Soul Music

step by logical step.
    So…he’d removed about six feet from the middle of the tree’s trunk, thus allowing the swing to, well, swing.
    The tree hadn’t died. It was still quite healthy.
    However, the lack of a major section of trunk had presented a fresh problem. This had been overcome by the addition of two large props under the branches, a little farther out from the ropes of the swing, keeping the whole top of the tree at about the right height off the ground.
    She remembered how she’d laughed, even then. And he’d stood there, quite unable to see what was wrong.
    And then she saw it all, all laid out.
    That was how Death worked. He never understood exactly what he was doing. He’d do something, and it would turn out wrong. Her mother: suddenly he had a grown woman on his hands and didn’t know what to do next . So he did something else to make it right, which made it more wrong. Her father. Death’s apprentice! And when that went wrong, and its potential wrongness was built right into it, he did something else to make it right.
    He’d turned over the hourglass.
    After that, it was all a matter of math.
    And the Duty.

    “Hello…hells, Glod, tell me where we are…Sto Lat! Yay!”
    It was an even bigger audience. There’d been more time for the posters to be up, more time for the word of mouth from Ankh-Morpork. And, the band realized, a solid core of people had followed them from Pseudopolis.
    In a brief break between numbers, just before the bit where people started leaping around on the furniture, Cliff leaned over to Glod.
    “You see dat troll in der front row?” he said. “The one Asphalt’s jumping on der fingers of?”
    “The one that looks like a spoil heap?”
    “She was in Pseudopolis,” said Cliff, beaming. “She keeps looking at me!”
    “Go for it, lad,” said Glod, emptying the spit from his horn. “In like Flint, eh?”
    “You think she’s one of dem groupies Asphalt told us about?”
    “Could be.”
    Other news had traveled fast, too. Dawn saw another redecorated hotel room, a royal proclamation from Queen Keli that the band was to be out of the city in one hour on pain of pain, and one more rapid exit.
    Buddy lay in the cart as it bumped over the cobbles toward Quirm.
    She hadn’t been there. He’d scanned the audience on both nights, and she hadn’t been there. He’d even got up in the middle of the night and walked through the empty streets, in case she was looking for him. Now he wondered if she existed. If it came to that, he was only half-certain that he existed, except for the times when he was onstage.
    He half listened to the conversation from the others.
    “Asphalt?”
    “Yes, Mr. Glod?”
    “Cliff and me can’t help noticing something.”
    “Yes, Mr. Glod?”
    “You’ve been carrying a heavy leather bag around, Asphalt.”
    “Yes, Mr. Glod.”
    “It was a bit heavier this morning, I think.”
    “Yes, Mr. Glod.”
    “It’s got the money in it, yes?”
    “Yes, Mr. Glod.”
    “How much?”
    “Er. Mr. Dibbler said I wasn’t to worry you with money stuff,” said Asphalt.
    “We don’t mind,” said Cliff.
    “That’s right,” said Glod. “We want to worry.”
    “Er.” Asphalt licked his lips. There was something deliberate in Cliff’s manner. “About two thousand dollars, Mr. Glod.”
    The cart bounced on for a while. The landscape had changed a little. There were hills, and the farms were smaller.
    “Two thousand dollars,” said Glod. “ Two thousand dollars. Two thousand dollars. Two thousand dollars .”
    “Why d’you keeping saying two thousand dollars?” said Cliff.
    “I’ve never had a chance to say two thousand dollars.”
    “Just don’t like it so loud.”
    “TWO THOUSAND DOLLARS!”
    “Ssh!” said Asphalt, desperately, as Glod’s shout echoed off the hills. “This is bandit country!”
    Glod eyed the satchel. “You’re telling me,” he said.
    “I don’t mean Mr. Dibbler!”
    “We’re on the road between Sto Lat and Quirm,” said Glod patiently. “This isn’t the Ramtops road. This is civilization. They don’t rob you on the road in civilization.” He glanced darkly at the satchel again. “They wait until you’ve got into the cities. That’s why it’s called civilization. Hah, can you tell me the last time anyone was ever robbed on this road?”
    “Friday, I believe,” said a voice from the rocks. “Oh, bugg—”
    The horses reared up and then galloped forward. Asphalt’s crack of the whip