“My mum's uncle was a sailor” said Nobby. “But after the big plague he got press-ganged. Bunch of farmers got him drunk, he woke up next morning tied to a plough.”

They lounged some more.

“Looks like we're going to be in a fight, sarge,” said Nobby, as the painter very carefully started on the final “k”.

“Won't last long. Lots of cowards, the Klatchians,” said Colon. “The moment they taste a bit of cold steel they're legging it away over the sand.”

Sergeant Colon had had a broad education. He'd been to the School of My Dad Always Said, the College of It Stands to Reason, and was now a postgraduate student at the University of What Some Bloke In the Pub Told Me.

“Shouldn't be any trouble to sort out, then?” said Nobby.

“And o'course, they're not the same colour as what we are,” said Colon. “Well… as me, anyway,” he added, in view of the various hues of Corporal Nobbs. There was probably no one alive who was the same colour as Corporal Nobbs.

“Constable Visit's pretty brown,” said Nobby. “I never seen him run away. If there's a chance of giving someone a religious pamphlet ole Washpot's after them like a terrier.”

“Ah, but Omnians are more like us,” said Colon. “Bit weird but, basic'ly, just the same as us underneath. No, the way you can tell a Klatchian is, you look an' see if he uses a lot of words beginning with ‘al’, right? “'Cos that's a dead giveaway. They invented all the words starting with ‘al’. That's how you can tell they're Klatchian. Like al-cohol, see?”

“They invented beer?”

“Yeah.”

“That's clever.”

“I wouldn't call it clever,” said Sergeant Colon, realizing too late that he'd made a tactical error. “More, luck, I'd say.”

“What else did they do?”

“Well, there's…” Colon racked his brains. “There's al-gebra. That's like sums with letters. For… for people whose brains aren't clever enough for numbers, see?”

“Is that a fact?”

“Right,” said Colon. “In fact,” he went on, a little more assertively now he could see a way ahead, “I heard this wizard down the University say that the Klatchians invented nothing. That was their great contribution to maffs, he said. I said ‘What?’ an' he said, they come up with zero.”

“Dun't sound that clever to me,” said Nobby. “Anyone could invent nothing. I ain't invented anything.”

“My point exactly,” said Colon. “I told him, it was people who invented numbers like four and, and—”

“—seven—”

“—right, who were the geniuses. Nothing didn't need inventing. It was just there. They probably just found it.”

“It's having all that desert,” said Nobby.

“Right! Good point. Desert. Which, as everyone knows, is basically nothing. Nothing's a natural resource to them. It stands to reason. Whereas we're more civilized, see, and we got a lot more stuff around to count, so we invented numbers. It's like… well, they say the Klatchians invented astronomy—”

“Al-tronomy,” said Nobby helpfully.

“No, no… no, Nobby, I reckon they'd discovered esses by then, probably nicked 'em off'f us… anyway, they were bound to invent astronomy, 'cos there's bugger all else for them to look at but the sky. Anyone can look at the stars and give 'em names. 's going it a bit to call it inventing, in any case. We don't go around saying we've invented something just because we had a quick dekko at it.”

“I heard where they've got a lot of odd gods,” said Nobby.

“Yeah, and mad priests,” said Colon. “Foaming at the mouth, half of 'em. Believe all kinds of loony things.”

They watched the painter in silence for a moment. Colon was dreading the question that came.

“So how exactly are they different from ours, then?” said Nobby. “I mean, some of our priests are—”

“I hope you ain't being unpatriotic,” said Colon severely.

“No, of course not. I was just asking. I can see where they'd be a lot worse than ours, being foreign and everything.”

“And of course they're all mad for fighting,” said Colon. “Vicious buggers with all those curvy swords of theirs.”

“You mean, like they viciously attack you while cowardly running away after tasting cold steel?” said Nobby, who sometimes had a treacherously good memory for detail.

“You can't trust 'em, like I said. And they burp hugely after meals.”

“Well… so do you, sarge.”

“Yes, but I don't pretend it's polite, Nobby.”

“Well, it's certainly a good job there's you around to explain things, sarge,” said Nobby. “It's amazing the stuff you know.”

“I surprise myself, sometimes,” said Colon modestly.

The painter of the ship leaned back to admire his work. They heard him give a heartfelt little groan, and both of them nodded in satisfaction.

Hostage negotiations were always tricky, Carrot had learned. It paid not to rush things. Let the other man talk when he was ready.

So he was whiling away the time sitting behind the upturned cart they were using as a shield from the occasional random arrow and writing his letter home. The exercise was carried out with much frowning, sucking of the pencil and what Commander Vimes called a ballistic approach to spelling and punctuation.

Dere Mum and Dade,

I hope this letter finds you in good health as I am also. Thank you for the big parcel of dwarf bread you sent me I have sharred it with the other dwarfs on the Watch and they say it is better even than Ironcrufts (“T'Bread Wi' T'Edge”) and you carn't beat the taste of a home-forged loaf, so well done mum.

Things are going well with the Wolf Pack that I have told you about but Cmdr. Vimes is not happy, I told him they were good lads at heart and it would help them to learn the ways of Natchure and the Wilderness and he said hah they know them already that is the trouble. But he gave me $5 to buy a football which proves he cares deep down.

We have more new faeces in the Watch which is just as well with this truble with Klatch, it is all looking very Grave, I feel it is the Clam before the Storm and no mistake.

I must brake off now because some robbers have broke into Vortin's Dimond Warehouse and have taken Corporal Angua hostage. I fear there may be terrible bloodshed so,

I remain,

Yr. Loving Son,

Carrot Ironfoundersson (Captain)

ps I will write again tomorrow

Carrot folded the letter carefully and slipped it under his breastplate.

“I think they have had long enough to consider our suggestion, constable. What's next on the list?”

Constable Shoe leafed through a file of grubby paper and pulled out another sheet

“Well, we're down to offences of stealing pennies off blind beggars now,” he said. “Oh, no, this is a good one…”

Carrot took the sheet in one hand and megaphone in the other and raised his head carefully over the edge of the cart.

“Good morning again!” he said brightly. “We've found another one. Theft of jewellery from—”

“Yes! Yes! We did it!” shouted a voice from the building.

“Really? I haven't even said what it was yet,” said Carrot.

“Never mind, we did it! Now can we come out, please?” There was another sound behind the voice. It sounded like a low, continuous growl.

“I think you ought to be able to tell me what you stole,” said Carrot.

“Er… rings? Gold rings?”

“Sorry, no rings mentioned.”

“Pearl necklace? Yes, that's what—”

“Getting warmer, but no.”

“Earrings?”

“Ooo, you're so close,” said Carrot encouragingly.

“A crown, was it? Maybe a coronet?”

Carrot leaned down to the constable. “Says here a tiara, Reg, can we let—?” He stood up. “We're prepared to accept ‘coronet’. Well done!”

He looked down at Constable Shoe again.

“This is all right, isn't it, Reg? It's not coercion, is it?”

“Can't see how it can be, captain. I mean, they broke in, they took a hostage…”

“I suppose you're right—”

“Please! No! Good boy! Down!”

“Seems to be about it, sir,” said Reg Shoe, peering around the edge of the cart. “We've got them down for everything but the Hide Park Flasher—”

“We did that!” screamed someone.

“—and that was a woman…”

“We did it!” This time the voice was a lot higher. “Now please can we come out?”

Carrot stood up and raised the megaphone. “If you gentlemen would care to step out with your hands up?”

“Are you joking?” whimpered someone, against the background of another growl.

“Well, at least with your hands where I can see them.”

“You bet, mister!”

Four men stumbled out into the street. Their tom clothing fluttered in the breeze. The apparent leader pointed an angry finger back at the doorway as Carrot walked towards them.

“The owner of that place ought to be prosecuted!” he shouted. “Keeping a wild animal like that in his strongroom, it's disgraceful! We broke in perfectly peacefully and it just attacked us for no reason at all!”

“You shot at Constable Shoe here,” said Carrot.

“Only to miss! Only to miss!”

Constable Shoe pointed at the arrow sticking into his breastplate.

“Right where it shows!” he complained. “It's a welding job and we have to pay for our own armour repairs and there'll always be a mark, you know, no matter what I do.”

Their horrified gaze took in the stitch marks around his neck and on his hands, and it dawned on them that although the human race came in a variety of colours, very few living people were grey with a hint of green.

“Here, you're a zombie!”

“That's right, kick a man when he's dead,” said Constable Shoe sharply.

“And you took Corporal Angua hostage. A lady,” said Carrot, in the same level voice. It was very polite. But it simply suggested that somewhere a fuse was burning, and it would be a good idea not to wait for it to reach the barrel.

“Yes… sort of… but she must've got away when that creature turned up…”

“So you left her in there?” said Carrot, still very calm.

The men dropped to their knees. The leader raised his hand imploringly.

“Please! We're just robbers and thieves! We're not bad men!”

Carrot nodded to Constable Shoe. “Take them down to the Yard, constable.”

“Right!” said Reg. There was a mean look in his eye as he cocked his crossbow. “I'm down ten dollars thanks to you. So you'd better not try to escape.”

“No, sir. Not us.”

Carrot wandered into the gloom of the building. Fearful faces peered out of doorways. He gave them a reassuring smile as he walked towards the strongroom.

Corporal Angua was adjusting her uniform.

“I didn't bite anyone, before you start,” she said, as he appeared in the doorway. “Not even flesh wounds. I just tore at their trousers. And that was no bed of roses, I might add.”

A frightened face appeared round the door.

“Ah, Mr Vortin,” said Carrot. “I think you will find that all is in order. They seem to have dropped everything.”

The diamond merchant looked at him in amazement.

“But they had a hostage—”

“They saw the error of their ways,” said Carrot.

“And… and there were snarling noises… sounded like a wolf…”

“Ah, yes,” said Carrot. “Well, you know, when thieves fall out…” Which was no kind of explanation, but because the tone of voice suggested that it was, Mr Vortin accepted it as such for fully five minutes after Carrot and Angua had left.

“Well, that's a nice start to the day,” said Carrot.

“Thank you, yes, I wasn't hurt,” said Angua.

“It makes it all seem worthwhile, somehow.”

“Just my hair messed up and another shirt ruined.”

“Well done.”

“Sometimes I might suspect that you don't listen to anything I say,” said Angua.

“Glad to hear it,” said Carrot.

The entire Watch was mustering. Vimes looked down at the sea of faces.

My gods, he thought. How many have we got now? A few years ago you could count the Watch on the fingers of a blind butcher's hand, and now…

There's more coming in!

He leaned sideways to Captain Carrot. “Who're all these people?”

“Watchmen, sir. You appointed them.”

“Did I? I haven't even met some of them!”

“You signed the paperwork, sir. And you sign the wage bill every month. Eventually.”

There was a hint of criticism in his voice. Vimes's approach to paperwork was not to touch it until someone was shouting, and then at least there would be someone to help him sort through the stacks.

“But how did they join?”

“Usual way, sir. Swore them in, gave them each a helmet—”

“Hey, that's Reg Shoe! He's a zombie! He falls to bits all the time!”

“Very big man in the undead community, sir,” said Carrot.

“How come he joined?”

“He came round last week to complain about the Watch harassing some bogeymen, sir. He was very, er, vehement, sir. So I persuaded him that what the Watch needed was some expertise, and so he joined up, sir.”

“No more complaints?”

“Twice as many, sir. All from undead, sir, and all against Mr Shoe. Funny, that.”

Vimes gave his captain a sideways look.

“He's very hurt about it, sir. He says he's found that the undead just don't understand the difficulties of policing in a multi-vital society, sir.”

Good gods, thought Vimes, that's just what I would have done. But I'd have done it because I'm not a nice person. Carrot is a nice person, he's practially got medals for it, surely he wouldn't have…

And he knew that he would never know. Somewhere behind Carrot's innocent stare was a steel door.

“You enrolled him, did you?”

“Nossir. You did, sir. You signed his joining orders and his kit chitty and his posting orders, sir.”

Vimes had another vision of too many documents, hurriedly signed. But he must have signed them and they needed the men, true enough. It was just that it ought to be him who—

“And anyone of sergeant rank or above can recruit, sir,” said Carrot, as if reading his mind. “It's in the General Orders. Page twenty-two, sir. Just below the tea stain.”

“And you've recruited… how many?”

“Oh, just one or two. We're still very short-handed, sir.”

“We are with Reg. His arms keep falling off.”

“Aren't you going to talk to the men, sir?”

Vimes looked at the assembled… well, multitude. There was no other word. Well, there were plenty, but none that it would be fair to use.

Big ones, short ones, fat ones, troll ones with the lichen still on, bearded dwarf ones, the looming pottery presence of the golem Constable Dorfl, undead ones… and even now he wasn't certain if that term should include Corporal Angua, an intelligent girl and a very useful wolf when she had to be. Waifs and strays, Colon had said once. Waifs and bloody strays, because normal people wouldn't be coppers.

Technically they were all in uniform, too, except that mostly they weren't wearing the same uniform as anyone else. Everyone had just been sent down to the armoury to collect whatever fitted, and the result was a walking historical exhibit: Funny-Shaped Helmets Through the Ages.

“Er… ladies and gentlemen—” he began.

“Be quiet, please, and listen to Commander Vimes!” bellowed Carrot.

Vimes found himself meeting the gaze of Angua, who was leaning against the wall. She rolled her eyes helplessly.

“Yes, yes, thank you, captain,” said Vimes. He turned back to the massed array of Ankh-Morpork's finest. He opened his mouth. He stared. And then he shut his mouth, all but a corner of it. And said out of that corner: “What's that little lump on Constable Flint's head?”

Vimes felt his stomach turn to lead.

Carrot arrived in the doorway.

“I lost them,” he panted. “There were three of them, I think. Can't see anything in this rain… Oh, it's you Mr Goriff. What happened here?”

“Captain Carrot! Someone threw a burning bottle through out window and then this beggar man rushed in and put it out!”

“What'd he say? What did you say?” said Vimes. “You speak Klatchian?”

“Not very well,” said Carrot modestly. “I just can't get the backof-the-throat sound to—”

“But… you can understand what he said?”

“Oh, yes. He just thanked you very much, by the way. It's all right, Mr Goriff, He's a watchman.”

“But you speak—”

Carrot knelt down and looked at the broken bottle.

“Oh, you know how it is. You come in here on night shift for a hot caraway bun and you just get chatting. You must have picked up the odd word, sir.”

“Well… vindaloo maybe, but…”

“This is a firebomb, sir.”

“I know, captain.”

“This is very bad. Who would do a thing like this?”

“Right now?” said Vimes. “Half the city, I should think.”

He looked helplessly at Goriff. He vaguely recognized the face. He vaguely recognized Mrs Goriff's face. They were… faces. They were usually at the other end of some arms holding a portion of carry or a kebab. Sometimes the boy ran the place. The shop opened very early in the morning and very late at night, when the streets were owned by bakers, thieves and watchmen.

Vimes knew the place as Mundane Meals. Nobby Nobbs had said that Goriff had wanted a word that meant ordinary, everyday, straight-forward, and had asked around until he found one he liked the sound of.

“Er… tell him… tell him you're staying here, and I'll go back to the Watch House and send someone out to relieve you,” said Vimes.

“Thank you,” said Goriff.

“Oh, you underst—” Vimes felt like an idiot. “Of course you do, you must have been here, what, five, six years?”

“Ten years, sir.”

“Really?” said Vimes manically. “That long? Really? My word… well, I'd better get along… Good morning to you—”

He hurried out into the rain.

I must have been going in there for years, he thought, as he splashed through the darkness. And I know how to say “vindaloo”. And… “korma”…? Carrot's hardly been here five minutes and he gargles the language like a native.

Good grief, I can get by in dwarfish and I can at least say, “cut down that rock, you're under arrest,” in troll, but…

He stamped into the Watch House, water pooling off him. Fred Colon was dozing quietly at the desk. In deference to the fact that he'd known Fred. All these years, Vimes was extra noisy about taking off his cape.

When he officially turned round, the sergeant was sitting at attention.

“I didn't know you were on tonight, Mr Vimes…”

“This is unofficial, Fred,” said Vimes. He accepted “Mr” from certain people. In an odd way, they'd earned it. “Send someone along to Mundane Meals in Scandal Alley, will you? A bit of trouble there.”

He reached the stairs.

“You stopping, sir?” said Fred.

“Oh, yes,” said Vimes grimly. “I've got to catch up on the paperwork.”

The rain fell on Leshp so hard it probably hadn't been worth the island's bother of rising from the bottom of the sea.

Most of the explorers slept in their boats now. There were buildings on the risen island, but…

…the buildings weren't quite right.

Solid Jackson peered out from the tarpaulin he'd rigged up on deck. Mist was rising off the soaking ground and was made luminous by the occasional flash of lightning.

The city, by storm light, looked far too malevolent. There were things he could recognize – columns and steps and archways and so on – but there were others… he shuddered. It looked as if people had once tried to add human touches to structures that were already ancient…

It was because of his son that everyone was staying in the boats.

A party of Ankh-Morpork fishermen had gone ashore that morning to search for the heaps of treasure that everyone knew littered the ocean bottom and had found a tiled floor, washed clean by the rain. Pretty blue and white squares showed a pattern of waves and shells, and, in the middle, a squid.

And Les had said, “That looks pretty big, Dad.”

And everyone had looked around at the weed-covered buildings and had shared the Thought, which remained unspoken but was made up of a lot of little thoughts like the occasional ripples in the pools, and the little splashes in the dark water of cellars that made the mind think of claws, winnowing the deeps, and the odd things that sometimes got washed up on beaches or turned up in nets. Sometimes you pulled things over the side that'd put a man off fish for life.

And suddenly no one wanted to explore any more, just in case they found something.

Solid Jackson pulled his head back under the cover.

“Why'n't we going home, Dad?” said his son. “You said this place gives you the willies.”

“All right, but they're Ankh–Morpork willies, see? And no foreigner's going to get his hands on them.”

“Dad?”

“Yes, lad?”

“Who was Mr Hong?”

“How should I know?”

“Only, when we was all heading back for the boats one of the other men said, ‘We all know what happened to Mr Hong when he opened the Three Jolly Luck Take-Away Fish Bar on the site of the old fish-god temple in Dagon Street on the night of the full moon, don't we…?’ Well, I don't know.”

“Ah…” Solid Jackson hesitated. Still, Les was a big lad now…

“He… closed up and left in a bit of a hurry, lad. So quick he had to leave some things behind.”

“Like what?”

“If you must know… half an earhole and one kidney.”

“Cool!”

The boat rocked, and wood splintered. Jackson jerked the cover up. Spray washed over him. Somewhere close in the wet darkness a voice shouted: “Why you not carrying lights, you second cousin of a jackal?”

Jackson pulled out the lantern and held it up.

“What're you doing in Ankh-Morpork territorial waters, you camel-eating devil?”

“These waters belong to us!”

“We were here first!”

“Yeah? We were here first!”

“We were here first first!”

“You damaged my boat! That's piracy, that is!”

There were other shouts around them. In the darkness the two flotillas had collided. Bowsprits tore away rigging. Hulls boomed. The controlled panic that is normal sailing became the frantic panic composed of darkness, spray and too much rigging coming unrigged.

At times like this the ancient traditions of the sea that unite all mariners should come to the fore and see them combine in the face of their common foe, the hungry and relentless ocean.

However, at this point Mr Arif hit Mr Jackson over the head with an oar.

“Hnh? Wuh?”

Vimes opened the only eye that appeared to respond. A horrible sight met it.

…I read him his rites, whereupon, he said up, yours copper. Sgnt Detritus then, cautioned him, upon which he said, ouch…

There may be a lot of things I'm not good at, thought Vimes, but at least I don't treat tile punctuation of a sentence like a game of Pin the Tail on the Donkey…

He rolled his head away from Carrot's fractured grammar. The pile of paper shifted under him.

Vimes's desk was becoming famous. Once there were piles, but they had slipped as piles do, forming this dense compacted layer that was now turning into something like peat. It was said there were plates and unfinished meals somewhere down there. No one wanted to check. Some people said they'd heard movement.

There was a genteel cough. Vimes rolled his head again and looked up into the big pink face of Willikins, Lady Sybil's butler. His butler too, technically, although Vimes hated to think of him like that.

“I think we had better proceed with alacrity, Sir Samuel. I have brought your dress uniform, and your shaving things are by the basin.”

“What? What?”

“You are due at the University in half an hour. Lady Sybil has vouchsafed to me that if you are not there she will utilize your intestines for hosiery accessories, sir.”

“Was she smiling?” said Vimes, staggering to his feet and making his way to the steaming basin on the wash stand.

“Only slightly, sir.”

“Oh gods…”

“Yes, sir.”

Vimes made an attempt at shaving while, behind him, Willikins brushed and polished. Outside, the city's clocks began to strike ten.

It must've been almost four when I sat down Vimes thought. I know I heard the shift change at eight, and then I had to sort out Nobby's expenses, that's advanced mathematics if ever there was some…

He tried to yawn and shave at the same time, which is never a good idea.

“Damn!”

“I shall fetch some tissue paper directly, sir,” said Willikins, without looking round. As Vimes dabbed at his chin, the butler went on: “I should like to take this opportunity to raise a matter of some import, sir…”

“Yes?” Vimes shared blearily at the red tights that seemed to be a major item of his dress uniform.

“Regretfully, I am afraid I must ask leave to give in my notice, sir. I wish to join the Colours.”

“Which colours are these, Willikins?” said Vimes, holding up a shirt with puffed sleeves. Then his brain caught up with his ears. “You want to become a soldier?”

“They say Klatch needs to be taught a sharp lesson, sir. A Willikins has never been found wanting when his country calls. I thought that Lord Venturi's Heavy Infantry would do for me. They have a particularly attractive uniform of red and white, sir. With gold frogging.”

Vimes pulled his boots on. “You've had military experience, have you?”

“Oh, no, sir. But I am a quick learner, sir, and I believe I have some prowess with the carving knife.” The butler's face showed a patriotic alertness.

“Yes, sir,” said Willikins, buffing up the ceremonial helmet.

“And you're off to fight the screaming hordes in Klatch, are you?”

“If it should come to that, sir,” said Willikins. “I think this is adequately polished now, sir.”

“A very sandy place, so they say.”

“Indeed, sir,” said Willikins, adjusting the helmet under Vimes's chin.

“And rocky. Very rocky. Lots of rocks. Dusty, too.”

“Very parched in parts, sir, I believe you are correct.”

“And so into this land of sand-coloured dust and sandcoloured rocks and sand-coloured sand you, Willikins, will march with your expertise in cutlery and your red and white uniform?”

“With the gold frogging, sir.” Willikins thrust out his jaw. “Yes, sir. If the need arises.”

“You don't see anything wrong with this picture?”

“Sir?”

“Oh, never mind.” Vimes yawned. “Well, we shall miss you, Willikins.” Others may not, he thought. Especially if they have time for a second shot.

“Oh, Lord Venturi says it'll all be over by Hogswatch, sir.”

“Really? I didn't know it had started.”

Vimes ran down the stairs and into a smell of curry.

“We saved you some, sir,” said Sergeant Colon. “You was asleep when the lad brought it round.”

“It was Goriff's kid,” said Nobby, chasing a bit of rice around his tin plate. “Enough for half the shift.”

“The rewards of duty,” said Vimes, hurrying towards the door.

“Bread and mango pickle and everything,” said Colon happily. “I've always said old Goriff isn't that bad for a rag'ead.”

A pool of sizzling oil… Vimes stopped at the door. The family, huddling together… He took out his watch. It was twenty past ten. If he ran—

“Fred, could you just step up to my office?” he said. “It won't take a moment.”

“Right, sir.”

Vimes ushered the sergeant up the stairs and closed the door.

Nobby and the other watchmen strained to listen, but there was no sound except for a low murmuring which went on for some time.

The door opened again. Vimes came down the stairs.

“Nobby, come up to the University in five minutes, will you? I want to stay in touch and I'm damned if I'm taking a pigeon with this uniform on.”

“Right, sir.”

Vimes left.

A few moments later Sergeant Colon walked carefully down to the main office. He had a slightly glassy look and walked back to his desk with the nonchalance that only the extremely worried try to achieve. He toyed with some paper for a while and then said:

“You don't mind what people call you, do you, Nobby?”

“I'd be minding the whole time if I minded that, sarge,” said Corporal Nobbs cheerfully.

“Right. Right! And I don't mind what people call me, neither.” Colon scratched his head. “Don't make sense, really. I reckon Sir Sam is missing too much sleep.”

“He's a very busy man, Fred.”

“Trying to do everything, that's his trouble. And… Nobby?”

“Yes?”

“It's Sergeant Colon, thanks.”

There was sherry. There was always sherry at these occasions. Seam Vimes could regard it dispassionately, since he always drank fruit juice these days. He'd heard they made sherry by letting wine go rotten He couldn't see the point of sherry.

“And you will try to look dignified, won't you?” said Lady Sybil, adjusting his cloak.

“Yes, dear.”

“What will you try to look?”

“Dignified, dear.”

“And please try to be diplomatic.”

“Yes, dear.”

“What will you try to be?”

“Diplomatic, dear.”

“You're using your ‘henpecked’ voice, Sam.”

“Yes, dear.”

“You know that's not fair.”

“No, dear.” Vimes raised a hand in a theatrical gesture of submission. “All right, all right. It's just these feathers. And these tights,” He winced and tried to do some surreptitious rearranging in an effort to prevent himself becoming the city's first hunchgroin. “I mean, supposing people see me?”

“Of course they'll see you, Sam. You're leading the procession. And I'm very proud of you.”

She brushed some lint off his shoulder.2

Feathers in my hat, Vimes thought glumly. And fancy tights. And a shiny breastplate. A breastplate shouldn't be shiny. It should be too denied to take a decent polish. And diplomatic talk? How should I know how to talk diplomatically?

“And now I must go and have a word with Lady Selachii,” said Lady Sybil. “You'll be all right, will you? You keep yawning.”

“Of course. Didn't get much sleep last night, that's all.”

“You promise not to run away?”

“Me? I never run—”

“You ran away before the big soiree for the Genuan ambassador. Everyone saw you.”

“I'd just got news that the De Bris gang were robbing Vortin's strongroom!”

“But you don't have to chase everyone, Sam. You employ people for that now.”

“We got 'em, though,” said Vimes, with satisfaction.

He'd enjoyed it immensely, too. It wasn't just the pursuit that was so invigorating, with his velvet cloak left behind on a tree and his hat in a puddle somewhere, it was the knowledge that while he was doing this he wasn't eating very small sandwiches and making even smaller talk. It wasn't proper police work, Vimes considered, unless you were doing something that someone somewhere would much rather you weren't doing.

When Sybil had disappeared into the crowd he found a handy shadow and lurked in it. It enabled him to see almost the whole of the University's Great Hall.

He quite liked the wizards. They didn't commit crimes. Not Vimes's type of crimes, anyway. The occult wasn't Vimes's beat. The wizards might well mess up the very fabric of time and space but they didn't lead to paperwork, and that was fine by Vimes. There were a lot of them in the hall, in all their glory. And there was nothing finer than a wizard dressed up formally, until someone could find a way of inflating a Bird of Paradise, possibly by using an elastic band and some kind of gas. But the wizards were getting a run for their money, because the rest of the guests were either nobles or guild leaders or both, and an occasion like the Convivium brought out the peacock in everyone.

“For Mrs Boos?” Vimes waggled a hand dismissively. “Nah… four camels, maybe four camels and a goat in a good light. And when she's had a shave.”

The milling guests turned at the sound of the Prince's explosion of laughter.

“Very good! Very good! I am afraid, commander, that some of your fellow citizens feel that just because my people invented advanced mathematics and allday camping we are complete barbarians who'd try to buy their wives at the drop of, shall we say, a turban. I am surprised they're giving me an honorary degree, considering how incredibly backward I am.”

