Going Postal

The world was blessedly free of honest men, and wonderfully full of people who believed they could tell the difference between an honest man and a crook.

He tapped his jacket pocket. The jailers had taken the map off him, of course, probably while he was busy being a dead man. It was a good map, and in studying it Mr Wilkinson and his chums would learn a lot about decryption, geography and devious cartography. They wouldn’t find in it the whereabouts of AM$ 150,000 in mixed currencies, though, because the map was a complete and complex fiction. However, Moist entertained a wonderful warm feeling inside to think that they would, for some time, possess that greatest of all treasures, which is Hope.

Anyone who couldn’t simply remember where he’d stashed a great big fortune deserved to lose it, in Moist’s opinion. But, for now, he’d have to keep away from it, while having it to look forward to…

Moist didn’t even bother to note the name of the next town. It had an inn, and that was enough. He took a room with a view over a disused alley, checked that the window opened easily, ate an adequate meal, and had an early night.

Not bad at all, he thought. This morning he’d been on the scaffold with the actual noose round his actual neck, tonight he was back in business. All he need do now was grow a beard again, and keep away from Ankh-Morpork for six months. Or perhaps only three.

Moist had a talent. He’d also acquired a lot of skills so completely that they were second nature. He’d learned to be personable, but something in his genetics made him unmemorable. He had the talent of not being noticed, for being a face in the crowd. People had difficulty describing him. He was… he was ‘about’. He was about twenty, or about thirty. On Watch reports across the continent he was anywhere between, oh, about six feet two inches and five feet nine inches tall, hair all shades from mid-brown to blond, and his lack of distinguishing features included his entire face. He was about… average. What people remembered was the furniture, things like spectacles and moustaches, so he always carried a selection of both. They remembered names and mannerisms, too. He had hundreds of those.

Oh, and they remembered that they’d been richer before they met him.

At three in the morning, the door burst open. It was a real burst; bits of wood clattered off the wall. But Moist was already out of bed and diving for the window before the first of them hit the floor. It was an automatic reaction that owed nothing to thought. Besides, he’d checked before lying down, and there was a large water butt outside that would break his fall.

It wasn’t there now.

Whoever had stolen it had not stolen the ground it stood on, however, and it broke Moist’s fall by twisting his ankle.

He pulled himself up, keening softly in agony, and hopped along the alley, using the wall for support. The inn’s stables were round the back; all he had to do was pull himself up on to a horse, any horse—

‘Mr Lipwig?’ a big voice bellowed.

Oh, gods, it was a troll, it sounded like a troll, a big one too, he didn’t know you got any down here outside the cities—

‘You Can’t Run And You Can’t Hide, Mr Lipwig!’

Hold on, hold on, he hadn’t given his real name to anyone in this place, had he? But all this was background thinking. Someone was after him, therefore he would run. Or hop.

He risked a look behind him when he reached the back gate to the stables. There was a red glow in his room. Surely they weren’t torching the place over a matter of a few dollars? How stupid! Everyone knew that if you got lumbered with a good fake you palmed it off on to some other sucker as soon as possible, didn’t they? There was no helping some people.

His horse was alone in the stable, and seemed unimpressed to see him. He got the bridle on, while hopping on one foot. There was no point in bothering with a saddle. He knew how to ride without a saddle. Hell, once he’d ridden without pants, too, but luckily all the tar and feathers helped him stick to the horse. He was the world champion at leaving town in a hurry.

He went to lead the horse out of the stall, and heard the clink.

He looked down, and kicked some straw away.

There was a bright yellow bar, joining two short lengths of chain with a yellow shackle attached, one for each foreleg. The only way this horse would go anywhere was by hopping, just like him.

They’d clamped it. They’d bloody clamped it…

‘Oh, Mr Lipppppwig!’ The voice boomed out across the stable yard. ‘Do You Want To Know The Rules, Mr Lipwig?’

He looked around in desperation. There was nothing in here to use as a weapon and in any case weapons made him nervous, which was why he’d never carried one. Weapons raised the ante far too high. It was much better to rely on a gift for talking his way out of things, confusing the issue and, if that failed, some well-soled shoes and a cry of ‘Look, what’s that over there?’