Making Money

sous cape à par les dieux?”
    There was a knock at the double doors, followed instantly by the entry of Bent. He was carrying a large, round box.
    “The suite is now ready for you, Master,” he announced. “That is to say, for Mr. Fusspot.”
    “The suite?”
    “Oh, yes. The chairman has a suite.”
    “Oh, that suite. He has to live above the shop, as it were?”
    “Indeed. Mr. Slant has been kind enough to give me a copy of the conditions of the legacy. The chairman must sleep in the bank every night—”
    “But I’ve got a perfectly good apartment in the—”
    “Ahem. They are the Conditions, sir,” said Bent. “You can have the bed, of course,” he added generously. “Mr. Fusspot will sleep in his in tray. He was born in it, as a matter of interest.”
    “I have to stay locked up here every night?”
    In fact, when Moist saw the suite the prospect looked much less like a penance. He had to open four doors even before he found a bed. It had a dining room, a dressing room, a bathroom, a separate flushing privy, a spare bedroom, a passage to the office, which was a kind of public room, and a little private study. The master bedroom contained a huge oak four-poster with damask hangings, and Moist fell in love with it at once. He tried it for size. It was so soft that it was like lying in a huge, warm puddle—
    He sat bolt upright. “Did Mrs. Lavish—” he began, panic rising.
    “She died sitting at her desk, Master,” said Bent soothingly, as he untied the string on the big round box. “We have replaced the chair. By the way, she is to be buried tomorrow. Small Gods, at noon, family members only, by request.”
    “Small Gods? That’s a bit down-market for a Lavish, isn’t it?”
    “I believe a number of Mrs. Lavish’s ancestors are buried there. She did once tell me in a moment of confidence that she would be damned if she was going to be a Lavish for all eternity.” There was a rustle of paper, and Bent added: “Your hat, sir.”
    “What hat?”
    “For the master of the Royal Mint.” Bent held it up.
    It was a black silk hat. Once it had been shiny. Now it was mostly bald. Old tramps wore better hats.
    It could have been designed to look like a big pile of dollars, it could have been a crown, it could have been set with small, jeweled scenes depicting embezzlement through the ages, the progression of negotiable currency from snot to little white shells and cows and all the way to gold. It could have said something about the magic of money. It could have been good.
    A black top hat. No style. No style at all.
    “Mr. Bent, can you arrange for someone to go over to the Post Office and get them to bring my stuff over here?” said Moist, looking glumly at the wreck.
    “Of course, Master.”
    “I think ‘Mr. Lipwig’ will be fine, thank you.”
    “Yes, sir. Of course.”
    Moist sat down at the enormous desk and ran his hands lovingly across the worn green leather.
    Vetinari, damn him, had been right. The Post Office had made him cautious and defensive. He’d run out of challenges, run out of fun.
    Thunder grumbled, away in the distance, and the afternoon sun was being threatened by blue-black clouds. One of those heavy all-night storms was rolling in from the plains. There tended to be more crimes on rainy nights these days, according to the Times. Apparently it was because of the werewolf in the Watch: rain made smells hard to track.
    After a while Peggy brought him an omelet containing absolutely no mention of the word garlic. And shortly after that, Gladys arrived with his wardrobe. All of it, including the door, carried under one arm. It bounced off the walls and ceiling as she lumbered across the carpet and dropped it in the middle of the big bedroom floor.
    Moist went to follow her, but she held up her huge hands in horror.
    “No, Sir! Let Me Come Out First!”
    She clumped past him into the hallway. “That Was Nearly Very Bad,” she said.
    Moist waited to see if anything more was going to be forthcoming, and then prompted, “Why, exactly?”
    “A Man And A Young Woman Should Not Be In The Same Bedroom,” said the golem with solemn certitude.
    “Er…how old are you, Gladys?” said Moist carefully.
    “One Thousand And Fifty-Four Years, Mr. Lipwig.”
    “Er…right. And you are made of clay. I mean, everyone’s made of clay, in a manner of speaking, but, as a golem, you are, as it were, er…very made of clay…”
    “Yes, Mr. Lipwig, But I Am Not