Unseen Academicals

prison and if people don’t know why, they’ll make it up, that’s how people are. Can’t you wizards do something?’
    ‘Yes,’ said Ponder. ‘We can do practically anything, but we can’t change people’s minds. We can’t magic them sensible. Believe me, if it were possible to do that, we would have done it a long time ago. We can stop people fighting by magic and then what do we do? We have to go on using magic to stop them fighting. We have to go on using magic to stop them being stupid. And where does all that end? So we make certain that it doesn’t begin. That’s why the university is here. That’s what we do. We have to sit around not doing things because of the hundreds of times in the past it’s been proved that once you get beyond the abracadabra, hey presto, changing-the-pigeons-into-ping-pong-balls style of magic you start getting more problems than you’ve solved. It was bad enough finding ping-pong balls nesting in the attics.’
    ‘Ping-pong balls nestin’?’ said Trev.
    ‘I don’t want to talk about it,’ said Ponder glumly.
    ‘I remember when one of you gentlemen got hungry in the night and cast a spell for a baked potato,’ said Glenda.
    Ponder shuddered. ‘That was the Bursar,’ he said. ‘He really does get confused about the decimal point.’
    ‘I remember all those wheelbarrows,’ said Glenda, slightly amused at Ponder’s discomfort. ‘Days and days it took to get them all out. I heard we were feeding every beggar in the city and every pig farm out as far as Sto Lat for weeks.’
    Ponder nearly gave a harrumph. ‘Well, yes, there’s an example of why we have to be careful.’
    ‘But there’s still going to be a match tomorrow and I would like to conclude my training programme,’ said Nutt.
    ‘Ah, there’s another problem. You know Lord Vetinari is allowing the Hippo to be used for the game? Well, some of the teams are doing their training there now. You know, a bit of a kick-about, and so on. It’s all about who will be playing Unseen Academicals.’
    ‘But that’s the other side of the city,’ said Glenda.
    ‘Commander Vimes has said the Watch will provide an escort,’ said Ponder. ‘Just for protection, you know?’
    ‘Whose?’ said Glenda. ‘You can see what’s going on here. People will see Mister Nutt as the problem.’
    ‘Oh, it’s all fun and games until someone loses a head,’ said a voice behind Glenda. She recognized that voice and it always sounded as if it was trying to put its hand up her jumper.
    ‘Pepe? What the hell are you doing here?’
    ‘And how did you get in?’ Ponder demanded. ‘The Watch are all around this place.’
    Pepe barely gave him a glance. ‘And who are you, smart boy?’
    ‘I run this university!’
    ‘Then I should go away and run it, because you’re not going to be any good around here.’
    ‘Is this–person–known to you, miss?’ Ponder demanded.
    ‘Er, yes. He, er, designs clothes.’
    ‘I am a fashionista,’ said Pepe. ‘I can do things with clothing that you wouldn’t think were possible.’
    ‘I’d believe that, at least,’ said Trev.
    ‘And I know a thing or two about riots and mobs.’
    An idea struck Glenda and she whispered to the irate Ponder, ‘Very big in dwarf circles, sir. Knows a lot of influential people.’
    ‘So do I,’ said Ponder. ‘Actually, I am one,’ he wailed. ‘But I had to do the training myself yesterday and I couldn’t remember all of the things Mister Nutt comes up with so I had them running on the spot, which I don’t think is very helpful.’
    ‘There’s somethin’ goin’ bad,’ said Trev. ‘I know about this city. I’ll go and check a few things out. It’s not as if you really need me.’
    ‘I do,’ said Juliet.
    Trev hesitated, but Nutt had shown him how to do this. He extended a hand and blew her a kiss as he went through the door.
    ‘Did you see that?’ said Juliet. ‘He blew me.’
    Glenda looked at Pepe, whose eyes were turned up so far in his head that she could see the whites–although they were red.
    A short while later, when most of the UU squad headed for the Hippo with Glenda and Juliet trailing after them like camp followers, half a dozen watchmen appeared from the various places that they had selected for a quiet smoke and fell in after them, trying to make it look as if they all just happened to be strolling in the same direction.
    Trev was right , Glenda thought. It is going bad .

    Trev had not gone very far when his