Making Money

'Er… which, it's true, staff put in the posting boxes to keep down the snails…'

Lord Vetinari remained unvocal.

'Er… These, I must in fairness point out, got into the boxes of their own accord, in order to eat the glue on the stamps,' said Moist, aware that he was beginning to burble.

'Well, at least you were saved the trouble of having to introduce them yourselves,' said Lord Vetinari cheerfully. 'As you indicate, this may well have been a case where chilly logic should have been replaced by the common sense of, perhaps, the average chicken. But that is not the reason I asked you to come here today.'

'If it's about the cabbage-flavoured stamp glue—' Moist began.

Vetinari waved a hand. 'An amusing incident,' he said, 'and I believe nobody actually died.'

'Er, the Second Issue 50p stamp?' Moist ventured.

'The one they call the "Lovers"?' said Vetinari. 'The League of Decency did complain to me, yes, but—'

'Our artist didn't realize what he was sketching! He doesn't know much about agriculture! He thought the young couple were sowing seeds!'

'Ahem,' said Vetinari. 'But I understand that the offending affair can only be seen in any detail with quite a large magnifying glass, and so the offence, if such it be, is largely self-inflicted.' He gave one of his slightly frightening little smiles. 'I understand the few copies in circulation among the stamp collectors are affixed to a plain brown envelope.' He looked at Moist's blank face and sighed. 'Tell me, Mr Lipwig, would you like to make some real money?'

Moist gave this some thought and then said, very carefully: 'What will happen to me if I say yes?'

'You will start a new career of challenge and adventure, Mr Lipwig.'

Moist shifted uneasily. He didn't need to look round to know that, by now, someone would be standing by the door. Someone heavily but not grotesquely built, in a cheap black suit, and with absolutely no sense of humour.

'And, just for the sake of argument, what will happen if I say no?'

'You may walk out of that door over there and the matter will not be raised again.'

It was a door in a different wall. He had not come in by it.

'That door over there?' Moist stood up and pointed.

'Indeed so, Mr Lipwig.'

Moist turned to Drumknott. 'May I borrow your pencil, Mr Drumknott? Thank you.' He walked over to the door and opened it. Then he cupped one hand to his ear, theatrically, and dropped the pencil.

'Let's see how dee—'

Clik! The pencil bounced and rolled on some quite solid-looking floorboards. Moist picked it up and stared at it, and then walked slowly back to his chair.

'Didn't there use to be a deep pit full of spikes down there?' he said.

'I can't imagine why you would think that,' said Lord Vetinari.

'I'm sure there was,' Moist insisted.

'Can you recall, Drumknott, why our Mr Lipwig should think that there used to be a deep pit full of spikes behind that door?' said Vetinari.

'I can't imagine why he would think that, my lord,' Drumknott murmured.

'I'm very happy at the Post Office, you know,' said Moist, and realized that he sounded defensive.

'I'm sure you are. You make a superb Postmaster General,' said Vetinari. He turned to Drumknott. 'Now I've finished this I'd better deal with the overnights from Genua,' he said, and carefully folded the letter into an envelope.

'Yes, my lord,' said Drumknott.

The tyrant of Ankh-Morpork bent to his work. Moist watched blankly as Vetinari took a small but heavy-looking box from a desk drawer, removed a stick of black sealing wax from it and melted a small puddle of the wax on to the envelope with an air of absorption that Moist found infuriating.

'Is that all?' he said.

Vetinari looked up and appeared surprised to see him still there. 'Why, yes, Mr Lipwig. You may go.' He laid aside the stick of wax and took a black signet ring out of the box.

'I mean, there's not some kind of problem, is there?'

'No, not at all. You have become an exemplary citizen, Mr Lipwig,' said Vetinari, carefully stamping a V into the cooling wax. 'You rise each morning at eight, you are at your desk at thirty minutes past. You have turned the Post Office from a calamity into a smoothly running machine. You pay your taxes and a little bird tells me that you are tipped to be next year's Chairman of the Merchants' Guild. Well done, Mr Lipwig!'

Moist stood up to leave, but hesitated. 'What's wrong with being Chairman of the Merchants' Guild, then?' he said.

With slow and ostentatious patience, Lord Vetinari slipped the ring back into its box and the box back into the drawer. 'I beg your pardon, Mr Lipwig?'

'It's just that you said it as though there was something wrong with it,' said Moist.

'I don't believe I did,' said Vetinari, looking up at his secretary. 'Did I utter a derogatory inflection, Drumknott?'

'No, my lord. You have often remarked that the traders and shopkeepers of the guild are the backbone of the city,' said Drumknott, handing him a thick file.

' I shall get a very nearly gold chain,' said Moist.