Thief of Time

The sooner the clock was finished, the better. A species as crazy as this couldn't be allowed to survive. She was visiting the clockmaker and his ugly assistant every day now, giving them as much help as she dared, but they always seemed one vital step away from completion—

Amazing! She could even lie to herself! Because another voice in her head, which was part of the dark committee, said, “You're not helping, are you? You're stealing parts and twisting parts… and you go back every day because of the way he looks at you, don't you?”

Parts of the internal committee that were so old they didn't have voices, only direct control of the body, tried to interfere at this point. She tried in vain to put them out of her mind.

And now she had to face the other Auditors. They would be punctual.

She pulled herself together. Water had taken to running out of her eyes lately for no reason at all. She did the best she could with her hair, and made her way to the large drawing room.

Greyness was already filling the air. In this space, there was not room for too many Auditors, but that did not really matter. One could speak for all.

Lady LeJean found the corners of her mouth turned up automatically as nine of them appeared. Nine was three threes, and the Auditors liked threes. Two would keep an eye on the other one. Each two would keep an eye on each other one. They don't trust themselves, said one of the voices in her head. Another voice cut in: It's we, we don't trust ourselves. And she thought: Oh, yes. We, not they. I must remember I'm a we.

An Auditor said, Why is there no further progress?

The corners of the mouth turned down again.

“There have been minor problems of precision and alignment,” said Lady LeJean. She found that her hands were rubbing themselves together slowly, and wondered why. She hadn't told them to.

Auditors had never needed body language, so they didn't understand it.

One said, What is the nature of—?

But another one cut in with, Why are you dwelling in this building? The voice was tinted with suspicion.

“The body requires one to do things that cannot be done on the street,” said Lady LeJean, and, because she'd got to know something about Ankh-Morpork, she added, “at least, on many streets. Also, I believe the servant of the clockmaker is suspicious. I have allowed the body to yield to gravity, since that is what it was designed for. It is as well to give the appearance of humanity.”

One, and it was the same one, said, And what is the meaning of these?

It had noticed the paints and the easel. Lady LeJean wished fervently that she'd remembered to put them away.

The one said, You are making an image with pigments?

“Yes. Very badly, I am afraid.”

One said, For what reason?

“I wished to see how humans do it.”

One said, That is simple: the eye receives the input, the hand applies the pigment.

“That's what I thought, but it appears to be much more complex than that—”

The one who had raised the question of the painting drifted towards one of the chairs and said, And what is this?

“It is a cat. It arrived. It does not appear to wish to depart.”

The cat, a feral ginger tom, flicked a serrated ear and curled up in a tighter ball. Anything that could survive in Ankh-Morpork's alleys, with their abandoned swamp dragons, dog packs and furriers' agents, was not about to open even one eye for a bunch of floating nightdresses.

The one who was now getting on Lady LeJean's nerves said: And the reason for its presence?

“It appears to tolerate the company of hu—of apparent humans, asking nothing in return but food, water, shelter and comfort,” said Lady LeJean. “This interests me. Our purpose is to learn, and thus I have, as you can see, begun.” She hoped it sounded better to them than it did to her.

One said, When will the clock problems you spoke of be resolved?

“Oh, soon. Very soon. Yes.”

The one that was beginning to terrify Lady LeJean said, We wonder: is it possible that you are slowing the work in some way?

Lady LeJean felt a prickling on her forehead. Why was it doing that?

“No. Why should I slow the work? There would be no logic to it!”

One said, Hmm.

And an Auditor did not say “Hmm” by accident. “Hmm” had a very precise meaning.

It went on: You are making moisture on your head.

“Yes. It's a body thing.”

One said, Yes. And that, too, had a very specific and ominous meaning.

One said, We wonder if too long in a solid body weakens resolve. Also, we find it hard to see your thoughts.