'Didn't you meet my ex-wife?' said the baker.
'Well, I'd draw the line if you wore make-up,' said the butcher to general amusement. 'Being an orc is one thing, but we don't want a funny one.'
Glenda looked down at Nutt. He was crying.
'My friends, I thank you for your trust in me,' he said.
'Well, you know, you're like part of the team,' said Bledlow Nobbs (no relation), whose smile almost managed to conceal his nervousness.
'Thank you, Mister Nobbs, that means a lot to me,' said Nutt, standing up.
That was quite a complex movement.
It stayed in Glenda's mind for ever afterwards as a kind of slow-motion scene of bursting chains and cracking wood when Nutt stood up as though he had been restrained by cobwebs. Pieces of chain spun off and hit the wall. Padlocks broke. As for the couch, barely one piece remained attached to another. It dropped to the floor as so much firewood.
'RUN FOR IT, LADS!'
You would have needed some kind of special micrometer to work out which man said it first, but the stampede along the corridor was swift and over very quickly.
'You know,' said Trev, after a few moments' silence, 'at one point I thought this was all goin' very well.'
'Those women,' said Glenda, 'what were they?'
Nutt stood forlornly in the wreckage; a length of chain slithered off him like a serpent and landed on the flagstones. 'Them?' he said. 'They are the Little Sisters of Perpetual Velocity. They come from Ephebe. I think the name for their species is Furies. I think Ladyship sent them in case I tried to hurt anybody.' The words came out without emphasis or emotion.
'But you haven't hurt anyone,' said Glenda.
'But they ran away,' said Nutt, 'because of what I am.'
'Well, you know, they're ordinary people,' said Glenda. 'They're - '
'Twits,' said Trev.
Nutt turned and walked down the opposite corridor, kicking off the remnants of wood and chain. 'But the world is full of ordinary people.'
'You can't just let 'im go like that,' said Juliet. 'You just can't. Look at 'im! 'e looks like 'e's been kicked.'
'I'm 'is boss, that's my job,' said Trev.
Glenda caught Trev by the arm. 'No, I'll sort this out. Now, you listen to me, Trev Likely, under all that gab, you're a decent sort, so I'll tell you this: see Juliet over there? You know her, she works in the kitchens. You wrote her a lovely poem, didn't you? Ever heard of Emberella? Everyone's heard of Emberella. Well, you might not be my first choice for Prince Charming, but there's probably plenty worse.'
'What the hell are you talkin' about?' said Trev.
'Juliet's going to be leaving soon, isn't that right, Jools?'
Juliet's face was a picture. 'Well, er - '
'And that's because she's been that girl in the papers.'
'What, the shiny dwarf one? With a beard?'
'That's her!' said Glenda. 'She's going to go off with the circus, well, you know what I mean. With the fashion show, at least.'
'But she hasn't got a beard,' said Trev.
Blushing, Juliet delved into her apron and to Glenda's surprise produced the beard. 'They let me keep it,' she said, with a nervous giggle.
'Right,' said Glenda. 'You say you love him. Trev, I don't know whether you love her or not, time to make up your mind. You're both grown up, well, strictly speaking, and so you better sort yourselves out, 'cos I don't see any fairy godmothers around. As for Mister Nutt, he hasn't got anyone.'