Well, it might be. Owlswick was crazy enough in a mild, bewildered sort of way. He had the look of one who'd long ago given up trying to understand the world beyond his easel, a man for whom cause and effect had no obvious linkage. Where would a man like that hide?
Moist lit the lamp and walked over to the battered wreckage of his wardrobe. Once again he selected the tatty grey suit. It had sentimental value; he had been hanged in it. And it was an unmemorable suit for an unmemorable man, with the additional advantage, unlike black, of not showing up in the dark. Thinking ahead, he went into the kitchen, too, and stole a couple of dusters from a cupboard.
The corridor was reasonably well lit by the lamps every few yards. But lamps create shadows and in one of them, beside a huge Ping Dynasty vase from Hunghung, Moist was just a patch of grey on grey.
A guard walked past, treacherously silent on the thick carpet. When he'd gone, Moist hurried down the flight of marble steps and tucked himself behind a potted palm that someone had thought it necessary to put there.
The floors of the bank all opened on to the main hall which, like the one in the Post Office, went from ground floor to roof. Sometimes, depending on the layout, a guard on a floor above could see the floor below. Sometimes, the guards walked over uncarpeted marble. Sometimes, on the upper floors, they crossed patches of fine tiling which rang like a bell.
Moist stood and listened, trying to pick up the rhythm of the patrols. There were more than he'd expected. Come on, lads, you're working security: what about the traditional all-night poker game! Don't you know how to behave?
It was like a wonderful puzzle. It was better than night-climbing, better even than Extreme Sneezing! And the really good thing about it was this: if he was caught, why, he was just testing the security! Well done, lads, you found me...
But he mustn't be caught.
A guard came upstairs, walking slowly and deliberately. He leaned against the balustrade and, to Moist's annoyance, lit the stub of a cigarette. Moist watched from between the fronds while the man leaned comfortably on the marble, looking down at the floor below. He was sure that guards weren't supposed to do this. And smoking, too!
After a few reflective drags, the guard dropped the dog-end, trod on it and continued up the stairs.
Two thoughts struggled for dominance in Moist's mind. Screaming slightly louder was: he had a crossbow! Do they shoot first to avoid having to ask questions later? But also there, vibrating with indignation, was a voice saying: he stubbed out that damn cigarette right there on the marble! Those tall brass wossnames with the little bowls of white sand are there for a reason, you know!
When the man had disappeared above him Moist ran down the rest of the flight, slid across the polished marble on his duster-covered boots, found the door that led down to the basement, opened it quickly and remembered just in time to close it quietly behind him.
He shut his eyes and waited for cries or sounds of pursuit.
He opened his eyes.
There was the usual brilliant light at the far end of the undercroft, but there was no rushing of water. Only the occasional drip demonstrated the depth of the otherwise all-pervading silence.
Moist walked carefully past the Glooper, which tinkled faintly, and into the unexplored shadows beneath the wonderful fornication.
If we build it, wilt thou comest? he thought. But the hoped-for god never came. It was sad but, in some celestial way, a bit stupid. Well, wasn't it? Moist had heard that there were maybe millions of little gods floating around in the world, living under rocks, blown about like tumbleweed, clinging to the topmost branches of trees... They awaited the big moment, the lucky break that might end up with a temple and a priesthood and worshippers to call your own. But they hadn't come here, and it was easy to see why.
Gods wanted belief, not rational thinking. Building the temple first was like giving a pair of wonderful shoes to a man with no legs. Building a temple didn't mean you believed in gods, it just meant you believed in architecture.
Something akin to a workshop had been built on the end wall of the undercroft, around a huge and ancient fireplace. An Igor was working over an intense, blue-white flame, carefully bending a piece of glass pipe. Behind him, green liquid surged and fizzed in giant bottles: Igors seemed to have a natural affinity with lightning.
You could always recognize an Igor. They went out of their way to be recognized. It wasn't just the musty dusty old suits, or even the occasional extra digit or mismatched eyes. It was that you could probably stand a ball on the top of their head without it falling off.
The Igor looked up. 'Good morning, thur. And you are... ?'
'Moist von Lipwig,' said Moist. 'And you would be Igor.'
'Got it in one, thur. I have heard many good thingth about you.'
'Down here?'
'I alwayth keep an ear to the ground, thur.'
Moist resisted the impulse to look down. Igors and metaphors didn't go well together.
'Well, Igor... the thing is... I want to bring someone into the building without troubling the guards, and I wondered if there was another door down here?'
What he did not say, but which passed between them on the ether, was: you're an Igor, right? And when the mob are sharpening their sickles and trying to break down the door, the Igor is never there. Igors were masters of the unobtrusive exit.
'There ith a thmall door we uthe, thur. It can't be opened from the outthide, tho it'th never guarded.'
Moist looked longingly at the rainwear on its stand. 'Fine. Fine. I'm just popping out, then.'