“Oh? What degree is that?” said Vimes. No wonder this man was a diplomat. You couldn't trust him an inch, he thought in loops, and you couldn't help liking him despite it.

The Prince pulled a letter out of his robe.

“Apparently it's a Doctorum Adamus cum Flabello Dulci– Is there something wrong, Sir Samuel?”

Vimes managed to turn the treacherous laugh into a coughing fit. “No, no, nothing,” he said. “No.”

He desperately wanted to change the subject. And fortunately there was something here to provide just the opportunity.

“Why has Mr Ahmed got such a big curved sword slung on his back?” he said.

“Ah, you are a policeman, you notice such things—”

“It's hardly a concealed weapon, is it? It's nearly bigger than him. He's practically a concealed owner!”

“It's ceremonial,” said the Prince. “And he does fret so if he has to leave it behind.”

“And what exactly is his—”

“Ah, there you are,” said Ridcully. “I think we're just about ready. You know you go right at the front, Sam—”

“Yes, I know,” said Vimes. “I was just asking His Highness what—”

“—and if you, Your Highness, and you, Mr… my word, what a big sword, and you come back here and take your place among the honoured guests, and we'll be ready in a brace of sheikhs…”

What a thing it is to have a copper's mind, Vimes thought, as the great file of wizards and guests tried to form a dignified and orderly line behind him. Just because someone makes himself pleasant and likeable you start to be suspicious of him, for no other reason than the fact that anyone who goes out of their way to be nice to a copper has got something on their mind. Of course, he's a diplomat, but still… I just hope he never studied ancient languages, and that's a fact.

Someone tapped Vimes on the shoulder. He turned and looked right into the grin of 71-hour Ahmed.

“If hyou changing your mind, offendi, I give hyou twenty-five camels, no problem,” he said, pulling a clove from his teeth. “May your hloins be full of fruit.”

He winked. It was the most suggestive gesture Vimes had ever seen. “Is this another—” he began, but the man had vanished into the crowd.

“My loins be full of fruit?” he repeated to himself. “Good grief!”

71-hour Ahmed reappeared at his other elbow in a gust of cloves. “I go, I hcome back,” he growled happily. “The Prince hsays the degree is Doctor of Sweet Fanny Adams. A hwizard wheeze, yes? Oh, how we are laughing.”

And then he was gone.

The Convivium was Unseen University's Big Day. Originally it had just been the degree ceremony, but over the years it had developed into a kind of celebration of the amicable relationship between the University and the city, in particular celebrating the fact that people were hardly ever turned to clams any more. In the absence of anything resembling a Lord Mayor's Show or a state opening of Parliament, it was one of the few formal opportunities the citizens had of jeering at their social superiors, or at least at people wearing tights and ridiculous costumes.

It had grown so big that it was now held in the city's Opera House. Distrustful people – that is to say, people like Vimes – considered that this was so there could be a procession. There was nothing like the massed ranks of wizardry walking sedately through the city in a spirit of civic amicability to subtly remind the more thoughtful kind of person that it hadn't always been this way. Look at us, the wizards seemed to be saying. We used to rule this city. Look at our big staffs with the knobs on the end. Any one of these could do some very serious damage in the wrong hands so it's a good thing, isn't it, that they're in the right hands at the moment? Isn't it nice that we all get along so well?

And someone, once, had decided that the Commander of the Watch should walk in front, for symbolic reasons. That hadn't mattered for years because there hadn't been a Commander of the Watch, but now there was, and he was Sam Vimes. In a red shirt with silly baggy sleeves, red tights, some kind of puffed shorts in a style that went out of fashion, by the lock of it, at the time when flint was at the cutting edge of cutting-edge technology, a tiny shiny breastplate and a helmet with feathers in it.

And he really did need some sleep.

And he had to carry the truncheon.

He kept his eyes fixed on the damn thing as he walked out of the University's main gate. Last night's rain had cleaned the sky. The city steamed.

If he stared at the truncheon he didn't have to see who was giggling at him.

The downside was that he had to keep staring at the thing.

It said, on a little tarnished shield that he'd had to clean before reading it, Protecter of thee Kinge's Piece.

That had brightened the occasion slightly.

Feathers and antiques, gold braid and fur…

Perhaps it was because he was tired, or just because he was trying to shut out the world, but Vimes found himself slowing down into the traditional watchman's walk and the traditional idling thought process.

It was an almost Pavlovian response.4 The legs swung, the feet moved, the mind began to work in a certain way. It wasn't a dream state, exactly. It was just that the ears, nose and eyeballs wired themselves straight into the ancient “suspicious bastard” node of his brain, leaving his higher brain centre free to freewheel.

…Fur and tights… what kind of wear was that for a watchman? Bashed-in armour, greasy leather breeches and a tatty shirt with bloodstains on it, someone else's for preference… that was the stuff… nice feel of the cobbles through his boots, it was really comforting…

Behind him, confusion running up and down the ranks, the procession slowed down to keep in step.

…Hah, Protecter of thee Kinge's Piece indeed… he'd said to the old man who'd delivered it, “Which piece did you have in mind?” but that had fallen on stony ears… damn silly thing anyway, he'd thought, a short length of wood with a lump of silver on the end… even a constable got a decent sword, what was he supposed to do, wave it at people?… ye gods, it was months since he'd had a good walk through the streets… lot of people about today… some parade on, wasn't there…?

“Oh dear,” said Captain Carrot, in the crowd. “What's he doing?”

Next to him an Agatean tourist was industriously pulling the lever of his iconograph.

Commander Vimes stopped and, with a faraway look in his eyes, tucked his truncheon under one arm and reached up to his helmet.

The tourist locked up at Carrot and tugged his shirt politely.

“Please, what is he doing now?” he said.

“Er… he's… he's taking out…”

“Oh, no…” said Angua.

“…he's taking the ceremonial packet of cigars out of his helmet,” said Carrot. “Oh… and he's, he's lighting one…”

The tourist pulled the lever a few times.

“Very historic tradition?”

“Memorable,” murmured Angua.

The crowd had fallen silent. No one wanted to break Vimes's concentration. There was the big gusty silence of a thousand people holding their breath.

Rust glared at him.

The Patrician coughed.

“You have identified the assassin?” said the Patrician.

Carrot was expecting Vimes to say, “Alleged assassin, sir,” but instead he said:

“Yes. He is– He was called Ossie Brunt, sir. No other name that we know. Lived in Market Street. Did odd jobs from time to time. Bit of a loner. No relatives or friends that we can find. We are making enquiries.”

“And that's all you fellows know?” said Lord Downey.

“It took some time to identify him sir,” said Vimes stolidly.

“Oh? Why should that be?”

“Couldn't give you the technical answer, sir, but it looked to me like they wouldn't need to make him a coffin, they could just have posted him between two barn doors.”

“Was he acting alone?”

“We only found the one body, sir. And a lot of recently fallen masonry, so it looks as—”

“I meant does he belong to any organization? Any suggestion that he's anti-Klatchian?”

“Apart from him trying to kill one? Enquiries are continuing.”

“Are you taking this seriously, Vimes?”

“I have put my best men on the job, sir.” Who's looking worried? “Sergeant Colon and Corporal Nobbs.” Who's looking relieved? “Very experienced men. The keystones of the Watch.”

“Colon and Nobbs?” said the Patrician. “Really?”

“Yes, sir.”

Their gazes met, very briefly.

“We're getting some very threatening noises, Vimes,” said Vetinari.

“What can I say, sir? I saw someone up on the tower, I ran, someone shot the Prince with an arrow and then I found the man at the bottom of the tower very obviously dead, with a broken bow and a lot of rock beside him. The storm last night probably loosened things up. I can't make up facts that don't exist, sir.”

Carrot watched the faces round the table. The general expression was one of relief.

“A lone bowman,” said Vetinari. “An idiot with some kind of mad grudge. Who died in the execution of the, uh, attempted execution. And, of course, valiant action by our watchmen probably at least prevented an immediately fatal shot.”

“Valiant action?” said Downey. “I know Captain Carrot here ran towards the VIPs and Vimes headed for the tower, but frankly, Vimes, your strange behaviour beforehand—”

“Somewhat immaterial now,” said Lord Vetinari. Once again he adopted a slightly faraway voice, as if reporting to somebody else. “If Commander Vimes had not slowed down the procession, the wretch would undoubtedly have got a much better shot. As it was, the man panicked. Yes… the Prince, possibly, would accept that.”

“Prince?” said Vimes. “But the poor devil—”

“His brother,” said the Patrician.

“Ah. The nice one?”

“Thank you, commander,” said the Patrician. “Thank you, gentlemen. Do not let me detain you. Oh, Vimes… just a brief word, if you would be so good. Not you, Captain Carrot. I'm sure someone is committing some crime somewhere.”

Vimes remained staring at the far wall while the room emptied. Vetinari left his chair and went over to the window.

“Strange days indeed, commander,” he said.

“Sir.”

“For example, I gather that this afternoon Captain Carrot was on the roof of the Opera House firing arrows down towards the archery butts.”

“Very keen lad, sir.”

“It could well be that the distance between the Opera House and the targets is about the same, you know, as the distance between the top of the Barbican and the spot where the Prince was hit.”

“Just fancy that, sir.”

Vetinari sighed. “And why was he doing this?”

“It's a funny thing, sir, but he was telling me the other day that in fact it is still law that every citizen should do one hour's archery practice every day. Apparently the law was made in 1356 and it's never been—”

“Do you know why I sent Captain Carrot away just now, Vimes?”

“Couldn't say, sir.”

“Captain Carrot is an honest young man, Vimes.”

“Yes, sir.”

“And did you know that he winces when he hears you tell a direct lie?”

“Really, sir?” Damn.

“I can't stand to see his poor face twitch all the time, Vimes.”

“Very thoughtful of you, sir.”

“Where was the second bowman, Vimes?”

Damn! “Second bowman, sir?”

“Have you ever had a hankering to go on the stage, Vimes?”

Yes, at the moment I'd leap on it wherever it's heading, thought Vimes.

“No, sir.”

“Pity. I am certain you're a great loss to the acting profession. I believe you said the man had put the boards back after him.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Nailed them back?”

Blast. “Yes, sir.”

“From the outside.”

Damn. “Yes, sir.”

“A particularly resourceful lone bowman, then.”

Vimes didn't bother to comment. Vetinari sat down at his desk, raised his steepled fingers to his lips and stared at Vimes over the top of them.

“Colon and Nobbs are investigating this? Really?”

“Yes, sir.”

“If I were to ask you why, you'd pretend not to understand?”

Vimes let his forehead wrinkle in honest perplexity “Sir?”

“If you say ‘Sir?’ again in that stupid voice, Vimes, I swear there will be trouble.”

“They're good men, sir.”

“However, some people might consider them to be unimaginative, stolid and… how can I put this? …possessed of an inbuilt disposition to accept the first explanation that presents itself and then bunk off somewhere for a quiet smoke? A certain lack of imagination? An ability to get out of their depth on a wet pavement? A tendency to rush to judgement?”

“I hope you are not impugning my men, sir.”

“Vimes, Sergeant Colon and Corporal Nobbs have never been pugn'd in their entire lives.”

“Sir?”

“And yet… in fact, we do not need complications, Vimes. An ingenious lone madman… well, there are many madmen. A regrettable incident.”

“Yes, sir.” The man was looking harassed and Vimes felt there was room for a pinch of sympathy.

“Fred and Nobby don't like complications either, sir.”

“We need simple answers, Vimes.”

“Sir. Fred and Nobby are good at simple.”

The Patrician turned away and looked out over the city.

“Ah,” he said, in a quieter voice. “Simple men to see the simple truth.”

“This is a fact, sir.”

“You are learning fast, Vimes.”

“Couldn't say about that, sir.”

“And when they have found the simple truth, Vimes?”

“Can't argue with the truth, sir.”

“In my experience, Vimes, you can argue with anything.”

When Vimes had gone Lord Vetinari sat at his desk for a while, staring at nothing. Then he took a key from a drawer and walked across to a wall, where he pressed a particular area.

There was a rattle of a counterweight. The wall swung back.

The Patrician walked softly through the narrow passageway beyond. Here and there it was illuminated by a very faint glow from around the edges of the little panels which, if gently slid back, would allow someone to look out through the eyesockets of a handy portrait.

They were a relic of a previous ruler. Vetinari never bothered with them. Looking out of someone else's eyes wasn't the trick.

There was a certain amount of travel up dark stairways and along musty corridors. Occasionally he'd make movements the meaning of which might not be readily apparent. He'd touch a wall here and here, apparently without thinking, as he passed. Along one stone-flagged passage, lit only by the grey light from a window forgotten by everyone except the most optimistic flies, he appeared to play a game of hopscotch, robes flying around him and calves twinkling as he skipped from stone to stone.

These various activities did not seem to cause anything to happen. Eventually he reached a door, which he unlocked. He did this with some caution.

The air beyond was full of acrid smoke, and the steady pop-pop sound which he had begun to hear further back along the passage was now quite loud. It faltered for a moment, was followed by a much louder bang, and then a piece of hot metal whirled past the Patrician's ear and buried itself in the wall.

In the smoke a voice said, “Oh dear.”

It didn't seem unhappy, but sounded rather like the voice one might use to a sweet and ingratiating little puppy which, despite one's best efforts, is sitting next to a spreading damp patch on the carpet.

As the billows cleared the indistinct shape of the speaker turned to Vetinari with a wan little smile and said, “Fully fifteen seconds this time, my lord! There is no doubt that the principle is sound.”

That was one of Leonard of Quirm's traits: he picked up conversations out of the air, he assumed everyone was an interested friend, and he took it for granted that you were as intelligent as he was.

Vetinari peered at a small heap of bent and twisted metal.

“What was it, Leonard?” he said.

“An experimental device for turning chemical energy into rotary motion,” said Leonard. “The problem, you see, is getting the little pellets of black powder into the combustion chamber at exactly the right speed and one at a time. If two ignite together, well, what we have is the external combustion engine.”

“And, er, what would be the purpose of it?” said the Patrician.

“I believe it could replace the horse,” said Leonard proudly.

They looked at the stricken thing.

“One of the advantages of horses that people often point out,” said Vetinari, after some thought, “is that they very seldom explode. Almost never, in my experience, apart from that unfortunate occurrence in the hot summer a few years ago.” With fastidious fingers he pulled something out of the mess. It was a pair of cubes, made out of some soft white fur and linked together by a piece of string. There were dots on them.

“Dice?” he said.

Leonard smiled in an embarrassed fashion. “Yes. I can't think why I thought they'd help it go better. It was just, well, an idea. You know how it is.”

Lord Vetinari nodded. He knew how it was. He knew how it was far more than Leonard of Quirm did, which was why there was one key to the door and he had it. Not that the man was a prisoner, except by dull, humdrum standards. He appeared rather grateful to be confined in this light, airy attic with as much wood, paper, sticks of charcoal and paint as he desired and no rent or food bills to pay.

In any case, you couldn't really imprison someone like Leonard of Quirm. The most you could do was lock up his body. The gods alone knew where his mind went. And, although he had so much cleverness it leaked continually, he couldn't tell you which way the political wind was blowing even if you fitted him with sails.

Leonard's incredible brain sizzled away alarmingly, an overloaded chip pan on the Stove of Life. It was impossible to know what he would think of next, because he was constantly reprogrammed by the whole universe. The sight of a waterfall or a soaring bird would send him spinning down some new path of practical speculation that invariably ended in a heap of wire and springs and a cry of “I think I know what I did wrong.” He'd been a member of most of the craft guilds in the city but had been thrown out for getting impossibly high marks in the exams or, in some cases, correcting the questions. It was said that he'd accidentally blown up the Alchemists' Guild using nothing more than a glass of water, a spoonful of acid, two lengths of wire and a pingpong ball.

Any sensible ruler would have killed off Leonard, and Lord Vetinari was extremely sensible and often wondered why he had not done so. He'd decided that it was because, imprisoned in the priceless, enquiring amber of Leonard's massive mind, underneath all that bright investigative genius was a kind of wilful innocence that might in lesser men be called stupidity. It was the seat and soul of that force which, down the millennia, had caused mankind to stick its fingers in the electric light socket of the Universe and play with the switch to see what happened – and then be very surprised when it did.

It was, in short, something useful. And if the Patrician was anything, he was the political equivalent of the old lady who saves bits of string because you never know when they might come in handy.

After all, you couldn't plan for every eventuality, because that would involve knowing what was going to happen, and if you knew what was going to happen, you could probably see to it that it didn't, or at least happened to someone else. So the Patrician never planned. Plans often got in the way.

And, finally, he kept Leonard around because the man was easy to talk to. He never understood what Lord Vetinari was talking about, he had a world view about as complex as that of a concussed duckling and, above all, never really paid attention. This made him an excellent confidant. After all, when you seek advice from someone it's certainly not because you want them to give it. You just want them to be there while you talk to yourself.

“I've just made some tea.” said Leonard. “Will you join me?”

He followed the Patrician's gaze to a brown stain all up one wall, which ended in a star of molten metal in the plaster.

“I'm afraid the automatical tea engine went wrong,” he said. “I shall have to make it by hand.”

“So kind,” said Lord Vetinari.

He sat down amidst the easels and, while Leonard busied himself at the fireplace, leafed through the latest sketches. Leonard sketched as automatically as other people scratched; genius – a certain kind of genius – fell off him like dandruff.

There was a picture of a man drawing, the lines catching the figure so accurately it appeared to stand out of the paper. And around it, because Leonard never wasted white space, were other sketches, scattered aimlessly. A thumb. A bowl of flowers. A device, apparently, for sharpening pencils by water power…

Vetinari found what he was looking for in the bottom lefthand corner, sandwiched between a sketch for a new type of screw and a tool for opening oysters. It, or something very much like it, was always there somewhere.

One of the things that made Leonard such a rare prize, and kept him under such secure lock and key, was that he really didn't see any difference between the thumb and the roses and the pencil-sharpener and this.

“Ah, the self-portrait,” said Leonard, returning with two cups.

“Yes, indeed,” said Vetinari. “But my eye was drawn to this little sketch here. The war machine…”

“Oh, that? A mere nothing. Have you ever noticed the way in which the dew on roses—”

“This bit here… what is it for?” said Vetinari, pointing persistently.

“Oh, that? That's just the throwing arm for the balls of molten sulphur,” said Leonard, picking up a plate of small cakes. “I calculate that one should get a range of almost half a mile, if one detaches the endless belt from the driving wheels and uses the oxen to wind the windlass.”

“Really?” said Vetinari, taking in the carefully numbered parts. “And it could be built?”

“What? Oh, yes. Macaroon? In theory.”

“In theory?”

“No one would ever actually do it. Raining unquenchable fire down upon fellow humans? Hah!” Leonard sprayed macaroon crumbs. “You'd never find an artisan to build it, or a soldier who would pull the lever… That's part 3(b) on the plan, just here, look…”

“Ah, yes,” said Vetinari. “Anyway,” he added, “I imagine these huge power arms here couldn't possibly be operated without them breaking…”

“Seasoned ash and yew, laminated and held together by special steel bolts,” said Leonard promptly. “I made a few calculations, just there below the sketch of light on a raindrop. As an intellectual exercise, obviously.”

“I'd hate to watch him try. Good grief… the only thing he could be sure of hitting with a bow like that would be his foot. By the way, do you think anyone saw you up there?”

“I doubt it, sir. I was right in among the chimneys and the air vents.”

Vimes sighed. “Captain, I expect if you'd done it in a cellar at midnight his lordship would have said ‘Wasn't it rather dark down there?’ next morning.”

He took out the by now rather creased picture. There was Carrot – or at least Carrot's arm and ear – as he ran towards the procession. And there, among the people in the procession turning to look at him, was the face of the Prince. There was no sign of 71-hour Ahmed. He'd been at the soiree, hadn't he? But then there'd been all that milling around at the door, people changing places, treading on one another's robes, nipping back to the privy, walking into one another… He could have gone anywhere.

“And the Prince fell as you got to him? With the arrow in his back? He was still facing you?”

“Yes, sir. I'm sure of that. Everyone else was milling around, of course…”

“So he was shot in the back by a man in front of him who could not possibly have used the bow that he didn't shoot him with from the wrong direction…”

There was a tapping at the window.

“That'll be Downspout,” said Vimes, without looking round. “I sent him on an errand…”

Downspout never quite fitted in. It wasn't that he didn't get on with people, because he hardly ever met people, except those whose activities took them above, say, second-floor level. Constable Downspout's beat was the rooftops. Very slowly. He'd come down for the Watch's Hogswatch party and had poured gravy in his ears to show willing, but gargoyles got very nervy indoors at ground level and he had soon exited via the chimney and his paper squeaker had echoed out forlornly amongst the snowy rooftops all night.

But gargoyles were good at watching, and good at remembering, and very, very good at being patient.

Vimes opened the window. Moving jerkily, Downspout unfolded himself into the room and then quickly scrambled up on to a corner of Vimes's desk, for the comfort that it brought.

Angua and Carrot stared at the arrow the gargoyle held in his hand.

“Ah, well done,” said Vimes, in the same even voice. “Where did you find it, Downspout?”

Downspout spluttered a series of guttural syllables only pronounceable by someone with a mouth shaped like a pipe.

“In the wall on the second floor of the dress shop in the Plaza of Broken Moons,” Carrot translated.

“'eshk,” said Downspout.

“That's barely halfway to Sator Square, sir.”

“Yes,” said Vimes. “A small weak man trying to pull a heavy bow, the arrow wobbling all over the place… Thank you very much, Downspout. There will be an extra pigeon for you this week.”

“'nkorr,” said Downspout, and clambered back out of the window.

“Excuse me, sir?” said Angua. She took the arrow from Vimes and, closing her eyes, sniffed at it gingerly.

“Oh, yes… Ossie,” she said. “All over it…”

“Thank you, corporal. It's as well to be sure.”

Carrot took the arrow from the werewolf and looked at it critically. “Huh. Peacock feathers and a plated point. It's the sort of thing an amateur buys because he thinks it'll magically improve his shot. Showy.”

“Right,” said Vimes. “You, Carrot, and you, Angua… you're on the case.”

“Sir, I don't understand,” said Carrot. “I am perplexed. I thought you said Fred and Nobby were investigating this?”

“Yes,” said Vimes.

“But—”

“Sergeant Colon and Corporal Nobbs are investigating why the late Ossie tried to kill the Prince. And do you know what? They're going to find lots of clues. I just know it. I can feel it in my water.”

“But we know he couldn't–” said Carrot.

“Isn't this fun?” said Vimes. “I don't want you to get in Fred's way. Just… ask around. Try Done It Duncan, or Sidney Lopsides, hah, there's a man with his ear to the ground all right. Or the Agony Aunts, or Lily Goodtime. Or Mr Slider, haven't seen him around for a while, but—”

“He's dead, sir,” said Carrot.

“What, Smelly Slider? When?”

“Last month, sir. He got hit by a falling bedstead. Freak accident, sir.”

“No one told me.”

“You were busy, sir. But you put some money in the envelope when Fred brought it round, sir. Ten dollars, which Fred remarked was very generous.”

Vimes sighed. Oh, yes, the envelopes. Fred was always wandering around with an envelope these days. Someone was always leaving, or some friend of the Watch was in trouble, or there was a raffle, or the tea money was low again, or some complicated explanation… so Vimes just put some money in. Simplest way.

Old Smelly Slider…

“You should've mentioned it,” he said reproachfully.

“You've been working hard, sir.”

“Any other street news you haven't mentioned, captain?”

“Not that I can think of, sir.”

“All right. Well… see which way the wind is blowing. Very carefully. And – trust no one.”

Carrot looked worried.

“Er… I can trust Angua, can't I?” he said.

“Well, of course you—”

“And you, presumably.”

“Me, well, obviously. That goes without say—”

“Corporal Littlebottom? She can be very helpful—”

“Cheery, yes, certainly you can trust—”

“Sergeant Detritus? I always thought he was very trust—”

“Detritus, oh yes, he—”

“Nobby? Should I—”

“Carrot, I understand what he means,” said Angua, tugging his arm.

Carrot looked a little crestfallen. “I've never liked… you know, underhand things,” he mumbled.

“I don't want any written reports,” said Vimes, grateful for that small mercy. “This is… unofficial. But officially unofficial, if you see what I mean.”

Angua nodded. Carrot just stayed looking dismal.

She's a werewolf, thought Vimes, of course she understands. And you'd think a man who is technically a dwarf'd be able to fold his head around the idea of subterfuge.

“Look, just… listen to the streets,” said Vimes. “The streets know everything. Talk to… Blind Hugh—”

“I'm afraid he passed away last month,” said Carrot.

“Did he? No one told me!”

“I thought I sent you a memo, sir.”

Vimes glanced guiltily at his overloaded desk, and then shrugged.

“Have a quiet look at things. Get to the bottom of things. And trust no– Trust practically no one. All right? Except trustworthy people.”

“Come on, open up! Watch business!”

Corporal Nobbs pulled at Sergeant Colon's sleeve and whispered in his ear.

“Not Watch business!” said Colon, pounding the door again. “Nothing to do with the Watch at all! We are just civilians, all right?”

The door opened a crack.

“Yes?” said a voice that counted its small change.

“We have to ask you some questions, missus.”

“Are you the Watch?” said the voice.

“No! I think I just made that clear—”

“Piss off, copper!”

The door slammed.

“You sure this is the right place, sarge?”

“Harry Chestnuts said he saw Ossie going in here. Come on, open up!”

“Everyone's looking at us, sarge,” said Nobby. Doors and windows had opened all along the street.

“And don't call me sarge when we're in plain clothes!”

“Right you are, Fred.”

“That's—” Colon hesitated in an agony of status. “Well, that's Frederick to you, Nobby.”

“And they're giggling Fred… er… crick.”

“We don't want to make a cock-up of this, Nobby.”

“Right, Frederick. And that's Cecil, thank you.”

“Cecil?”

“That is my name,” said Nobby coldly.

“Have it your way,” said Colon. “Just remember who's the superior civilian around here, all right?”

He hammered on the door again.

“We hear you've got a room to let, missus!” he yelled.

“I can't imagine,” said Angua.

“It's just amazing the stuff they've got. False hair, false noses, false beards, even false…” He hesitated, and began to blush. “Even false… you know, chests. For ladies. But I can't imagine for the life of me why they'd want to disguise those.”

He probably couldn't, Angua thought. She took the very small book from Carrot and glanced through it. She sighed.

“Carrot, these disguises are meant for a potato.”

“Are they?”

“Look, they're all on potatoes, see?”

“I thought that was just for display.”

“Carrot, it's got ‘Mr Spuddy Face’ on it.”

Behind his thick black moustache Carrot looked hurt and perplexed. “What does a potato want a disguise for?” he said.

They'd reached the alley alongside the University that had been known informally as Scholars' Entry for so many centuries that this was now on a nameplate at one end. A couple of student wizards went past.

The unofficial entrance to the University has always been known only to students. What most students failed to remember was that the senior members of the faculty had also been students once, and also liked to get out and about after the official shutting of the gates. This naturally led to a certain amount of embarrassment and diplomacy on dark evenings.

Carrot and Angua waited patiently as a few more students climbed over, followed by the Dean.

“Good evening, sir,” said Carrot, politely.

“Good evening to you, Spuddy,” said the Dean, and ambled off into the night.

“You see?”

“Ah, but he didn't call me Carrot,” said Carrot. “The principle is sound.”

They dropped down on to lawns of academia and headed for the library.

“It'll be shut,” said Angua.

“Remember, we have a man on the inside,” said Carrot, and knocked.

The door opened a little way. “Ook?”

Carrot raised his horrible little round hat.

“Good evening, sir, I wonder if we could come in? It's Watch business.”

“Ook eek ook?”

“Er…”

“What did he say?” said Angua.

“If you must know, he said, ‘My goodness me, a walking potato,’” said Carrot.

