Making Money

Fartswell,” said Dr. Hicks, in case Moist was due a sudden attack of recollection.
    “Oh, that was you was it?” said Moist, who’d met actors before. “Everyone at work was talking about it!”
    I’m okay so long as he doesn’t ask which night they talked about, he thought. There’s always one night in every play when something hilariously dreadful happens. But he was lucky; an experienced actor knows when not to push his luck.
    Instead, Hicks said, “Do you know ancient languages?”
    “I can do Basic Droning,” said Moist.
    “I can speak formal Golem. Is this ancient enough for you?” said Adora Belle, and made Moist’s spine tingle. The private language of the golems was usually hell on the human tongue, but it sounded unbearably sexy when Adora Belle uttered it. It was like silver in the air.
    “What was that?” said Hicks.
    “The common language of golems for the last twenty thousand years,” said Adora Belle.
    “Really? Most, er, moving…er…We’ll begin…”

    IN THE COUNTING house no one dared to look up as the desk of the chief cashier rumbled around on its turntable like some ancient tumbrel. Papers flew under Mavolio Bent’s hands while his brain drowned in poisons and his feet treadled continually to release the dark energies choking his soul.
    He didn’t calculate, not as other men saw it. Calculation was for people who couldn’t see the answer turning gently in their head. To see was to know. It always had been.
    The mound of accumulated paperwork dwindled as the fury of his thinking wracked him.
    There were new accounts being opened all the time. And why? Was it because of trust? Probity? An urge toward thrift? Was it because of anything that could be called worth?
    No! It was because of Lipwig! People whom Mr. Bent had never seen before and hoped never to see again were pouring into the bank, their money in boxes, their money in piggy banks, and quite often their money in socks. Sometimes they were actually wearing the socks!
    And they were doing this because of words! The bank’s coffers were filling up because the wretched Mr. Lipwig made people laugh and made people hope. People liked him. No one had ever liked Mr. Bent, as far as he was aware. Oh, there had been a mother’s love and a father’s arms, the one chilly, the other too late, but where had they got him? In the end he’d been left alone. So he’d run away and found the gray caravan and entered a new life based on numbers and on worth and solid respect, and he had worked his way up and yes, he was a man of worth and yes, he had respect. Yes, respect. Even Mr. Cosmo respected him.
    And now here was Lipwig, and who was he? No one seemed to know, except for the suspicious man with the unstable teeth. One day there was no Lipwig, next day he was the postmaster general! And now he was in the bank, a man whose worth was in his mouth and who showed no respect for anyone! And he made people laugh—and the bank filled up with money!
    And did the Lavishes lavish anything on you? said a familiar little voice in his head. It was a hated little part of himself that he had beaten and starved and punched back into its wardrobe for years. It wasn’t the voice of his conscience. He was the voice of his conscience. It was the voice of the…the mask.
    “No!” snapped Bent. Some of the nearest clerks looked up at the unaccustomed noise and then hurriedly lowered their heads for fear of catching his eye. Bent stared fixedly at the sheet in front of him, watching the numbers roll past. Rely on the numbers! They didn’t let you down…
    Cosmo doesn’t respect you, you fool, you fool. You have run their bank for them and cleaned up after them! You made, they spent…and they laugh at you. You know they do. Silly Mr. Bent with his funny walk, silly, silly, silly…
    “Get away from me, get away,” he whispered.
    The people like him because he likes them. No one likes Mr. Bent.
    “But I have worth. I have value!” Mr. Bent pulled another worksheet toward himself and sought solace in its columns. But he was pursued…
    Where was your worth and value when you made the numbers dance, Mr. Bent? The innocent numbers? You made them dance and somersault and cartwheel when you cracked your whip, and they danced into the wrong places, didn’t they, because Sir Joshua demanded his price! Where did the gold dance off to, Mr. Bent? Smoke and mirrors!
    “No!”
    In the counting house all the pens ceased moving for a few seconds,