Men at Arms (Discworld 15)

'This is very moving,' said Boffo.

On a dais on the opposite side of the quadrangle was a fat clown in baggy trousers, huge braces, a bow tie that was spinning gently in the breeze, and a top hat. His face had been painted into a picture of misery. He held a bladder on a stick.

The clown with the urn reached the dais, climbed the steps, and waited.

The band fell silent.

The clown in the top hat hit the urn-carrier about the head with the bladder – once, twice, three times . . .

The urn-bearer stepped forward, waggled his wig, took the urn in one hand and the clown's belt in the other and, with great solemnity, poured the ashes of the late Brother Beano into the other clown's trousers.

A sigh went up from the audience. The band struck up the clown anthem 'The March of the Idiots', and the end of the trombone flew off and hit a clown on the back of the head. He turned and swung a punch at the clown behind him, who ducked, causing a third clown to be knocked through the bass drum.

Colon and Nobby looked at one another and shook their heads.

shed open a door.

It was a large room, heavily outfitted with the usual badly ventilated furnaces, rows of bubbling crucibles, and one stuffed alligator. Things floated in jars. The air smelled of a limited life expectancy.

A lot of equipment had been moved away, however, to make room for a billiard table. Half a dozen alchemists were standing around it in the manner of men poised to run.

'It's the third this week,' said Sendivoge, gloomily. He nodded to a figure bent over a cue.

'Er, Mr Silverfish—' he began.

'Quiet! Game on!' said the head alchemist, squinting at the white ball.

Sendivoge glanced at the score rail.

'Twenty-one points,' he said. 'My word. Perhaps we're adding just the right amount of camphor to the nitro-cellulose after all—'

There was a click. The cue ball rolled away, bounced off the cushion—

—and then accelerated. White smoke poured off it as it bore down on an innocent cluster of red balls.

Silverfish shook his head.

'Unstable,' he said. 'Everybody down!'

Everyone in the room ducked, except for the two Watchmen, one of whom was in a sense pre-ducked and the other of whom was several minutes behind events.

The black ball took off on a column of flame, whiffled past Detritus' face trailing black smoke and then shattered a window. The green ball was staying in one spot but spinning furiously. The other balls cannoned back and forth, occasionally bursting into flame or caroming off the walls.

A red one hit Detritus between the eyes, curved back on to the table, holed itself in the middle pocket and then blew up.

There was silence, except for the occasional bout of coughing. Silverfish appeared through the oily smoke and, with a shaking hand, moved the score point one notch with the burning end of his cue.

'One,' he said. 'Oh well. Back to the crucible. Someone order another billiard table—'

' 'Scuse me,' said Cuddy, prodding him in the knee.

'Who's there?'

'Down here!'

Silverfish looked down.

'Oh. Are you a dwarf?'