The Librarian wrinkled his nose at Angua. He did not like the smell of werewolves. But he beckoned them inside and then left them waiting while he knuckled back to his desk and rummaged in a drawer. He produced a Watch Special Constable's badge on a string, which he hung around the general area where his neck should have been, and then stood as much to attention as an orang-utan can, which is not a great deal. The central ape gets the idea but outlying areas are slow to catch on.

“Ook ook!”

“Was that ‘How may I be of assistance, Captain Tuber?’” said Angua.

“We need to have a look on the fifth floor, overlooking the square,” said Carrot, a shade coldly.

“Ook oook – ook.”

“He says that's just old storerooms,” said Carrot.

“And that last ‘ook’?” said Angua.

“‘Mr Horrible Hat’,” said Carrot.

“Still, he hasn't worked out who you are, eh?” said Angua.

The fifth floor was a corridor of airless rooms, smelling sadly of old, unwanted books. They were stacked not on shelves but on wide racks, bundled up with string. A lot of them were battered and missing their covers. Judging by what remained, though, they were old textbooks that not even the most ardent bibliophile could treasure.

Carrot picked up a torn copy of Woddeley's Occult Primer. Several loose pages fell out. Angua picked one up.

“‘Chapter Fifteen, Elementary Necromancy’,” she read aloud. “‘Lesson One: Correct Use of Shovel…’”

She put it down again and sniffed the air. The presence of the Librarian filled the nasal room like an elephant in a matchbox, but—

“Someone else has been in here,” she said. “In the last couple of days. Could you leave us, sir? When it comes to odours, you're a bit… forthright…”

“Ook?”

The Librarian nodded at Carrot, shrugged at Angua and ambled out.

“Don't move,” said Angua. “Stay right where you are, Carrot. Don't disturb the air…”

She inched forward carefully.

Her ears told her the Librarian was down the corridor, because she could hear the floorboards creaking. But her nose told her that he was still here. He was a little fuzzy, but—

“I'm going to have to change,” she said. “I can't get a proper picture this way. It's too strange.”

Carrot obediently shut his eyes. Shed forbidden him to watch her en route from a human to a wolf, because of the unpleasant nature of the shapes in between. Back in Überwald people went from one shape to the other as naturally as ordinary humans would put on a different coat, but even there it was considered polite to do it behind a bush.

When he re-opened them Angua was slinking forward, her whole being concentrated in her nose.

The olfactory presence of the Librarian was a complex shape, a mere purple blur where he had been moving but almost a solid figure where he'd been standing still. Hands, face, lips… they'd be just the centre of an expanding cloud in a few hours' time, but now she could still smell them out.

There must be only the tiniest air currents in here. There weren't even any flies buzzing in the dead air to cause a ripple of disturbance.

She edged nearer to the window. Vision was a mere shadowy presence, providing a charcoal sketch of a room over which the scents painted their glorious colours.

By the window… by the window…

Yes! A man had stood there, and by the scent of it he hadn't moved for some time. The smell wavered in the air, on the edge of her nasal skill. The curling, billowing traces said that the window had been opened and closed again, and was there just the merest, tiniest suggestion that he'd held an arm out in front of him?

Her nose raced, trying to form original shapes from the patterns hanging in the room like dead smoke…

When she'd finished, Angua went back to her pile of clothes and coughed politely while she was pulling on her boots.

“There was a man standing by the window,” she said. “Long hair, a bit dry, stinks of expensive shampoo. He was the man who nailed the boards back after Ossie got into the Barbican.”

“Are you sure?”

“Is this nose ever wrong?”

“Sorry. Go on.”

“I'd say he was heavy-set, a bit bulky for his height. He doesn't wash a lot, but when he does he uses Windpike's Soap, the cheap brand. But expensive shampoo, which is odd. Quite new boots. And a green coat.”

“You can smell the colour?”

“No. The dye. It comes from Sto Lat, I think. And… I think he shot a bow. An expensive bow. There's a hint of silk in the air, and that's what the strongest bowstrings are made of, isn't it? And you wouldn't put one of those on a cheap bow.”

Carrot stood by the window. “He got a good view,” he said, and looked down at the floor. And then at the sill. And on the shelves nearby.

“How long was he here?”

“Two or three hours, I'd say.”

“He didn't move around much.”

“No.”

“Or smoke, or spit. He just stood and waited. A professional. Mr Vimes was right.”

“A lot more professional than Ossie,” said Angua.

“Green coat,” said Carrot, as if thinking aloud. “Green coat, green coat…”

“Oh… and bad dandruff,” said Angua, standing up.

“Snowy Slopes?!” shouted Carrot.

“What?”

“Really bad dandruff?”

“Oh, yes, it—”

“That's why they call him Snowy,” said Carrot. “Daceyville Slopes, the man with the reinforced comb. But I'd heard he'd moved to Sto Lat—”

In unison they said: “—where the dye comes from—”

“Is he good with a bow?” said Angua.

“Very good. He's good at killing people he never met, too.”

“He's an Assassin, is he?”

“Oh, no. He just kills people for money. No style. Snowy can't read and write.”

Carrot scratched his head in sympathetic recollection. “He doesn't even look at complicated pictures. We'd have got him last year, but he shook his head fast and got away while we were trying to dig out Nobby. Well, well. I wonder where he's staying?”

“Don't ask me to follow him in these streets. Thousands of people will have walked over the trail.”

“Oh, there's people who will know. Someone sees everything in this town.”

MR SLOPES?

Snowy Slopes gingerly felt his neck, or at least the neck of his soul. The human soul tends to keep to the shape of the original body for some time after death. Habit is a wonderful thing.

“Who the hell was he?” he said.

NOT SOMEONE YOU KNOW? said Death.

“Well, no! I don't know many people who cut my head off!”

Snowy Slopes's body had knocked against the table as it fell. Several bottles of medicated shampoo now dripped and mixed their contents into the other more intimate fluids from the Slopes corpse.

“That stuff with the special oil in it cost me nearly four dollars,” said Snowy. Yet, somehow, it all seemed slightly… irrelevant now. Death happens to other people. The other person in this case had been him. That is, the one down there. Not the one standing here looking at it. In life, Snowy hadn't even been able to spell “metaphysical”, but he was already beginning to view life in a different way. From the outside, for a start.

“Four dollars,” he repeated. “I never even had time to try it!”

IT WOULDN'T HAVE WORKED, said Death, patting the man on a fading shoulder. BUT, IF I MIGHT SUGGEST THAT YOU LOOK ON THE BRIGHT SIDE, IT WILL NO LONGER BE NECESSSARY.

“No more dandruff?” said Snowy, now quite transparent and fading fast.

EVER, said Death. TRUST ME ON THIS.

Commander Vimes ran down darkened streets, trying to buckle on his breastplate as he ran.

“All right, Cheery, what's happening?”

“They say a Klatchian killed someone, sir. There's a mob up in Scandal Alley and it's looking bad. I was on the desk and I thought you ought to be told, sir.”

“Right!”

“And anyway I couldn't find Captain Carrot, sir.”

A little bit of acid ink scribbled its subtle entry on the ledger of Vimes's soul.

“Oh, gods… so who's the officer in charge?”

“Sergeant Detritus, sir.”

It seemed to the dwarf that she was suddenly standing still. Commander Vimes had become a rapidly disappearing blur.

With the calm expression of someone who was methodically doing his duty, Detritus picked up a man and used him to hit some other men. When he had a clear area around him and a groaning heap of former rioters, he climbed the heap and cupped his hands round his mouth.

“Listen to me, youse people!”

A troll shouting at the top of his voice could easily be heard above a riot. When he seemed to have their attention he pulled a scroll out of his breastplate and waved it over his head.

“Dis is der Riot Act,” he said. “You know what dat means? It means if'n I reads it out and youse don't disb… disp… go away, der Watch can use deadly force, you unnerstand?”

“What did you just use, then?” moaned someone from underneath his feet.

“Dat was you helpin' der Watch,” said Detritus, shifting his weight.

He unrolled the scroll.

Although there was some scuffling in alleyways and shouts from the next street, a ring of silence expanded outwards from the troll. An almost genetic component of the citizens of Ankh-Morpork was their ability to spot an opportunity for amusement.

Detritus held the document at arm's length. And then a few inches from his face. He tried turning it round a few times.

His lips moved uneasily.

Finally, he leaned down and showed it to Constable Visit.

“What dis word?”

“That's ‘Whereby’, sergeant.”

“I knew dat.”

He straightened up again.

“‘Whereby… it is…’” Beads of the troll equivalent of sweat began to form on Detritus's forehead. “‘Whereby it is… ack-no-legg-ed…’”

“Acknowledged,” whispered Constable Visit.

“I knew dat.” Detritus stared at the paper again, and then gave up. “Youse don't want to stand here listenin' to me all day!” he bellowed. “Dis is der Riot Act and you've all got to read it, right? Pass it round.”

“What if we don't read it?” said a voice in the crowd.

“You got to read it. It legal.”

“And then what happens?”

“Den I shoot you,” said Detritus.

“That's not allowed!” said another voice. “You've got to shout ‘Stop! Armed Watchman!’ first.”

“Sure, dat suits me,” said Detritus. He shrugged one huge shoulder to bring his crossbow under his arm. It was a siege bow, intended to be mounted on the cart. The bolt was six feet long. “It harder to hit runnin' targets.”

He released the safety catch.

“Anyone finishing readin' dat thing yet?”

“Sergeant!”

Vimes pushed his way through the crowd. And it was a crowd now. Ankh-Morpork was always a good audience.

There was a clang as Detritus saluted.

“Were you proposing to shoot these people in cold blood, sergeant?”

“Nossir. Just a warning shot inna head, sir.”

“Really? Just give me a moment to talk to them, then.”

Vimes looked at the man next to him. He was holding a flaming torch in one hand and a long length of wood in the other. He gave Vimes the nervously defiant stare of someone who has just felt the ground shift under his feet.

Vimes pulled the torch towards him and lit a cigar. “What's happening here, friend?”

“The Klatchians have been shooting people, Mr Vimes! Unprovoked attack!”

“Really?”

“People have been killed!”

“Who?”

“I… there were… everyone knows they've been killing people!” The man's mental footsteps found safer ground. “Who do they think they are, coming over—”

“That's enough,” said Vimes. He stood back and raised his voice.

“I recognize a lot of you,” he said. “And I know you've got homes to go to. See this?” He pulled his baton of office out of his pocket. “This says I've got to keep the peace. So in ten seconds I'm going somewhere else to find some peace to keep, but Detritus is going to stay here. And I just hope he doesn't do anything to disgrace the uniform. Or get it very dirty, at least.”

Irony was not a degree-level subject among the listeners, but the brighter ones recognized Vimes's expression. It said that here was a man hanging on to his patience by his teeth.

The mob dispersed, going ragged at the edges as people legged it down side alleys, threw away their makeshift weapons and emerged at the other end walking the grave, thoughtful walk of honest citizens.

“All right, what happened?” said Vimes, turning to the troll.

“We're hearing where dis boy shot dis man,” said Detritus. “We got here, next minute it rainin' people from everywhere, shoutin'.”

“He smote him as Hudrun smote the fleshpots of Ur,” said Constable Visit.6

“Smote?” said Vimes, bewildered. “He killed someone?”

“Not by der way der man was cussing, sir,” said Detritus. “Hit him in der arm. His friends brought him round der Watch House to complain. He a baker on der night shift. He said he was late for work, he come runnin' in to pick up his dinner, next minute he flat on der floor.”

Vimes walked across the street and tried the door of the shop. It opened a little way, and then fetched up against what seemed to be a barricade. Furniture had been piled up against the window as well.

“How many people were there, constable?”

“A multitude thereof, sir.”

And four people in here, thought Vimes. A family. The door moved a fraction and Vimes realized he was ducking even before the crossbow protruded.

There was a strip of cloth hiding the lower half of his face. He thrust another strip towards Vimes.

“Across your nose and mouth!” he commanded. “For the smoke!”

It was boiling across the roof. Beside Vimes a chimneypot gushed a roaring tongue of flame.

The rest of the unwound turban was thrust into his hands.

“You take this side, I'll take the other,” said the apparition, and darted away again into the smoke.

“But wh—”

Vimes could feel the heat through his boots. He edged away across the roof, and heard the shouting coming from below.

When he leaned over the edge here he could see the window some way below him. Someone had smashed a pane, because a hand was waving.

There was more commotion down in the courtyard. Amid a press of figures he could make out the huge shape of Constable Dorfl, a golem and quite definitely fireproof. But Dorfl was bad enough at stairs as it was. There weren't many that could take the weight.

The hand in the smoke stopped waving.

Vimes looked down again.

Can you fly, Mr Vimes?

He looked at the chimney, belching flame.

He looked at the unwound turban.

A lot of Sam Vimes's brain had shut down, although the bits relaying the twinges of pain from his legs were operating with distressing efficiency. But there were still some thoughts operating down around the core, and they delivered for his consideration the insight:

…tough-looking cloth…

He looked back at the chimney. It looked stout enough.

The window was about six feet below.

Vimes began to move automatically.

So, purely theoretically, if a man were to wrap one end of the cloth round the belching stack like this and pay it out like this and lower himself over the parapet like this and kick himself away from the wall like this, then when he swung back again his feet ought to be able to smash his way through the other panes of the window, like this…

A cart squeaked along the wet street. Its progress was erratic because no two of its wheels were the same size, so it rocked and wobbled and skidded and probably involved more effort to pull than it saved overall, especially since its contents appeared to be rubbish. But then, so did its owner.

Who was about the size of a man, but bent almost double, and was covered with hair or rags or quite possibly a matted mixture of both that was so felted and unwashed that small plants had taken root on it. If the thing had stopped walking and crouched down, it would have given an astonishingly good impression of a long-neglected compost heap. As it walked along, it snuffled.

A foot was stuck out to impede its progress.

“Good evening, Stoolie,” said Carrot as the cart halted.

The heap stopped. Part of it tilted upwards.

“Geroff,” it muttered, from somewhere in the thatch.

“Now, now, Stoolie, let's help one another, shall we? You help me, and I'll help you.”

“B'g'r'ff, c'p'r.”

“Well, you tell me things I want to know,” said Carrot, “and I won't search your cart.”

“I hate gnolls,” said Angua. “They smell awful.”

“Oh, that's hardly fair. The stressed be a lot dirtier without you and yours, eh, Stoolie?” said Carrot, still speaking quite pleasantly. “You pick up this, you pick up that, maybe bash it against a wall until it stops struggling—”

“'s a vile acur'cy,” said the gnoll. There was a bubbling noise that might have been a chuckle.

“So I'm hearing you might know where Snowy Slopes is these days,” said Carrot.

“D'nno n'thin'.”

“Fine.” Carrot produced a three-tined garden fork and walked round to the cart, which dripped.

“D'nno n'thin' ab't–” said the gnoll quickly.

“Yes?” said Carrot, fork poised.

“D'nno n'thin' ab't t' sweetsp'p'n M'ney Tr'p L'ne.”

“The one with the Rooms To Let sign?”

“R't.”

“Well done. Thank you for being a good citizen,” said Carrot. “Incidentally, we passed a dead seagull the way here. Its in Brewer Street. I bet if you hurried you could beat the rush.”

“H't d'gg'ty,” snuffled the gnoll. The cart started to judder forward. The watchmen watched it lurch and scrape around the corner.

“They're good fellows at heart,” said Carrot. “I think it says a lot for the spirit of tolerance in this city that even gnolls can call it home.”

“They turn my stomach,” said Angua, as they set off again. “That one had plants growing on him!”

“Mr Vimes says we ought to do something for them,” said Carrot.

“All heart, that man.”

“With a flamethrower, he says.”

“Wouldn't work. Too soggy. Has anyone ever really found out what they eat?”

“It's better to think of them as… cleaners. You certainly don't see as much rubbish and dead animals on the streets as you used to.”

“Yes, but have you ever seen a gnoll with a brush and shovel?”

“Well, that's society for you, I'm afraid,” said Carrot. “Everything is dumped on the people below until you find someone who's prepared to eat it. That's what Mr Vimes says.”

“Yes,” said Angua. They walked in silence for a while, and then she said. “You care a lot about what Mr Vimes says, don't you…?”

“He is a fine officer and an example to us all.”

“And… you've never thought of getting a job in Quirm or somewhere, have you? The other cities are headhunting Ankh-Morpork watchmen now.”

“What, leave Ankh-Morpork?” The tone of voice included the answer.

“No… I suppose not,” said Angua sadly.

“Anyway, I don't know what Mr Vimes would do without me running around all the time.”

“It's a point of view, certainly,” said Angua.

It wasn't far to Money Trap Lane. It was in a ghetto of what Lord Rust would probably call “skilled artisans”, the people too low down the social scale to be movers and shakers but slightly too high to be easily moved or shook. The sanders and polishers, generally.

The people who hadn't got very much but were proud even of that. There were little clues. Shiny house numbers, for a start. And, on the walls of houses that were effectively just one long continuous row, after centuries of building and inbuilding, very careful boundaries in the paint where people had brushed up to the very border of their property and not a gnat's blink to each side. Carrot always said it showed the people were the kind who instinctively realized that civilization was based on a shared respect for ownership; Angua thought they were just tight little bastards who'd sell you the time of day.

Carrot walked noiselessly down the alley beside the sweetshop. There was a rough wooden staircase going up to the first floor. He pointed silently to the midden below it.

It seemed to consist almost entirely of bottles.

“Big drinker?” Angua mouthed. Carrot shook his head.

She crouched down and looked at the labels, but her nose was already giving her a hint. Dibbler's Homeopathic Shampoo. Mere and Stingbat's Herbal Wash – with Herbs! Rinse 'n' Run Scalp Tonic – with Extra Herbs!…

There were others. Herbs, she thought. Chuck a handful of weeds in the pot and you've got herbs…

Carrot was starting up the stairs when she put her hand on his shoulder. There was another smell. It was one that drove through all the other scents of the streets like a spear. It was one that a werewolf's nose is particularly attuned to.

He nodded and went carefully to the door. Then he pointed down. There was a stain under the gap.

Carrot drew his sword and kicked the door open.

Daceyville Slopes hadn't taken his condition lightly.

Bottles of all shapes and colours occupied most flat surfaces, giving testimony to the alchemist's art and humanity's optimism.

The suds of his latest experiment were still in a bowl on the table, and his body on the floor had a towel around his neck. The watchmen looked down at it. Snowy had cleaned, washed and gone.

“I think we can say life is extinct,” said Carrot.

“Yuk,” said Angua. She grabbed the open shampoo bottle and sniffed deeply. The sickly scent of marinated herbs assailed her sinuses, but anything was better than the sharp, beguiling smell of blood.

“I wonder where his head is at?” said Carrot, in a determinedly matter-of-fact voice. “Oh, it's rolled over there… What's the horrible smell?”

“This!” Angua flourished the shampoo. “Four dollars a bottle, it says. Sheesh!”

Angua took another deep sniff at the herbal goo, to drown out the call of the wolf.

“Doesn't look as if they stole anything,” said Carrot. “Unless they were very neat– What's the matter?”

“Don't ask!”

She managed to get a window open and sucked down great draughts of comparatively fresh air, while Carrot went through the corpse's pockets.

“Er… you can't tell if there's a clove around, can you?” he said.

“Carrot! Please! This is a room with blood all over the floor! Have you any idea? Excuse me…”

She rushed out and down the steps. The alley had the generic smell of all alleys everywhere, overlaid on the basic all-embracing smell of the city. But at least it didn't make your hair grow and your teeth try to lengthen. She leaned against the wall and fought for control. Shampoo? She could have saved Snowy a hell of a lot of money with just one careful bite. Then he'd know all about a really bad hair day…

Carrot came down a couple of minutes later, locking the door behind him.

“Are you feeling better?”

“A bit…”

“There was something else,” said Carrot, looking thoughtful. “I think he wrote a note before he died. But it's all rather odd.” He waved in the air what looked like a cheap notepad. “This needs careful looking at.” He shook his head. “Poor old Snowy.”

“He was a killer!”

“Yes, but that's a nasty way to die.”

“Decapitation? With a very sharp sword, by the look of it. I can think of worse.”

“Yes, but I can't help thinking that if only the chap had better hair or had found the right shampoo at an early age he'd have led a different life…”

“Well, at least he won't have to worry about dandruff any more.”

“That was a little tasteless.”

“Sorry, but you know how blood makes me, tense.”

“Your hair always looks amazing,” said Carrot, changing the subject with, Angua thought, unusual tact. “I don't know what you use, but it's a shame he never tried it.”

“I doubt if he went to the right shop,” said Angua. “It says ‘For a Glossy Coat’ on the bottles I usually buy– What's the matter?”

“Can you smell smoke?” said Carrot.

“Carrot, it's going to be five minutes before I can smell anything except—”

But he was staring past her, at the big red glow in the sky.

Vimes coughed. And then coughed some more. And eventually opened his streaming eyes in the confident expectation of seeing his own lungs in front of him.

“Glass of water, Mr Vimes?”

Vimes peered through the tears at the shifting shape of Fred Colon.

“Thanks, Fred. What's the horrible burning smell?”

“It's you, sir.”

Vimes was sitting on a low wall outside the wreck of the embassy. Cool air washed around him. He felt like underdone beef. The heat was radiating off him.

“You was passed on for a while there, sir,” said Sergeant Colon helpfully. “But everyone saw you swing in that window, sir! And you threw that woman out for Detritus to catch! That'll be a feather in your cap and no mistake, sir! I bet the ragh– I bet the Klatchians'll be giving you the Order of the Camel or something for this night's work, sir!” Colon beamed, bursting with pride by association.

“A feather in my cap…” murmured Vimes. He undid his helmet and with a certain amount of exhausted delight saw that every single plume had been burned to a stub.

He blinked slowly.

“What about the man, Fred? Did he get out?”

“What man?”

“There was…” Vimes blinked again. Various parts of his body, aware that he hadn't been taking calls, were ringing in to complain.

There had been… some man? Vimes had landed on a bed or something, and there was a woman clutching at him, and he had smashed out what was left of the window, seen the big, broad and above all strong arms of Detritus down below, and had thrown her out as politely as the circumstances allowed. Then the man from the roof had come out of the smoke again, carrying another figure over his shoulder, screamed something at him and beckoned him to follow and…

…then the floor had given way…

“There were… two other people in there,” he said, coughing again.

“They didn't get out the front way, then,” said Colon.

“How did I get out?” said Vimes.

“Oh, Dorfl was stamping on the fire down below, sir. Very handy, a ceramic constable. You landed right on him, so of course he stopped what he was doing and brought you out. 's gonna be handshakes and buns all round in the morning, sir!”

There weren't any right now, Vimes noted There were still plenty of people around, carrying bundles, putting out small fires, arguing with one another… but there was a big hole where congratulating-the-hero-of-the-hour should have been.

“Oh, everyone's always a bit preoccupied after something like this, sir,” said Colon, as if reading his thoughts.

“I think I'll have a nice cold bath,” said Vimes, to the world in general. “And then some sleep. Sybil's got some wonderful ointment for burns… Ah, hello, you two.”

“We saw the fire—” Carrot began, running up. “Is it all over?”

“Mr Vimes saved the day!” said Sergeant Colon excitedly. “Just went straight in and saved everyone, in the finest tradition of the Watch!”

“Fred?” said Vimes, wearily.

“Yessir?”

“Fred, the finest tradition of the Watch is having a quiet smoke somewhere out of the wind at 3 a.m. Let's not get carried away, eh?”

Colon looked crestfallen. “Well—” He began.

Vimes staggered to his feet and patted his sergeant on the back

“Oh, all right, it's a tradition,” he conceded. “You can do the next one, Fred. And now,” he steadied himself as he stood up, “I'm going down to the Yard to write my report.”

“You're covered in ash and you're swaying,” said Carrot. “I should just get on home, sir.”

“Oh no,” said Vimes. “Got to do the paperwork. Anyone know the time?”

“Bingeley-bingeley beep!” said a cheerful voice from his pocket.

“Damn!” said Vimes, but it was too late.

“It is,” said the voice, which had the squeaky friendly quality that begs to be strangled, “about… nineish.”

“Nineish?”

“Yep. Nineish. Precisely about nineish.”

Vimes rolled his eyes. “Precisely about nineish?” he said, pulling a small box out of his pocket and opening the lid. The demon inside gave him an angry look.

“Yesterday you said,” it said, “that if I, and I quote, Didn't Stop all that Eight Fifty-Six and Six Seconds Precisely business I Would Be Looking at a Hammer From Below. And when I said, Mr Insert Name Here, that this would invalidate my warranty, you said that I could take my warranty and—”

“I thought you'd lost that thing,” said Carrot.

“Hah,” said the Dis-organizer, “really? You thought he did? I don't call putting something in your trouser pockets just before they go into the wash losing it.”

“That was an accident,” muttered Vimes.

“Oh? Oh? And dropping me in the dragon's feeding bowl, that was accidental too, was it?” The demon mumbled to itself for a moment and then said, “Anyway, do you want to know your appointments for this evening?”

Vimes looked at the smouldering wreckage of the embassy.

“Do tell,” he said.

“You don't have any,” said the demon sulkily. “You haven't told me any.”

“You see?” said Vimes. “That's what drives me lived! Why should I have to tell you? Why didn't you tell me, ‘Eightish: break up riot at Mundane Meals and stop Detritus shooting people,’ eh?”

“You didn't tell me to tell you!”

“I didn't know! And that's how real life works! How can I tell you to warn me about things that no one knows are going to happen? If you were any good, that'd be your job!”

“He writes in the manual,” said the demon nastily. “Did you know that, everybody? He writes in the manual.”

“Well, of course I make notes—”

“He's actually sneakily trying to keep his diary in the manual so his wife won't find out he's never bothered to learn how to use me,” said the demon.

“What about the Vimes manual, then?” snapped Vimes. “I notice you've never bothered to learn how to use me!”

The demon hesitated. “Humans come with a manual?” it said.

“It'd be a damn good idea!” said Vimes.

“True,” murmured Angua.

“It could say things like ‘Chapter One: Bingeley-bingeley beep and other damn fool things to spring on people at six in the morning,’” said Vimes, his eyes wild. “And ‘Toubleshooting: my owner keeps trying to drop me in the privy, what am I doing wrong?’ And—”

Carrot patted him gently on the back. “I should sign off now, sir,” he said gently. “It's been a busy few days.”

Vimes rubbed his forehead. “I daresay I could do with a rest,” he said. “Come on, there's nothing more to see here. Let's go home.”

“I thought you said you weren't going—” Carrot began, but Vimes's mind was already scolding him.

“I meant the Yard, of course,” he said. “I'll go home afterwards.”

A ball of lamplight floated through the Ramkin library, drifting across the shelves of huge, leatherbound books.

Many of them had never been read, Sybil knew. Various ancestors had simply ordered them from the engravers and put them on the shelves, because a library was something you had to have, don'tcherknow, like a stableyard and a servants' wing and some ghastly landscaping mistake created by “Bloody Stupid” Johnson, although in the latter case her grandfather had shot the man before he could do any real damage.

She held the lamp higher.

Ramkins looked down their noses at her from their frames, through the brown varnish of the centuries. Portraits were another thing that had been collected out of unregarded habit.

Most of them were of men. They were invariably in armour and always on horseback. And every single one of them had fought the sworn enemies of Ankh-Morpork.

In recent times this had been quite difficult and her grandfather, for example, had to lead an expedition all the way to Howondaland in order to find some sworn enemies, although there was an adequate supply and a lot of swearing by the time he left. Earlier, of course, it had been a lot easier. Ramkin regiments had fought the city's enemies all over the Sto Plains and had inflicted heroic casualties, quite often on people in the opposing armies.8

There were a few women among the sitters, none of them holding anything heavier than a glove or a small pet dragon. Their job had largely been to roll bandages and await the return of their husbands with, she liked to think, resolution and fortitude and a general hope that said husbands would return with as many of their bits as possible.

