Soul Music (38 page)

The cart stopped outside one small shop and Glod leapt down and went inside.

Asphalt heard the conversation:

‘Have you done it?'

‘Here you are, mister. Right as rain.'

‘Will it play? You know I said where you have to have spent a fortnight wrapped in a bullock hide behind a waterfall before you should touch one of these things.'

‘Listen, mister, for this kind of money it had me in the shower for five minutes with a chamois leather on me head. Don't tell me that's not good enough for folk music.'

There was a pleasant sound, which hung in the air for a moment before being lost in the busy din of the street.

‘We said twenty dollars, right?'

‘No, you said twenty dollars.
I
said twenty-five dollars.'

‘Just a minute, then.'

Glod came out, and nodded at Cliff.

‘All right,' he said. ‘Cough up.'

Cliff growled, but fumbled for a moment somewhere at the back of his mouth.

They heard the cunning artificer say, ‘What the hell's that?'

‘A molar. Got to be worth at least—'

‘It'll do.'

Glod came out again with a sack, which he tucked under the seat.

‘OK,' he said. ‘Head for the park.'

They went in through one of the back gates. Or, at least, tried to. Two trolls barred their way. They had the glossy marble patina of Chrysoprase's basic gang thugs. He didn't have henchmen. Most trolls weren't clever enough to hench.

‘Dis is for der bands,' one said.

‘Dat's right,' said the other one.

‘We
are
The Band,' said Asphalt.

‘Which one?' said the first troll. ‘I got a list here.'

‘Dat's right.'

‘We're The Band With Rocks In,' said Glod.

‘Hah, you ain't
them
. I've seen
them
. Dere's a guy with this glow round him, and when he plays der guitar it goes—'

Whauauauaummmmm-eeeee-gngngn
.

‘Dat's
right
—'

The chord curled around the cart.

Buddy was standing up, guitar at the ready.

‘Oh, wow,' said the first troll. ‘This are
amazing
!' He fumbled in his loincloth and produced a dog-eared piece of paper. ‘You couldn't write your name down, could you? My boy Clay, he won't
believe
I met—'

‘Yes, yes,' said Buddy wearily. ‘Pass it up.'

‘Only it not for me, it for my boy Clay—' said the troll, jumping from one foot to the other in excitement.

‘How d'you spell it?'

‘It don't matter, he can't read anyway.'

‘Listen,' said Glod, as the cart trundled into the backstage area, ‘someone's already playing. I
said
we—'

Dibbler hurried up.

‘What kept you?' he said. ‘You'll be on soon! Right after . . . Boyz From The Wood. How did it go? Asphalt, come here.'

He pulled the small troll into the shadows at the back of the stage.

‘You brought me some money?' he said.

‘About three thousand—'

‘Not so loud!'

‘I'm only whispering it, Mr Dibbler.'

Dibbler looked around carefully. There was no such thing as a whisper in Ankh-Morpork when the sum involved had the word ‘thousand' in it somewhere; people could hear you
think
that kind of money in Ankh-Morpork.

‘You be sure and keep an eye on it, right? There's going to be more before this day's out. I'll give Chrysoprase his seven hundred dollars and the rest is all prof—' He caught Asphalt's little beady eye and remembered himself. ‘Of course, there's depreciation . . . overheads . . . advertising . . . market research . . . buns . . . mustard . . . basically, I'll be lucky if I break even. I'm practically cutting me own throat in this deal.'

‘Yes, Mr Dibbler.'

Asphalt peered around the edge of the stage.

‘Who's that playing now, Mr Dibbler?'

‘“And you”.'

‘Sorry, Mr Dibbler?'

‘Only they write it &U,' said Dibbler. He relaxed a little and pulled out a cigar. ‘Don't ask me why. The right kind of name for musicians ought to be something like Blondie and his Merry Troubadours. Are they any good?'

‘Don't you know, Mr Dibbler?'

