Unseen Academicals (43 page)

And there, right in front of him, was the Hippo. It used to be a racetrack until all that was moved up to the far end of Ankh. Now, it was just a big space that every large town needs for markets, fairs, the occasional insurrection and, of course, the increasingly popular cart-tail sales, which were very fashionable with people who wanted to buy their property back.

It was full today, without even a stolen shovel to be seen. All over the field, people were kicking footballs about. Trevor relaxed a little. There were pointy hats in the distance and no one seemed to be doing any murder.

‘Wotcher, howya doing?’

He adjusted his eyeline down a little bit. ‘How’s it goin’, Throat?’

‘I’m hearing you’re kind of associated with Unseen Academicals,’ said Cut-Me-Own-Throat Dibbler, the city’s most enterprising but inexplicably least successful businessman.

‘Don’t tell me you’ve come to sell pies?’

‘Nah, nah, nah,’ said Dibbler. ‘Too many amateurs here today. My pies aren’t just knocked up out of rubbish for a load of drunken old football fans.’

‘So
your
pies are for—?’ Trev left the question hanging in the air with a noose on the end of it.

‘Anyway, pies are so yesterday,’ said Dibbler dismissively. ‘I am on the ground floor of football memorabilityness.’

‘What’s that, then?’

‘Like genuine autographed team jerseys and that sort of thing. I mean, look here.’ Dibbler produced from the large tray around his neck a smaller version of what one of the new
gloing! gloing!
footballs would be if it were about a half of the size and had been badly carved out of wood. ‘See those white patches? That’s so they can be signed by the team.’

‘You’re goin’ to get them signed, are you?’

‘Well, no, I think people would like to get that done themselves. The personal touch, you know what I mean?’

‘So they’re actually just painted balls of wood and nothin’ else?’ said Trev.

‘But authentic!’ said Dibbler. ‘Just like the shirts. Want one? Five dollars to you, and that’s cutting me own throat.’ He produced a skimpy red cotton item and waved it enticingly.

‘What’s that?’

‘Your team colours, right?’

‘Two big yellow Us on the front?’ said Trev. ‘That’s wrong! Ours has got two little Us interlocked on the left breast like a badge. Very stylish.’

‘Pretty much the same,’ said Dibbler airily. ‘No one’ll notice. And I had to keep the price down for the kiddies.’

He leaned closer. ‘Anything you can tell me about the game tomorrow, Trev? Looks like the teams are putting together a tough squad. Vetinari’s not going to get it all his own way for once?’

‘We’ll play a good game, you’ll see,’ said Trev.

‘Right! Can’t lose with a Likely playing, right?’

‘I just help around the place. I’m not playin’. I promised my ol’ mum after Dad died.’

Dibbler looked around at the crowded stadium of the Hippo. He appeared to have something else on his mind other than the need for the next dollar. ‘What happens if your lot lose?’ he said.

‘It’s only a game,’ said Trev.

‘Ah, but Vetinari’s got his reputation based on it.’

‘It’s a game. One side wins, one side loses. Just a game.’

‘A lot of people aren’t thinking like that,’ said Dibbler. ‘Things always come out well for Vetinari,’ he went on, staring at the sky. ‘And that’s the magic, see? Everyone thinks he always gets it right. What do you think will happen if he gets things wrong?’

‘It’s
just
a game, Throat, only a game…Be seein’ you.’ Trev wandered onwards. People were putting up tiers of wooden stands on one side of the arena, and because this was Ankh-Morpork, when two or more people gathered together thousands turned up just to wonder why.

And there was Mr Ponder Stibbons, sitting at a long table with some of the football captains. Oh, yes, the Rules Committee. There had been talk about that. Even with the rules written down, and half of them as old as the game itself, there were a few things that had to be made clear. He arrived in time to hear Ponder say, ‘Look, you can’t have a situation in the new game where people hang around right next to the other team’s goal.’

‘Worked all right before,’ said one of the captains.

‘Yes, but the ball flies. One really good kick would send it down half the length of the Hippo. If someone gets that right the goalkeeper wouldn’t have a chance.’

‘So, what you’re saying,’ said Mr Stollop, who had become a kind of spokesman for the captains, ‘is that there’s got to be two blokes from team A in front of a bloke from team B before he scores?’

‘Yes, that’s about right,’ said Ponder stiffly, ‘but one of them is the goalkeeper.’

‘So, what happens if one of them fellers nips past him downfield before he kicks the ball?’

