Hogfather

     She knelt down to have a look.

     It was a small black bean.

     A bird trilled, high on a branch.  She  looked up. A wren bobbed at her and fluttered to another twig.

     When she looked back, the man was different. He  had clothes now, heavy furs,  with  a  fur  hood  and fur boots.  He  was  supporting  himself on a stone-tipped spear, and looked a lot stronger.

     Something  hurried  through  the  wood,  barely  visible except  by its shadow.  For a  moment she glimpsed a white hare before it sprang away on  a new path.

     She looked  back.  Now the furs  had gone  and  the man  looked  older, although he had the same eyes. He was wearing thick white robes, and  looked very much like a priest.

     When  a  bird  called again she didn't look away. And she realized that she'd been mistaken  in  thinking that the man changed  like the  turning of pages. All the images were there at once, and many others too.  What you saw depended on how you looked.

     Yes. It's a  good  job I'm cool and totally used to this sort of thing, she thought. Otherwise I'd be rather worried...

     Now they were at the edge of the forest.

     A little way  off, four  huge  boars stood  and steamed, in front  of a sledge that  looked as if  it  had been put together out of  crudely trimmed trees.  There were faces in the blackened  wood,  possibly  carved by stone, possibly carved by rain and wind.

     The  Hogfather  climbed  aboard and sat down. He'd put on weight in the last few yards and  now  it was almost impossible to see anything other than the huge, redrobed  man, ice crystals settling here and there on  the cloth. Only in the occasional sparkle of frost was there a hint of hair or tusk.

     He shifted on the seat and then reached down to extricate a false beard, which he held up questioningly.

     SORRY, said a voice behind Susan. THAT WAS MINE.

     The Hogfather nodded at Death, as one craftsman to another, and then at Susan. She wasn't sure if  she was being thanked -  it was more a gesture of recognition, of acknowledgement that  something that needed doing had indeed been done. But it wasn't thanks.

     Then he shook the reins and clicked his teeth and the sledge slid away.

     They watched it go.

     'I  remember  hearing,'  said  Susan distantly, 'that the  idea of  the Hogfather wearing a red and white outfit was invented quite recently.'

NO. IT WAS REMEMBERED.

     Now the Hogfather was a red dot on the other side of the valley.

     'Well, that about  wraps it up for this dress,'  said Susan.  'I'd just like to ask, just out of  academic interest... you were sure I  was going to survive, were you?'

I WAS QUITE CONFIDENT.

     'Oh, good.'

     I WILL GIVE YOU A LIFT BACK, said Death, after a while.

     'Thank you. Now... tell me . .

     WHAT WOULD HAVE HAPPENED IF YOU HADN'T SAVED HIM?

     'Yes! The sun would have risen just the same, yes?'

NO.

     'Oh, come on. You can't expect me to believe that. It's an astronomical fact.'

THE SUN WOULD NOT HAVE RISEN.

     She turned on him.

     'It's been  a long night,  Grandfather! I'm tired and I need  a bath! I don't need silliness!'

THE SUN WOULD NOT HAVE RISEN.

     'Really? Then what would have happened, pray?'

A MERE BALL OF FLAMING GAS WOULD HAVE ILLUMINATED THE WORLD.

     They walked in silence for a moment.

     'Ah,' said  Susan  dully. 'Trickery  with words.  I would have  thought you'd have been more literal-minded than that.'

I AM NOTHING IF NOT LITERAL-MINDED. TRICKERY WITH WORDS IS WHERE HUMANS LIVE.

     'All right,' said Susan. 'I'm not stupid.  You're saying humans need... fantasies to make life bearable.'

REALLY? AS IF IT WAS SOME KIND OF PINK PILL? NO. HUMANS NEED FANTASY TO BE HUMAN. TO BE THE PLACE WHERE THE FALLING ANGEL MEETS THE RISING APE.

     'Tooth fairies? Hogfathers? Little...'

YES. AS PRACTICE. YOU HAVE TO START OUT  LEARNING TO BELIEVE THE LITTLE LIES.

     'So we can believe the big ones?'

YES. JUSTICE. MERCY. DUTY. THAT SORT OF THING.

     'They're not the same at all!'

YOU THINK SO? THEN TAKE THE  UNIVERSE AND GRIND  IT  DOWN TO THE FINEST POWDER  AND SIEVE IT THROUGH THE FINEST SIEVE AND  THEN SHOW ME  ONE ATOM OF JUSTICE,  ONE  MOLECULE OF MERCY. AND YET... Death waved a hand. AND YET  YOU ACT AS  IF THERE IS SOME IDEAL ORDER IN  THE  WORLD,  AS IF THERE IS SOME... SOME RIGHTNESS IN THE UNIVERSE BY WHICH IT MAY BE JUDGED.

     'Yes, but people have got to believe that, or what's the point...'

MY POINT EXACTLY.

     She tried to assemble her thoughts.

THERE IS A PLACE WHERE  TWO GALAXIES HAVE  BEEN COLLIDING FOR A MILLION YEARS, said Death, apropos of nothing. DON'T TRY TO TELL ME THAT'S RIGHT.

     'Yes,  but people don't think about that,'  said Susan. Somewhere there was a bed...

     CORRECT. STARS EXPLODE, WORLDS COLLIDE, THERE's HARDLY ANYWHERE IN  THE UNIVERSE  WHERE HUMANS CAN LIVE WITHOUT BEING FROZEN OR  FRIED, AND  YET YOU BELIEVE THAT A... A BED IS A NORMAL THING. IT IS THE MOST AMAZING TALENT.

     'Talent?'

OH, YES. A VERY SPECIAL KIND OF STUPIDITY. YOU THINK THE WHOLE UNIVERSE IS INSIDE YOUR HEADS.

     'You make us sound mad,' said Susan. A nice warm bed...