Mort

not. You could do with a good night’s sleep, my lad.”
    “M’t,” murmured Mort.
    He felt Ysabell slip his arm over her shoulder. The walls were moving gently, even the sound of his own voice was coming from a long way off, and he dimly felt how nice it would be to stretch out on a nice stone slab and sleep forever.
    Death’d be back soon, he told himself, feeling his unprotesting body being helped along the corridors. There was nothing for it, he’d have to tell Death. He wasn’t such a bad old stick. Death would help; all he needed to do was explain things. And then he could stop all this worrying and go to slee….

“And what was your previous position?”
    I BEG YOUR PARDON ?
    “What did you do for a living?” said the thin young man behind the desk.
    The figure opposite him shifted uneasily.
    I USHERED SOULS INTO THE NEXT WORLD . I WAS THE GRAVE OF ALL HOPE . I WAS THE ULTIMATE REALITY . I WAS THE ASSASSIN AGAINST WHOM NO LOCK WOULD HOLD .
    “Yes, point taken, but do you have any particular skills?” Death thought about it.
    I SUPPOSE A CERTAIN AMOUNT OF EXPERTISE WITH AGRICULTURAL IMPLEMENTS ? he ventured after a while.
    The young man shook his head firmly.
    N O ?
    “This is a city, Mr.—” he glanced down, and once again felt a faint unease that he couldn’t quite put his finger on—“Mr.—Mr.—Mr., and we’re a bit short of fields.”
    He laid down his pen and gave the kind of smile that suggested he’d learned it from a book.
    Ankh-Morpork wasn’t advanced enough to possess an employment exchange. People took jobs because their fathers made room for them, or because their natural talent found an opening, or by word-of-mouth. But there was a call for servants and menial workers, and with the commercial sections of the city beginning to boom the thin young man—a Mr. Liona Keeble—had invented the profession of job broker and was, right at this moment, finding it difficult.
    “My dear Mr.—” he glanced down—“Mr., we get many people coming into the city from outside because, alas, they believe life is richer here. Excuse me for saying so, but you seem to me to be a gentleman down on his luck. I would have thought you would have preferred something rather more refined than—” he glanced down again, and frowned—“‘something nice working with cats or flowers.’”
    I’ M SORRY. I FELT IT WAS TIME FOR A CHANGE .
    “Can you play a musical instrument?”
    N O .
    “Can you do carpentry?”
    I DO NOT KNOW , I HAVE NEVER TRIED . Death stared at his feet. He was beginning to feel deeply embarrassed.
    Keeble shuffled the paper on his desk, and sighed.
    I CAN WALK THROUGH WALLS , Death volunteered, aware that the conversation had reached an impasse.
    Keeble looked up brightly. “I’d like to see that,” he said. “That could be quite a qualification.”
    R IGHT .
    Death pushed his chair back and stalked confidently towards the nearest wall.
    O UCH .
    Keeble watched expectantly. “Go on, then,” he said.
    U M . T HIS IS AN ORDINARY WALL, IS IT ?
    “I assume so. I’m not an expert.”
    I T SEEMS TO BE PRESENTING ME WITH SOME DIFFICULTY .
    “So it would appear.”
    W HAT DO YOU CALL THE FEELING OF BEING VERY SMALL AND HOT ?
    Keeble twiddled his pencil.
    “Pygmy?”
    B EGINS WITH AN M .
    “Embarrassing?”
    “Yes,” said Death, I MEAN YES .
    “It would seem that you have no useful skill or talent whatsoever,” he said. “Have you thought of going into teaching?”
    Death’s face was a mask of terror. Well, it was always a mask of terror, but this time he meant it to be.
    “You see,” said Keeble kindly, putting down his pen and steepling his hands together, “it’s very seldom I ever have to find a new career for an—what was it again?”
    A NTHROPOMORPHIC PERSONIFICATION .
    “Oh, yes. What is that, exactly?”
    Death had had enough.
    T HIS , he said.
    For a moment, just for a moment, Mr. Keeble saw him clearly. His face went nearly as pale as Death’s own. His hands jerked convulsively. His heart gave a stutter.
    Death watched him with mild interest, then drew an hourglass from the depths of his robe and held it up to the light and examined it critically.
    S ETTLE DOWN , he said, YOU’VE GOT A GOOD FEW YEARS YET .
    “Bbbbbbb—”
    I COULD TELL YOU HOW MANY IF YOU LIKE .
    Keeble, fighting to breathe, managed to shake his head.
    D O YOU WANT ME TO GET YOU A GLASS OF WATER, THEN ?
    “nnN—nnN.”
    The shop bell jangled. Keeble’s eyes rolled. Death