‘Then he will be what is traditionally known as off his side,’ said Ponder.

‘Off his head, more like,’ said one of the captains. And since this had the same shape as humour, it got a laugh. ‘If that’s true, you could end up with loads of blokes rushing past one another, all trying to get the other poor buggers into an unlawful position without any of the poor devils moving, right?’

‘Nevertheless, we are standing by this rule. We have tried it out. It allows for free movement on the field. In the old game it wasn’t unusual for players to bring their lunch and a copy of
Girls, Giggles and Garters
and just wait for the ball to come along.’

‘Hello, Trev, how are you getting on?’ It was Andy, and he was standing behind Trev.

There must be a thousand people here today, Trev thought in a curiously slow and blissful sort of way. And a lot of watchmen. I can see a couple of them from here. Andy isn’t going to try anything right here, is he?

Well, yes, he might, because that’s what made him Andy. The little bee that buzzed in his brain might bang against the wrong bit and he would carve your face off. Oh, yes, and there was Tosher Atkinson and his mum, strolling about as if out for a walk.

‘Haven’t seen you about much lately, Trev,’ said Andy. ‘Been busy, I suspect?’

‘I thought you were lyin’ low?’ said Trev hopelessly.

‘Well, you know what they say. Sooner or later all sins are forgiven.’

In your case, quite a bit later, Trev thought.

‘Besides,’ said Andy, ‘I’m turning over a new leaf, ain’t I?’

‘Oh, yeah?’

‘Got out of the Shove,’ said Andy. ‘Gotta put aside my scallywag ways. Time to fit in.’

‘Glad to hear it,’ said Trev, waiting for the knife.

‘So I’m a key player for Ankh-Morpork United.’ It wasn’t a knife, but
it had a rather similar effect. ‘Apparently his lordship gave them the idea,’ Andy said, still speaking in the same greasy, friendly tone. ‘Of course, no one wants to be the team playing you wizards. So there is, like, a new one just for the occasion.’

‘I thought you never played?’ said Trev weakly.

‘Ah, but that was in the bad old days before football was open to more individual effort and enterprise. See this shirt?’ he said.

Trev looked down. He hadn’t thought much about what the man was wearing, just that he was there.

‘White with blue trim,’ said Andy cheerfully. ‘Very snazzy.’ He turned around. The numeral 1 was on the back in blue with the name Andy Shank above it. ‘My idea. Very sensible. Means we’ll know who we are from the back.’

‘And I told your wizards that your gentlemen ought to do the same,’ said Mrs Atkinson, surely one of the most feared Faces who had ever wielded a sharpened umbrella with malice aforethought. Grown men would back away from Mrs Atkinson, otherwise grown men bled.

Just what we need, thought Trev. Our names on the back as well. Saves them having the trouble to go round the front before they stab.

‘Still, I can’t stand here chattin’ all day with you. Got to talk to the team. Got to think about tactics.’

There will be a referee, thought Trev. The Watch will be there. Lord Vetinari will be there. Unfortunately, Andy Shank will be there, too, and Nutt wants me as his assistant and so I’ve got to be there. If it all goes wrong, the floor of the arena isn’t going to be the place to be and I’ll be in it.

‘And if you’re wondering where that dim little girl of yours is, she’s back there with the fat girl. Honestly, what must you think of me?’

‘Nothing, right up until you said that,’ said Trev. ‘And now I do.’

‘Give my best to the orc,’ said Andy. ‘Shame to hear he’s the last one.’

They strolled on, but Trev was quick enough to get out of the way before Mrs Atkinson sliced at his leg with her stick.

Find Juliet. Find Nutt. Find Glenda. Find help. Find a ticket to Fourecks.

Trev had never fought. Never
really
fought. Oh, there had been times when he was younger when he was drawn into a bit of a ruck and it was politic to be among the other kids, holding a makeshift weapon in his hands. He’d been so good at appearing to be everywhere, shouting a lot and then running into the thick of the fray, but never actually catching up with the real action. He could go to the Watch and tell them…that Andy had been threatening? Andy was always threatening. When trouble struck in the Shove as it sometimes did, when two tribes were brought into conjunction, there was
always
the forest of legs to dive between and once, when Trev had been really desperate, a number of shoulders to run across…What was he thinking? He wouldn’t be there. He wasn’t going to play. He’d promised his old mum. Everyone knew he’d promised his old mum. He’d like to play, but his old mum wouldn’t like it. It was as if his old mum had written him a note: Dear Andy, please do not knife Trevor today because he has promised not to play.

