'Er ...  not really,'  said the oh god. 'But I'd like  some toast, if that helps.'

     The Dean took  off  his hat and  pulled a thaumameter out of the point. 'Something happened,' he said. 'There was a massive thaumic surge.'

     'Didn't it even taste a bit ... well, spicy?' said Ridcully.

     'It didn't taste of anything, really,' said the oh god.

     'Oh, look, it's obvious,' said  Susan. 'When the  God  of Wine  drinks, Bilious here gets the aftereffects, so when the God of  Hangovers  drinks  a hangover cure then the effects must jump back across the same link.'

     'That could be right,' said the  Dean. 'He is,  after  all, basically a conduit.'

     'I've always thought of myself as more of a tube,' said the oh god.

     'No, no, she's right,' said Ridcully. 'When  he drinks,  this  lad here gets the nasty result. So, logically, when our  friend here takes a hangover cure the side effects should head back the same way--'

     'Someone mentioned a crystal ball just now,' said the oh god in a voice suddenly clanging with vengeance. 'I want to see this ...'

     It was  a big drink.  A very  big  and a very long drink. It was one of those  special cocktails where  each very sticky, very strong ingredient  is poured in very slowly, so that they layer on top of one another.  Drinks like  this  tend  to  get  called  Traffic  Lights  or Rainbow's Revenge or, in places where truth is more highly valued, Hello and Goodbye, Mr Brain Cell.

     In addition, this drink had some lettuce floating in it. And a slice of lemon and a piece of pineapple hooked coquettishly on the side of the glass, which had sugar frosted round the  rim.  There were two paper umbrellas, one pink and one blue, and they each had a cherry on the end.

     And someone had taken the  trouble  to freeze ice cubes in the shape of little elephants. After that, there's no hope. You might as well be drinking in a place called the Cococobana.

     The God of Wine picked it up lovingly. It was his kind of drink.

     There was a rumba going on in the background. There were also a  couple of young ladies snuggling up to him. It was going to be a good night. It was always a good night.

     'Happy Hogswatch, everyone!' he said, and raised the glass.

     And then: 'Can anyone hear something?'

     Someone blew a paper squeaker at him.

     'No, seriously ... like a sort of descending note

     Since no one paid this any attention he shrugged, and nudged one of his fellow drinkers.

     'How about we have a couple more and go to this club I know?' he said.

     And then.......

     The wizards leaned back, and one or two of them grimaced.

     Only the oh god stayed glued to the glass, face contorted  in a vicious smile.

     'We have eructation!' he shouted, and punched the  air. 'Yes! Yes! Yes! The worm  is on  the other boot  now, eh? Hah! How do you like  them apples, huh?'

     'Well, mainly apples--' said the Dean.

     'Looked like a lot of other things  to me,' said Ridcully. 'It seems we have reversed the cause-effect flow . . .'

     'Will it be permanent?' said the oh god hopefully.

     'I shouldn't think so.  After all, you are the God  of Hangovers. It'll probably just reverse itself again when the potion wears off.'

     'Then I may not have much time. Bring me ... let's see ... twenty pints of lager, some pepper vodka and a bottle of coffee liqueur! With an umbrella in it! Let's see how he enjoys that, Mr  You've Cot Room For Another  One In There!'

     Susan grabbed his hand and pulled him over to a bench.

     'I didn't have you sobered up just so  you could go on a binge!' she said.

     He blinked at her. 'You didn't?'

     'I want you to help me!'

     'Help you what?'

     'You said you'd never been human before, didn't you?'

     'Er ...' The oh god looked down at himself. 'That's right,'  he said. 'Never.'

     'You've never incarnated?' said Ridcully.

     'Surely that's a rather personal question, isn't it?' said the Chair of Indefinite Studies.

     'That's ...  right,'  said  the  oh god. 'Odd, that. I  remember always having headaches ... but never having a head. That can't be right, can it?'

     'You existed in potentia?' said Ridcully.

     'Did what?'

     'Did he?' said Susan.

     Ridcully paused. 'Oh dear,'  he said. 'I  think  I did  it, didn't I? I said something to young Stibbons about  drinking and hangovers, didn't I ... ?'

     'And you created him just like that?' said the Dean. 'I  find that very hard to  believe,  Mustrum. Hah! Out of thin air? I suppose  we can  all  do that, can we? Anyone care to think up some new pixie?'

     'Like the  Hair Loss  Fairy?'  said the Lecturer  in  Recent Runes. The other wizards laughed.

     'I am not  losing my hair!' snapped  the Dean. 'It is  just very finely spaced.'

     'Half on your head and half on your  hairbrush,'  said  the Lecturer in Recent Runes.

     'No sense  in bein' bashful  about goin'  bald,'  said Ridcully evenly. 'Anyway, you know what they say about bald men, Dean.'

     'Yes, they say, "Look at him, he's  got no hair,"' said the Lecturer in Recent Runes. The Dean had been annoying him lately.

     'For the last time,' shouted the Dean, 'I am not...'

     He stopped.

     There was a glingleglingleglingle noise.

     'I wish I knew where that was coming from,' said Ridcully.

     'Er . . .' the Dean began. 'Is there ... something on my head?'

     The other wizards stared.

     Something was moving under his hat.

     Very carefully, he reached up and removed it.

     The very small gnome sitting on his head had a chimp of the Dean's hair in each hand. It blinked guiltily in the light.

     'Is there a problem?' it said.

     'Get it off me!' the Dean yelled.

     The wizards hesitated. They were  all vaguely  aware of the theory that very small creatures could pass on diseases, and  while the gnome was larger than  such creatures were generally  thought to be,  no  one wanted to catch Expanding Scalp Sickness.

     Susan grabbed it.

     'Are you the Hair Loss Fairy?' she said.

     `Apparently,' said the gnome, wriggling in her grip.

     The Dean ran his hands desperately through his hair.

     'What have you been doing with my hair?' he demanded.

     'Welt some of it I think I have to put on hairbrushes,' said the gnome, 'but sometimes I think I weave it into little mats to block up the bath with.'

     'What do you mean, you think?' said Ridcully.

     'Just a minute,' said Susan. She  turned to the oh god.  'Where exactly were you before I found you in the snow?'

     'Er ... sort of ... everywhere,  I think,' said the oh god. 'Anywhere where drink had  been  consumed in beastly quantities some time  previously, you could say.'

     'Ah-ha,' said Ridcully. 'You were an immanent vital force, yes?'

     'I suppose I could have been,' the oh god conceded.

     'And when we joked about the Hair Loss Fairy it suddenly focused on the Dean's head,' said Ridcully,  'where its operations  have been noticeable to all of us in recent months although of course we have been far too polite to pass comment on the subject.'

     'You're calling things into being,' said Susan.

     'Things like the Give  the Dean a Huge Bag  of  Money Goblin?' said the Dean,  who could think  very  quickly at times. He looked  around hopefully. 'Anyone hear any fairy tinkling?'

     'Do you often get given huge bags of money, sir?' said Susan.

     'Not on what you'd call a daily basis, no,' said the Dean. 'But if...'