Free Carpe Jugulum by Terry Pratchett

different nameth, woman.”
    “Look, I’m Nanny Ogg and thith, excuse me, this is Agnes Nitt. And you are…?”
    “My name ith…well, it’th Igor, ath a matter of facththth,” said Igor. He raised a hasty finger. “But it might not have been!”
    “It’s a chilly night. Can we get you something?” said Nanny cheerfully.
    “Perhaps a towel?” said Agnes.
    Nanny nudged her in the ribs to be silent. “A glass of wine, p’raps?” she said.
    “I do not drink…wine,” said Igor haughtily.
    “I’ve got some brandy,” said Nanny, hitching up her skirt.
    “Oh right , I drink brandy like thtink.”
    Knickerleg elastic twanged in the gloom.
    “So,” said Nanny, passing up the flask, “what’re you doing this far from home, Igor?”
    “Why’th there a thtupid troll down there on the…bridge?” said Igor, taking the flask in one large hand which, Agnes noticed, was a mass of scars and stitches.
    “Oh, that’s Big Jim Beef. The King lets him live under there provided he looks official when we’ve got comp’ny comin’.”
    “Beef ith an odd name for a troll.”
    “He likes the sound of it,” said Nanny. “It’s like a man calling himself Rocky, I suppose. So…I used to know an Igor from Uber-wald. Walked with a limp. One eye a bit higher than the other. Had the same manner of…speaking. Very good at brain juggling, too.”
    “That thoundth like my Uncle Igor,” said Igor. “He worked for the mad doctor at Blinz. Ha, an’ he wath a proper mad doctor, too, not like the mad doctorth you get thethe dayth. And the thervantth? Even worthe. No pride thethe dayth.” He tapped the brandy flask for emphasis. “When Uncle Igor wath thent out for a geniuth’th brain, that’th what you damn well got. There wath none of thith fumble-finger thtuff and then pinching a brain out of the ‘Really Inthane’ jar and hopin’ no one’d notithe. They alwayth do, anyway.”
    Nanny took a step back. The only sensible way to hold a conversation with Igor was when you had an umbrella.
    “I think I’ve heard of that chap,” she said. “Didn’t he stitch folk together out of dead parts?”
    “No! Really?” said Agnes, shocked. “Ow!”
    “That’th right. Ith there a problem?”
    “No, I call it prudent,” said Nanny, taking her foot off Agnes’s toe. “My mum was a dab hand at sewing a new sheet from bits of old ones, and people’re worth more than linen. So he’s your master now, is he?”
    “No, my Uncle Igor thtill workth for him. Been thtruck by lightning three hundred timeth and thtill putth in a full night’th work.”
    “Have a drop more of that brandy, it’s very cold out here,” said Nanny. “So who is your master, Igor?”
    “Call them marthterth?” said Igor, with sudden venom and a light shower. “Huh! Now the old Count, he wath a gentleman of the old thcool. He knew how it all workth. Proper evening dreth at all timeth , that’th the rule!”
    “Evenin’ dress, eh?” said Nanny.
    “Yeth! Thith lot only wear it in the evening, can you imagine that? The retht of the time it’th all thwanning around in fanthy waithtcoatth and lacy thkirtth! Hah! D’you know what thith lot hath done?”
    “Do tell…”
    “They’th oiled the hingeth!” Igor took a hefty pull of Nanny’s special brandy. “Thome of thothe thqueakth took bloody yearth to get right. But, oh no, now it’th ‘Igor, clean thothe thpiderth out of the dungeon’ and ‘Igor, order up thome proper oil lampth, all thethe flickering torcheth are tho fifthteen minuteth ago’! Tho the plathe lookth old? Being a vampire’th about continuity, ithn’t it? You get lotht in the mountainth and thee a light burnin’ in thome carthle, you got a right to expect proper thqueakin’ doorth and thome old-world courtethy, don’t you?”
    “Ah, right. An’ a bed in the room with a balcony outside,” said Nanny.
    “My point egthactly!”
    “Proper billowing curtains, too?”
    “Damn right!”
    “Real gutterin’