He stood now in Bugg’s office, hunched at the shoulders as if to make himself even narrower, and the high collar of his dark green cloak flared out like a snake’s hood behind his elongated, small-eared and hairless head. His regard was languid in that lifeless way of his as he studied Bugg. ‘Did I hear you correctly?’ the advocate asked in a voice that he tried hard to make sibilant, but which instead came out awkward and wavering. The effect, Bugg realized with a faint start, precisely matched what he would imagine a snake would sound like with words emerging from a lip-less mouth. Although, he added to himself, the specific question hardly seemed one he would expect a snake to utter. Snakes don’t ask for clarification.
Do they?
‘You wear a most odd expression,’ Sleem said after a moment. ‘Did my inability to understand you leave you confused, Master Bugg?’
‘Did you truly misunderstand?’
‘That is why I sought reiteration.’
‘Ah. Well, what did you think you heard?’
The eyes blinked. ‘Have we truly uttered all these words to return to my original query?’
‘I invite you to use some more, Sleem.’
‘Rather than simply repeating yourself.’
‘I hate repeating myself.’
Advocate Sleem, Bugg knew, despised discombobu-lation, although that was in all probability not even a word.
‘Master Bugg, as you know, I despise discombobulation.’
‘Oh, I’m sorry to hear that.’
‘You should be, since I charge by the word.’
‘Both our words, or just yours?’
‘It is a little late to ask that now, isn’t it?’ Sleem’s folded hands did something sinuous and vaguely disreputable. ‘You have instructed me, if I understand you correctly-and correct me if I am in error-you have instructed me, then, to approach your financier to request yet another loan with the stated intention to use it to pay a portion of the interest on the previous loan, which if I recall accurately, and I do, was intended to address in part the interest on yet another loan. This leads me to wonder, since I am not your only advocate, just how many loans you have arranged to pay interest on yet other loans?’
‘Well, that was expensive.’