The point was, though, that they never thought about it. There was a war, and off they went. If there wasn't a war, they looked for one. They didn't even use words like “duty”. It was all built in at bone level.

She sighed. It was all so difficult these days, and Lady Sybil came from a class that was not used to difficulty, or at least the kind that couldn't be sorted out by shouting at a servant. Five hundred years ago one of her ancestors had cut off a Klatchian's head in battle and had brought it home on a pole, and no one thought any the worse of him, given what the Klatchians would have cut off if they'd caught him. That seemed straightforward. You fought them, they fought you, everyone knew the rules, and if you got your head cut off you jolly well didn't blub about it afterwards.

Certainly, things were better now. But they were just… more difficult.

And of course some of those antique husbands were away for months or years at a time, and for them wives and families were pretty much like the library and stableyard and the Johnson Exploding Pagoda. You got them sorted out and then didn't think much about it. At least Sam was home every day.

Well, most days. Every night, anyway.

Well… part of most nights, certainly.

At least they ate meals together.

Well, most meals.

Well, at least they made a start on most meals.

Well, at least she knew he was never very far away, just somewhere where he was trying to do too much and run too fast and people were trying to kill him.

All in all, she considered, she was jolly lucky.

Vimes stared at Carrot, who was standing in front of his desk.

“So what does all that add up to?” he said. “The man we know didn't get the Prince is dead. The man who probably did… is dead. Someone tried very clumsily to make it look as if Ossie was paid by the Klatchians. OK, I can see why someone might want to do that. That's what Fred calls politics. They get Snowy to do the real business, and he helps poor dumb Ossie who's there to take the fall, and then the Watch proves that Ossie was in the pay of the Klatchians and that's another reason for fighting. And Snowy just slopes off. Only someone cured his dandruff for him.”

“After he'd written something, sir,” said Carrot.

“Ah… yes.”

Vimes looked at the notepad retrieved from Snowy's room. It was a crude affair, the wads of mismatched bits of scrap that the engravers sold off cheaply. He sniffed at it.

“Soap on the edges,” he said.

“His new shampoo,” said Carrot. “First time he'd used it.”

“How do you know?”

“We looked at all the bottles on the heap, sir.”

“Hmm. Looks like fresh blood here, at the spine, where they're stitched together…”

“His, sir,” said Angua.

Vimes nodded. You never argued with Angua about blood.

“But none of the actual pages have blood on them…” said Vimes. “Which is a bit odd. Messy business, decapitation. People tend to… spray. So the top page—”

“—has been taken away, sir,” said Carrot, grinning and nodding. “But that's not the funny part, sir. See if you can guess, sir!”

Vimes glared at him and then moved the lamp closer. “Very faint impression of writing on the top page…” he muttered. “Can't make it out…”

“We can't either, sir. We know he wrote in pencil, sir. There was one on the table.”

“Very faint traces,” said Vimes. “Blokes like Snowy write as though they're chipping stone.” He flicked the notebook. “Someone tore out… not just the page he'd written on but several below it as well.”

“Clever, eh, sir? Everyone knows—”

“—you can read the suspicious note by looking at the marks on the page below,” said Vimes. He tossed the book on to the table again. “Hmm. There's a message there, yes…”

“Perhaps he was blackmailing whoever's behind all this?” said Angua.

“That's not his style,” said Vimes. “No, what I meant was—”

There was a knock on the door, and Fred Colon entered.

“Brung you a mug of coffee,” he said, “and there's a bunch of wo– Klatchians to see you downstairs, Mr Vimes. Probably come to give you a medal and gabble at you in their lingo. And if you're on for late supper, Mrs Goriffs doing goat and rice and foreign gravy.”

“I suppose I'd better go down and see them,” said Vimes. “But I haven't even had time for a wash—”

“That's evidence of your heroic endeavours,” said Colon stoutly.

“Oh, all right.”

Unease began about halfway down the stairs. Vimes had never run into a group of citizens wishing to give him a medal and so he did not have a lot of experience on this score, but the group waiting for him in a tight cluster near the sergeant's desk did not look like a committee of welcome.

They were Klatchian. At least, they were wearing foreign-looking clothes and one or two of them had caught more sun than you generally got in Ankh-Morpork. The feeling crept over Vimes that Klatch was a very big place in which his city and the whole of the Sto Plains would be lost, and so there must be room in it for all kinds of peoples, including this short chap in the red fez who was practically vibrating with indignation.

“Are you the man Vimes?” the enfezzed one demanded.

“Well, I'm Commander Vimes—”

“We demand the release of the Goriff family! And we won't take any excuses!”

Vimes blinked. “Release?”

“You have locked them up! And confiscated their shop!”

Vimes stared at the man, and then he looked across the room at Sergeant Detritus.

“Where did you put the family, sergeant?”

Detritus saluted. “In der cells, sir.”

“Aha!” said the man in the fez. “You admit it!”

“Excuse me, who are you?” said Vimes, blinking with tiredness.

“I don't have to tell you and you can't beat it out of me!” said the man, sticking out his chest.

“Oh, thank you for telling me,” said Vimes. “I do hate wasted effort.”

“Oh, hello, Mr Wazir,” said Carrot, appearing behind Vimes. “Did you get the note about that book?”

There was one of those silences that happen when everyone has to reprogramme their faces.

Then Vimes said, “What?”

“Mr Wazir sells books in Widdy Street,” said Carrot. “Only I asked him for some books on Klatch, you see, and one of the ones he gave me was The Perfumed Allotment, or, The Garden of Delights. And I didn't mind because the Klatchians invented gardens, sir, so I thought it might be a very useful cultural insight. Get inside the Klatchian mind, as it were. Only it, er, it… er… well, it wasn't about gardening… er…” He started to blush.

“Yes, yes, all right, bring it back if you like,” said Mr Wazir, looking a little derailed.

“I just thought you ought to know in case you hadn't… in case you sold… well… it could shock the impressionable, you know, a book like that…”

“Yes, fine—”

“Corporal Angua was so shocked she couldn't stop laughing.” Carrot went on.

“I will have your money sent round directly,” said Wazir. His expression turned vengeful again. He glared at Vimes.

“Books are unimportant at this time! We demand you release my countrymen now!”

“Detritus, why the hell did you put them in the cells?” said Vimes wearily.

“What else we got, sir? Dey're not locked in and dey got clean blankets.”

“There's your explanation,” said Vimes. “They're our guests.”

“In the cells!” said Wazir, relishing the word.

“They're free to go whenever they like,” said Vimes.

“I'm sure they are now,” said Wazir, contriving to indicate that only his arrival had prevented officially sanctioned bloodshed. “You can be sure the Patrician will hear about this!”

“He hears about everything else,” said Vimes. “But if they leave here, who is going to protect them?”

“We are! Their fellow countrymen!”

“How?”

Wazir almost stood to attention. “By force of arms, if necessary.”

“Oh, good,” said Vimes. “Then there'll be two mobs—”

“Bingeley-bingeley beep!”

“Damn!” Vimes slapped at his pocket. “I don't want to know I haven't got any appointments!”

“You have one at eleven pee em. The Rats Chamber, at the palace,” said the Dis-organizer.

“Don't be stupid!”

“Please yourself.”

“And shut up.”

“I was just trying to help.”

“Shut up.” Vimes turned back to the Klatchian bookseller.

“Mr Wazir, if Goriff wants to leave with you, we won't stop him—”

“Aha! You may well try!”

Vimes told himself that there was no reason at all why a Klatchian couldn't be a pompous little troublemaker. But he felt uneasy about it, like a man edging along the side of a very deep crevasse.

“Sergeant Colon?”

“Yessir?”

“See to this, will you?”

“Yessir!”

“Diplomatically.”

“Right, sir!” Colon tapped the side of his nose. “Is this politics, sir?”

“Just… just go and fetch the Goriff family and they can…” Vimes waved a hand vaguely. “They can do whatever they like.”

He turned and walked up the stairs.

“Someone has to protect my people's rights!” shouted Wazir.

They heard Vimes stop halfway up the stairs. The board creaked under his weight for a second. Then he continued upwards, and several of the watchmen started breathing again.

Vimes shut his office door behind him.

Politics! He sat down and scrabbled through the papers. It was much easier to think about crime. Give him good honest crime any time.

He tried to shut out the outside world.

Someone had beheaded Snowy Slopes. That was a fact. You couldn't put it down to a shaving accident, or unreasonably strong shampoo.

And Snowy had attempted to shoot the Prince.

And so had Ossie, but Ossie only thought he was an assassin. Everyone else thought he was a weird little twerp who was as impressionable as wet clay.

A lovely idea, though. You used a real murderer, a nice quite professional, and then you had – Vimes smiled grimly – someone else to take the fall. And if he hadn't taken a less metaphorical fall the poor twisted little sod would have believed he was the murderer.

And the Watch was supposed to believe it was a Klatchian plot.

Sand in their sandals… The nerve of it! Did they think he was stupid? He wished Fred had carefully swept up the sand, because he was damn well going to find out who'd put it there and they were going to eat it. Someone wanted Vimes to chase Klatchians.

The man on the burning roof. Did he fit in? Did he have to fit in? What could Vimes recall? A man in a robe, his face hidden. And a voice of a man not just used to giving commands – Vimes was used to giving commands – but also used to having commands obeyed, whereas a member of the Watch treated orders as suggestions.

But some things didn't have to fit. That was where “clues” let you down. And the damn notebook. That was the oddest thing yet. So someone had carefully ripped out several pages after Snowy had written whatever he'd written. Someone bright enough to know the trick of looking at the pages underneath for faint impressions.

So why not pinch the whole pad?

It was all too complicated. But somewhere was the one thing that'd make it simple, that would turn it all into sense—

He flung down his pencil and wrenched open the door to the stairs.

“What the hell's all this noise?” he yelled.

Sergeant Colon was halfway up the stairs.

“It was Mr Goriff and Mr Wazir having a bit of what you might call an argy-bargy, sir. Someone set fire to someone else's country two hundred years ago, Carrot says.”

“What, just now?”

“'s all Klatchian to me, sir. Anyway, Wazir's gone off with his nose in a sling.”

“Wazir comes from Smale, you see,” said Carrot. “And Mr Goriff comes from Elharib, and the two countries only stopped fighting ten years ago. Religious differences.”

“Run out of weapons?” said Vimes.

“Ran out of rocks, sir. They ran out of weapons last century.”

Vimes shook his head. “That always chews me up,” he said. “People killing one another just because their gods have squabbled—”

“Oh, they've got the same god, sir. Apparently it's over a word in their holy book, sir. The Elharibians say it translates as ‘god’ and the Smalies say it's ‘man’.”

“How can you mix them up?”

“Well, there's only one tiny dot difference in the script, you see. And some people reckon it's only a bit of fly dirt in any case.”

“Centuries of war because a fly crapped in the wrong place?”

“It could have been worse,” said Carrot. “If it had been slightly to the left the word would have been ‘liquorice’.”

Vimes shook his head. Carrot was good at picking up this sort of thing. And I know how to ask for vindaloo, he thought. And it turns out that's just a Klatchian word meaning “mouth-scalding gristle for macho foreign idiots”.

“I wish we understood more about Klatch,” he said.

Sergeant Colon tapped the side of his nose conspiratorially.

“Know the enemy, eh, sir?” he said.

“Oh, I know the enemy,” said Vimes. “It's Klatchians I want to find out about.”

“Commander Vimes?”

The watchmen looked round. Vimes narrowed his eyes.

“You're one of Rust's men, aren't you?”

The young man saluted.

“Lieutenant Hornett, sir.” He hesitated. “Er… his lordship has sent me to ask you if you and your senior officers would be so good as to come to the palace at your convenience, sir.”

“Really? Those were his words?”

The lieutenant decided that honesty was the only policy.

“In fact he said, ‘Get Vimes and his mob up here right now,’ sir.”

“Oh, did he?” said Vimes.

“Bingeley-bingeley beep!” said a small triumphant voice from his pocket. “The time is eleven pee em precisely!”

The door opened before Nobby knocked, and a small stout woman glared out at him.

“Yes, I am!” she snapped.

Nobby stood with his hand still raised. “Er… are you Mrs Cake?” he said.

“Yes, but I don't hold with doing it except for money.”

Nobby's hand did not move.

“Er… you can tell the future, right?” said Nobby.

They stared at one another. Then Mrs Cake thumped her own ear a couple of times, and blinked.

“Drat! Left my precognition on again.” Her gaze unfocused for a moment as she replayed the recent conversation in the privacy of her head.

“I think we're sorted out,” she said. She looked at Nobby and sniffed. “You'd better come in. Mind the carpet, it's just been washed. And I can only give you ten minutes 'cos I've got cabbage boilin'.”

She led Corporal Nobbs into her tiny front room. A lot of it was occupied by a round table covered with a green cloth. There was a crystal ball on the table, not very well covered by a pink knitted lady in a crinoline dress.

Mrs Cake motioned Nobby to sit down. He obediently did so. The smell of cabbage drifted through the room.

“A bloke in the pub told me about you,” Nobby mumbled. “Said you do mediuming.”

“Would you care to tell me your problem?” said Mrs Cake. She looked at Nobby again and, in a state of certainty that had nothing to do with precognition and everything to do with observation, added: “That is, which of your problems do you want to know about?”

Nobby coughed. “Er… it's a bit… you know… intimate. Affairs of the heart, sort of thing.”

“Are women involved?” said Mrs Cake cautiously.

“Er… I hope so. What else is there?”

Mrs Cake visibly relaxed.

“I just want to know if I'm going to meet any,” Nobby went on.

“I see.” Mrs Cake gave a kind of facial shrug. It wasn't up to her to tell people how to waste their money. “Well, there's the tenpenny future. That's what you see. And there's the ten-dollar future. That's what you get.”

“Ten dollars? That's more'n a weeks pay! I'd better take the tenpenny one.”

“A very wise choice,” said Mrs Cake. “Give me your paw.”

“Hand,” said Nobby.

“That's what I said.”

Mrs Cake examined Nobby's outstretched palm while taking care not to touch it.

“Are you going to moan and roll your eyes and stuff?” said Nobby, a man out to get his tenpenn'orth.

“I don't have to take cheek,” said Mrs Cake, without looking up. “That sort of—”

She peered closer, and then gave Nobby a sharp look.

“Have you been playing with this hand?”

“Pardon?”

Mrs Cake whipped the crinoline lady off the crystal and glared into the depths. After a while she shook her head.

“I don't know, I'm sure… oh, well.” She cleared her throat and spoke in a more sibyllic voice. “Mr Nobbs, I see you surrounded by dusky ladies in a hot place. Looks a bit foreign to me. They're laughing and chatting with you… in fact, one of them's just handed you a drink…”

“None of 'em are shouting or anything?” said Nobby, mystified.

“Doesn't look like it,” said Mrs Cake, equally fascinated. “They seem quite happy.”

“You can't see any… magnets?”

“What're they?”

“Dunno,” Nobby admitted. “I 'spect you'd know 'em if you saw 'em.”

Mrs Cake, despite a certain rigidity of character, couldn't help but be aware of a drift in Nobby's speculation.

“Some of the ladies look… nubile,” she hinted.

“Ah, right,” said Nobby, his expression not changing in any way.

“If you understand what I mean…”

“Right. Yes. Nubile. Right.”

Mrs Cake gave up. Nobby counted out ten pennies.

“And that'll be soon, will it?” said Nobby.

“Oh yes. I can't see very far for tenpence.”

“Happy young ladies…” mused Nobby. “Nubile, too. Definitely something to think about.”

After he'd gone, Mrs Cake went back to her crystal and sneaked a whole ten dollars' worth of precognition for her own curiosity and satisfaction, and laughed about it all afternoon.

Vimes was only half surprised when the doors to the Rats Chamber opened and there, sitting at the head of the table, was Lord Rust. The Patrician wasn't there.

He was half surprised. That is, at a certain shallow level he thought, that's odd, I thought you couldn't budge the man with a siege weapon. But at a dark level, where the daylight seldom penetrated, he thought: of course. At a time like this men like Rust rise to the top. It's like stirring a swamp with a stick. Really big bubbles are suddenly on the surface and there's a bad smell about everything. Nevertheless, he saluted and said:

“Lord Vetinari on his holidays, then?”

“Lord Vetinari stepped down this evening, Vimes,” said Lord Rust. “Pro tem, of course. Just for the duration of the emergency.”

“Really?” said Vimes.

“Yes. And I have to say that he anticipated a certain… cynicism on your part, commander, and therefore asked me to give you this letter. You will see that it is sealed with his seal.”

Vimes looked at the envelope. There was certainly the official seal in the wax, but—

He met Lord Rust's gaze and at least that suspicion faded. Rust wouldn't try a trick like that. Men like Rust had a moral code of sorts, and some things weren't honourable. You could own a street of crowded houses where people lived like cockroaches and the cockroaches lived like kings and that was perfectly OK, but Rust would probably die before he'd descend to forgery.

“I see, sir,” said Vimes. “You wanted me?”

“Commander Vimes, I must ask you to take the Klatchians resident in the city into custody.”

“On what charge, sir?”

“Commander, we are on the verge of war with Klatch. Surely you understand?”

“No, sir.”

“We are talking about spying, commander. Sabotage, even,” said Lord Rust. “To be frank… the city is to be placed under martial law.”

“Yessir? What kind of law's that, sir?” said Vimes, staring straight ahead.

“You know very well, Vimes.”

“Is it the kind where you shout ‘Stop!’ before you fire, sir, or the other kind?”

“Ah. I see.” Rust stood up and leaned forward.

“It pleased you to be… smart with Lord Vetinari, and for some reason he indulged you,” he said. “I, on the other hand, know your type.”

“My type?”

“It seems to me that the streets are full of crimes, commander. Unlicensed begging, public nuisances… but you seem to turn a blind eye, you seem to think you should have bigger ideas. But you are not required to have big ideas, commander. You are a thief-taker, nothing more. Are you eyeballing me, Vimes?”

“I was trying not to turn a blind eye, sir.”

She glared at the rest of the guards and swept on. Angua saw several others like her passing along the crowds of spectators. Here and there was a flash of white.

“I'll be thinking: those Klatchians are jolly brave,” said Carrot. “I'm afraid, Nobby, that the white feather is to shame you into joining up.”

“Oh, that's all right, then,” said Nobby, a man for whom shame held no shame. “What am I supposed to do with it?”

“That reminds me… did I tell you what I said to Lord Rust?” said Sergeant Colon, nervously.

“Seventeen times so far,” said Angua, watching the women with the feathers. She added, apparently to herself, “‘Come back with your shield or on it.’”

“I wonder if I can get the lady to give me any more?” said Nobby.

“What was that?” said Carrot.

“These feathers,” said Nobby. “They look like real goose. I've got a use for a lot more of these—”

“I meant what was it that Angua said?” said Carrot.

“What? Oh… it's just something women used to say when they sent their men off to war. Come back with your shield, or on it.”

“On your shield?” said Nobby. “You mean like… sledging, sort of thing?”

“Like dead,” said Angua. “It meant come back a winner or not at all.”

“Well, I always came back with my shield,” said Nobby. “No problem there.”

“Nobby,” sighed Colon, “you used to come back with your shield, everyone else's shield, a sack of teeth and fifteen pairs of still-warm boots. On a cart.”

“We-ell, no point in going to war unless you're on the winning side,” said Nobby, sticking the white feather in his helmet.

“Nobby, you was always on the winning side, the reason bein', you used to lurk aroun' the edges to see who was winning and then pull the right uniform off'f some poor dead sod. I used to hear where the generals kept an eye on what you were wearin' so they'd know how the battle was going.”

“Lots of soldiers have served in lots of regiments,” said Nobby.

“Right, what you say is true. Only not usually during the same battle,” said Sergeant Colon.

They trooped back into the Watch House. Most of the shift had taken the day off. After all, who was in charge? What were they supposed to be doing today? The only ones left were those who never thought of themselves as off duty, and the new recruits who hadn't had their keen edge blunted.

“I'm sure Mr Vimes'll think of something,” said Carrot. “Look, I'd better take the Goriffs back to their shop. Mr Goriff says he's going to pack up and leave. A lot of Klatchians are leaving. You can't blame them, either.”

Dreams rising with him like bubbles, Vimes surfaced from the black fathoms of sleep.

Normally, these days, he treasured the moment of waking. It was when solutions presented themselves. He assumed bits of his brain came out at night and worked on the problems of the previous day, handing him the result just as he opened his eyes.

All that arrived now were memories. He winced. Another memory turned up. He groaned. The sound of his badge bouncing on the table replayed itself. He swore.

He swung his legs off the covers and groped for the bedside table.

“Bingeley-bingeley beep!”

“Oh, no… All right, what's the time?”

“One o'clock pee em! Hello, Insert Name Here!”

Vimes looked blearily at the Dis-organizer. One day, he knew, he really would have to try to understand the manual for the damn thing. Either that or drop it off a cliff.9

“What—” he began, and then groaned again. The twanging sound made by the unwound turban as it took his weight had just come back to haunt him.

“Sam?” The bedroom door was pushed open and Sybil came in carrying a cup.

“Yes, dear?”

“How do you feel?”

“I've got bruises on my brui—” Another memory crawled up from the pit of guilt. “Oh, good grief, did I really call him a long streak of—?”

“Yes,” said his wife. “Fred Colon came round this morning and told me all about it. And a very good description, I'd say. I went out with Ronnie Rust once. Bit of a cold fish.”

Another recollection burst like a ball of marsh gas in Vimes's head.

“Did Fred tell you where he said Rust could put his badge?”

“Yes. Three times. It seems to be weighing on his mind. Anyway, knowing Ronnie, he'd have to use a hammer.”

Vimes had long ago got used to the fact that the aristocracy all seemed to know one another by their first name.

“And did Fred tell you anything else?” he said timidly.

“Yes. About the shop and the fire and everything. I'm proud of you.” She gave him a kiss.

“What do I do now?” he said.

“Drink your tea and have a wash and a shave.”

“I ought to go down to the Watch House and—”

“A shave! There's hot water in the jug.”

When she had left he hauled himself upright and tottered into his bathroom. There was, indeed, a jug of hot water on the marble washstand.

He looked at the face in the mirror. Unfortunately, it was his. Perhaps if he shaved it first…? And then he could wash the bits that were left.

Fragments of the night before kept on respectfully drawing themselves to his attention. It was a shame about that guard, but sometimes you just coudln't stand and argue

He shouldn't have done that with his badge. It wasn't like the old days. He had responsibilities. He should've stayed on and made things just a little less—

No. That never worked.

He managed to get the lather on his face. The Riot Act! Good grief… He stopped his razor thoughtfully. Rust's milky eyes stared out of his memory. Bastard! Men like that thought, they really thought, that the Watch was a kind of sheepdog, to nip at the heels of the flock, bark when spoken to and never, ever, bite the shepherd…

Oh yes. Vimes knew in his bones who the enemy was.

Except

No badge, no Watch, no job…

Another memory arrived, late.

Lather still dripping down his shirt, he pulled Vetinari's sealed letter out of his pocket and slit it open with the razor.

There was a blank sheet of paper inside. Hie turned it over, and there was nothing on the other side either. Mystified, he glanced at the envelope.

Sir Samuel Vimes, Knight.

Nice of him to be so precise about it, Vimes thought. What was the point of a message with no message? Some people might absentmindedly have slipped the wrong piece of paper in an envelope, but Vetinari wouldn't. What was the point of sending him a note telling him he was a knight, for gods' sake, he knew that embarrassing fact well enough—

Another little memory burst open as silently as a mouse passing wind in a hurricane.

Who'd said it? Any gentleman—

Vimes stared. Well, he was a gentleman, wasn't he? It was official.

And then he didn't shout, and he didn't run out of the room. He finished shaving, had a wash and put on a change of underwear, very calmly.

Downstairs, Sybil had cooked him a meal. She wasn't a very good cook. This was fine by Vimes, because he wasn't a very good eater. After a lifetime of street meals his stomach wasn't set up right. What it craved was little crunchy brown bits, the food group of the gods, and Sybil reliably always left the pan too long on the dragon.

She eyed him carefully as he chewed his fried egg and stared into the middle distance. Her manner was that of someone with a portable safety net watching a man on the high wire.

After a while, while she watched him crack open a sausage, he said, “Do we have any books on chivalry, dear?”

“Hundreds, Sam.”

“Is there any one which tells you what… you know, what it's all about? I mean, what you have to do if you're a knight, say? Responsibilities and so on?”

“Most of them, I should think.”

“'sright, sarge,” said Nobby vehemently. “I know no one ever locked their houses down our street.”

“That's what I'm talking about. That's my point.”

“It was 'cos the bastards even used to steal the locks.”

Colon considered the truth of this.

“Yes, but at least it was each other's stuff they were nicking, Nobby. It's not like they was foreigners.”

“Right.”

They strolled on for a while, each entangled in his own thoughts.

“Sarge?”

“Yes, Nobby?”

“Where's Nubilia?”

“Nubilia?”

“It's got to be a place, I reckon. Pretty warm there, I think?”

“Ah, Nubilia,” said Colon. He invented desperately. “Right. Yes. It's one of them Klatchian places. Yeah. Got lots of sand. And mountains. Exports dates. Why'd you want to know?”

“Oh… no reason.”

“Nobby?”

“Yes, sarge?”

“Why are you carrying that huge book?”

“Hah, clever idea, sarge. I saw what you said about that book of your great-grandad, so if there's any fighting I got this one off'f Washpot. It's The Book of Om. Five inches thick.”

“It's a bit big for a pocket, Nobby. It's a bit big for a cart, to be honest.”

“I thought I could make sort of braces to carry it. I reckon even a longbow could only get an arrow as far as the Apocrypha.”

A familiar creak made them look up.

A Klatchian's head was swinging in the breeze.

“Fancy a pint?” said Sergeant Colon. “Big Anjie brews up some that's a treat.”

“Better not, sarge. Mr Vimes is in a bit of a mood.”

Colon sighed. “You're right.”

Nobby looked up at the head again. It was wooden. It had been repainted many times over the centuries. The Klatchian was smiling very happily for someone who'd never have to buy a shirt ever again.

“The Klatchian's Head. My grandad said his granddad remembered when it was still the real one,” Colon said. “Of course, it was about the size of a walnut by then.”

“Bit… nasty, sticking up a bloke's head for a pub sign,” said Nobby.

“No, Nobby. Spoils of war, right? Some bloke came back from one of the wars with a souvenir, stuck it on a pole and opened a pub. The Klatchian's Head. Teach 'em not to do it again.”

“I used to get into enough trouble just for nicking boots,” said Nobby.

“More robust times, Nobby.”

“You ever met a Klatchian, sarge?” said Nobby, as they began to pace the length of the quiet street. “I mean one of the wild ones.”

“Well, no… but you know what? They're allowed three wives! That's criminal, that is.”

“Yeah, 'cos here's me and I ain't got one,” said Nobby.

“And they eat funny grub. Curry and that.”

Nobby gave this some thought. “Like… we do, when we're on late duty.”

“Weelll, yerss – but they don't do it properly—”

“You mean runny ear-wax yellow with peas and currants in, like your mum used to do?”

“Right! You poke around as much as you like in a Klatchian curry and you won't find a single piece of swede.”

“And I heard where they eat sheep's eyeballs, too,” said Nobby, international gastra-gnome.

“Right again.”

“Not decent ordinary stuff like lambs' fry or sweetbreads, then?”

“That's… right.”

Colon felt that he was being got at in some say.

“Look, Nobby, when all's said and done they ain't the right colour, and there's an end to it.”

“Good job you found out, Fred!” said Nobby, so cheerfully that Sergeant Colon was almost sure that he meant it.

“Well, it's obvious,” he conceded.

“Er… what is the right colour?” said Nobby.

“White, of course!”

“Not brick-red, then? 'Cos you–”

“Are you winding me up, Corporal Nobbs?”

