Hogfather

     'What do you  mean,  you can't walk through the door?' said Susan. 'You walked through the door in the bar.'

     'That was different.  I have certain god-like powers in the presence of alcohol. Anyway, we've knocked and she hasn't answered and whatever happened to Mr Manners?'

     Susan shrugged, and walked through the cheap woodwork.  She knew  she probably  shouldn't. Every  time she did something like this  she  used up  a certain amount  of,  well, normal.  And sooner or later she'd forget what doorknobs were for, just like Grandfather.

     Come to think of it, he'd never found out what doorknobs were for.

     She  opened the door from the inside. The oh god stepped in and  looked around.  This  did  not  take  long. It was not  a  large room. It had  been subdivided from a room that itself hadn't been all that big to start with.

     'This is where the Tooth fairy  lives?' Bilious  said. 'It's  a bit ... poky, isn't it? Stuff  all over the floor  ... What're these  things hanging from this line?'

     'They're . .  . women's clothes,'  said  Susan,  rummaging through  the paperwork on a small rickety table.

     'They're not very big,' said the oh god. 'And a bit thin ...'

     'Tell me,' said Susan, without looking up. 'These  memories you arrived here with ... They weren't very complicated, were they ... ? Ah...'

     He looked over her shoulder as she opened a small red notebook.

     'I've only  talked to  Violet  a few times,'  she  said.  'I think  she delivers the teeth somewhere and gets a percentage of the money.  It's not a highly paid line  of work. You know,  they say you can Earn $$$ in Your Spare Time but she says really she could  earn more money waiting on tables - All, this looks right

     'What's that?'

     'She said she gets given the names every week.'

     'What, of the children where going to lose teeth?'

     'Yes. Names and addresses,' said Susan, flicking through the pages.

     'That doesn't sound very likely.'

     `Pardon  me, but are you the God of Hangovers? Oh,  look here's Twyla's tooth last month.'  She smiled at the  neat  grey writing.  'She practically hammered it out because she needed the half-dollar.'

     'Do you like children?' said the oh god.

     She  gave him a look. 'Not raw,' she said. `Other people's are OK. Hold on ...'

     She flicked some pages back and forth.

     'There's  just  blank  days,' she  said. 'Look, the last few days,  all unticked. No  names.  But if you go back a  week or  two,  look  they're all properly marked off  and the money added up at the bottom  of the page, see? And ... this can't be right, can it?'

     There were only five names entered on the first unticked night, for the previous week. Most children instinctively knew when to push their  luck and only the greedy or dentally improvident called  out  the Tooth Fairy  around Hogswatch.

     'Read the names,' said Susan.

     'William Wittles, a.k.a. Willy (home), Tosser (school),

     2nd flr bck bdrm, 68 Kicklebury Street;

     Sophie Langtree, a.k.a. Daddy's Princess, attic bdrm,

     5 The Hippo;

     The Hon. Jeffrey Bibbleton, a.k.a. Trouble in Trousers

     (home), Foureyes (school), 1st fir bck, Scrote

     Manor, Park Lane...'

     He stopped. 'I say, this is a bit intrusive, isn't it?'

     ' It's a whole new world,' said Susan. 'You haven't got there yet. Keep going.'

     'Nuhakme  Icta, a.k.a.  Little Jewel, basement,  The  Laughing Falafel, Klatchistan Take-Away and All

     Nite Grocery, cnr. Soake and Dimwell;

     Reginald Lilywhite, a.k.a. Banjo, The Park Lane Bully,

     Have You Seen This Man? , The Goose Gate

     Grabber, The Nap Hill Lurker, Rm 17, YMPA.

     'YMPA?'

     'It's what we generally call the Young-Men's-Reformed-Cultists-of-the-Ichor-God-Bel-Shamharoth-Association,' said  Susan.

'Does that  sound to you  like  someone who'd expect  a  visit  from a tooth fairy?'

     'No.'

     'Me  neither.  He  sounds like someone  who'd  expect  a visit from the Watch.'

     Susan looked  around. It really  was a crummy room, the sort rented  by someone who probably took  it never intending to  stay Iong, the sort  where walking across the floor  in the middle of the night would be accompanied by the crack of cockroaches in a death flamenco. It was amazing how many people  spent their whole fives in  places where  they never intended to stay.

     Cheap, narrow bed, crumbling plaster, tiny window

     She opened the window and fished around below the ledge, and felt satisfied when her questing fingers dosed on a piece of string which was attached to an oilcloth bag. She hauled it in.

     'What's that?' said the oh god, as she opened it on the table.

     'Oh, you see  them a lot,' said Susan, taking out some packages wrapped in  second-hand  waxed  paper.   'You  live  alone,  mice  and  roaches  eat everything, there's nowhere to store food - but outside the window it's cold and safe. More or  less  safe. It's an old  trick.  Now ...  look  at  this. Leathery bacon, a green loaf and a bit of cheese you could shave. She hasn't been back home for some time, believe me.'

     'Oh dear. What now?'