Hogfather

Wrangler, managing some sarcasm, but they could tell his heart wasn’t in it. “Er, would you like to borrow my handkerchief? It’s nearly fresh.”
    “Why don’t you get the lady a nice sherry?” said Ridcully. “And some corn for her chicken…”
    “Oh, I never drink alcohol,” said the Cheerful Fairy, horrified.
    “Really?” said Ridcully. “We find it’s something to be cheerful about. Mr. Stibbons…would you be so kind as to step over here for a moment?”
    He beckoned him up close.
    “There’s got to be a lot of belief sloshing around to let her be created,” he said. “She’s a good fourteen stone, if I’m any judge. If we wanted to contact the Hogfather, how would we go about it? Letter up chimney?”
    “Yes, but not tonight , sir,” said Ponder. “He’ll be out delivering.”
    “No telling where he’ll be, then,” said Ridcully. “Blast.”
    “Of course, he might not have come here yet,” said Ponder.
    “Why should he come here?” said Ridcully.

    The Librarian pulled the blankets over himself and curled up.
    As an orangutan he hankered for the warmth of the rain forest. The problem was that he’d never even seen a rain forest, having been turned into an orangutan when he was already a fully grown human. Something in his bones knew about it, though, and didn’t like the cold of winter at all. But he was also a librarian in those same bones and he flatly refused to allow fires to be lit in the library. As a result, pillows and blankets went missing everywhere else in the University and ended up in a sort of cocoon in the reference section, in which the ape lurked during the worst of the winter.
    He turned over and wrapped himself in the Bursar’s curtains.
    There was a creaking outside his nest, and some whispering.
    “No, don’t light the lamp.”
    “I wondered why I hadn’t seen him all evening.”
    “Oh, he goes to bed early on Hogswatch Eve, sir. Here we are…”
    There was some rustling.
    “We’re in luck. It hasn’t been filled,” said Ponder. “Looks like he’s used one of the Bursar’s.”
    “He puts it up every year?”
    “Apparently.”
    “But it’s not as though he’s a child. A certain childlike simplicity, perhaps.”
    “It might be different for orangutans, Archchancellor.”
    “Do they do it in the jungle, d’you think?”
    “I don’t imagine so, sir. No chimneys, for one thing.”
    “And quite short legs, of course. Extremely underfunded in the sock area, orangutans. They’d be quids in if they could hang up gloves, of course. Hogfather’d be on double shifts if they could hang up their gloves. On account of the length of their arms.”
    “Very good, Archchancellor.”
    “I say, what’s this on the…my word, a glass of sherry. Well, waste not, want not.” There was a damp glugging noise in the darkness.
    “I think that was supposed to be for the Hogfather, sir.”
    “And the banana?”
    “I imagine that’s been left out for the pigs, sir.”
    “Pigs?”
    “Oh, you know, sir. Tusker and Snouter and Gouger and Rooter. I mean,” Ponder stopped, conscious that a grown man shouldn’t be able to remember this sort of thing, “that’s what children believe.”
    “Bananas for pigs? That’s not traditional, is it? I’d have thought acorns, perhaps. Or apples or swedes.”
    “Yes, sir, but the Librarian likes bananas, sir.”
    “Very nourishin’ fruit, Mr. Stibbons.”
    “Yes, sir. Although, funnily enough it’s not actually a fruit, sir.”
    “Really?”
    “Yes, sir. Botanically, it’s a type of fish, sir. According to my theory it’s cladistically associated with the Krullian pipefish, sir, which of course is also yellow and goes around in bunches or shoals.”
    “And lives in trees?”
    “Well, not usually, sir. The banana is obviously exploiting a new niche.”
    “Good heavens, really? It’s a funny thing, but I’ve never much liked bananas and I’ve always been a bit suspicious of fish, too. That’d explain it.”
    “Yes, sir.”
    “Do they attack swimmers?”
    “Not that I’ve heard, sir. Of course, they may be clever enough to only attack swimmers who’re far from land.”
    “What, you mean sort of…high up? In the trees, as it were?”
    “Possibly, sir.”
    “Cunning, eh?”
    “Yes, sir.”
    “Well, we might as well make ourselves comfortable, Mr. Stibbons.”
    “Yes, sir.”
    A match flared in the darkness as Ridcully lit his pipe.

    The Ankh-Morpork wassailers had practiced for