The Truth

Suddenly Mr Pin's arm was stretched out, his crossbow an inch from Mr Tulip's neck.

'No time to argue! Gimme the damn potato right now! This is no time for you to thinkV

Uncertain, but trusting as ever in Mr Pin's survival abilities in a tight corner, Mr Tulip pulled the thong of the potato over his head and handed it to Mr Pin.

'Right,' said Mr Pin, one side of his face beginning to twitch. The way I see it--'

'You better hurry!' said Mr Tulip. 'It's only a coupla inches away!' '--the way I see it, I'm a small man, Mr Tulip. You couldn't stand on me. I wouldn't do. You're a big man, Mr Tulip. I wouldn't want to see you suffer.'

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And he pulled the trigger. It was a good shot. 'Sorry,' he whispered, as the lead splashed. 'Sorry. I'm sorry. Sorry. But I wasn't born to fry...'

Mr Tulip opened his eyes.

There was darkness around him, but with a suggestion of stars overhead behind an overcast sky. The air was still, but there was distant soughing, as of wind in dead trees.

He waited a while to see if anything would happen, and then said: 'Anyone --ing there?'

JUST ME, MR TULIP.

Some of the darkness opened its eyes, and two blue glows looked down at him.

'The --ing bastard stole my potato. Are you --ing Death?'

JUST DEATH WILL SUFFICE, I THINK. WHO WERE YOU EXPECTING?

'Eh? For what?'

TO CLAIM YOU AS ONE OF THEIRS.

'Dunno, really. I never --ing thought...'

YOU NEVER SPECULATED?

'All I know is, you got to have your potato, and then it will be all right.' Mr Tulip parroted the sentence without thinking, but it was coming back now in the total recall of the dead, from a vantage point of two feet off the ground and three years of age. Old men mumbling. Old women weeping. Shafts of light through holy windows. The sound of wind under the doors, and every ear straining to hear the soldiers. Us or theirs didn't matter, when a war had gone on this long...

Death gave the shade of Mr Tulip a long, cool stare.

AND THAT'S IT?

'Right.'

You DON'T THINK THERE WERE ANY BITS YOU MIGHT HAVE MISSED?

... the sound of wind under the doors, the smell of the oil lamps, the fresh acid smell of snow, blowing in through the...

'And... if I'm sorry for everything...' he mumbled. He was lost in a world of darkness, without a potato to his name.

... candlesticks... they'd been made of gold, hundreds of years ago... there were only ever potatoes to eat, grubbed up from

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under the snow, but the candlesticks were of gold... and some old woman, she'd said: 'It'll all turn out right if you've got a potato

WAS ANY GOD OF SOME SORT MENTIONED TO YOU AT ANY POINT? 'NO...'

DAMN. I WISH THEY DIDN'T LEAVE ME TO DEAL WITH THIS SORT OF THING, Death sighed. You BELIEVE, BUT YOU DON'T BELIEVE IN ANYTHING.

Mr Tulip stood with his head bowed. More memories were trickling back now, like blood under a closed door. And the knob was rattling, and the lock had failed.

Death nodded at him.

AT LEAST YOU STILL HAVE YOUR POTATO, I SEE.

Mr Tulip's hand flew to his neck. There was something wizened and hard there, on the end of a string. It had a ghostly shimmer to it.

'I thought he got it!' he said, his face alight with hope.

AH, WELL. YOU NEVER KNOW WHEN A POTATO MIGHT TURN UP.

'So it's all going to be all right?'

WHAT DO YOU THINK?

Mr Tulip swallowed. Lies did not survive long out here. And more recent memories were squeezing under the door now, bloody and vengeful.

'I think it's gonna take more than a potato,' he said.

ARE YOU SORRY FOR EVERYTHING?

More unused bits of Mr Tulip's brain, which had shut down long ago or had never even opened up, came into play.

'How will I know?' he said.

Death waved a hand through the air. Along the arc described by the bony fingers appeared a line of hourglasses.

I UNDERSTAND YOU ARE A CONNOISSEUR, MR TULIP. IN A SMALL WAY, SO

AM I. Death selected one of the glasses and held it up. Images appeared around it, bright but insubstantial as shadow.

'What are they?' said Tulip.

LIVES, MR TULIP. JUST LIVES.- NOT ALL MASTERPIECES, OBVIOUSLY, OFTEN RATHER NAIF IN THEIR USE OF EMOTION AND ACTION, BUT NEVERTHELESS FULL OF INTEREST AND SURPRISE AND, EACH IN THEIR OWN WAY, A WORK OF SOME GENIUS. AND CERTAINLY VERY... COLLECTABLE. Death picked up an

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hourglass as Mr Tulip tried to back away. YES. COLLECTABLE. BECAUSE, IF I HAD TO FIND A WAY TO DESCRIBE THESE LIVES, MR TULIP, THAT WORD WOULD BE 'SHORTER'.

Death selected another hourglass. AH. NUGGA VELSKI. You WILL

NOT REMEMBER HIM, OF COURSE. HE WAS SIMPLY A MAN WHO WALKED INTO HIS RATHER SIMPLE LITTLE HUT AT THE WRONG TIME, AND YOU ARE A BUSY MAN AND CANNOT BE EXPECTED TO REMEMBER EVERYONE. NOTE THE MIND, A BRILLIANT MIND THAT MIGHT IN OTHER CIRCUMSTANCES HAVE CHANGED THE WORLD, DOOMED TO BE BORN INTO A TIME AND PLACE WHERE LIFE WAS NOTHING BUT A DAILY, HOPELESS STRUGGLE. NEVERTHELESS, IN HIS TINY VILLAGE, RIGHT UP UNTIL THE DAY HE FOUND YOU STEALING HIS COAT, HE DID HIS BEST TO----

Mr Tulip raised a trembling hand. 'Is this the bit where my whole life passes in front of my eyes?' he said.

NO, THAT WAS THE BIT JUST NOW.

'Which bit?'