‘It's not what
I
call music,' said Dibbler. ‘When I was a lad we had proper music with real words . . . “Summer is icumen in, lewdly sing cuckoo”, that sort of thing.'

Asphalt looked at &U again.

‘Well, it's got a beat and you can dance to it,' he said, ‘but they're not very good. I mean, people are just watching them. They don't just watch when The Band are playing, Mr Dibbler.'

‘You're right,' said Dibbler. He looked at the front of the stage. In between the candles was a row of music traps.

‘You'd better go and tell them to get ready. I think this lot are running out of ideas.'

‘Um. Buddy?'

He looked up from his guitar. Some of the other musicians were tuning theirs, but he'd found he never had to. He couldn't, anyway. The pegs didn't move.

‘What is it?'

‘Um,' said Glod. He waved vaguely at Cliff, who grinned sheepishly and produced the sack from behind his back.

‘This is . . . well, we thought . . . that is, all of us,' said Glod, ‘that . . . well, we saw it, you see, and I know you said it couldn't be repaired but there's people in this city that can do just about
anything
so we asked around, and we knew how much it meant to you, and there's this man in the Street of Cunning Artificers and he said he thought he could do it and it cost Cliff another tooth but here you are anyway because you're right, we're on top of the music business right enough and it's because of you and we know how much this meant to you so it's a sort of thank-you present, well, go on then,
give
it to him.'

Cliff, who'd lowered his arm again as the sentence began to extend, pushed the sack towards the puzzled Buddy.

Asphalt poked his head through the sacking.

‘We guys better get on the stage,' he said. ‘Come on!'

Buddy put down the guitar. He opened the sack, and began to pull at the linen wrappings inside.

‘It's been tuned and everything,' said Cliff helpfully.

The harp gleamed in the sun as the last wrapping came off.

‘They can do amazing things with glue and stuff,' said Glod. ‘I mean, I know you said there wasn't anyone left in Llamedos that could repair it. But this is Ankh-Morpork. We can fix nearly everything.'

‘Please!' said Asphalt, as his head reappeared. ‘Mr Dibbler says you've got to come, they've started to throw things!'

‘I don't know much about strings,' said Glod, ‘but I had a go. Sounds . . . kind of nice.'

‘I . . . er . . . don't know what to say,' said Buddy.

The chanting was like a hammer.

‘I . . . won this,' said Buddy, in a small, distant world of his own. ‘With a song.
Sioni Bod Da
, it was. I worked on it allll winter. Allll about . . . home, you know. And going away, see? And trees and things. The judges were . . . very plleased. They said that in fifty years I might realllly understand music.'

He pulled the harp towards him.

Dibbler pushed his way through the rabble of musicians backstage until he found Asphalt.

‘Well?' he said. ‘Where are they?'

‘They're just sitting around talking, Mr Dibbler.'

‘Listen,' said Dibbler. ‘You hear the crowd? It's Music With Rocks In they want! If they don't get it . . . they'd just better get it, all right? Letting the anticipation build up is all very well but . . .
I want them on stage right now!
'

Buddy stared at his fingers. Then he looked up, whitefaced, at the other bands milling around.

‘You . . . with the guitar . . .' he said hoarsely.

‘Me, sir?'

‘Give it to me!'

Every nascent group in Ankh-Morpork was in awe of The Band With Rocks In. The guitarist handed his instrument over with the expression of one passing over a holy item to be blessed.

Buddy stared at it. It was one of Mr Wheedown's best.

He struck a chord.

The sound sounded like lead would sound if you could make guitar strings out of it.

‘OK, boys, what's the problem?' said Dibbler, hurrying towards them. ‘There's six thousand ears out there waiting to be filled up with music and you're still sitting around?'

Buddy handed the guitar back to the musician and swung his own instrument around on its strap. He played a few notes that seemed to twinkle in the air.

‘But I can play
this
,' he said. ‘Oh, yes.'

