly little smile could drag out of you things you didn’t know you knew.
*
From the best chair in the room of ornaments, a large grey cat watched Tiffany with a half-open eye that glinted with absolute evil. Nanny had referred to him as ‘Greebo … don’t mind him, he’s just a big old softie,’ which Tiffany knew enough to interpret as ‘He’ll have his claws in your leg if you go anywhere near him.’
It was hard to be embarrassed by Nanny Ogg, because her laugh drove it away She wasn’t embarrassed about anything.
She opened the cutlery drawer for a spoon. It stuck. She rattled it, pulled at it and swore a few times, but it stayed stuck.
‘Oh, yes, go ahead,’ said a voice behind her. ‘See how much help that is. Don’t be sensible and stick your hand under the top and carefully free up the stuck item. Oh no. Rattle and curse, that’s the way!’
Tiffany turned.
There was a skinny, tired-looking woman standing by the kitchen table. She seemed to be wearing a sheet draped around her and was smoking a cigarette. Tiffany had never seen a woman smoke a cigarette before, but especially never a cigarette that burned with a fat red flame and gave off sparks.
‘Who are you?’ she said sharply.
‘Anoia, Goddess of Things That Get Stuck In Drawers,’ said the woman. ‘Pleased to meet you.’
‘There’s a goddess just for that?’ said Tiffany.
‘Well, I find lost corkscrews and things that roll under furniture,’ said Anoia, off-handedly ‘They want me to do stuck zips, and I’m thinking about that. But mostly I manifest whensoever people rattle stuck drawers and call upon the gods.’ She puffed on her cigarette. ‘Got any tea?’
‘But I didn’t call on anyone!’
‘You did,’ said Anoia. ‘You cussed. Sooner or later, every curse is a prayer.’ She waved the hand that wasn’t holding the cigarette and something in the drawer went pling. ‘It’ll be all right now. It was the fish slice. Everyone has one, and no one knows why. Did anyone in the world ever knowingly go out one day and buy a fish slice? I don’t think so.’