“'Course not, sarge. So… what colour am I?”

That caused Sergeant Colon to think. You could have found, somewhere on Corporal Nobbs, a shade appropriate to every climate on the disc and a few found only in specialist medical books.

“White's… white's a state of, you know… mind,” he said. “It's like… doing an honest day's work for an honest day's pay, that sort of thing. And washing regular.”

“Not lazing around, sort of thing.”

“Right.”

“Or… like… working all hours like Goriff does.”

“Nobby—”

“And you never see those kids of his with dirty clo—”

“Nobby, you're just trying to get me going, right? You know we're better'n Klatchians. Otherwise, what's the point? Anyway, if we're going to fight 'em, you could get locked up for going around talking treachery.”

“Are you going to fight them, Fred?”

Fred Colon scratched his chin. “Well, as a hexperienced milit'ry man, I suppose I'll have to…”

“What' re you going to do? Join a regiment and go to the front?”

“We-ell… my fore-tay lies in training, so I reckon I'd better stay here and train up the new recruits.”

“Here at the back, you might say.”

“We all have to do our bit, Nobby. If it was down to me I'd be out there like a shot to give Johnny Klatchian a taste of cold steel.”

“Their razor-sharp swords wouldn't worry you, then?”

“I should laugh at them with scorn, Nobby.”

“But s'posing the Klatchians attack here? Then you'll be at the front and the front will be at the back.”

“I'll sort of try for a posting in the middle…”

“The middle of the front or—”

“Gentlemen?”

They looked round to find that they had been followed by a man of medium height but with an extraordinary head. It wasn't that he had gone bald. He had quite a lot of hair, which was long and curly and reached almost to his shoulders, and his beard was large enough to conceal a small chicken. But his head had simply risen through his hair, like a kind of intrusive dome.

He gave them a friendly smile.

“Am I by any change addressing the heroic Sergeant Colon and the—” The man looked at Nobby. Expressions of amazement, dread, interest and charity passed across his otherwise sunny countenance like storm-driven clouds. “And the Corporal Nobbs?” he finished.

“That is us, citizen,” said Colon.

“Ah, good. I was very specifically told to find you. It's quite amazing, you know. No one had even broken into the boathouse, although I must say I did design the locks rather well. And all I've had to do is replace the leatherwork around the joints and grease it up… oh, do excuse me, I've got rather ahead of myself. Now… there was a message I had to give you… what was it now?… Something about your hands…” He reached down into the large canvas bag by his feet and pulled out a long tube, which he handed to Nobby.

“I do apologize about this,” he said, producing a smaller tube and handing it to Colon. “I had to do things in such a hurry, there really was no time to finish it off properly, and frankly the materials are not very good—”

Colon looked at his tube. It was pointed at one end.

“This is a firework rocket,” he said. “Look, it's s got ‘A riot of coloured balls and stars’ on it…”

“Yes, I do so apologize,” said the man, lifting a complex little arrangement of wood and metal out of the bag. “May I have the tube back, corporal?” He took it and screwed the arrangement on to one end. “Thank you… yes, I'm afraid that without my lathe and, indeed, my forge, I really have had to make do with what I could find lying around… Could I have the rocket back, please? Thank you.”

“They don't go properly without a stick,” said Nobby.

“Oh, in fact they do,” said the man. “Just not very accurately.”

He raised the tube to shoulder height and peered into a small wire grid.

“That seems about right,” he said.

“And they don't go along,” said Nobby. “They just go up.”

“A common misconception,” said Leonard of Quirm, turning to face them.

Colon could see the tip of the rocket in the depths of the tube, and had a sudden image of stars and balls.

“Now, apparently you two have to step into this alley here and come with me,” said Leonard. “I'm very sorry about this, but his lordship has explained to me at great length how the needs of society as a whole may have to overrule the rights of a particular individual. Oh, and I've just remembered. You have to put your hands up.”

Sand had been spilled across the big table in the Rats Chamber.

Lord Rust felt a sensation akin to pleasure as he surveyed it. There were the little square boxes for the towns and cities, and cut-out palm trees to indicate the known oasisies. And, although he was uneasy about the word “oasisies”, Lord Rust looked at it and saw that it was good. Especially since it was a map of Klatch and everyone knew that Klatch was sand anyway, which made it rather satisfying in an existential sort of way, although this sand here had been commandeered from the heap behind Chalky the troll's wholesale pottery and bore the occasional cigarette end and trace of feline incontinence that would probably not be found in the real desert, or certainly not to scale.

“Here would be a good landing area,” he said, pointing with his stick.

His equerry tried to look helpful. “The El Kinte peninsula,” he said. “That's the closest point to us, sir.”

“Exactly! We can be across the straits in jig time.”

“Very good, sir,” said Leiutenant Hornett, “but… you don't think the enemy might be expecting us there? It being such an obvious landing site?”

“Not obvious at all to the trained military thinker, sir! They won't be expecting us there precisely because it is so obvious, d'y'see?”

“You mean… they'll think only a complete idiot would land there, sir?”

“Correct! And they know we're not complete idiots, sir, and therefore that will be the last place they will be expecting us, d'y'see? They'll be expecting us somewhere like” – his stick stabbed into the sand – “here.”

Hornett looked closely. In the street outside, someone started to bang a drum.

“Oh, you mean Eritor,” he said. “Where I believe there is a concealed landing area, and two days' forced march through good cover would have us at the heart of the empire, sir.”

“Exactly!”

“Whereas landing at El Kinte means three days over sand dunes and past the fortified city of Gebra…”

“Precisely. Wide-open spaces! And that is where we can practise the art of warfare.” Lord Rust raised his voice above the drumming. “That's how you settle these things. One decisive battle. Us on one side, the Klatchians on the other. THAT IS HOW THESE THINGS ARE D—”

He threw down his pointer. “Who the devil is making that infernal noise?”

The equerry walked across to the window. “It's someone else recruiting, sir,” he said.

“But we're all here!”

The equerry hesitated, as the bearers of bad tidings to short-tempered men often do.

“It's Vimes, sir…”

“Recruiting for the Watch?”

“Er… no, my lord. For a regiment. Er… the banner says ‘Sir Samuel Vimes's First of Foot’, my lord—”

“The arrogance of the man. Go and– No, I'll go myself!”

There was a crowd in the street. In the centre there rose the bulk of Constable Dorfl, and a key thing about the golem was that if he was banging a drum then no one was going to ask him to stop. No one except possibly Lord Rust, who strode up and snatched the drumsticks out of his hands.

“Yerss, it are species of your choice's life in der First of Foot!” shouted Sergeant Detritus, unaware of the events going on behind him. “You learnin' a trade! You learnin' self-respek! Also you get spiffy uniform plus all der boots you can eat – here, dat's my banner!”

“What's the meaning of this?” said Rust, flinging the homemade banner on to the ground. “Vimes can't do this!”

A figure detached itself from the wall, where it had been watching the show.

“You know, I rather think I can,” said Vimes. He handed Rust a piece of paper. “It's all here, my lord. With references citing the highest authorities, in case you are in any doubt.”

“Citing the—?”

“On the role of a knight, my lord. In fact the duties of a knight, funnily enough. A lot of it is pretty damn stupid stuff, riding around the place on one of those bloody great horses with curtains round it and so on, but one of them says in time of need a knight has to raise and maintain – you'll laugh when I tell you this – a body of armed soldiers! No one could have been more surprised than me, I don't mind telling you! Seems there's nothing for it but I have to go out and get some chaps together. Of course, most of the watch have joined, well, you know how it is, disciplined lads, anxious to do their bit, so that saved me a bit of effort. Except for Nobby Nobbs, 'cos he says if he leaves it till Thursday he's going to have enough white feathers for a mattress.”

Rust's expression would have preserved meat for a year.

“This is a nonsense,” he said. “And you, Vimes, certainly are no knight. Only a king can make—”

“There's a good few lordships in this city created by the Patricians,” said Vimes. “Your friend Lord Downey, for one. You were saying?”

“Then if you persist in playing games I will say that before a knight is created he must spend a night's vigil watching his armour—”

“Practically every night of my life,” said Vimes. “A man doesn't keep an eye on his armour round here, that man's got no armour in the morning.”

“In prayer,” said Rust sharply.

“That's me,” said Vimes. “Not a night has gone by without me thinking, ‘Ye gods, I hope I get through this alive.’”

“—and he must have proved himself on the field of combat. Against other trained men, Vimes. Not vermin and thugs.”

Vimes started to undo the strap of his helmet.

“Well, this isn't the best of moments, my lord, but if someone'll hold your coat I can spare you five minutes…”

In Vimes's eyes Rust recognized the fiery gleam of burning boats.

“I know what you're doing, Vimes, and I am not going to rise to it,” he said, taking a step back. “In any case, you have had no formal training in arms.”

“That's true,” said Vimes. “You've got me there, right enough. No one ever trained me in arms. I was lucky there.” He leaned closer and lowered his voice so that the watching crowd wouldn't hear. “Y'see, I know what ‘training in arms’ means, Ronald. There hasn't been a real war in ages. So it's all prancing around wearing padded waistcoats and waving swords with knobs on the end so no one'll really get hurt, isn't it? But down in the Shades no one's had any training in arms either. Wouldn't know an épée from a sabre. No, what they're good at is a broken bottle in one hand and a length of four-by-two in the other and when you face 'em, Ronnie, you know you aren't going off for a laugh and a jolly drink afterwards, 'cos they want you dead. They want to kill you, you see, Ron? And by the time you've swung your nice shiny broadsword they've carved their name and address on your stomach. And that's where I got my training in arms. Well… fists and knees and teeth and elbows, mostly.”

“You, sir, are no gentleman,” said Rust.

“I knew there was something about me that I liked.”

“Can you not even see that you can't enrol… dwarfs and trolls in an Ankh-Morpork regiment?”

“It just says ‘armed soldiers’, and dwarfs come with their own axes. A great saving. Besides, if you've ever seen them really fight, then you must've been on the same side.”

“Vimes—”

“It's Sir Samuel, my lord.”

Rust seemed to think for a moment.

“Very well, then,” he said. “Then you and your… regiment come under my command—”

“Strangely, no,” said Vimes swiftly. “Under the command of the King or his duly appointed representative, it says in Scavone's Chivalric Law and Usage. And, of course, there has been no duly appointed representative ever since some complete bastard cut off the last king's head. Oh, assorted bods appeared to have been ruling the city, but according to the chivalric tradition–”

The paper began to crinkle around the edges and then vanished in a small puff of acrid smoke.

Vimes stared at the little pile of ash that remained.

“I suppose it's a mercy they didn't blow up the pigeon, sir,” said Cheery.

“What the hell are they up to? Well, I can't chase around after them. Thanks, Cheery.”

The dwarf saluted and departed.

“Co-incidence,” said Vimes.

“All right, then,” said the demon. “Bingeley-bingeley beep! Three fifteen pee em, Emergency Meeting with Captain Carrot.”

It was a cylinder, tapering to a point at both ends. At one end the taper was quite complex, the cylinder narrowing in a succession of smaller and smaller rings, overlapping one another until they ended in a large fishtail. Oiled leather could be seen gleaming in the gaps between the metal.

At the other end, extending from the cylinder for all the world like the horn of a unicorn, was a very long and pointed screw thread.

The whole thing was mounted on a crude trolley, which was in turn riding on a pair of iron rails that disappeared into the black water at the far end of the boathouse.

“Looks like a giant fish to me,” said Colon. “Made of tin.”

“With an 'orn,” said Nobby.

“It'll never float,” said Colon. “I can see where you've gone wrong there. Everyone knows metal sinks.”

“Not entirely true,” said Leonard, diplomatically. “In any case, this boat is designed to sink.”

“What?”

“Propulsion was a major headache, I'm afraid,” said Leonard, climbing up a stepladder. “I thought of paddles and oars, and even some kind of screw, and then I thought: dolphins, that's the ticket! They move extremely fast with barely an effort. That's out at sea, of course, we only get the shovel-nosed dolphin in our estuary here. The linkage rods are a bit complicated but I used to be able to get quite a turn of speed. The pedalling can be somewhat tiresome, but with three of us we should be able to get up to some quite satisfactory accelerations. It's amazing what you can do when you imitate nature, I just wish my flying exp– Oh… where did you go…?”

It would be difficult to establish what part of satisfactorily accelerating nature the watchmen were trying to imitate, but it was a part which tended to get stuck in doors a lot.

They stopped struggling and began to back into the room.

“Ah, sergeant,” said Lord Vetinari, entering in front of them. “And Corporal Nobbs, too. Leonard has explained everything to you?”

“You can't ask us to go in that thing, sir! It'll be suicide!” said Colon.

The Patrician brought his hands together in front of his lips in the manner of someone praying, and sucked air thoughtfully.

“No. No, I think you are wrong,” he said at last, as if reaching a conclusion on some complex metaphysical conundrum. “I think that, in all probability, going into that thing would be a valiant and possibly rewarding deed. I would venture to suggest that, in fact, it is not going that would be suicidal. But I would appreciate your views.”

Lord Vetinari was not a heavily built man and, these days, he walked with the aid of an ebony cane. No one could remember seeing him handle a weapon, and a flash of unaccustomed insight told Sergeant Colon that this was not in fact a comforting thought at all. They said he's been educated at the Assassins' School, but no one remembered what weapons he'd learned. He'd studied languages. And suddenly, with him in front of you, this didn't seem like the soft option.

Sergeant Colon saluted, always a useful thing to do in an emergency such as this, and shouted: “Corporal Nobbs, why aren't you in the… the metal sinking fish thing?”

“Sarge?”

“Let's see you get up them steps, lad… hup hup hup…”

Nobby scrambled up the ladder and disappeared. Colon saluted again. You could usually tell his nervousness by the smartness of his salute. You could have cut bread with this one.

“Ready to go, sah!” he shouted.

“Well done, sergeant,” said Vetinari. “You're displaying exactly those special qualities I'm looking for—”

“'ere, sarge,” came a metallic voice from the belly of the fish, “there's all chains and cogwheels in here. What's this do?” The big auger in front of the thing started to squeak round.

Leonard appeared from behind the fish.

“I think we should all get in,” he said. “I've lit the candle that'll burn down and sever the string that'll release the weight that'll pull the blocks out.”

“Er… what is this thing called?” said Colon, as he followed the Patrician up the ladder.

“Well, because it is submersed in a marine environment I've always called it the Going-Under-The-Water-Safely Device,” said Leonard, behind him.10 “But usually I just think of it as the Boat.”

He reached behind him and shut the lid.

After a moment any listener in the boathouse would have heard a complicated clonk as bolts slid into place.

The candle burned down and severed the string that released the weight that pulled the blocks out and, slowly at first, the Boat slid down the rails and into the dark water which, after a second or two, closed over it with a gloop.

No one took any notice of Angua as she trotted up the gangplank. The important thing, she knew, was to look at home. No one bothered a large dog that looked as though it knew where it was going.

People were milling about on deck in the manner peculiar to non-sailors on board ship, not sure of what they should be doing or where they should refrain from doing it. Some of the more stoic ones had made little camps, defining with bundles and pieces of cloth tiny areas of private property. They reminded Angua of the bi-coloured drainpipes and microscopically delineated household boundaries in Money Trap Lane, showing yet another way of drawing a line in the sand. This is Mine, and that is Yours. Trespass on Mine, and you'll get Yours.

There were a couple of guards standing on either side of the door to the cabins. They hadn't been told to stop dogs.

Scents led down below. She could smell the other dogs and a strong odour of cloves.

At the end of the narrow passage a door was ajar. She forced it open with her nose and looked around.

The dogs were lying on a rug on one side of a large cabin. Other dogs might have barked, but these just turned their beautiful heads towards her, sighted down the length of their noses and examined her carefully.

A narrow bed beyond them was half concealed by silk hangings. 71-hour Ahmed was bending over it, but he turned when she entered.

He glanced towards the dogs and gave her a puzzled look. Then, to her amazement, he sat down on the deck in front of her.

“And who do you belong to?” he said in perfect Morporkian.

Angua wagged her tail. There was someone in the bed, she could smell them, but they wouldn't be a problem. Jaw muscles strong enough to sever someone's neck help you to feel relaxed in most situations.

Ahmed patted her on the head. Very few people have ever done that to a werewolf without having to get people to cut up their meals for them in future, but Angua had learned self-control.

Then he stood up and went to the door. She heard him say something to someone outside, and then he came back into the room and smiled at her.

“I go, I come back…”

He opened a small cupboard and took out a jewelled dog collar. “You shall have a collar. Oh, and here is some food,” he added, as a servant brought in some bowls. “‘Knickknack, paddywack, give a dog a bone’ is a rhyme I hear your Ankh-Morpork children sing, but a paddywack is a ball of gristle suitable only for animal food and who knows what part of the animal is its knick-knack…”

The plate was put in front of Angua. The other dogs stirred, but Ahmed snapped a word at them and they settled back again.

The food was… dog food. In Ankh-Morpork terms, it meant something that you wouldn't even put in a sausage, and there are very few things that a man with a big enough mincer cannot put in a sausage.

The little central human part of her was revolted, but the werewolf drooled at the sight of every glistening tube and wobbly fat bit

It was on a silver plate.

She looked up. Ahmed was watching her carefully. Of course, the royal dogs were treated like kings, all those diamond collars… It didn't have to mean he knew–

“Not hungry?” he said. “Your mouth says you are.”

Something snapped around her neck as she spun around to bite. Her teeth closed on a mouthful of greasy cloth but that wasn't as important as the pain.

“His Highness has always liked fine collars on his dogs,” said 71-hour Ahmed, through the red mist. “Rubies, emeralds… and diamonds, Miss Angua.” His face came down level with hers. “Set in silver.”

“…A crucial factor, I have always found, is NOT the size of the forces. It is the positioning and commitment of reserves, the bringing of power to a point…”

Vimes tried to concentrate on Tacticus. But there were two distractions. One was that the grinning face of 71-hour Ahmed looked out at him from every line. The other was his watch, which he had propped up against the Disorganizer. It was powered by actual clockwork and was much more reliable. And it never needed feeding. It ticked quietly. As far as it was concerned, he could forget his appointments. He liked it.

The second hand was just curving towards the top of the minute when he heard someone coming up the stairs.

“Come in, captain,” said Vimes. There was a snigger from the box.

Carrot's face was pinker than normal.

“Something's happened to Angua,” said Vimes.

The high colour drained from Carrot's face. “How did you know that?”

Vimes firmly closed the lid on the sniggering demon. “Let's call it intuition, shall we? I'm right, am I?”

“Yes, sir! She went aboard a Klatchian boat and now it's sailing! She hasn't come off!”

“What the hell did she go on board for?”

“We were after Ahmed! And he looked as if he was taking someone with him, sir. Someone ill, sir!”

“He's left? But the diplomats are still—”

Vimes stopped. There was, if you didn't know Carrot, something wrong with the situation. There were people who, when their girlfriend was spirited away on a foreign ship, would have dived into the Ankh, or at least run briskly along the crust, leapt aboard and dealt out merry hell on a democratic basis. Of course, at a time like this that would be a dumb thing to do. The sensible approach would be to let people know, but even so—

But Carrot really did believe that personal wasn't the same as important. Of course, Vimes believed the same thing. You had to hope that when push came to shove you'd act the right way. But there was something slightly creepy about someone who didnt just believe it, but lived their life by it. It was as unnerving as meeting a really poor priest.

Obviously, it was a consideration that if someone had captured Angua you knew that the rescue you were going to probably wouldn't be hers.

But…

The gods alone knew what would happen if he left now. The city had gone war mad. Big things were happening. At a time like this, every cell in his body was telling him that the Commander of the Watch had Responsibilities…

He drummed his fingers on the desk. In times like this, it was vital to make the right decision. That was what he was paid for. Responsibility…

He ought to stay here, and do the best he could.

But… history was full of the bones of good men who'd followed bad orders in the hope that they could soften the blow. Oh, yes, there were worse things they could do, but most of them began right where they started following bad orders.

His eyes went from Carrot to the Dis-organizer and then to the tottering mounds of paperwork on his desk.

Blow that! He was a thief-taker! He'd always be a thieftaker! Why lie?

“Damned if I'll let Ahmed get back to Klatch!” he said, standing up. “Fast boat, was it?”

“Yes, but it looked pretty heavy in the water.”

“Then maybe we can catch it up before it goes very far—”

As he hurried forward he had, just for a second, the strange sensation that he was two people. And this was because, for the merest fraction of a second, he was two people. They were both called Samuel Vimes.

To history, choices are merely directions. The Trousers of Time opened up and Vimes began to hurtle down one leg of them.

And, somewhere else, the Vimes who made a different choice began to drop into a different future.

They both darted back to grab their Dis-organizers. By the most outrageous of freak chances, quite uniquely, in this split second of decision, they each got the wrong one.

And sometimes the avalanche depends on one snowflake. Sometimes a pebble is allowed to find out what might have happened – if only it had bounced the other way.

The wizards of Ankh-Morpork had been very firm on the subject of printing. It's not happening here, they said. Supposing, they said, someone printed a book on magic and then broke up the type again and used it for a book on, say, cookery? The metal would remember. Spells aren't just words. They have extra dimensions of existence. We'd be up to here in talking souffles. Besides, someone might print thousands of the damn things, many of which could well be read by unsuitable people.

The Engravers' Guild was also against printing. There was something pure, they said, about an engraved page of text. It was there, whole, unsullied. Their members could do very fine work at very reasonable rates. Allowing unskilled people to bash lumps of type together showed a disrespect for words and no good would come of it.

The only attempt ever to set up a printing press in Ankh-Morpork had ended in a mysterious fire and the death by suicide of the luckless printer. Everyone knew it was suicide because he'd left a note. The fact that this had been engraved on the head of a pin was considered an irrelevant detail.

And the Patrician was against printing because if people knew too much it would only bother them.

So people relied on work of mouth, which worked very well because the mouths were so close together. A lot of them were just below the noses of the members of the Beggars' Guild,11 citizens generally regarded as reasonably reliable and well informed. Some of them were highly thought of for their sports coverage.

Lord Rust looked thoughtfully at Crumbling Michael, a Grade II Mutterer.

“And what happened next?”

Crumbling Michael scratched his wrist. He'd recently got his extra grade because he'd finally managed to catch a disfiguring but harmless skin disease.

“Mr Carrot was in there about two minutes, m'lord. Then they all come runnin' out, right, an' they—”

“Who were they?” said Rust. He fought off an urge to scratch his own arm.

“There was Carrot an' Vimes anna dwarf an' a zombie an' all of them, m'lord. They ran all the way to the docks, m'lord, and Vimes saw Captain Jenkins and he said—”

“Ah, Captain Jenkins! This is your lucky day!”

The captain looked up from the rope he was coiling. No one likes being told it's their lucky day. That sort of thing does not bode well. When someone tells you it's your lucky day, something bad is about to happen.

“It is?” he said.

“Yes, because you have an unrivalled opportunity to aid the war effort!”

“I have?”

“And also to demonstrate your patriotism,” Carrot added.

“I do?”

“We need to borrow your boat,” said Vimes.

“Bugger off!”

“I'm choosing to believe that was a salty nautical expression meaning ‘Why, certainly’,” said Vimes. “Captain Carrot?”

“Sir.”

“You and Detritus go and look behind that false partition in the hold,” said Vimes.

“Right, sir,” said Carrot, walking towards the ladder.

“There's no false partition in the hold!” snapped Jenkins. “And I know the law, and you can't—”

There was a crash of timber from below.

“If that wasn't a false partition, our Carrot's gone and knocked a hole in the side,” said Vimes calmly, watching the captain.

“Er…”

“I know the law too,” said Vimes. He drew his sword. “See this?” he said, holding it up. “This is military law. And military law is a sword. Not a two-edged sword. There's only one edge, and it's pointing at you. Found anything, Carrot?”

Carrot appeared over the edge of the hold. There was a crossbow in his hand.

“I do declare,” said Vimes, “but that looks to me like a Burleigh and Stronginthearm. ‘Viper’ Mk 3, which kills people but leaves buildings standing.”

“There's crates and crates of stuff,” said Carrot.

“'s no law—” Jenkins began, but he sounded as if the bottom was dropping out of his world.

“You know, I think there probably is some law against selling weapons to the enemy in times of war,” said Vimes. “Of course, there might not be. Tell you what,” he added brightly, “why don't we all go along to Sator Square? It's full of people around this time, all very keen on the war and cheering our brave lads… Why don't we go along and put it to them? You told me I ought to listen to the voice of the people. Odd thing, ain't it… you meet people one at a time, they seem decent, they got brains that work, and then they get together and you hear the voice of the people. And it snarls.”

“That's mob rule!”

“Oh, no, surely not,” said Vimes. “Call it democratic justice.”

“One man, one rock,” Detritus volunteered.

Jenkins looked like a man afraid the world was about to drop out of his bottom. He glared at Vimes and then at Carrot, and saw no help there.

“Of course, you'd have nothing to fear from us,” said Vimes. “Although you might trip on your way down the stairs to the cells.”

“There's no stairs down to your cells!”

“Stairs can be arranged.”

“Please, Mr Jenkins,” said Carrot, the good cop.

“I wasn't… taking… the weapons to… Klatch,” Jenkins said slowly, as if he was reading the words very painfully off some interior script. “I had… in fact… bought them to… donate them… to…”

“Yes? Yes?” said Vimes.

“…our… brave lads,” said Jenkins.

“Well done!” said Carrot.

“And you'd be happy to…?” Vimes prompted.

“And… I'd be happy to… lend my boat to the war effort,” said Jenkins, sweating.

“A true patriot,” said Vimes.

Jenkins writhed.

“Who told you there was a false panel in the hold?” he demanded. “It was a guess, right?”

“Right,” said Vimes.

“Aha! I knew you were only guessing!”

“Patriotic and clever,” said Vimes. “Now… how do you make this thing go fast?”

Lord Rust tapped his fingers on the table.

“What did he take the boat for?”

“Dunno, m'lord,” said Cumbling Michael, scratching his head.

“Damn! Did anyone else see them?”

“Oh, there weren't many people around, m'lord.”

“That's a small mercy, at least.”

“Just me and Foul Ole Ron and the Duck Man and Blind Hugh and Ringo Eyebrows and No Way Jose and Sidney Lopsides and that bastard Stoolie and Whistling Dick and a few others, m'lord.”

Rust sank back in his chair and put a pale hand over his face. In Ankh-Morpork the night had a thousand eyes and so did the day, and it also had five hundred mouths and nine hundred and ninety-nine ears.12

“The Klatchians must know, then,” he said. “A detachment of Ankh-Morpork soldiery has taken ship for Klatch. An invasion force.”

“Oh, you could hardly call it—” Lieutenant Hornett began.

“The Klatchians will call it that. Besides, the troll Detritus is with them,” said Rust.

Hornett looked glum. Detritus was an invasion force all by himself.

“What ships have we commandeered?” said Rust.

“There's more than twenty now, if you include the Indestructible, the Indolence and the…” Lieutenant Hornett looked at his list again, “…and the Prid of Ankh-Morpork, sir.”

“The Prid?”

“I'm afraid so, sir.”

“We should be able to take more than a thousand men and two hundred horses, then.”

“Why not let Vimes go?” said Lord Selachii. “Let the Klatchians deal with him, and good riddance.”

“And give them a victory over Ankh-Morpork forces? That's how they will see it. Damn the man. He forces our hand. But still, perhaps it is for the best. We should embark.”

“Are we entirely ready, sir?” said Lieutenant Hornett, with the special inflection that means “We are not entirely ready, sir.”

“We had better be. Glory awaits, gentlemen. In the words of General Tacticus, let us take history by the scrotum. Of course, he was not a very honourable fighter.”

White sunlight etched dark shadows in Prince Cadram's palace. He too had a map of Klatch, made of tiny coloured tiles set into the floor. He sat looking at it pensively.