‘Right, good, now get up there and play it,' said Dibbler.

‘Someone else give me a guitar!'

Musicians fell over themselves to hand them to him. He strummed frantically at a couple. But the notes weren't simply flat. Flat would have been an improvement.

The Musicians' Guild contingent had managed to secure an area close to the stage by the simple expedient of hitting any encroachers very hard.

Mr Clete scowled at the stage.

‘I don't understand,' he said. ‘It's rubbish. It's all the same. It's just noise. What's so good about it?'

Satchelmouth, who had twice had to stop himself tapping his feet, said, ‘We haven't had the main band yet. Er. Are you sure you want to—'

‘We're within our rights,' said Clete. He looked around at the shouting people. ‘There's a hot dog seller over there. Anyone else fancy a hot dog? Hot dog?' The Guild men nodded. ‘Hot dog? Right. That's three hot d—'

The audience cheered. It wasn't the way that an audience normally applauds, with it starting at one point and rippling outwards, but all at once, every single mouth opening at the same time.

Cliff had knuckled on to the stage. He sat down behind his rocks and looked desperately back towards the wings.

Glod trailed on, blinking in the lights.

And that seemed to be it. The dwarf turned and said something which was lost in the noise, and then stood looking awkward while the cheers gradually subsided.

Buddy came on, staggering slightly as if he'd been pushed.

Up until then Mr Clete had thought the crowd was yelling. And then he realized that it had been a mere murmur of approval compared to what was happening now.

It went on and on while the boy stood there, head bowed.

‘But he's not
doing
anything,' Clete shouted into Satchelmouth's ear. ‘Why're they all cheering him for not doing anything?'

‘Can't say, sir,' said Satchelmouth.

He looked around at the glistening, staring,
hungry
faces, feeling like an atheist who has wandered into Holy Communion.

The applause went on. It redoubled again when Buddy slowly raised his hands to the guitar.

‘He's not doing
anything
!' screamed Clete.

‘He's got us bang to rights, sir,' Satchelmouth bellowed. ‘He's not guilty of playing without belonging to the Guild if he doesn't play!'

Buddy looked up.

He stared at the audience so intently that Clete craned to see what it was the wretched boy was staring at.

It was nothing. There was a patch of it right in front of the stage.

People were packed tight everywhere else but there, right in front of the stage, was a little area of cleared grass. It seemed to rivet Buddy's attention.

‘Uh-huh-huh . . .'

Clete rammed his hands over his ears but the force of the cheering made his head echo.

And then, very gradually, layer by layer, it died away. It yielded to the sound of thousands of people being very quiet, which was somehow, Satchelmouth thought, a lot more dangerous.

Glod glanced at Cliff, who made a face.

Buddy was still standing, staring at the audience.

If he doesn't play
, Glod thought,
then we've had it
.

He hissed at Asphalt, who sidled over.

‘Is the cart ready?'

‘Yes, Mr Glod.'

‘You filled up the horses with oats?'

‘Just like you said, Mr Glod.'

‘OK.'

The silence was velvet. And it had that quality of suction found in the Patrician's study and in holy places and deep canyons, engendering in people a terrible desire to shout or sing or yell their name. It was a silence that demanded: fill me up.

Somewhere in the darkness, someone coughed.

Asphalt heard his name hissed from the side of the stage. With extreme reluctance he sidled over to the darkness, where Dibbler was frantically beckoning him.

‘You know that bag?' said Dibbler.

‘Yes, Mr Dibbler. I put it—'

Dibbler held up two small but very heavy sacks.

‘Tip these in and be ready to leave in a big hurry.'

‘Yes, that's right, Mr Dibbler, because Glod said—'

‘Do it now!'

Glod looked around.
If I throw away the horn and helmet and this chain mail shirt
, he thought,
I might just get out of here alive. What's he
doing?

Buddy put down the guitar and walked into the wings. He returned before the audience had realized what was happening. He was carrying the harp.