The Lecturer in Recent Runes screwed up his face and waggled his hands. 'Broadly, yes,' he said. 'Living tissue, certainly. And definitely sober.'

     'I think we had  in  mind something that would leave him the same shape and still breathing,' said Susan.

     'Well, you might've said . . .'

     Then  the Dean repeated the mantra that has had such a marked effect on the progress of knowledge throughout the ages.

     'Why don't we  just mix up absolutely everything and see what happens?' he said.

     And Ridcully responded with the traditional response.

     'It's got to be worth a try,' he said.

     The big glass beaker for  the cure had been placed on a pedestal in the middle of the  floor. The wizards liked to make a ceremony  of everything in any  case,  but felt  instinctively that  if they  were going,  to cure  the biggest hangover in the world it needed to be done with style.

     Susan and  Bilious watched as  the ingredients  were added. Round about halfway the mixture,  which was  an orange- brown colour, went gloop. 'Not a lot of improvement, I feel,' said the Lecturer in Recent Runes.

     Englebert's Enhancer was the penultimate ingredient.  The  Dean dropped in a greenish ball of light that sank under the surface. The  only apparent effect was  that  it  caused purple bubbles to creep  over  the sides of the beaker and drip onto the floor.

     'That's it?' said the oh god.

     'I think the yoghurt probably wasn't a good idea,' said the Dean.

     'I'm not drinking that,'  said Bilious firmly, and then clutched at his head.

     'But gods are practically unkillable, aren't they?' said the Dean.

     'Oh, good,' muttered Bilious. 'Why not stick my legs in a meat grinder, then?'

     'Well, if you think it might help ...'

     'I  anticipated a certain  amount of resistance from the patient,' said the  Archchancellor. He removed his  hat and fished out a small crystal ball from a pocket in the lining. 'Let's see what the God of Wine is up to at the moment, shall we? Shouldn't be  too difficult to locate a funloving god like him on an evening like this ...'

     He blew on the glass and polished it. Then he brightened up.

     'Why, here he is, the  little  rascal! On Dunmanifestin, I  do believe. Yes ... yes ... reclining on his couch, surrounded by naked maenads.'

     'What? Maniacs?' said the Dean.

     'He means ... excitable  young women,' said Susan. And it seemed to her that  there was a  general  ripple  of movement among the wizards, a sort of nonchalant drawing towards the glittering ball.

     'Can't quite see what he's doing said

     Ridcully.

     'Let me see if I can make it out,' said the Chair of Indefinite Studies hopefully. Ridcully half turned to keep the ball out of his reach.

     'Ah., yes,' he said. 'It looks like he's drinking ... yes, could very wen be lager and blackcurrant, if I'm any judge ...'

     'Oh, me . . .' moaned the oh god.

     'These young women, now--' the Lecturer in Recent Runes began.

     'I  can see there's some bottles  on  the table,'  Ridcully  continued. 'That one,  hmm,  yes,  could be  scumble which, as  you  know, is made from apple ...'

     'Mainly  apples,' the Dean  volunteered. 'Now,  about  these  poor  mad girls ...'

     The oh god slumped to his knees.

     '...  and there's ... that  drink, you know, there's  a  worm  in the bottle ...'

     'Oh, me ...'

     '... and ... there's an empty glass,  a big one, can't quite see what it contained, but  there's  a paper umbrella in it.  And some cherries  on a stick. Oh, and an amusing little monkey.'

     'ooohhh ...'

     '... of course, there's a lot of other bottles too,'  said Ridcully, cheerfully. 'Different coloured drinks, mainly. The sort made from  melons  and  coconuts and chocolate and suchlike,  don'tcherknow. Funny thing is, all the glasses on the table are pint mugs ...'

     Bilious fell forward.

     'All right,' he murmured. 'I'll drink the wretched stuff.'

     'It's not quite ready yet,' said Ridcully. 'Ah, thank you, Modo.'

     Modo tiptoed in, pushing a trolley. There was a large metal bowl on it, in which a small bottle stood in the middle of a heap of crushed ice.

     'Only just made this for  Hogswatch dinner,' said Ridcully. 'Hasn't had much time to mature yet.'

     He put down the crystal and fished a pair  of heavy  gloves out  of his hat.

     The wizards  spread  like  an  opening flower.  One  moment  they  were gathered around Ridcully, the next they were standing close to various items of heavy furniture.

     Susan  felt she  was present at a  ceremony  and hadn't  been  told the rules.

     'What's that?' she said, as Ridcully carefully lifted up the bottle.

     'Wow-Wow Sauce,' said Ridcully. 'Finest condiment known to man. A happy accompaniment to  meat, fish, fowl, eggs and many types of vegetable dishes. It's  not safe  to drink  it when  sweat's still condensing on  the  bottle, though.' He peered at the bottle,  and then rubbed at it, causing a glassy, squeaky noise. 'On the other hand,' he said brightly, 'if it's a kill-or-cure remedy then we are, given that the patient is practically  immortal, probably on to a winner.'

     He placed. a thumb over the cork and shook the bottle vigorously. There was a crash as the Chair of Indefinite Studies and the Senior Wrangler tried to get under the same table.

     'And these fellows  seem to have taken  against it for some reason,' he said, approaching the beaker.

     'I  prefer  a sauce that doesn't  mean  you mustn't  make  any  jolting movements for half an hour after using it,' muttered the Dean.

     'And  that can't be used for breaking up small rocks,'  said the Senior Wrangler.

     'Or getting rid of tree roots,' said the Chair of Indefinite Studies.

     'And which isn't actually outlawed in three cities,' said  the Lecturer in Recent Runes.

     Ridcully  cautiously uncorked  the  bottle. There was  a brief  hiss of indrawn air.

     He allowed a few drops to splash into the beaker. Nothing happened.

     A more  generous helping  was allowed  to  fall.  The  mixture remained irredeemably inert.

     Ridcully sniffed suspiciously at the bottle.

     'I wonder if I added enough grated wahooni?' he said, and then upturned the sauce and let most of it slide into the mixture.

     It merely went gloop.

     The  wizards began to stand up  and  brush themselves  off, giving  one another the  rather  embarrassed grins of people who  know that they've just been part of a synchronized makinga-fool-of-yourself team.

     'I  know  we've had that asafoetida rather a long time,' said Ridcully. He turned the bottle round, peering at it sadly.

     Finally he  tipped it up for the last  time and thumped it  hard on the base.

     A trickle of sauce arrived on the lip of the bottle and glistened there for a moment. Then it began to form a bead.

     As if drawn  by invisible  strings, the  heads of the wizards turned to look at it.

     Wizards wouldn't be wizards if they couldn't see a  little way into the future.

     As the bead swelled and started to  go pearshaped they turned and, with a surprising turn of speed for men so wealthy in years and waistline, began to dive for the floor.

     The drop fen.

     It went gloop.

     And that was all.

     Ridcully, who'd been standing like a statue, sagged in relief.

     'I don't know,' he said,  turning away,  'I wish you fellows would show some backbone ...'

     The fireball lifted him off his feet. Then it rose to the ceiling where it   spread  out  widely  and  vanished  with  a  pop,  leaving a perfect chrysanthemum of scorched plaster.