“Just one boat?” he said.

General Ashal, his chief adviser, nodded. And added: “Our scryers can't get a very clear picture over that distance, but we do believe one of the men to be Vimes. You recall the name, sire.”

“Ah, the useful Commander Vimes.” The Prince smiled.

“Indeed. And since then there has been a lot of activity all along the docks. We have to take the view that the expeditionary force is setting out.”

“I thought we had at least a week, Ashal.”

“It is certainly puzzling. They cannot possibly be prepared, sire. Something must have happened.”

Cadram sighed. “Oh, well, let us follow where fate points the way. Where will they attack?”

“Gebra, sire. I'm sure of it.”

“Our most heavily fortified city? Surely not. Only an idiot would do that.”

“I have studied Lord Rust in some depth, sire. Remember that he doesn't expect us to fight, so the size of our forces really doesn't worry him.” The general smiled. It was a neat, thin little smile. “And of course in attacking us he is piling infamy upon infamy. The other coastal states will take note.”

“A change of plan, then,” said Cadram. “Ankh-Morpork can wait.”

“A wise move, sire. As always.”

“Any news of my poor brother?”

“Alas no, sire.”

“Our agents must search harder. The world is watching, Ashal.”

“Correct, sire.”

“Sarge?”

“Yes, Nobby?”

“Tell me again about our special qualities.”

“Shut up and keep pedalling, Nobby.”

“Right, sarge.”

It was quite dark in the Boat. A candle swung from a bracket over Leonard of Quirm's bowed head as he sat steering with two levers. Around Nobby, pulleys rattled and little chains clicked. It was like being inside a sewing machine. A damp one, too. Condensation dropped off the ceiling in a steady stream.

They had been pedalling for ten minutes. Leonard had spent most of the time talking excitedly. Nobby got the impression he didn't get out much. He talked about everything.

There were the tanks of air, for example. Nobby was happy to accept that you could squeeze air up really small, and that was what was in the groaning, creaking steel-bound casks strapped to the walls. It was what happened to the air afterwards that came as a surprise.

“Bubbles!” said Leonard. “Dolphins again, you see? They don't swim through the water, they fly through a cloud of bubbles. Which is much easier, of course. I add a little soap, which seems to improve matters.”

“He thinks dolphins fly, sarge,” whispered Nobby.

“Just keep pedalling.”

Sergeant Colon risked a glance behind him.

Lord Vetinari was sitting on an upturned box amidst the clicking chains, with several of Leonard's sketches open on his knees.

“Carry on, sergeant,” said the Patrician.

“Right, sir.”

The Boat was moving faster now they were away from the city. There was even a brackish light filtering through the little glass windows.

“Mr Leonard,” said Nobby.

“Yes?”

“Where're we going?”

“His lordship wishes to go to Leshp.”

“Yes, I thought it'd be something like that,” said Nobby. “I thought: ‘Where don't I want to go?’ And the answer just popped into my head, just like that. Only I don't think we'll get there, the reason bein', in about another five minutes my knees are going to fall off…”

“Oh, my word, you won't have to pedal all the way,” said Leonard. “What did you think the big auger on the nose is for?”

“That?” said Nobby. “I thought that was for drillin' into the bottom of enemy ships—”

“What?” Leonard spun around in his seat, a look of horror on his face.

“Sink ships? Sink ships? With people on them?”

“Well… yes…”

“Corporal Nobbs, I think you are a very misguided young… man,” said Leonard stiffly. “Use the Boat to sink ships? That would be terrible! In any case, no sailor would dream of doing such a dishonourable thing!”

“Sorry.”

“The auger, I would have you know, is for attaching us to passing ships in the manner of the remora, the sucker-fish which attaches itself to sharks. A few turns is all that is necessary for a firm attachment.”

“So… you couldn't bore all the way through the hull, then?”

“Only if you were a very careless and extremely thoughtless young man!”

The ocean waves may not be ploughable, but the crust of the river Ankh downstream from the city was known to sprout small bushes in the summertime. The Milka moved slowly, leaving a furrow behind it.

“Can't you go faster?” said Vimes.

“Why, certainly,” said Jenkins nastily. “Where would you like us to put the extra mast?”

“The ship's just a dot,” said Carrot. “Why aren't we gaining on them?”

“It's a bigger ship so it has got what we technically call more sails,” said Jenkins. “And they're fast hulls on those Klatchian boats. And we've got a full hold—”

He stopped, but it was too late.

“Captain Carrot?” said Vimes.

“Sir?”

“Throw everything overboard,” said Vimes.

“Not the crossbows! They cost more than a hundred dollars ea—”

Jenkins stopped. Vimes's expression said, very clearly, that there were a whole lot of things that could be thrown off the boat, and it would be a good idea not to be among them.

“Go and pull some ropes, Mr Jenkins,” he said.

He watched the captain stamp off. A few moments later there was a splash. Vimes looked over the side and saw a crate bob for a moment and then sink. And he felt happy. Thief-taker, Rust had called him. The man had meant it as an insult, but it'd do. Theft was the only crime, whether the loot was gold, innocence, land or life. And for the thieftaker, there was the chase…

There were several more splashes. Vimes fancied the ship surged forward.

…the chase. Because the chase was simpler than the capture. Once you'd caught someone it got complicated, but the chase was pure and free. Much better than prodding at clues and peering at notebooks. He flees, I chase. Simple.

Vetinari's terrier, eh?

“Bingeley-bingeley beep!” said his pocket.

“Don't tell me,” said Vimes. “It's something like ‘Five pee em, At Sea,’ yes?”

“Er… no,” said the Dis-organizer. “Says here ‘Violent Row With Lord Rust’, Insert Name Here.”

“Aren't you supposed to tell me what I'm going to do?” said Vimes, opening the box.

“Er… what you should be doing,” said the demon, looking very worried. “What you should be doing. I don't understand it… er… something seems to be wrong…”

Angua stopped trying to rub the collar off against a bulkhead. It wasn't working, and the silver pressing against her skin seemed to freeze her and burn her at the same time.

Apart from that – and a silver collar on a werewolf was a fairly major that – she'd been treated well. They'd left a plate of food, a wooden plate, and she'd let her wolf side eat it while the human side shut its eyes and held its nose. There was a bowl of water, quite fresh by Ankh-Morpork standards. She could see the bottom of the bowl, at least.

It was so hard to think in wolf shape. It was like trying to unlock a door while drunk. It was possible, but you had to concentrate every step of the way.

There was a sound.

Her ears pricked up.

Something tapped once or twice under the hull. She hoped it was a reef. That meant… land, possibly… with any luck she could swim ashore…

Something clinked. She'd forgotten about the chain. It was hardly necessary. She felt as weak as a kitten.

There was a rhythmic noise, like something chewing at the wood.

A tiny metal point splintered through the wall just in front of her nose, and rose an inch.

And someone spoke. It sounded far off and distorted, and perhaps only a werewolf would have heard it, but words were happening, somewhere under her paws.

“—can stop pedalling now, Corporal Nobbs.”

“I am knackered, sarge. Is there anything to eat?”

“There's some more of that garlic sausage. Or there's the cheese. Or cold beans.”

“We're in a tin with no air and we're supposed to eat cheese? I ain't even going to comment on the beans.”

“I'm very sorry gentlemen. Things were rather rushed and I had to take food which would keep.”

“It's just that it's getting a bit… crowded, if you get my meaning.”

“I will pay out the rope as soon as it's dark and we can surface and take on air.”

“Just so long as we get rid of the air we've got, that's all I'm saying…”

Angua's brows wrinkled as she tried to make sense of this. The voices were familiar. Even muffled as they were, she recognized the tones. The vague feeling that fought its way through the mists of animal intellect was: friends.

The tiny little unchangeable centre of her thought: good grief, next thing I'll be licking hands.

She laid her head down near the point again.

“—way to do it, young man. There you go again! Sink ships? I can't imagine how anyone could think of such a thing!”

Names. Some of those voices had… names.

Thinking was getting harder. That was the silver at work. But if she stopped, she might forget how to start again.

She stared at the point of metal. The point of metal with sharp edges.

The tiny human part of her mind raged at the wolf brain, trying to get it to understand what it needed to do.

It was after midnight.

The lookout man knelt on the deck in front of 71-hour Ahmed and trembled.

“I know what I saw, wali,” he moaned. “And the others saw it too! Something rose up behind the ship and began chasing us! A monster!”

Ahmed looked at the captain, who shrugged. “Who knows what lies on the floor of the sea, wali?”

“Its breath!” moaned the seaman. “There was a great roar of breath like the stink of a thousand privies! And then it spoke!”

“Really?” said Ahmed. “This is not usual. What did it say?”

“I did not understand!” The man's face screwed up as he tried to assemble the unfamiliar syllables. “It sounded like…” he swallowed, and went on, “‘Ye gods, that was better out than in, sarge!’”

Ahmed stared at him. “And what did that mean to you?” he said.

“I do not know, wali!”

“You have not spent much time in Ankh-Morpork?”

“No, wali!”

“Then return to your post.”

The man stumbled out.

“We have lost speed, wali,” said the captain.

“Perhaps the sea monster is clutching at our keel?”

“It pleases you to joke, lord. But who knows what has been disturbed by the rising of the new land?”

“I shall have to see for myself,” said 71-hour Ahmed.

He walked alone to the stern of the ship. Dark waters sucked and splashed and left a phosphorescent glow edging the wake.

He watched for a long time. People bad at watching didn't last long in the desert, where a shadow in the moonlight could be just a shadow or it could be someone anxious to help you on your way to Paradise. The D'regs came across many shadows of the latter persuasion.

D'reg wasn't their name for themselves, although they tended to adopt it now out of pride. The word meant enemy. Everyone's. And if anyone else wasn't around, then one another's.

If he concentrated, he might believe that there was a darker shape about a hundred yards behind the ship, very low in the water. Waves were breaking where waves shouldn't be. It looked as though the ship was being followed by a reef.

Well, well…

71-hour Ahmed was not superstitious. He was substitious, which put him in a minority among humans. He didn't believe in the things everyone believed in but which nevertheless weren't true. He believed instead in the things that were true in which no one else believed. There are many such substitions, ranging from “It'll get better if you don't pick at it” all the way up to “Sometimes things just happen.”

Currently he was disinclined to believe in sea monsters, especially ones that spoke in the language of Ankh-Morpork, but he did believe that there were a lot of things in the world that he didn't know about.

In the far distance he could see the lights of a ship. It didn't seem to be gaining on them.

This was much more worrying.

In the darkness 71-hour Ahmed reached over his shoulder and grasped the handle of his sword.

Above him, the mainsail creaked in the wind.

Sergeant Colon knew he was facing one of the most dangerous moments in his career.

There was nothing for it. He was out of options.

“Er… if I add this A and this O and this I and this D,” he said, the sweat pouring down his pink cheeks, “then I can use that V to make ‘avoid’. Er… and that gets me, er, a… what d'you call these blue squares, Len?”

“A ‘Three Times Ye Value of Thee Letter’ score,” said Leonard of Quirm.

“Well done, sergeant,” said Lord Vetinari. “I do believe that puts you in the lead.”

“Er… I do believe it does, sir,” squeaked Sergeant Colon.

“However, I find that you have left me the use of my U, N and A, B, L, E,” the Patrician went on, “which incidentally lands me on this Three Times the Whole Worde square and, I rather suspect, wins me the game.”

Sergeant Colon sagged with relief.

“A capital game, Leonard,” said Vetinari. “What did you say it was called?”

“I call it the ‘Make Words With Letters That Have All Been Mixed Up Game’, my lord.”

“Ah. Yes. Obviously. Well done.”

“Huh, an' I got three points,” mumbled Nobby. “They was perfectly good words that you wouldn't let me have, too.”

“I'm sure the gentlemen don't want to know those words,” said Colon severely.

“I'd have got ten points for that X.”

Leonard looked up. “Strange. We seem to have stopped moving…”

He reached up and opened the hatch. Damp night air poured in, and there was the sound of voices, quite close, echoing loudly as voices do when heard across water.

“Heathen Klatchian talk,” said Colon. “What are they gabblin' about?”

“‘What nephew of a camel cut the rigging?’” said Lord Vetinari, without looking up. “‘Not just the ropes, look at this sail – here, give me a hand…’”

“I didn't know you spoke Klatchian, my lord.”

“Not a word,” said Lord Vetinari.

“But you—”

“I did not,” said Vetinari calmly.

“Ah… right…”

“Where are we, Leonard?”

“Well, er, my star charts are all out of date, of course, but if you would care to wait until the sun rises, and I've invented a device for ascertaining position by reference to the sun, and devised a satisfactorily accurate watch—”

“Where are we now, Leonard?”

“Er… in the middle of the Circle Sea, I suspect.”

“The middle?”

“Pretty close, I should say. Look, if I can measure the wind speed—”

“Then Leshp should be in this vicinity?”

“Oh, yes, I should—”

“Good. Unhitch us from his apparently stricken ship while we still have the cover of darkness and in the morning I wish to see this troublesome land. In the meantime, I suggest that everyone gets some sleep.”

Sergeant Colon did not get a lot of sleep. This was partly because he was woken up several times by sawing and banging coming from the front of the Boat, and partly because water kept dripping on his head, but mainly because the lull in activity was causing him to consider his position.

Sometimes when he woke up he saw the Patrician hunched over Leonard's drawings, a gaunt silhouette in the light of the candle – reading, making notes…

He was in the immediate company of a man even the Assassins' Guild was frightened of, another man who would stay up all night in order to invent an alarm clock to wake him up in the morning, and a man who had never knowingly changed his underwear.

And he was at sea.

He tried to look on the bright side. What was the main reason why he hated boats? The fact that they sank, right? But this one had the sinking built in right from the start And you didn't have to watch the waves going up and down, because they were already above you.

All this was logical. It just wasn't very comforting.

When he awoke at one point there were faint voices coming from the other end of the vessel.

“—don't quite understand, my lord. Why them?”

“They do what they're told, they tend to believe the last thing they heard, they're not bright enough to ask questions, and they have that certain unshakable loyalty available to those unencumbered by too much intelligence.”

“I suppose so, my lord.”

“Such men are valuable, believe me.”

Sergeant Colon turned over and tried to make himself comfortable. Glad I'm not like those poor bastards, he thought as he drifted off to sleep on the bosom of the deep. I'm a man with special qualities.

Vimes shook his head. The stern light of the Klatchian ship was barely visible in the gloom.

“Are we gaining on them?” he said.

Captain Jenkins nodded. “We might be. There's a lot of sea between us.”

“And has all excess weight been thrown overboard?”

“Yes! What do you want me to do, shave my beard off?”

Carrot's face appeared over the edge of the hold, “All the lads are bedded down, sir.”

“Right.”

“I'll turn in for a few hours too, sir, if it's all right with you.”

“Sorry, captain?”

“I'll get my head down, sir.”

“But… but—” Vimes waved vaguely at the darkening horizon, “we're in hot pursuit of your girlfriend! Among other things,” he added.

“Yes, sir.”

“So aren't you… you mean you can… you want to… captain, you intend to go and have a bit of a nap?”

“To be fresh for when we catch up with them. Yes, sir. If I spend the whole night staring out there worrying then I'll probably be a bit useless when we catch up with them, sir.”

It made sense. It really did make sense. Of course it made sense. Vimes could see the sense all over it. Carrot had actually sat down and thought sensibly about things.

She kicked them both hard and ran in the opposite direction, opened the first door at random and slammed it behind her.

It was the cabin with the dogs in it. They sprang to their feet, opened their mouths – and slunk down again. A werewolf can have considerable power over other animals, whatever shape she's in, although it is largely the power to make them cringe and try to look inedible.

She hurried past them and pulled at one of the hangings over the bunk.

The man in the bunk opened his eyes. He was a Klatchian, but pale with weakness and pain. There were dark rings under his eyes.

“Ah,” he said, “it would appear that I have died and gone to Paradise. Are you a houri?”

“I don't have to take that kind of language, thank you,” said Angua, ripping the silk in two with a practised hand.

She was aware that she had a slight advantage over male werewolves in that naked women caused fewer complaints, although the downside was that they got some pressing invitations. Some kind of covering was essential, for modesty and the prevention of inconvenient bouncing, which was why fashioning impromptu clothes out of anything to hand was a lesser-known werewolf skill.

Angua stopped. Of course, to the unpractised eye all Klatchians looked alike, but then to a werewolf all humans looked alike: they looked appetizing. She'd learned to discern.

“Are you Prince Khufarah?”

“I am. And you are…?”

The door was kicked open. Angua leapt towards the window and flung aside the bar restraining the shutters. Water funnelled into the cabin, drenching her, but she managed to scramble up and out.

“Just passing through?” the Prince murmured.

71-hour Ahmed strode to the window and looked out. Green-blue waves edged with fire fought outside as the ship heaved. No one could stay afloat in a sea like that.

He turned and looked along the hull to where Angua was clinging to a trailing line.

She saw him wink at her. Then he turned away and she heard him say, “She must have drowned. Back to your posts!”

Presently, up on the deck, a hatch closed.

The sun rose in a cloudless sky.

A watcher, if such had been out here, would have noticed a slight difference in the way the swells were moving on this tiny patch of sea.

They might even have wondered about the piece of bent piping which turned with a faint squeaking noise.

Had they been able to place an ear to it, they would have heard the following:

“—idea while I was dozing off. Piece of pipe, two angled mirrors – the solution to all our steering and air problems!”

“Fascinating. A Seeing-Things-Pipe-You-Can-Breathe-Down.”

“My goodness, how did you know it was called that, my lord?”

“A lucky guess.”

“'ere, someone's re-designed my pedalling seat, it's comfortable–”

“Ah, yes, corporal, I took some measurements while you were asleep and rebuilt it for a better anatomical configu—”

“You took measurements?”

“Oh, yes, I—”

“What, of my… saddlery regions?”

“Oh, please don't be concerned, anatomy is something of a passion with me—”

“Is it? Is it? Well, you can stop being passionate about mine for a start—”

“Here, I can see an island of some sort!”

The pipe squeaked around.

“Ah, Leshp. And I see people. To your pedals, gentlemen. Let us explore the ocean's bottom…”

“I expect we shall, with him steering—”

“Shut up, Nobby.”

The pipe slid down into the waves. There was a little flurry of bubbles and a damp argument about whose job it should have been to put the cork in, and then the patch of sea that had been empty was, somehow, a little bit emptier still.

There weren't any fish.

At a time like this Solid Jackson would have even been prepared to eat Curious Squid.

But the sea was empty. And it smelled wrong. It fizzed gently. Solid could see little bubbles breaking on the surface, which burst with a smell of sulphur and rotting eggs. He guessed that the rise of the land must have stirred up a lot of mud. It was bad enough at the bottom of a pond, all those frogs and bugs and things, and this was the sea

He tried hard to reverse that train of thought, but it kept on rising from the depths like a… like a…

Why were there no fish? Oh, there'd been the storm last night, but generally you got better fishing in these parts after a storm because it… stirred… up…

The raft rocked.

He was beginning to think it might be a good idea to go home, but that'd mean leaving the land to the Klatchians, and that'd happen over his dead body.

The treacherous internal voice said: Funnily enough, they never found Mr Hong's body. Not most of the important bits, anyway.

“I think, think, I think we'll be getting back now,” he said to his son.

“Oh, Dad,” said Les. “Another dinner of limpets and seaweed?”

“Nothing wrong with seaweed,” said Jackson. “It's full of nourishing… seaweed. 's got iron in it. Good for you, iron.”

“Why don't we boil an anchor, then?”

“None of your lip, son.”

“The Klatchians have got bread,” said Les. “They brought flour with them. And they've got firewood.” This was a sore point with Jackson. Efforts to make seaweed combust had not been successful.

“Yeah, but you wouldn't like their bread,” said Jackson. “It's all flat and got no proper crust—”

A breeze blew the scent of baking over the water. It carried a hint of spices.

“They're baking bread! On our property!”

“Well, they say it's their–”

Jackson grabbed the piece of broken plank he used as an oar and began to scull furiously towards the shore. The fact that this only made the raft go round in circles added to his fury.

“They bloody move in right next to us and all we get is the stink of foreign food—”

“Why's your mouth watering, Dad?”

“And how come they've got wood, may I ask?”

“I think the current takes the driftwood to their side of the island, Dad—”

“See? They're stealing our driftwood! Our damn driftwood! Hah! Well, we'll—”

“But I thought we agreed that the bit over there was theirs, and—”

Jackson had finally remembered how to propel a raft with one oar.

“That wasn't an agreement,” he said, creating foam as the oar thrashed back and forth, “that was just an… an arrangement. It's not as if they created the driftwood. It just turned up. Accident of geography. It is a natural resource, right? It don't belong to anyone—”

The raft hit something which made a metallic sound. But they were still a hundred yards from the rocks.

Something else, long and bent at the end, rose up with a creaking noise. It twisted around until it pointed at Jackson.

“Excuse me,” it said, in a tinny yet polite voice, “but this is Leshp, isn't it?”

Jackson made a sound in his throat.

“Only,” the thing went on, “the water's a little cloudy and I thought we might have been going the wrong way for the last twenty minutes.”

“Leshp!” squeaked Jackson, in an unnaturally high-pitched voice.

“Ah, good. Thank you so much. Good day to you.”

The appendage sank slowly into the sea again. The last sounds from it, erupting on the surface in a cloud of bubbles, were, “…don't forget to put the cork in– You've forgot to put the cor–”

The bubbles stopped.

After a while Les said, “Dad, what was—?”

“It wasn't anything!” snapped his father. “That sort of thing doesn't happen!”

The raft shot forward. You could have waterski'd behind it.

Another important thing about the Boat, thought Sergeant Colon gloomily as they slipped back into a blue twilight, was that you couldn't bale out the bilges. It was the bilges.

He was pedalling with his feet in water and he was suffering simultaneously from claustrophobia and agoraphobia. He was afraid of everything in here and everything out there at the same time. Plus, there were unpleasantnesses out there, moving past as the Boat drifted down the wall of rock. Feelers waved. There were claws. Things scuttled into the waving weeds. Giant clams watched Sergeant Colon with their lips.

The Boat creaked.

“Sarge,” said Nobby, as they looked out at the wonders of the deep.

“Yes, Nobby?”

“You know they say every tiny part of your body is replaced every seven years?”

“A well-known fact,” said Sergeant Colon.

“Right. So… I've got a tattoo on my arm, right? Had it done eight years ago. So… how come it's still there?”

Giant seaweeds winnowed the gloom.

“Interesting point,” quavered Colon. “Er…”

“I mean, OK, new tiny bits of skin float in, but that means it ought to be all new and pink by now.”

A fish with a nose like a saw swam past.

In the middle of all his other fears, Sergeant Colon tried to think fast.

“What happens.” he said, “Is that all the blue skin bits are replaced by other blue skin bits. Off'f other people's tattoos.”

“So… I've got other people's tattoos now?”

“Er… yes.”

“Amazing. 'cos it still looks like mine. 's got the crossed daggers and ‘WUM’.”

“Wum?”

“It was gonna be ‘Mum’ but I passed out and Needle Ned didn't notice I was upside down.”

“I should've thought he'd notice that…”

“He was pissed too. C'mon, sarge, you know it's not a proper tattoo unless no one can remember how it got there.”

Leonard and the Patrician were staring out at the submarine landscape.

“What're they looking for?” said Colon.

“Leonard keeps talking about hieroglyphs,” said Nobby. “What're they, sarge?”

Colon hesitated, but not for long. “A type of mollusc, corporal.”

“Cor, you know everything, sarge,” said Nobby admiringly. “That's what hieroglyphs are, is it? So, if we go any deeper, they'll be loweroglyphs?”

There was something slightly off-putting about Nobby's grin. Sergeant Colon decided to go for broke.

“Don't be daft, Nobby. ‘Loweroglphys if you go lower…’ Oh my me.”

“Sorry, sarge.”

“Everyone knows you don't get loweroglyphs in these waters.”

A couple of Curious Squid peered at them, curiously.

Jenkins's ship was a floating wreck.

Several sails were in tatters. Rigging and other string that Vimes refused to learn the nautical names for covered the deck and trailed in the water.

Such sail as remained was moving them along in the brisk breeze.

Atop the mast the lookout cupped his hands around his mouth and leaned down.

“Land ahoy!”

“Even I can see that,” said Vimes. “Why does he have to shout?”

“It's lucky,” said Jenkins. He squinted into the haze.

“But your friend ain't heading for Gebra. Wonder where he's going?”

Vimes stared at the pale yellow mass on the horizon, and then up at Carrot.

“We'll get her back, don't worry,” he said.

“I wasn't actually worrying, sir. Although I am very concerned,” said Carrot.

“Er… right…” Vimes waved his arms helplessly, “Er… everyone fit and well? The men in good heart, are they?”

“It would help morale no end if you were to say a few words, sir.”

The monstrous regiment of watchmen had lined up on the deck, blinking in the sunshine. Oh, dear. Round up the unusual suspects. One dwarf, one human who was brought up as a dwarf and thinks like a manual of etiquette, one zombie, one troll, me and, oh no, one religious fanatic—

Constable Visit saluted. “Permission to speak, sir.”

“Go ahead,” mumbled Vimes.

“I'm pleased to tell you, sir, that our mission is clearly divinely approved of, sir. I refer to the rain of sardines which sustained us in our extremity, sir.”

“We were a little hungry, I wouldn't say we were in extremi—”

“With respect, sir,” said Constable Visit firmly, “the pattern is firmly established, sir. Yes, indeed. The Sykoolites when being pursued in the wilderness by the forces of Offlerian Mitolites, sir, were sustained by a rain of celestial biscuits, sir. Chocolate ones, sir.”

“Perfectly normal phenomenon,” muttered Constable Shoe. “Probably swept up by the wind passing a baker's shop—”

Visit glared at him, and went on: “And the Murmurians, when driven into the mountains by the tribes of Miskmik, would not have survived but for a magical rain of elephants, sir—”

“Elephants?”

“Well, one elephant, sir,” Visit conceded. “But it splashed.”

“Perfectly normal phenomenon,” said Constable Shoe. “Probably an elephant was picked up by a freak—”

“And when they were thirsty in the desert, sir, the Four Tribes of Khanli were succoured by a sudden and supernatural rain of rain, sir.”

“A rain of rain?” said Vimes, almost mesmerized by Visit's absolute conviction.

“Perfectly normal phenomenon,” sneered Reg Shoe. “Probably water was evaporated from the ocean, was blown through the sky, condensed around nuclei when it ran into cold air, and precipitated…” He stopped, and continued irritably, “Anyway, I don't believe it.”

“So… which particular deity is on our case?” said Vimes, hopefully.

“I shall definitely inform you as soon as I have ascertained this, sir.”

“Er… very good, constable.”

Vimes took a step back. “I don't pretend this is going to be easy, men,” he said. “But our mission is to catch up with Angua and this bastard Ahmed and shake the truth out of him. Unfortunately, this means we will be following him through his own country, with which we are at war. This is bound to put a few barriers in our way. But we should not let the prospect of being tortured to death dismay us, eh?”

“Fortune favours the brave, sir,” said Carrot cheerfully.

“Good. Good. Pleased to hear it, captain. What is her position vis a vis heavily armed, well prepared and excessively manned armies?”

“Oh, no one's ever heard of Fortune favouring them, sir.”

“According to General Tacticus, it's because they favour themselves,” said Vimes. He opened the battered book. Bits of paper and string indicated his many bookmarks. “In fact, men, the general has this to say about ensuring against defeat when outnumbered, out-weaponed and outpositioned. It is…” he turned the page, “‘Don't Have a Battle.’”

“Sounds like a clever man,” said Jenkins. He pointed to the yellow horizon.

“See all that stuff in the air?” he said. “What do you think that is?”

“Mist?” said Vimes.

