No, the dippers were no problem. He did his best for them when he could. Lifeitself had beaten them so hard that they had no strength left to beat up anyoneelse. That was helpful. When people found out that you were a goblin, all youcould expect was trouble.

He remembered what the people in the villages had shouted at him when he wassmall and the word would be followed by a stone.

Goblin. It was a word with an ox-train-load of baggage. It didn’t matter whatyou said or did, or made, the train ran right over you. He’d shown them thethings he’d built, and the stones had smashed them while the villagers screamedat him like hunting hawks and shouted more words.

That had stopped on the day Pastor Oats rode gently into town, if a bunch ofhovels and one street of stamped mud could be called a town, and he hadbrought… forgiveness. But on that day, no one had wanted to be forgiven.

In the darkness, Concrete the troll, who was so gooned out on Slab, Slice,Sleek and Slump, and who would even snort iron filings if Nutt didn’t stop him,whimpered on his mattress.

Nutt lit a fresh candle and wound up his home-made dribbling aid. It whirredaway happily, and made the flame go horizontal. He paid attention to his work.A good dribbler never turned the candle when he dribbled; candles in the wild,as it were, almost never dripped in more than one direction, which was awayfrom the draught. No wonder the wizards liked the ones he made; there wassomething disconcerting about a candle that appeared to have dribbled in everydirection at once. It could put a man off his stroke[5].

He worked fast, and was putting the nineteenth well-dribbled candle in thedelivery basket when he heard the clank of a tin can being bowled along thestone floor of the passage.

‘Good morning, Mister Trev,’ he said, without looking up. A moment later anempty tin can landed in front of him, on end, with no more ceremony than ajigsaw piece falling into place.

‘How did you know it was me, Gobbo?’

‘Your leitmotif, Mister Trev. And I’d prefer Nutt, thank you.’

‘What’s one o’ them motifs?’ said the voice behind him.

‘It is a repeated theme or chord associated with a particular person or place,Mister Trev,’ said Nutt, carefully placing two more warm candles in the basket.‘I was referring to your love of kicking a tin can about. You seem in goodspirits, sir. How went the day?’

‘You what?’

‘Did Fortune favour Dimwell last night?’

‘What are you on about?’

Nutt pulled back further. It could be dangerous not to fit in, not to behelpful, not to be careful. ‘Did you win, sir?’

‘Nah. Another no-score draw. Waste of time, really. But it was only a friendly.Nobody died.’ Trev looked at the full baskets of realistically dribbledcandles.

‘That’s a shitload you’ve done there, kid,’ he said kindly.

Nutt hesitated again, and then said, very carefully, ‘Despite the scatologicalreference, you approve of the large but unspecified number of candles that Ihave dribbled for you?’

‘Blimey, what was that all about, Gobbo?’

Frantically, Nutt sought for an acceptable translation. ‘I done okay?’ heventured.

Trev slapped him on the back. ‘Yeah! Good job! Respect! But you gotta learn tospeak more proper, you know. You wu’nt last five minutes down our way. You’dprobably get a half-brick heaved at yer.’

‘That has, I mean ’as been known to… ’appen,’ said Nutt, concentrating.

‘I never seen why people make such a to-do,’ said Trev generously. ‘So therewere all those big battles? So what? It was a long time ago and a long wayaway, right, an’ it’s not like the trolls and dwarfs weren’t as bad as you lot,ain’t I right? I mean, goblins? What was that all about? You lot jus’ cutthroats and nicked stuff, right? That’s practically civilized in some streetsround here.’

Probably, Nutt thought. No one could have been neutral when the Dark War hadengulfed Far Uberwald. Maybe there had been true evil there, but apparently theevil was, oddly enough, always on the other side. Perhaps it was contagious.Somehow, in all the confusing histories that had been sung or written, thegoblins were down as nasty cowardly little bastards who collected their ownearwax and were always on the other side. Alas, when the time came to writetheir story down, his people hadn’t even had a pencil.

Smile at people. Like them. Be helpful. Accumulate worth. He liked Trev. He wasgood at liking people. When you clearly liked people, they were slightly moreinclined to like you. Every little helped.

Trev, though, seemed genuinely unfussed about history, and had recognized thathaving someone in the vats who not only did not try to eat the tallow but alsodid most of his work for him and, at that, did it better than he could bebothered to do it himself, was an asset worth protecting. Besides, he wascongenially lazy, except when it came to foot-the-ball, and bigotry took toomuch effort. Trev never made too much effort. Trev went through life onprimrose paths.

‘Master Smeems came looking for you,’ said Nutt. ‘I sorted it all out.’

‘Ta,’ said Trev, and that was that. No questions. He liked Trev.

But the boy was standing there, just staring at him, as if trying to work himout.

‘Tell you what,’ Trev said. ‘Come on up to the Night Kitchen and we’ll scroungebreakfast, okay?’

‘Oh no, Mister Trev,’ said Nutt, almost dropping a candle. ‘I don’t think,sorry, fink, I ought to.’

‘Come on, who’s going to know? And there’s a fat girl up there who cooks greatstuff. Best food you ever tasted.’

Nutt hesitated. Always agree, always be helpful, always be becoming, neverfrighten anyone.

‘I fink I will come with you,’ he said.

There’s a lot to be said for scrubbing a frying pan until you can see your facein it, especially if you’ve been entertaining ideas of gently tapping someoneon the head with it. Glenda was not in the mood for Trev when he came up thestone steps, kissed her on the back of the neck and said cheerfully, ‘ ’ullo,darlin’, what’s hot tonight?’

‘Nothing for the likes of you, Trevor Likely,’ she said, batting him away withthe pan, ‘and you can keep your hands to yourself, thank you!’

‘Not bin keeping somethin’ warm for your best man?’

Glenda sighed. ‘There’s bubble and squeak in the warming oven and don’t say aword if anyone catches you,’ she said.

‘Just the job for a man who’s bin workin’ like a slave all night!’ said Trev,patting her far too familiarly and heading for the ovens.

‘You’ve been at the football!’ snapped Glenda. ‘You’re always at the football!And what kind of working do you call that?’

The boy laughed, and she glared at his companion, who backed away quickly asthough from armour-piercing eyes.

‘And you boys ought to wash before you come up here,’ she went on, glad of atarget that didn’t grin and blow kisses at her. ‘This is a food-preparationarea!’

Nutt swallowed. This was the longest conversation he’d ever had with a femaleapart from Ladyship and Miss Healstether and he hadn’t even said anything.

‘I assure you, I bath regularly,’ he protested.

‘But you’re grey!’

‘Well, some people are black and some people are white,’ said Nutt, almost intears. Oh, why had he, why had he left the vats? It was nice and uncomplicateddown there, and quiet, too, when Concrete hadn’t been on the ferrous oxide.

‘It doesn’t work like that. You’re not a zombie, are you? I know they do theirbest, and none of us can help how we die, but I’m not having all that troubleagain. Anyone might get their finger in the soup, but rolling around in thebottom of the bowl? That’s not right.’

‘I am alive, miss,’ said Nutt helplessly.

‘Yes, but a live what, that’s what I’d like to know.’