Hogfather

     'I often see things  that weren't there  a  moment ago,' he said.  'And they often aren't there a  moment later. Which is a blessing  in most cases, let me tell you. So I don't usually take a lot of notice.'

     He folded up and landed in the snow again.

     There's just snow now, Susan thought.  Nothing but  snow and the  wind. There's not even a ruin.

     The certainty stole over  her again  that the Hogfather's castle wasn't simply not there any  more. No ...  it  had never been there. There  was  no ruin, no trace.

     It  had  been an  odd  enough place. It was  where the Hogfather lived, according  to  the legends. Which was  odd,  when you  thought about  it. It didn't look like the kind of place a cheery old toymaker would live in.

     The  wind  soughed  in the trees behind them.  Snow slid  off branches. Somewhere in the dark there was a flurry of hooves.

     A spidery little figure leapt off a snowdrift and landed on the oh gods head. It turned a beady eye up towards Susan.

     'All right by you,  is it?'  said the  imp, producing its  huge hammer. 'Some of us have a job to do,  you  know, even if  we are of a metaphorical, nay, folkloric persuasion.'

     'Oh, go away.'

     'If  you  think I'm bad, wait until you see the little pink elephants,' said the imp.

     'I don't believe you.'

     'They  come out  of  his ears  and fly around his head making  tweeting noises.'

     'Ah,' said the raven, sagely. 'That sounds more like robins. I wouldn't put anything past them.'

     The oh god grunted.

     Susan  suddenly felt that she didn't want to  leave him. He was  human. Well, human shaped.

     Well, at least he had two arms and legs. He'd freeze to  death here. Of course,  gods,  or even oh  gods, probably couldn't, but humans didn't think like that.  You couldn't just leave someone. She prided herself on this  bit of normal thinking.

     Besides,  he might have some answers, if  she could make him stay awake enough to understand the questions.

     From the edge of the frozen forest.. animal eyes watched them go.

     Mr Crumley sat  on  the  damp stairs and sobbed.  He couldn't  get  any nearer to the toy department. Every time he tried he got lifted off his feet by the mob and dumped at the edge of the crowd by the current of people.

     Someone  said, 'Top of the evenin', squire,' and he looked up  blearily at the small yet irregularly formed figure that had addressed him thusly.

     'Are you one of the pixies?' he said, after mentally exhausting all the other possibilities.

     'No, sir. I am not in fact a pixie, sir, I am in fact Corporal Nobbs of the Watch. And this is Constable Visit, sir.' The creature looked at a piece of paper in its paw. 'You Mr Crummy?'

     'Crumley!'

     'Yeah, right. You sent a runner to the Watch  House  and we have hereby responded with  commendable  speed, sir,' said  Corporal Nobbs. 'Despite  it being Hogswatchnight and there being a  lot of strange things happening  and most importantly it being the occasion of our Hogswatchly piss-up, sir. But this is  all right because Washpot, that's Constable Visit here, he  doesn't drink,  sir, it being against his religion, and although I do drink,  sir, I volunteered to come  because  it  is  my civic duty, sir.'

  Nobby  tore off a salute,  or what he  liked to  believe  was a  salute. He did not add,  'And turning out  for  a  rich bugger such as your good self is  bound to put the officer  concerned in the  way  of a  seasonal  bottle or  two or some other tangible  evidence of  gratitude,' because his entire stance said it for him Even Nobby's ears could look suggestive.

     Unfortunately, Mr  Crumley wasn't in the right receptive frame of mind. He stood up and waved a shaking finger towards the top of the stairs.

     'I want you to go up there,' he said, 'and arrest him!'

     'Arrest who, sir?' said Corporal Nobbs.

     'The Hogfather!'

     'What for, sir?'

     'Because he's sitting up there as bold as brass in  his  Grotto, giving away presents!'

     Corporal Nobbs thought about this.

     'You  haven't  been having  a festive drink, have  you,  sir?'  he said hopefully.

     'I do not drink!'

     'Very wise, sir,' said Constable Visit.  'Alcohol is the tarnish of the soul. Ossory, Book Two, Verse Twentyfour.'

     'Not  quite  up to  speed here,  sir,'  said  Corporal  Nobbs,  looking perplexed. 'I thought the

     Hogfather  is  s'posed  to give away stuff,  isn't  he?' This  time  Mr Crumley had to stop  and  think. Up until now  he hadn't quite sorted things out in his head, other than recognizing their essential wrongness.

     'This one is an Impostor!'  he declared. 'Yes, that's right! He smashed his way into here!'

     'Y'know, I always thought  that,' said  Nobby. 'I thought,  every year, the Hogfather spends a fortnight sitting in  a wooden  grotto in a  shop  in Ankh-Morpork? At his busy time, too? Hah! Not likely! Probably just some old man in a beard, I thought.'

     'I  meant ... he's not the  Hogfather  we usually have,' said  Crumley, struggling for firmer ground. 'He just barged in here"

     'Oh, a different impostor? Not the real impostor at all?'

     'Well ... yes ... no. . .'