'Why, nuncle—'
'And I am not your nuncle.'
'N'aunt?' said the Fool.
'No.'
'Why . . . prithee . . . you need to finance your ambitious programme for the country.'
'Sorry?' said the duke, who was getting lost again.
'He means that chopping down trees costs money,' said the duchess. She smiled at the Fool. It was the first time he had ever seen her look at him as if he was other than a disgusting little cockroach. There was still a large element of cockroach in her glance, but it said: good little cockroach, you have learned a trick.
'Intriguing,' she said. 'But can your words change the past?'
The Fool considered this.
'More easily, I think,' he said. 'Because the past is what people remember, and memories are words. Who knows how a king behaved a thousand years ago? There is only recollection, and stories. And plays, of course.'
'Ah, yes. I saw a play once,' said Felmet. 'Bunch of funny fellows in tights. A lot of shouting. The people liked it.'
'You tell me history is what people are told?' said the duchess.
The Fool looked around the throne room and found King Gruneberry the Good (906-967).
'Was he?' he said, pointing. 'Who knows, now? What was he good at? But he will be Gruneberry the Good until the end of the world.'
The duke was leaning forward in his throne, his eyes gleaming.
'I want to be a good ruler,' he said. 'I want people to like me. I would like people to remember me fondly.'
'Let us assume,' said the duchess, 'that there were other matters, subject to controversy. Matters of historical record that had . . . been clouded.'
'I didn't do it, you know,' said the duke, quickly. 'He slipped and fell. That was it. Slipped and fell. I wasn't even there. He attacked me. It was self-defence. That's it. He slipped and fell on his own dagger in self-defence.' His voice fell to a mumble. 'I have no recollection of it at this time,' he murmured. He rubbed his dagger hand, although the word was becoming inappropriate.
'Be quiet, husband,' snapped the duchess. 'I know you didn't do it. I wasn't there with you, you may recall. It was I who didn't hand you the dagger.' The duke shuddered again.
'And now, Fool,' said Lady Felmet. 'I was saying, I believe, that perhaps there are matters that should be properly recorded.'
'Marry, that you were not there at the time?' said the Fool, brightly.
It is true that words have power, and one of the things they are able to do is get out of someone's mouth before the speaker has the chance to stop them. If words were sweet little lambs, then the Fool watched them bound cheerfully away into the flamethrower of the duchess's glare.
'Not where?' she said.
'Anywhere,' said the Fool hastily.
'Stupid man! Everyone is somewhere.'
'I mean, you were everywhere but at the top of the stairs,' said the Fool.
'Which stairs?'
'Any stairs,' said the Fool, who was beginning to sweat. 'I distinctly remember not seeing you!'
The duchess eyed him for a while.
'So long as you remember it,' she said. The duchess rubbed her chin, which made an audible rasping noise.