Hogfather

     'Then I may not have much time. Bring me ... let's see ... twenty pints of lager, some pepper vodka and a bottle of coffee liqueur! With an umbrella in it! Let's see how he enjoys that, Mr  You've Cot Room For Another  One In There!'

     Susan grabbed his hand and pulled him over to a bench.

     'I didn't have you sobered up just so  you could go on a binge!' she said.

     He blinked at her. 'You didn't?'

     'I want you to help me!'

     'Help you what?'

     'You said you'd never been human before, didn't you?'

     'Er ...' The oh god looked down at himself. 'That's right,'  he said. 'Never.'

     'You've never incarnated?' said Ridcully.

     'Surely that's a rather personal question, isn't it?' said the Chair of Indefinite Studies.

     'That's ...  right,'  said  the  oh god. 'Odd, that. I  remember always having headaches ... but never having a head. That can't be right, can it?'

     'You existed in potentia?' said Ridcully.

     'Did what?'

     'Did he?' said Susan.

     Ridcully paused. 'Oh dear,'  he said. 'I  think  I did  it, didn't I? I said something to young Stibbons about  drinking and hangovers, didn't I ... ?'

     'And you created him just like that?' said the Dean. 'I  find that very hard to  believe,  Mustrum. Hah! Out of thin air? I suppose  we can  all  do that, can we? Anyone care to think up some new pixie?'

     'Like the  Hair Loss  Fairy?'  said the Lecturer  in  Recent Runes. The other wizards laughed.

     'I am not  losing my hair!' snapped  the Dean. 'It is  just very finely spaced.'

     'Half on your head and half on your  hairbrush,'  said  the Lecturer in Recent Runes.

     'No sense  in bein' bashful  about goin'  bald,'  said Ridcully evenly. 'Anyway, you know what they say about bald men, Dean.'

     'Yes, they say, "Look at him, he's  got no hair,"' said the Lecturer in Recent Runes. The Dean had been annoying him lately.

     'For the last time,' shouted the Dean, 'I am not...'

     He stopped.

     There was a glingleglingleglingle noise.

     'I wish I knew where that was coming from,' said Ridcully.

     'Er . . .' the Dean began. 'Is there ... something on my head?'

     The other wizards stared.

     Something was moving under his hat.

     Very carefully, he reached up and removed it.

     The very small gnome sitting on his head had a chimp of the Dean's hair in each hand. It blinked guiltily in the light.

     'Is there a problem?' it said.

     'Get it off me!' the Dean yelled.

     The wizards hesitated. They were  all vaguely  aware of the theory that very small creatures could pass on diseases, and  while the gnome was larger than  such creatures were generally  thought to be,  no  one wanted to catch Expanding Scalp Sickness.

     Susan grabbed it.

     'Are you the Hair Loss Fairy?' she said.

     `Apparently,' said the gnome, wriggling in her grip.

     The Dean ran his hands desperately through his hair.

     'What have you been doing with my hair?' he demanded.

     'Welt some of it I think I have to put on hairbrushes,' said the gnome, 'but sometimes I think I weave it into little mats to block up the bath with.'

     'What do you mean, you think?' said Ridcully.

     'Just a minute,' said Susan. She  turned to the oh god.  'Where exactly were you before I found you in the snow?'

     'Er ... sort of ... everywhere,  I think,' said the oh god. 'Anywhere where drink had  been  consumed in beastly quantities some time  previously, you could say.'

     'Ah-ha,' said Ridcully. 'You were an immanent vital force, yes?'

     'I suppose I could have been,' the oh god conceded.

     'And when we joked about the Hair Loss Fairy it suddenly focused on the Dean's head,' said Ridcully,  'where its operations  have been noticeable to all of us in recent months although of course we have been far too polite to pass comment on the subject.'

     'You're calling things into being,' said Susan.

     'Things like the Give  the Dean a Huge Bag  of  Money Goblin?' said the Dean,  who could think  very  quickly at times. He looked  around hopefully. 'Anyone hear any fairy tinkling?'

     'Do you often get given huge bags of money, sir?' said Susan.

     'Not on what you'd call a daily basis, no,' said the Dean. 'But if...'

     'Then  there probably  isn't any  occult room for  a Huge Bags of Money Goblin,' said Susan.

     'I personally have always wondered what happens to my socks,' said the Bursar cheerfully. 'You know how there's always  one missing? When I was  a  lad I  always thought that something was taking them . . .'

     The wizards gave this some thought. Then they all heard it - the little crinkly tinkling noise of magic taking place.

     The Archchancellor pointed dramatically skywards.

     'To the laundry!' he said.

     'It's downstairs, Ridcully,' said the Dean.

     'Down to the laundry!'

     'And you know Mrs Whitlow doesn't like  us  going  in there,' said  the Chair of Indefinite Studies.

     'And  who  is  Archchancellor  of  this University, may  I  ask?'  said Ridcully. 'Is it Mrs Whitlow? I don't think so! Is it  me? Why, how amazing, I do believe it is!'

     'Yes, but you know what she can be like,' said the Chair.

     'Er, yes, that's true...' Ridcully began.

     'I  believe she's  gone to  her sister's for  the  holiday,'  said  the Bursar.