“Hah, yes. Klatchian mist! It's a sandstorm! The sand blows about all the time. Vicious stuff. If you want to sharpen your sword, just hold it up in the air.”

“Oh.”

“And it's just as well because otherwise you'd see Mount Gebra. And below it is what they call the Fist of Gebra. It's a town but there's a bloody great fort, walls thirty feet thick. 's like a big city all by itself. 's got room inside for thousands of armed men, war elephants, battle camels, everything. And if you saw that, you'd want me to turn round right now. Whats your famous general got to say about it, eh?”

“I think I saw something…” said Vimes. He flicked to another page. “Ah, yes, he says, ‘After the first battle of Sto Lat, I formulated a policy which has stood me in good stead in other battles. It is this: if the enemy has an impregnable stronghold, see he stays there.’”

“That's a lot of help,” said Jenkins.

Vimes slipped the book into a pocket.

“So, Constable Visit, there's a god on our side, is there?”

“Certainly, sir.”

“But probably also a god on their side as well?”

“Very likely, sir. There's a god on every side.”

“Let's hope they balance out, then.”

The Klatchian ship's boat hit the water with the gentlest of splashes. This was because 71-hour Ahmed was standing by the winches with his sword at the ready, which had the effect of making the men lowering the boat take some trouble over their task.

“When we are away you may take the ship into Gebra,” he said to the captain.

The captain trembled. “What shall I tell them, wali?”

“Tell them the truth… eventually. The commander of the garrison is a man of no breeding and will torture you a little bit. Save up the truth until you need it. That will make him happy. It will help you to say that I forced you.”

“Oh, I will. I will… tell that lie,” the captain added quickly.

Ahmed nodded, slid down the rope into the boat and set it adrift

The crew watched him row through the surf.

This wasn't a nice beach. It was a wrecking coast. Ribcages of broken ships crumbled into the sand. Bones and driftwood and bleached white seaweed mounded along the high tide line. And beyond, the dunes of the real desert rose. Even down here sand stung the eyes and gritted the teeth.

“There's sudden death on that beach,” said the first mate, looking over the rail and trying to blink his eyes clear.

“Yes,” said the captain. “Hes just got out of the boat.” The figure on the beach pulled the other, recumbent figure out of the boat and dragged him out of reach of the waves. The mate raised his bow.

“I could kill him from here, master. Just say the word.”

“How sure are you? Because you'd better be really sure. First, if you miss him you're dead and, second, if you hit him, you're still dead. Look up there.”

On the high distant dunes, dark against the sandfilled sky, there were mounted figures. The mate dropped his bow.

“How did they know we were here?”

“Oh, they watch the sea,” said the captain. “D'regs like a good shipwreck as much as anyone else. More, in fact. A lot more.”

As they turned away from the rail, something leapt from the hull and entered the water with barely a splash.

Detritus tried to lurk in the shade, but there was not a lot of it about. The heat came off the high desert ahead of them like a blowtorch.

“I'm gonna get fick,” he muttered.

There was a shout from the lookout.

“He says someone's climbing the dunes,” said Carrot. “Carrying someone else, he says.”

“Er… female?”

“Look, sir, I know Angua. She's not the useless type. She doesn't stand there and scream helplessly. She makes other people do that.”

“Well… if you're sure…” Vimes turned to Jenkins. “Don't bother to chase the ship, captain. Just keep heading for the shore.”

“I don't work like that, mister. For one thing, that' s a damn difficult shore, the wind's always against you, and there's some very nasty currents. Many an incautious sailorman has left his bones to bleach on those sands. No, we'll stand out a little way and you can lower the– well, if we had a boat any more, you could lower it… and we'll drop the anchor, oh, no, tell a lie, it turned out to be too heavy, didn't it—”

“You just keep straight on,” said Vimes.

“We'll all be killed.”

“Think of it as the lesser of two evils.”

“What's the other one?”

Vimes drew his sword.

“Me.”

The Boat squeaked through the mysterious depths of the ocean. Leonard spent a lot of time looking out of the tiny windows, particularly interested in pieces of seaweed which, to Sergeant Colon, looked like pieces of seaweed.

“Do you note the fine strands of Dropley's Etoliated Bladderwrack?” said Leonard. “That's the brown stuff. A marvellous growth which, of course, you will see as significant.”

“Could we just assume for the moment that I have neglected my seaweed studies in recent years?” said the Patrician.

“Really? Oh, the loss is entirely yours, I assure you. The point is, of course, that the Etoliated Bladderwrack is never usually found growing above thirty fathoms, and it's only ten here.”

“Ah.” The Patrician flicked through a stack of Leonard's drawings. “And the hieroglyphs – an alphabet of signs and colours. Colours as a language… what a fascinating idea…”

“An emotional intensifier,” said Leonard. “But of course we ourselves use something like it. Red for danger and so on. I never did succeed in translating it, though.”

“Colours as a language…” murmured Lord Vetinari.

Sergeant Colon cleared his throat. “I know something about seaweed, sir.”

“Yes, sergeant?”

“Yessir! If it's wet, sir, it means it's going to rain.”

“Well done, sergeant,” said Lord Vetinari, without turning his head. “I think it is quite possible that I will never forget you said that.”

Sergeant Colon beamed. He had Made A Contribution.

Nobby nudged him. “What're we doing down here, sarge? I mean, what's it all about? Poking around, looking at weird marks on the rocks, going in and out of caves… and the smell… well…”

“It's not me,” said Sergeant Colon.

“Smells like… sulphur…”

Little bubbles streamed past the window.

“It stunk up on the surface, too,” Nobby went on.

“Nearly finished, gentlemen,” said Lord Vetinari, putting the papers aside. “One last little venture and then we can surface. Very well, Leonard… take us underneath.”

“Er… aren't we underneath already, sir?” said Colon.

“Only underneath the sea, sergeant.”

“Ah. Right.” Colon gave this due consideration. “Is there anything else to be under, then, sir?”

“Yes, sergeant. Now we're going under the land.”

The beach was a lot closer now. The watchmen couldn't help noticing that the sailors were all hurrying to the blunt end of the ship and hanging on to any small, lightweight and above all buoyant objects they could find.

“This seems close enough,” said Vimes. “Right. Stop here.”

“Stop here? How?”

“Don't ask me, I'm no sailor. Aren't there some sort of brakes?”

Jenkins stared at him. “You – you landlubber!”

“I thought you never used the word!”

“I never met one like you before! You even think we call the bows the sharp en—”

It was, the crew agreed later, one of the strangest landings in the history of bad seamanship. The shelving of the beach must have been right and the tide as well, because the ship did not so much hit the beach as sail up it, rising out of the water as the keel de-barnacled itself on the sand. Finally the forces of wind, water, impetus and friction all met at the point marked “fall over slowly”.

It did so, earning the title of “world's most laughable shipwreck”.

“Well, that might have been worse,” said Vimes, when the splintering noises had died away.

He eased himself out of a tangle of canvas and adjusted his helmet with as much aplomb as he could muster.

He heard a groan from the lopsided hold.

“Is dat you, Cheery?”

“Yes, Detritus.”

“Is dis me?”

“No!”

“Sorry.”

Carrot eased his way down the sloping deck and jumped onto the damp sand. He saluted.

“All present and lightly bruised, sir. Shall we establish a beachhead?”

“A what?”

“We have to dig in, sir.”

Vimes looked both ways along the beach, if such a sunny-sounding word could be applied to the forsaken strand. It was really just a hem to the land. Nothing stirred except the heat haze and, in the distance, one or two carrion birds.

“What for?” he said.

“Establish a defensible position. It's just one of those things soldiers do, sir.”

Vimes glanced at the birds. They were approaching with a kind of sidling sideways hop, ready to move in just as soon as anyone had been dead for a few days. Then he flicked through Tacticus until the word “beachhead” caught his eye.

“It says here ‘If you want your men to spend much time wielding a shovel, encourage them to become farmers,’” he said. “So I think we'll press on. He can't have got very far. We'll be back soon.”

Jenkins waded out of the surf. He didn't look angry. He was a man who had passed through the fires of anger and was now in some strange peaceful bay beyond them. He pointed a quivering finger at his stricken ship and said “Muh…?”

“Pretty good shape, all things considered,” said Vimes.

“Muh?”

“I'm sure you and your salty sailors will be able to float it again.”

“Muh…”

Jenkins and his wading crew watched the regiment as it slithered and complained its way up the side of the dune. Eventually the crew went into a huddle and drew lots and the cook, who was always unlucky in games of chance, approached the captain.

“Never mind, captain,” he said, “we can probably find some decent balks of timber in all this driftwood, and a few days' work with block and tackle should—”

“Muh.”

“Only… we'd better get started 'cos he said they won't be long…”

“They won't be back!” said the captain. “The water they've got won't last a day up there! They haven't got the right gear! And once they're out of sight of the sea they'll get lost!”

“Good!”

It took half an hour to get to the top of the dune. The sand had been stamped down but, even as Vimes watched, the wind caught the particles and nibbled away at the prints.

“Camel tracks,” said Vimes. “Well, camels don't go all that fast. Let's—”

“I think Detritus is having real trouble, sir,” said Carrot.

The troll was standing with his knuckles on the ground. The motor of his cooling helmet sounded harsh for a moment in the dry air, and then stopped as the sand got into the mechanism.

“Feelin' fick,” he muttered. “My brain hurts.”

“Quick, hold your shield over his head,” said Vimes. “Give him some shade!”

“He's never going to make it, sir,” said Carrot. “Let's send him back down to the boat.”

“We need him! Quick, Cheery, fan him with your axe!”

At which point, the sand stood up and drew a hundred swords.

“Bingeley-bingeley beep!” said a cheerful if somewhat muffled voice. “Eleven eh em, Get Haircut… er… that's right… isn't it?”

It wasn't large, but slabs of collapsing building had smashed together in such a way that they made a cistern that the rain had filled half full.

Solid Jackson slapped his son on the back.

“Fresh water! At last!” he said. “Well done, lad.”

“You see, I was looking at these sort of painting things, Dad, and then—”

“Yeah, yeah, pictures of octopuses, very nice,” said Jackson. “Hah! The ball is on the other foot now and no mistake! It's our water on our side of the island, and I'd just like to see them greasy buggers claim otherwise. Let 'em keep their damn driftwood and suck water out of fishes!”

“Yeah, Dad,” said Les. “And we can trade them some of the water for wood and flour, right?”

His father waved a hand cautiously. “Maybe,” he said. “No need to rush into that, though. We're pretty close to finding a seaweed that'll burn. I mean, what're our long-term objectives here?”

“Cooking meals and keeping warm?” said Les hopefully.

“Well, initially,” said Jackson. “That's obvious. But you know what they say, lad. ‘Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day, but set fire to him and he's warm for the rest of his life.’ See my point?”

“I don't think that's actually what the saying is—”

“I mean, we can stop here living on water and raw fish for… well, practically for ever. But that lot can't go without proper fresh water for much longer. See? So they'll have to come begging to us, right? And then we deal on our terms, eh?”

He put his arm around his son's reluctant shoulders and waved a hand at the landscape.

“I mean, I started out with nothing, son, except that old boat that your grandad left me, but—”

“—you worked and scraped—” said Les wearily.

“—I worked and scraped—”

“—and you've always kept your head above water—”

“—right, I've always kept my head above water—”

“And you've always wanted to leave me something that– Ow!”

“Stop making fun of your dad!” said Jackson. “Otherwise I'll wallop the other ear. Look, you see this land? You see it?”

“I see it, Dad.”

“It's a land of opportunity.”

“But there's no fresh water and all the ground's full of salt, Dad, and it smells bad!”

“That's the smell of freedom, that is.”

“Smells like someone did a really big fart, Dad– Ow!”

“Sometimes the two are very similar! And it's your future I'm thinking of, lad!”

Les looked at the acres of decomposing seaweed in front of him.

He was learning to be a fisherman like his father before him because that's how the family had always done it and he was too good-natured to argue, although he actually wanted to be a painter like no one in the family had ever been before. He was noticing things, and they worried him even though he couldn't quite say why.

But the buildings didn't look right. Here and there were definite bits of, well, architecture, like Morporkian pillars and the remains of Klatchian arches, but they'd been added to buildings that looked as though some ham-fisted people had just piled rocks on top of one another. And then in other places the slabs had been stacked on top of ancient brick walls and tiled floors. He couldn't imagine who'd done the tiling, but they did like pictures of octopussies.

The feeling was stealing over him that Morporkians and Klatchians arguing over who owned this piece of old sea bottom was extremely pointless.

“Er… I'm thinking about my future too, Dad,” he said. “I really am.”

Far below Solid Jackson's feet, the Boat surfaced. Sergeant Colon reached automatically for the screws that held the lid shut.

“Don't open it, sergeant!” shouted Leonard, rising from his seat.

“The air's getting pretty lived-in, sir.”

“It's worse outside.”

“Worse than in here?”

“I'm almost certain.”

“But we're on the surface!”

“A surface, sergeant,” said Lord Vetinari. Beside him, Nobby uncorked the seeing device and peered through it.

“We're in a cave?” said Colon.

“Er… sarge…” said Nobby.

“Capital! Well worked out,” said Lord Vetinari. “Yes. A cave. You could say that.”

“Er… sarge?” said Nobby again, nudging Colon. “This isn't a cave, sarge! It's bigger than a cave, sarge!”

“What, you mean… like a cavern?”

“Bigger!”

“Bigger'n a cavern? More like a… big cavern?”

“Yeah, that'd be about right,” said Nobby, taking his eye away from the device. “Have a look yourself, sarge.”

Sergeant Colon peered into the tube.

Instead of the darkness he was half expecting, he saw the sea's surface, bubbling like a boiling saucepan. Green and yellow flashes of lightning danced across the water, illuminating a distant wall that seemed practically a horizon…

The tube squeaked around. If this was a cave, it was at least a couple of miles across.

“How long, do you think?” said Lord Vetinari, behind him.

“Well, the rock has a large proportion of tufa and pumice, very light, and once floated up the build-up of gas starts to escape very rapidly because of the swell,” said Leonard. “I don't know… perhaps another week… and then I think it takes a very long time for a sufficient bubble to build up again…”

“What're they saying, sarge?” said Nobby. “This place floats?”

“A most unusual natural phenomenon,” Leonard went on. “I'd have thought it was just a legend had I not seen it for myself…”

“Of course it's not floating,” said Sergeant Colon. “Honestly, Nobby, how're you ever going to find out anything when you ask daft questions like that? Land's heavier than water, right? That's why you find it at the bottom of the sea.”

“Yes, but he said pumice, and my gran had a pumice stone that worked a treat for getting tough skin off'f your feet in the tub and that'd float—”

“That sort of thing happens in bath tubs maybe,” said Colon. “Not in real life. This is just a phenomena. It's not real. Next thing you'll be saying there's rocks up in the sky.”

“Yeah, but—”

“I am a sergeant, Nobby.”

“Yes, sarge.”

“It puts me in mind,” said Leonard, “of those nautical stories about giant turtles that sleep on the surface, thus causing sailors to think they are an island. Of course, you don't get giant turtles that small.”

“Hey, Mr Quirm, this is an amazing boat,” said Nobby.

“Thank you.”

“I bet you could even smash up ships with it if you wanted.”

There was an embarrassed silence.

“Altogether an interesting experience,” said Lord Vetinari, making some notes. “And now, gentlemen – downward and onward, please…”

The watchmen drew their weapons.

“They're D'regs, sir,” said Carrot. “But – this is all wrong…”

“What do you mean?”

“We're not dead yet.”

They're watching us like cats watch mice, thought Vimes. We can't run away and we can't win a fight, and they want to see what we'll do next.

“What does General Tacticus have to say about sir?” said Carrot.

There's a hundred of them, thought Vimes. And six of us. Except that Detritus is drifting off and there's no knowing what particular commandment Visit is obeying right now and Reg's arms tend to drop off when he gets excited—

“I don't know,” he said. “Probably something on the lines of Don't Allow This to Happen.”

“Why don't you check, sir?” said Carrot, not taking his eyes off the watching D'regs.

“What?”

“I said, why don't you check, sir?”

“Right now?”

“It might be worth a try, sir.”

“That's crazy, captain.”

“Yes, sir. The D'regs have some very strange notions about crazy people, sir.”

Vimes pulled out the battered book. The D'reg nearest to him, with a grin almost as wide and as curved as his sword, had a certain additional swagger that suggested chieftainship. A huge ancient crossbow was slung on his back.

“I say!” said Vimes. “Could we just delay things a little?” He strode towards the man, who looked very surprised, and waved the book in the air. “This is a book by General Tacticus, don't know if you've ever heard of him, quite a big name in these parts once, probably slaughtered your great-great-great-great-grandfather in fact, and I just want to take a moment to see what he has to say about this situation. You don't mind, do you?”

The man gave Vimes a puzzled look.

“This might take a moment, there's no index, but I think I saw something—”

The chieftain took a step backwards and looked at the men next to him, who shrugged.

“I wonder if you could help me with this word here?” Vimes went on, reaching the man's side and holding the book under his nose. He got another puzzled grin.

What Vimes did next was known in Ankh-Morpork's alleyways as the Friendly Handshake, and consisted largely of driving his elbow into the man's stomach, then bringing his knee up to meet the man's chin on its way down, gritting his own teeth because of the pain in both knee and ankle, and then drawing his sword and holding it to the D'reg's throat before he could scramble up.

“Now, captain,” said Vimes, “I'd like you to say in a loud clear voice that unless they back off a really long way, this gentleman here is going to be in some very serious legal trouble.”

“Mr Vimes, I don't think—”

“Do it!”

The D'reg looked into his eyes while Carrot hawked his way through the demand. The man was still grinning

Vimes couldn't risk shifting his gaze, but he sensed some puzzlement and confusion among the tribesmen.

Then, as one man, they charged.

A Klatchian fishing boat, whose captain knew which way the wind was blowing, made its way back to the harbour of Al-Khali It seemed to the captain that, despite the favourable wind, he wasn't making quite the speed he should. He put it down to barnacles.

Vimes awoke with a noseful of camel. There are far worse awakenings, but not as many as you might think

By turning his head, which took some effort, he ascertained that the camel was sitting down. By the sound of things, it was digesting something explosive.

Now, how had he got here… Oh, gods…

But it should have worked… It was classic. You threatened to cut off the head and the body just folded up. That was how everyone reacted, wasn't it? That was practically how civilization worked…

Put it down to cultural differences, then.

On the other hand, he wasn't dead. According to Carrot, knowing the D'regs for five minutes and still being alive at the end of it meant that they really, really liked you.

On the other other hand, he'd just given their head man a Handshake, which influenced people without making friends.

Well, no sense lying over this saddle bound hand and foot and dying of sunstroke all day. He ought to start being a leader of men again, and would do so just as soon as he could get this camel out of his mouth.

“Bingeley-bingeley beep?”

“Yes?” said Vimes, struggling with his bonds.

“Would you like to know about the appointments you missed?”

“No! I'm trying to get these damn ropes untied!”

“Do you want me to put that on your To Do list?”

“Oh, you've woken up, sir.”

It sounded like Carrot's voice and it was the sort of thing he'd say. Vimes tried to turn his head.

What he saw was mainly a white sheet, but it then became Carrot's face, upside down.

“They asked if they should untie you but I said you hadn't been getting enough rest lately,” Carrot went on.

“Captain, my arms and legs have gone to sleep…” Vimes began.

“Oh, well done, sir! That's a start, at least.”

“Carrot?”

“Yes, sir?”

“I want you to listen very carefully to the order I am about to give you.”

“Certainly, sir.”

“The point I'm making is that it won't be a request or a suggestion or some sort of hint.”

“Understood, sir.”

“I have, as you know, always encouraged my officers to think for themselves and not blindly obey me, but sometimes in any organization it is necessary for instructions to be followed to the letter and with alacrity.”

“Right, sir.”

“Untie me right now or you'll bloody well live to regret untying me!”

“Er, sir, I believe there is an inadvertent inconsistency in—”

“Carrot!”

“Of course, sir.”

His ropes were cut. He slid down onto the sand. The camel turned its head, looked at him with its nostrils for a moment, and then looked away.

Vimes managed to sit upright while Carrot busied himself cutting the rest of his bonds.

“Captain, why are you wearing a white sheet?”

“It's a burnous, sir. Very practical for desert wear. The D'regs gave them to us.”

“Us?”

“The rest of us, sir.”

“Everyone's OK?”

“Oh, yes.”

“But they attacked—”

“Yes, sir. But they only wanted to take us prisoner, sir. One of them did accidentally cut Reg's head off, but he did help him sew it on again, so no real harm done there.”

“I thought D'regs didn't take prisoners…?”

“Beats me too, sir. But they say if we try to escape they'll cut our feet off, and Reg says he hasn't got enough thread for everyone, sir.”

Vimes rubbed his head, Someone had hit him so hard his helmet was dented.

“What went wrong?” he said. “I had their boss down!”

“As I understand it, sir, the D'regs think that any leader who is stupid enough to be defeated so easily isn't worth following. It's a Klatchian thing.”

Vimes tried to persuade himself that there wasn't a hint of sarcasm in Carrot's voice as he went on: “They're not really very interested in leaders, sir, to tell you the truth. They look on them as a sort of ornament. You know… just someone to shout ‘Charge!’, sir.”

“A leader has to do other things, Carrot.”

“The D'regs think ‘Charge!’ pretty well covers all of them, sir.”

Vimes managed to stand up. Strange muscles twanged in his legs. He tottered forward.

“Here, let me give you a hand…” said Carrot, catching him.

The sun was setting. Ragged tents clustered below one of the dunes, and there was the glow of firelight. Someone was laughing. It didn't sound like a prison.

But then, thought Vimes, the desert was probably better than bars, He wouldn't even know which way to run, feet or no feet.

“The D'regs, like all Klatchians, are a very hospitable people,” said Carrot, as if he'd memorized this. “They take hospitality very, very seriously.”

Their captors were sitting round the fire. So were the watchmen. They'd also been persuaded to dress more suitably, which meant that Cheery looked like a girl in her mum's dress, apart from the iron helmet, and Reg Shoe looked like a mummy, and Detritus was a small snowcovered mountain.

“He's gone very… insensible in all this heat,” whispered Carrot. “And that's Constable Visit over there, arguing religion. There are six hundred and fifty-three religions on the Klatchian continent.”

“He must be having fun.”

“And this is Jabbar,” said Carrot. Exhibit A, who looked like a slightly older version of 71-hour Ahmed, stood up and salaamed to Vimes.

“Offendi,” he said.

“He's their… well, he's like an official wise man,” said Carrot.

“Oh, so he's not the one who tells them to charge?” said Vimes His head buzzed with the heat.

“No, that's the leader,” said Carrot. “Whenever they have one.”

“So perhaps Jabbar tells them when it's wise to charge?” said Vimes brightly.

“It's always wise to charge, offendi,” said Jabbar. He bowed again. “My tent is your tent,” he said.

“It is?” said Vimes.

“My wives are your wives.,.”

Vimes looked panicky. “They are? Really?”

“My food is your food…” Jabbar went on.

Vimes stared down at the dish by the fire. It looked like a sheep or a goat had been the main course. And the man bent down, picked up a morsel and handed it to him.

Sam Vimes looked at the mouthful. And it looked back.

“The best part,” said Jabbar, and made appreciative suckling noises. He added something in Klatchian. There was some muffled laughter from the other men around the fire.

“This looks like a sheep's eyeball,” said Vimes, doubtfully.

“Yes, sir,” said Carrot. “But it is unwise to—”

“You know what?” Vimes went on. “I think this is a little game called ‘Let's see what offendi will swallow’. And I'm not swallowing this, my friend.”

Jabbar gave him an appraising look.

The sniggering stopped.

“Then it is true that you can see further than most,” he said.

“So can this food,” said Vimes. “My father told me never to eat anything that can wink back.”

There was one of those little hanging–by–a–thread moments, which might suddenly rock one way or the other into a gale of laughter or sudden death.

Then Jabbar slapped Vimes on the back. The eyeball shot off his palm and into the shadows.

“Well done! Extremely good! First time it have not worked in twenty year! Now sit down and have proper rice and sheep just like mother!”

There was a certain feeling of relaxation. Vimes found himself pulled down. Bottoms shuffled aside to make room for him and a big slab of bread dripping with meat was put in front of him. Vimes prodded at it as politely as he dared, and then took the usual view that, if you can recognize at least half of it, it's probably OK to eat the rest.

“So we're your prisoners, Mr Jabbar?”

“Honoured guests! My tent is—”

“But… how can I put this?… you want us to enjoy your hospitality for some time?”

“We have tradition,” said Jabbar. “A man who is a guest in your tent, even if he is your worst enemy, you owe him hospitality for tree dace.”

“Tree dace, eh?” said Vimes.

“I learn language on…” Jabbar waved a hand vaguely, “you know, wooden ting, a camel of the sea—”

“Boat?”

“Right! But too many water!” He slapped Vimes on the back again, so that hot fat spilled into his lap. “Any road up, lots speaking Morporkian these dace, offendi. It is language of… merchant.” He put an inflection on the word that suggested it was the same as “earthworm”.

“So you have to know how to say things like ‘Give us all your money’?” said Vimes.

“Why ask?” said Jabbar. “We take it anyway. But now…” he spat at the fire with amazing accuracy “… they say, we got to stop, this is wrong. What harm do we do?”

“Apart from killing people and taking all their merchandise?” said Vimes.

Jabbar laughed again. “Wali said you were a big diplomatic! But we don't kill merchants, why should we kill merchants? What is the sense? How foolish to be killing gift horse that lays the golden egg!”

“You could make money exhibiting it, certainly,” said Vimes.

“We kill merchants, we rob too much, they never come back. Dumb. We let them go, they get rich again, our sons rob them. Such is wisdom.”

“Ah… it's a sort of agriculture,” said Vimes.

“Right! But if you plant merchants, they don't grow so good.”

Vimes realized that it was getting colder as the sun went down. In fact, a lot colder. He inched closer to the fire.

“Why is he called 71-hour Ahmed?” he said.

The murmur of conversation stopped. Suddenly all eyes were on Jabbar, except the one that had ended up in the shadows.

“Not so diplomatic,” said Jabbar.

“We chase him up here, then suddenly we're ambushed by you. That seems—”

“I know nothing,” said Jabbar.

“Why won't you—?” Vimes began.

“Er, sir,” said Carrot urgently. “That would be very unwise, sir. Look, I had a bit of a talk with Jabbar while you were… resting. It's a bit political, I'm afraid.”

“What isn't?”

“Prince Cadram is trying to unite the whole of Klatch, you see.”

“Dragging it kicking and screaming into the Century of the Fruitbat?”

“Why, yes, sir, how did—?”

“Just a lucky guess. Go on.”

“But he has been having trouble,” said Carrot.

“What kind?” said Vimes.

“Us,” said Jabbar proudly.

“None of the tribes like the idea, sir,” Carrot went on. “They've always fought among themselves, and now most of them are fighting him. Historically, sir, Klatch isn't so much an empire as an argument.”

“He say, you must be educated. You must be learning to pay taxes. We do not wish to be educated about taxes,” said Jabbar.

“So you think you're fighting for your freedom?” said Vimes.

Jabbar hesitated, and looked at Carrot. There was a brief exchange in Klatchian. Then Carrot said: “That's a rather difficult question for a D'reg, sir. You see, their word for ‘freedom’ is the same as their word for ‘fighting’.”

“They certainly make their language do a lot of work, don't they…?”

Vimes was feeling better in the caller air. He took out a crushed and damp packet of cigars, pulled a coal out of the fire, and took a deep drag.

“So… Prince Charming's got a lot of troubles at home, has he? Does Vetinari know this?”

“Does a camel shit in the desert, sir?”

“You're really getting the hang of Klatch, aren't you?” said Vimes.

Jabbar rumbled something. There was more laughter.

“Er… Jabbar says a camel certainly does shit in the desert, sir, otherwise you wouldn't have anything to light your cigar with, sir.”

