The Dean looked uncertain.

'Well, er... I mean, it makes no sense, Archchancellor. He couldn't even do proper magic. What good would he be to anyone? Besides... where Rincewind went' - he lowered his voice - 'trouble followed behind.'

Ridcully noticed that the wizards drew a little closer together.

'Sounds all right to me,' he said. 'Best place for trouble behind. You certainly don't want it in front.'

'You don't understand, Archchancellor,' said the Dean. 'It followed behind on hundreds of little legs.'

The Archchancellor's smile stayed where it was while the rest of his face went solid behind it.

'You been on the Bursar's pills, Dean?'

'I assure you, Mustrum—'

'Then don't talk rubbish.'

'Very well, Archchancellor. But you do realize, don't you, that it might take years to find him?'

'Er,' said Ponder, 'if we can work out his thaumic signature, I think Hex could probably do it in a day...'

The Dean glared.

'That's not magic!' he snapped. 'That's just... engineering!'

Rincewind trudged through the shallows and used a sharp rock to hack the top off a coconut that had been cooling in a convenient shady rock pool. He put it to his lips.

A shadow fell across him.

It said, 'Er, hello?'

It was possible, if you kept on talking at the Arch-chancellor for long enough, that some facts might squeeze through.

'So what you're tellin' me,' said Ridcully, eventually, 'is that this Rincewind fella has been chased by just about every army in the world, has been bounced around life like a pea on a drum, and probably is the one wizard who knows anything about the Agatean Empire on account of once being friends with,' he glanced at his notes,' "a strange little man in glasses" who came from there and gave him this funny thing with the legs you all keep alluding to. And he can speak the lingo. Am I right so far?'