Lords and Ladies (Discworld 14)

“We haven't even got,” said the Bursar, despite Ridcully's efforts to sit on his head, “any billygoats.”

There are some people that would whistle “Yankee Doodle” in a crowded bar in Atlanta.

Even these people would consider it tactless to mention the word “billygoat” to a troll.

The troll's expression changed very slowly, like a glacier eroding half a mountain. Ponder tried to get under the seat.

“So we'll just trit-trot along, shall we?” said the Bursar, his voice by now slightly muffled.

“He doesn't mean it,” said the Archchancellor quickly. “It's the dried frog talking.”

“You don't want to eat me,” said the Bursar. “You want to eat my brother, he's much mfmfph mfmfph . . .”

“Well, now,” said the troll, “seems to me that-” He spotted Casanunda.

“Oh-ho,” he said, “dwarf smuggling, eh?”

“Don't be ridiculous, man,” said Ridcully, “there's no such thing as dwarf smuggling.”

“Yeah? Then what's that you've got there?”

“I'm a giant,” said Casanunda.

“Giants are a lot bigger.”

“I've been ill.”

The troll looked perplexed. This was post-graduate thinking for a troll. But he was looking for trouble. He found it on the roof of the coach, where the Librarian had been sunbathing.

“What's in that sack up there?”

“That's not a sack. That's the Librarian.”

The troll prodded the large mass of red hair.

“Ook. . .”

“What? A monkey?”

“Oook?”

Several minutes later, the travellers leaned on the parapet, looking down reflectively at the river far below.

“Happen often, does it?” said Casanunda.

“Not so much these days,” said Ridcully. “It's like - what's that word, Stibbons? About breedin' and passin' on stuff to yer kids?”

“Evolution,” said Ponder. The ripples were still sloshing against the banks.

“Right. Like, my father had a waistcoat with embroidered peacocks on it, and he left it to me, and now I've got it. They call it hereditarery-”

“No, that's not-” Ponder began, with no hope whatsoever that Ridcully would listen.

“-so anyway, most people left back home know the difference between apes and monkeys now,” said Ridcully. “Evolution, that is. It's hard to breed when you've got a headache from being bounced up and down on the pavement.”

The ripples had stopped now.

“Do you think trolls can swim?” said Casanunda.