He blinked away the sensation that a knife was already hurtling towards him and heard the voice of Nutt saying, ‘Oh, I have heard about
Bu-bubble
.’ There was Glenda and Juliet and Nutt and Juliet and a slightly worried young lady with a notebook and Juliet. There was also Juliet, but it was hard to even notice her because Juliet was there.

‘She says she wants to write an article,’ said Glenda, who had clearly waylaid the journalist. ‘Her name is Miss—’

‘Roz,’ said the girl. ‘Everyone’s talking about you, Mister Nutt. Would you answer a few questions, please? We have a very now audience.’
*

‘Yes?’ he ventured.

‘How does it feel to be an orc, Mister Nutt?’

‘I am not sure. How does it feel to be human?’ said Nutt.

‘Have your experiences as an orc affected the way you will play football?’

‘I will only be playing as a substitute. My role is merely that of a
trainer. And, I have to say, in answer to your question, I’m not sure I have had many experiences as an orc up until now.’

‘But are you advising the players to rip opponents’ heads off?’ the girl giggled.

Glenda opened her mouth, but Nutt said solemnly, ‘No, that would be against the rules.’

‘I hear they think you’re a very good trainer. Why do you think this is?’

Despite the patent stupidity of the question, Nutt seemed to think deeply. ‘One must consider the horizons of possibility,’ he said slowly. ‘
E Pluribus Unum
, the many become one, but it could just as easily be said that the one becomes many,
Ex uno multi
, and indeed, as Von Sliss said in
The Effluence of Reality
, the one, when carefully considered, may in fact be a many in different clothing.’

Glenda looked at the girl’s face. Her expression hadn’t moved and neither had her pencil. Nutt smiled to himself and continued. ‘Now let us consider this in the light, as it may be, of the speeding ball. Where it has come from we believe we know, but where it will land is an ever-changing conundrum, even if only considered in four-dimensional space. And there we have the existential puzzle that confronts the striker, for he is both striker and struck. As the ball flies, all possibilities are inexorably linked, as Herr Frugal said in
Das Nichts des Wissens
, “Ich kann mich nicht genau erinnern, aber es war so etwas wie eine Vanillehaltige süsse Nachspeisenbeigabe,” although I believe he was on some medication at the time. Who is mover and who is moved? Given that the solution can only be arrived at through conceptual manifestation using, I believe, some perception of transfinite space, it can clearly be seen that among the possibilities is that the ball will land everywhere at the same time or turn out never to have been kicked at all. It is my job to reduce this metaphysical overhead, as it were, and to give my lads some acceptable paradigm, such as, it might be, whack it right down the middle, my son, and at least if the goalie stops it you will have given him a hot handful he won’t forget in a hurry.

‘You see, the thing about football is that it is not about football. It is
a most fascinating multi-dimensional philosophy, an extrusion, as it were, of what Doctor Maspinder promulgated in
Das Meer von Unvermeidlichkeit
. Now, you would say to me, I am sure,’ he went on, ‘What of the 4–4–2 or even the 4–1–2–1–2, yes? And my answer to that would be, there is only the one. Traditionally we say there are eleven players in the team, but that is because of our rather feeble perceptions. In truth, there is only the one and therefore, I would say,’ he gave a little laugh, ‘daring to adapt a line from
The Doors of Deception
: it does not matter whether you win or lose so long as you score the most goals.’

The girl looked down at her notepad. ‘Could you give that to me a little bit more simply?’

‘Oh, I’m sorry,’ said Nutt. ‘I thought I had.’

‘And I think that’s about enough,’ said Glenda, taking the girl by the arm.

‘But I haven’t asked him about his favourite spoon,’ she wailed.

Nutt cleared his throat. ‘Well, I would have appreciated some notice of that question because it is quite a large field, but I think the Great Bronze Spoon of Cladh, which weighed more than a ton, would definitely have to be a runner, though we must not forget the set of spoons, each one smaller than a grain of rice, crafted by some unknown genius for the concubines of the Emperor Whezi. But undoubtedly, from what I can gather, these were surpassed by the notorious clockwork spoon, devised by Bloody Stupid Johnson, which could apparently stir coffee so fast that the cup would actually rise up from the saucer and hit the ceiling. Oh, to be a fly on that wall, but not too close, obviously. Possibly less well known is the singing spoon of the learned sage Ly Tin Wheedle, which could entertain the dinner table by singing comic songs. Among other great spoons—’