Unseen Academicals

Life as an unseen part of Unseen University was a matter of alliances, feuds, obligations and friendships, all stirred and twisted and woven together.

Glenda was good at it. The Night Kitchen had always been generous to other toilers and right now the Great Hall owed her favours, even if all she had done was keep her mouth shut. Now she bore down on Shiny Robert, one of the head waiters, who gave her the cautious nod due to someone who knew things about you that you wouldn’t want your mother to know.

‘Got a menu?’ she asked. One was produced from under a napkin. She read it in horror.

‘That’s not the stuff they like!’

‘Oh dear, Glenda,’ Robert smirked. ‘Are you saying it’s too good for them?’

‘You’re giving them Avec. Nearly every dish has got Avec in it, but stuff with Avec in the name is an acquired taste. I mean, do these look to you like people who habitually eat in a foreign language? Oh dear, and you are giving them beer! Beer with Avec!’

‘A choice of wines is available. They are choosing beer,’ said Robert coldly.

Glenda stared at the captains. They seemed to be enjoying themselves now. Here was free food and drink and if the food tasted strange there was plenty of it, and the beer tasted welcomely familiar and there was lots of that, too.

She didn’t like this. Heavens knew that football had got pretty disgusting these days, but… well, she couldn’t quite work out what she was uneasy about, but—

‘ ’scuse me, miss?’

She looked down. A young footballer had decided to confide in the only uniformed woman he could see who was not carrying at least two plates at once.

‘Can I help?’

He lowered his voice. ‘This chutney tastes of fish, miss.’

She looked at the other grinning faces around the table. ‘It’s called caviar, sir. It’ll put lead in your pencil.’

The table, as one well-oiled drinker, guffawed, but the youth only looked puzzled. ‘I haven’t got a pencil, miss.’ More amusement.

‘There’s not a lot of them around,’ said Glenda, and left them laughing.

‘So kind of you to invite me, Mustrum,’ said Lord Vetinari, waving away the hors d’oeuvres. He turned to the wizard on his right. ‘And the Archchancellor formerly known as Dean is back with you, I see. That is capital.’

‘You may remember that Henry went to Pseudopolis-Brazeneck, you know. He is, er… ’ Ridcully slowed.

‘The new Archchancellor,’ said Vetinari. He picked up a spoon and perused it carefully, as if it were a rare and curious object. ‘Dear me. I thought that there could be only one Archchancellor. Is this not so? One above all others and one Hat, of course? But these are wizardly matters, of which I know little. So do excuse me if I have misunderstood.’ In the gently turning bowl of the spoon his nose went from long to short. ‘However, it occurs to me, as an onlooker, that this could lead to a little friction, perhaps.’ The spoon stopped in mid twirl.

‘A soupçon, perhaps,’ said Ridcully, not looking in the direction of Henry.

‘That much, indeed? But I surmise from the absence of people being turned into frogs that you gentlemen have forgone the traditional option of magical mayhem. Well done. When it comes to the pinch, old friends, united by the bonds of mutual disrespect, cannot bring themselves to actually kill one another. We have hope. Ah, soup.’

There was a brief interregnum as the ladle went from bowl to bowl, and then the Patrician said, ‘Could I assist you? I am without any bias in this matter.’

‘Excuse me, my lord, but I think it might be said that you would favour Ankh-Morpork,’ said the Archchancellor formerly known as Dean.

‘Really? It might also be said that it would be in my interest to weaken the perceived power of this university. You take my meaning? The delicate balance between town and gown, the unseen and the mundane? The twin foci of power. It might be said that I could take the opportunity to embarrass my learned friend.’ He smiled a little smile. ‘Do you still own the official Archchancellor’s Hat, Mustrum? I notice that you don’t wear it these days and tend to prefer the snazzy number with the rather attractive drawers and the small drinks cabinet in the point.’

‘I never liked wearing the official one. It grumbled all the time.’

‘It really can talk?’ said Vetinari.

‘I think the word “nag” would be far more accurate, since its only topic of conversation has been how much better things used to be. My only comfort here is that every Archchancellor over the last thousand years has complained about it in exactly the same way.’

‘So it can think and speak?’ said Vetinari innocently.

‘Well, I suppose you could put it like that.’

‘Then you can’t own it, Mustrum: a hat that thinks and speaks cannot be enslaved. No slaves in Ankh-Morpork, Mustrum.’ He waved a finger waggishly.

‘Yes, but it is the look of the thing. What would it look like if I gave up the uniqueness of Archchancellorship without a fight?’