'The Duke de Haberdasheri,' said Angalo proudly. 'Defender of the Mezzanine and Autocrat of the Staff Canteen.' 'He's three people?' said Masklin, puzzled.
'Those are his titles. Some of them. He's nearly the most powerful nome in the Store. Do you have things like fathers Outside?' Funny thing, Masklin thought. He's a rude little twerp except when he talks about the Outside, then he's like an eager little boy.
'I had one once,' he said. He didn't want to dwell on the subject.
'I bet you had- lots of adventures!' Masklin thought about some of the things that had happened to him - or, more accurately, had nearly happened to him - recently.
'Yes,' he said.
'I bet it was tremendous fun!' Fun, Masklin thought. It wasn't a familiar word. Perhaps it referred to running through muddy ditches with hungry teeth chasing you. 'Do you hunt?' he asked.
'Rats, sometimes. In the boiler-room. Of course, we have to keep them down.' He scratched Bobo behind an ear.
'Do you eat them?' Angalo looked horrified. 'Eat rat?' Masklin stared around at the piles of food. 'No, I suppose not,' he said. 'You know, I never realized there were so many nomes in the world. How many live here?' Angalo told him.
'Two what?' said Masklin.
Angalo repeated it.
'You don't look very impressed,' he said, when Masklin's expression didn't change.
Masklin looked hard at the end of his spear. It was a piece of flint he'd found in a field one day, and he'd spent ages teasing a bit of binder twine out of the haybale in order to tie it on to a stick. Right now it seemed about the one familiar thing in a bewildering world.
'I don't know,' he said. What is a thousand?' Duke Cido de Haberdasheri, who was also Lord Protector of the Up Escalator, Defender of the Mezzanine and Knight of the Counter, turned the Thing over in his hands, very slowly. Then he tossed it aside.