Once again, there was one of those moments when Vimes felt that he was under close scrutiny. Be diplomatic, Vetinari had told him.

He took another deep draw. “Improves the flavour,” he said. “Remind me to take some home.”

In Jabbar's eyes, the judges held up at least a couple of grudging eights.

“A man on a horse came and said we must fight the foreign dogs—”

“That's us, sir,” said Carrot helpfully.

“—because you have stolen an island that is under the sea. But what is that to us? We know no harm of you foreign devils, but the men who oil their beards in Al-Khali we do not like. So we send him back.”

“All of him?” said Vimes.

“We are not barbaric. He was clearly a madman. But we kept his horse.”

“And 71-hour Ahmed told you to keep us, didn't he?” said Vimes.

“No one orders the D'regs! It is our pleasure to keep you here!”

“And when will it be your pleasure to let us go? When Ahmed tells you?”

Jabbar stared at the fire. “I will not speak of him. He is devious and cunning and not to be trusted.”

“But you are D'regs, too.”

“Yes!” Jabbar slapped Vimes on the back again. “We know what we are talking about!”

The Klatchian fishing boat was a mile or two out of harbour when it seemed to its captain that it was suddenly riding better in the water. Perhaps the barnacles have dropped off, he thought.

When his boat was lost in the evening mists a length of bent pipe rose slowly out of the swell and squeaked around until it faced the coast.

A distant tinny voice said: “Oh no…”

And another tinny voice said: “What's up, sarge?”

“Take a look through this!”

“OK.” There was a pause.

Then the second tinny voice said: “Oh, bugger…”

What was riding at anchor before the city of Al-Khali wasn't a fleet. It was a fleet of fleets. The masts looked like a floating forest.

Down below, Lord Vetinari took his turn to peer through the pipe.

“So many ships,” he said. “In such a short time, too. How very well organized. Very well organized. One might almost say… astonishingly well organized. As they say, ‘If you would seek war, prepare for war.’”

“I believe, my lord, the saying is ‘If you would seek peace, prepare for war,’” Leonard ventured.

Vetinari put his head on one side and his lips moved as he repeated the phrase to himself. Finally he said, “No, no. I just don't see that one at all.”

He ducked back into his seat.

“Let us proceed with care,” he said. “We can go ashore under cover of darkness.”

“Er… can we maybe go ashore under cover of cover?” said Sergeant Colon.

“In fact these extra ships will make our plan that much easier,” said the Patrician, ignoring him.

“Our plan?” said Colon.

“People within the Klatchian hegemony come in every shape and colour.” Vetinari glanced at Nobby. “Practically every shape and colour,” he added. “So our appearance on the streets should not cause undue comment.” He glanced at Nobby again. “To any great extent.”

“But we're wearing our uniforms, sir,” said Sergeant Colon. “It's not like we can say we're on our way to a fancy-dress party.”

“Well, I'm not taking mine off,” said Nobby firmly. “I'm not running around in my drawers. Not in a port. Sailors are at sea a long time. You hear stories.”

“That'd be worse,” said the sergeant, without wasting time calculating how long any sailor would need to be at sea before the vision of Nobby Nobbs would present itself as anything other than a target, “'cos if we're not in uniform, we'll be spies – and you know what happens to spies.”

“Are you going to tell me, sarge?”

“Excuse me, your lordship?” Sergeant Colon raised his voice. The Patrician looked up from a conversation with Leonard.

“Yes, sergeant?”

“What do they do to spies in Klatch, sir?”

“Er… let me see…” said Leonard. “Oh, yes… I believe they give you to the women.”

Nobby brightened up. “Oh well, that doesn't sound too bad—”

“Er, no, Nobby—” Colon began.

“—'cos I've seen the pictures in that book The Perfumed Allotment that Corporal Angua was reading, and—”

“—no, listen, Nobby, you've got the wrong—”

“—I mean, blimey, I didn't know you could do that with a—”

“—Nobby, listen–”

“—and then there's this bit where she—”

“Corporal Nobbs!” Colon yelled.

“Yes, sarge?”

Colon leaned forward and whispered in Nobby's ear. The corporal's expression changed, slowly.

“They really—”

“Yes, Nobby.”

“They really–”

“Yes, Nobby.”

“They don't do that at home.”

“We ain't at home, Nobby. I wish we was.”

“Although you hear stories about the Agony Aunts, sarge.”

“Gentlemen,” said Lord Vetinari. “I am afraid Leonard is being rather fanciful. That may apply to some of the mountain tribes, but Klatch is an ancient civilization and that sort of thing is not done officially. I should imagine they'd give you a cigarette.”

“A cigarette?” said Fred.

“Yes, sergeant. And a nice sunny wall to stand in front of.”

Sergeant Colon examined this for any downside. “A nice roll-up and a wall to lean against?” he said.

“I think they prefer you to stand up straight, sergeant.”

“Fair enough. No need to be sloppy just because you're a prisoner. Oh, well. I don't mind risking it, then.”

“Well done,” said the Patrician calmly. “Tell me, sergeant… in your long military career, did anyone ever consider promoting you to an officer?”

“Nossir!”

“I cannot think why.”

Night poured over the desert. It came suddenly, in purple. In the clear air, the stars drilled down out of the sky, reminding any thoughtful watcher that it is in the deserts and high places that religions are generated. When men see nothing but bottomless infinity over their heads they have always had a driving and desperate urge to find someone to put in the way.

Life emerged from the burrows and fissures. Soon, the desert was filled with the buzz and click and screech of creatures which, lacking mankind's superior brainpower, did not concern themselves with finding someone to blame and instead tried to find someone to eat.

At around three in the morning Sam Vimes walked out of the tent for a smoke. The cold air hit him like a door. It was freezing. That wasn't what was supposed to happen in deserts, was it? Deserts were all hot sand and camels and… and… he struggled for a while, as a man whose geographical knowledge got severely cramped once you got off paved road… camels, yes, and dates. And possibly bananas and coconuts. But the temperature here made your breath tinkle in the air.

He waved his cigar packet theatrically at a D'reg who was lounging near the tent. The man shrugged.

The fire was just a heap of grey, but Vimes poked around in the vain hope of finding a glowing ember.

He was amazed at how angry he was. Ahmed was the key, he knew it. And now they were stuck out here in the desert, the man had gone, and they were in the hands of… quiet, likeable people, fair enough. Brigands, maybe, the dry land equivalent of pirates, but Carrot would have said they were jolly good chaps for all that. If you were content to be their guest then they were as nice as pie, or sheep's eyeball and treacle or whatever you got out here—

Something moved in the moonlight. A shadow slipped down the side of a dune.

Something howled, out in the desert night.

Tiny hairs rose, all down Vimes's back, just like they had for his distant ancestors.

The night is always old. He'd walked too often down dark streets in the secret hours and felt the night stretching away, and known in his blood that while days and kings and empires come and go, the night is always the same age, always aeons deep. Terrors unfolded in the velvet shadows and while the nature of the talons may change, the nature of the beast does not.

He stood up quietly, and reached for his sword.

It wasn't there.

They'd taken it away. They'd not even—

“A fine night,” said a voice beside him.

Jabbar was standing by his shoulder.

“Who is out there?” Vimes hissed.

“An enemy.”

“Which one?”

Teeth gleamed in the shadows.

“We will find out, offendi.”

“Why would they attack you now?”

“Maybe they think we have something they want, offendi.”

More shadows slid across the desert.

And one rose up right behind Jabbar, reached down and picked him up. A huge grey hand dragged his sword out of his belt.

“What do you want me to do with him, Mr Vimes?”

“Detritus?”

The troll saluted with the hand that still held the D'reg.

“All present and correct, sir!”

“But—” And then Vimes realized. “It's freezing cold! Your brain's working again?”

“With rather more efficiency, sir.”

“Is this a djinn?” said Jabbar.

“I don't know, but I could certainly do with one,” said Vimes. He finally managed to locate some matches in his pocket, and lit one. “Put him down, sergeant,” he said, puffing his cigar into life. “Jabbar, this is Sergeant Detritus. He could break every bone in your body, including some of the small ones in the fingers which are quite hard to do—”

The darkness went shwup and something whispered past the back of his neck, just a slice of a second before Jabbar cannoned into him and bore him to the ground.

“They shoot at the light!”

“Mwwf?”

Vimes raised his head cautiously and spat out sand and fragments of tobacco.

“Mr Vimes?”

Only Carrot could whisper like that. He associated whispering with concealment and untruth and compromised by whispering very loudly. To Vimes's horror the man came round the edge of a tent holding a tiny lamp.

“Put that damn—”

But he didn't have time to finish the sentence because, somewhere out in the night, a man screamed. It was a high-pitched scream and was suddenly cut off.

“Ah,” said Carrot, crouching down by Vimes and blowing out the lamp. “That was Angua.”

“That was nothing like– oh. Yeah, I think I see what you mean,” Vimes said, uneasily. “She's out there, is she?”

“I heard her earlier. She's probably enjoying herself. She doesn't really get much of a chance to let herself go in Ankh-Morpork.”

“Er… no…” Vimes had a mental picture of a werewolf letting go. But surely, Angua wouldn't—

“You two, uh… you're getting along OK, are you?” he said, trying to make out shapes in the darkness.

“Oh, fine, sir. Fine.”

So her turning into a wolf occasionally doesn't worry you? Vimes couldn't bring himself to say it.

“No… problems, then?”

“Oh, not really, sir. She buys her own dog biscuits and she's got her own flap in the door. When it's full moon I don't really get involved.”

There were shouts in the night and then a shape erupted from the darkness, streaked past Vimes, and disappeared into a tent. It didn't wait for a door. It simply hit the cloth at full speed and continued until the tent collapsed around it.

“And what is that?” said Jabbar.

“This may take some explaining,” said Vimes, picking himself up.

Carrot and Detritus were already hauling at the collapsed tent.

“We are D'regs,” said Jabbar reproachfully. “We are supposed to fold tents silently in the night, not—”

There was enough moonlight. Angua sat up and snatched a piece of tent out of Carrot's hands.

“Thank you,” she said, wrapping it around her. “And before anyone says anything, I just bit him on the bum. Hard. And that was not the soft option, let me tell you.”

Jabbar looked back into the desert, and then down at the sand, and then at Angua. Vimes could see him thinking, and put a fraternal arm around his shoulders.

“I'd better explain—” he began.

“There's a couple of hundred soldiers out there!” Angua snapped.

“—later.”

“They're taking up positions all round you! And they don't look nice! Has anyone got any clothes that might fit? And some decent food? And a drink! There's no water in this place!”

“They will not dare attack before dawn,” said Jabbar.

“And what will you do, sir?” said Carrot.

“At dawn we will charge!”

“Ah. Uh. I wonder if I could suggest an alternative approach?”

“Alternative? It is right to charge! Charging is what dawn is for.”

Carrot saluted Vimes. “I've been reading your book, sir. While you were… asleep. Tacticus's got quite a lot to say about how to deal with overwhelming odds, sir.”

“Yes?”

“He says take every opportunity to turn them into underwhelming odds, sir. We could attack now.”

“But it's dark, man!”

“It's just as dark for the enemy, sir.”

“I mean it's pitch black! You wouldn't know who the hell you were fighting! Half the time you'd be shooting your own side!”

“We wouldn't, sir, because there'd only be a few of us. Sir? All we need to do is crawl out there, make a bit of noise, and then let them get on with it. Tacticus says all armies are the same size in the night, sir.”

“There might be something in that,” said Angua. “They're crawling around in ones and twos, and they're dressed pretty much like—” She waved a hand at Jabbar.

“This is Jabbar,” said Carrot. “He's sort of not the leader.”

Jabbar grinned nervously. “It happens often in your country, where dogs turn into naked women?”

“Sometimes days can go past and it doesn't happen at all,” Angua snapped. “I'd like some clothes, please. And a sword, if there's going to be fighting.”

“Um, I think Klatchians have a very particular view about women fighting—” Carrot began.

“Yes!” said Jabbar. “We expect them to be good at it, Blue Eyes. We are D'regs!”

The Boat surfaced in the scummy dead water under a jetty. The lid opened slowly.

“Smells like home,” said Nobby.

“You can't trust the water,” said Sergeant Colon.

“But I don't trust the water at home, sarge.”

Fred Colon managed to get a foothold on the greasy wood. It was, in theory, quite a heroic enterprise. He and Nobby Nobbs, the bold warriors, were venturing forth in hostile territory. Unfortunately, he knew they were doing it because Lord Vetinari was sitting in the Boat and would raise his eyebrows in no uncertain manner if they refused.

Colon had always thought that heroes had some special kind of clockwork that made them go out and die famously for god, country and apple pie, or whatever particular delicacy their mother made. It had never occurred to him that they might do it because they'd get yelled at if they didn't.

He reached down.

“Come on up, Nobby,” he said. “And remember we're doing this for the gods, Ankh-Morpork and—” It seemed to Colon that a foodstuff would indeed be somehow appropriate. “And my mum's famous knuckle sandwich!”

“Our mum never made us knuckle sandwiches,” said Nobby, as he hauled himself on to the planks. “But you'd be amazed at what she could do with a bit of cheese…”

“Yeah, all right, but that aint much of a battle cry, is it? ‘For the gods, Ankh-Morpork and amazing things Nobby's mum can do with cheese’? That'll strike fear in the hearts of the enemy!” said Sergeant Colon, as they crept forward.

“Oh, well, if that's what you're after, you want my mum's Distressed Pudding and custard,” said Nobby.

“Frightening, is it?”

“They wouldn't want to know about it, sarge.”

The docks of Al-Khali were like docks everywhere, because all docks everywhere are connected. Men have to put things on and off boats. There are only a limited number of ways to do this. So all docks look the same. Some are hotter, some are damper, there are always piles of vaguely forgotten-looking things.

In the distance there was the glow of the city, which seemed quite unaware of the enemy incursion.

“‘Get us some clothes so that we'll blend in,’” muttered Colon. “That's all very well to say.”

“Nah, nah, that's easy,” said Nobby. “Everyone knows how to do that one. You lurk in an alley somewhere, right, and you wait until a couple of blokes come by and you lure them into the alley, see, and there's a couple of thumps, and then you come out wearing their clothes.”

“That works, does it?”

“Never fails, sarge,” said Nobby confidently.

The desert looked like snow in the moonlight.

“What? Oh… er…” Colon hesitated, waiting for shiny death.

“Hah, yes.” The guard lowered his sword and jerked a thumb towards the docks. “You get back to your detachment now!”

“Right!” said Nobby.

“What your name?” one of the guards demanded.

“Nhobi,” said Nobby. This seemed to pass.

“And you, fat one?”

Colon was panicking on the spot. He sought desperately for any name that sounded Klatchian, and there was only one that presented itself and which was absolutely and authentically Klatchian.

“Al,” he said, his knees trembling.

“You get back right now or there will be trouble!”

The watchmen ran for it, dragging the donkey behind them, and didn't stop until they were on the greasy jetty, which somehow felt like home.

“What was that all about, s– Al?” said Nobby. “All they wanted to do was push us around a bit! Typical Watch behaviour,” he added. “Not ours, of course.”

“I suppose we had the right clothes on…”

“You didn't even tell them where we came from! And they spoke our language!”

“Well, they… I mean… anyone ought to be able to speak Morporkian,” said Colon, gradually regaining his mental balance. “Even babies learn it. I bet it comes easy after learning somethin' as complicated as Klatchian.”

“What're we going to do with the donkey, Al?”

“Do you think it can pedal?”

“I doubt it.”

“Then leave it up here.”

“But it'll get pinched, Al.”

“Oh, these Klatchians'll pinch anything.”

“Not like us, eh, Al?”

Nobby looked at the forest of masts filling), the bay.

“Looks like even more of 'em from here,” he said. “You could walk from boat to boat for a mile. What're they all here for?”

“Don't be daft, Nobby. It's obvious. They're to take everyone to Ankh-Morpork!”

“What for? We don't eat that much cur—”

“Invasion, Nobby! There's a war on, remember?”

They looked back at the ships. Riding lights gleamed on the water.

The bit of it that was immediately below them bubbled for a moment, and then the hull of the Boat rose a few inches above the surface. The lid unscrewed and Leonard's worried face appeared.

“Ah, there you are,” he said. “We were getting concerned…”

They lowered themselves down into the fetid interior of the vessel.

Lord Vetinari was sitting with a pad of paper across his knees, writing carefully. He glanced up briefly.

“Report.”

Nobby fidgeted while Sergeant Colon delivered a more or less accurate account, although there was some witty repartee with the Klatchian guards that the corporal had not hitherto recalled.

Vetinari did not look up. Still writing, he said, “Sergeant, Ur is an old country Rimward of the kingdom of Djelibeybi, whose occupants are a byword for bucolic stupidity. For some reason, I cannot think why, the guard must have assumed you were from there. And Morporkian is something of a lingua franca even in the Klatchian empire. When someone from Hersheba needs to trade with someone from Istanzia, they will undoubtedly haggle in Morporkian. This will serve us well, of course, The force that is being assembled here must mean that practically every man is a distant stranger with outlandish ways. Provided we do not act too foreign, we should pass muster. This means not asking for curry with swede and currants in it and refraining from ordering pints of Winkle's Old Peculiar, do I make myself clear?”

“Er… what is it we're going to do, sir?”

“We will reconnoitre initially.”

“Ah, right. Yes. Very important.”

“And then seek out the Klatchian high command. Thanks to Leonard I have a little… package to deliver. I hope it will end the war very quickly.”

Sergeant Colon looked blank. At some point in the last few seconds the conversation had run away with him.

“Sorry, sir… you said high command, sir.”

“Yes, sergeant.”

“Like… the top brass, or turbans or whatever… all surrounded by crack troops, sir. That's where you always put the best troops, around the top brass.”

“I expect this will be the case, yes. In fact, I rather hope it is.”

Sergeant Colon, once again, tried to keep up.

“Ah. Right. And we'll go and look for them, will we, sir?”

“I can hardly ask them to come to us, sergeant.”

“Right, sir. I can see that, It could get a bit crowded.”

At last, Lord Vetinari looked up.

“Is there some problem, sergeant?”

And Sergeant Colon once again knew a secret about bravery. It was arguably a kind of enhanced cowardice the knowledge that while death may await you if you advance it will be a picnic compared to the certain living hell that awaits should you retreat.

“Er… not as such, sir,” he said.

“Very well.” Vetinari pushed his paperwork aside. “If there is more suitable clothing in your bag, I will get changed and we can take a look at Al-Khali.”

“Oh, gods…”

“Sorry, sergeant?”

“Oh, good, sir.”

“Good.” Vetinari began to pull other items out of the liberated sack. There was a set of jugglers clubs, a bag of coloured balls and finally a placard, such as might be placed to one side of the stage during an artiste's performance.

“‘Gulli, Gulli and Beti’,” he read. “‘Exotic tricks and dances’. Hmm,” he added. “It would seem there was a lady among the owners of this sack.”

The watchmen looked at the gauzy material that came out of the sack next. Nobby's eyes bulged.

“What are them?”

“I believe they are called harem pants, corporal.”

“They're very—”

“Curiously, the purpose of the clothing of the nautch girl or exotic dancer has always been less to reveal and more to suggest the imminence of revelation,” said the Patrician.

Nobby looked down at his costume, and then at Sergeant Al-Colon in his costume, and said cheerfully, “Well, I ain't sure it's going to suit you, sir.”

He regretted the words immediately.

“I hadn't intended that they should suit me,” said the Patrician calmly. “Please pass me your fez, Corporal Beti.”

The subtle, deceiving dawn-before-dawn slid over the desert, and the commander of the Klatchian detachment wasn't happy about it.

The D'regs always attacked at dawn. All of them. It didn't matter how many of them there were, or how many of you there were. Anyway, the whole tribe attacked. It wasn't just the women and children, but the camels, goats, sheep and chickens too. Of course you were expecting them and bows could cut them down, but… they always appeared suddenly, as if even the desert had spat them out. Get it wrong, be too slow, and you'd be hacked, kicked, butted, pecked and viciously spat at.

His troops lay in wait. Well, if you could call them troops. He'd said they were overstretched… well, he hadn't actually said, because that sort of thing could get you into trouble in this man's army, but he'd thought it very hard. Half of them were keen kids who thought that if you went into battle shouting and waving your sword in the air the enemy just ran away. They'd never faced a D'reg chicken coming in at eye height.

As for the rest of it… in the night people had run into one another, ambushed one another by mistake and were now as jittery as peas on a drum. A man had lost his sword and swore that someone had walked away with it stuck right through him. And some kind of rock had got up and walked around hitting people. With other people.

The sun was well up now.

“It's the waiting that's the worst part,” said his sergeant, next to him.

“It might be the worst part,” said the commander. “Or, there again, the bit where they suddenly rise out of the desert and cut you in half might be the worst part.” He stared mournfully at the treacherously empty sand. “Or the bit where a maddened sheep tries to gnaw your nose off might be the worst part. In fact, when you think of all the things that can happen when you're surrounded by a horde of screaming D'regs, the bit where they aren't there at all is, I think you'll find, the best part.”

The sergeant wasn't trained for this sort of thing. So he said, “They're late.”

“Good. Rather them than us.”

“Sun's right up now, sir.”

The commander looked at his shadow. It was full day, and the sand was mercifully free of his blood. The commander had been pacifying various recalcitrant parts of Klatch for long enough to wonder why, if he was pacifying people, he always seemed to be fighting them. Experience had taught him never to say things like “I don't like it, it's too quiet.” There was no such thing as too quiet.

“They might have decamped in the night, sir,” said the sergeant.

“That doesn't sound like the D'regs. They never run away. Anyway, I can see their tents.”

“Why don't we rush 'em, sir?”

“You haven't fought D'regs before, sergeant?”

“No, sir. I've been pacifying the Mad Savatars in Uhistan, though, and they're—”

“The D'regs are worse, sergeant. They pacify right back at you.”

“I didn't say how mad the Savatars were, sir.”

“Compared to the D'regs, they were merely slightly vexed.”

The sergeant felt that his reputation was being impugned.

“How about I take a few men and investigate, sir?”

The commander glanced at the sun again. Already the air was too hot to breathe.

“Oh, very well. Let's go.”

The Klatchians advanced on the camp. There were the tents, and the ash of fires. But there were no camels and horses, merely a long scuffed trail leading off among the dunes.

Morale began to rise a little. Attacking a dangerous enemy who isn't there is one of the more attractive forms of warfare, and there was a certain amount of assertion about how lucky the D'regs were to have run away in time, and some extemporizing on the subject of what the soldiers would have done to the D'regs if they'd caught them…

“Who's that?” said the sergeant.

A figure appeared between the dunes, riding on a camel. His white robes fluttered in the breeze.

He slid down when he reached the Klatchians, and waved at them.

“Good morning, gentlemen! May I persuade you to surrender?”

“Who are you?”

“Captain Carrot, sir. If you would be kind enough to lay down your weapons no one will get hurt.”

The commander looked up. Blobs were appearing along the tops of the dunes. They rose, and turned out to be heads.

“They're… D'regs, sir!” said the sergeant.

“No. D'regs would be charging, sergeant.”

“Oh, sorry. Shall I tell them to charge?” said Carrot. “Is that what you'd prefer?”

The D'regs were all along the dunes now. The climbing sun glittered off metal.

“Are you telling me,” the commander began slowly, “that you can persuade D'regs not to charge?”

“It was tricky, but I think they've got the idea,” said Carrot.

The commander considered his position. There were D'regs on either side. His troop were practically huddling together. And this red-headed, blue-eyed man was smiling at him.

“How do they feel about the merciful treatment of prisoners?” he ventured.

“I think they could get the hang of it. If I insist.”

The commander glanced at the silent D'regs again.

“Why?” he said. “Why aren't they fighting us?” he said.

“My commander says he doesn't want unnecessary loss of life, sir,” said Carrot. “That's Commander Vimes, sir. He's sitting on that dune up there.”

“You can persuade armed D'regs not to charge and you have a commander?”

“Yes, sir. He says this is a police action.”

The commander swallowed. “We give in,” he said.

“What, just like that, sir?” said his sergeant. “Without a fight?”

“Yes, sergeant. Without a fight. This man can make water run uphill and he has a commander. I love the idea of giving in without a fight. I've fought for ten years and giving in without a fight is what I've always wanted to do.”

Water dripped off the Boat's metal ceiling and blobbed on to the paper in front of Leonard of Quirm. He wiped it away. It might have been boring, waiting in a small metal can under a nondescript jetty, but Leonard had no concept of the term.

Absentmindedly, he jotted a brief sketch of an improved ventilation system.

He started to watch his own hand. Almost without his guidance, taking its instructions from somewhere else in his head, it drew a cutaway of a much larger version of the Boat. Here, here and here… there could be a bank of a hundred oars rather than pedals, each one manned – his pencil caressed the paper – by a well muscled and not overdressed young warrior. A boat that would pass unseen under other boats, take men wherever they needed to go. Here a giant saw, affixed to the roof, so that when rowed at speed it could cut the hulls of enemy ships. And here and here a tube…

He stopped and stared at his drawing for a while. Then he sighed and started to tear it up.

Vimes watched from the dune. He couldn't hear much from up here, but he didn't need to.

Angua sat down beside him. “It's working, isn't it?” she said.

“Yes.”

“What's he going to do?”

“Oh, he'll take their weapons and let 'em go, I suppose.”

“Why do people follow him?” said Angua.

“Well, you're his girlfriend, you ought—”

“That's different. I love him because he's kind without thinking about it. He doesn't watch his own thoughts like other people do. When he does good things it's because he's decided to do them, not because he's trying to measure up to something. He's so simple. Anyway, I'm a wolf living with people, and there's a name for wolves that live with people. If he whistled, I'd come running.”

Vimes tried not to show his embarrassment.

Angua smiled. “Don't worry, Mr Vimes. You've said it yourself. Sooner or later, we're all someone's dog.”

“It's like hypnotism,” said Vimes hurriedly. “people follow him to see what's going to happen next. They tell themselves that they're just going along with it for a while and can stop any time they want to, but they never want to. It's damn magic.”

“No. Have you ever really watched him? I bet he'd found out everything about Jabbar by the time he'd talked to him for ten minutes. I bet he knows the name of every camel. And he'll remember it all. People don't take that much interest in other people, usually.” Her fingers idly traced a pattern in the sand. “So he makes you feel important.”

“Politicians do that—” Vimes began.

“Not the way he does, believe me. I expect Lord Vetinari remembers facts about people—”

“Oh, you'd better believe that!”

“—but Carrot takes an interest. He doesn't even think about it. He makes space in his head for people. He takes an interest, and so people think they're interesting. They feel… better when he's around.”

Vimes glanced down. Her fingers were drawing aimlessly in the sand again. We're all changing in the desert, he thought. It's not like the city, hemming your thoughts in. You can feel your mind expand to the horizons. No wonder this is where religions start. And suddenly here I am, probably not legally, just trying to do my job. Why? Because I'm too damn stupid to stop and think before I give chase, that's why. Even Carrot knew better than to do that. I'd have just chased after Ahmed's ship without a thought, but he was bright enough to report back to me first. He did what a responsible officer ought to do, but me…

“Vetinari's terrier,” he said aloud. “Chase first, and think about it afterwards—”

His eye caught the distant bulk of Gebra. Out there was a Klatchian army, and somewhere over there was the Ankh-Morpork army, and he was a handful of people and no plan because he'd chased first and—

“But I had to,” he said. “Any copper wouldn't have let a suspect like Ahmed get—”

Once again he had the feeling that the problem he was facing wasn't really a problem at all. It was something very obvious. He was the problem. He wasn't thinking right.

Come to think of it, he hadn't really thought at all.

He glanced down again at the trapped company. They had stripped down to their loincloths and were looking very sheepish, as men generally do in their underwear.

Carrot's white robe still flapped in the breeze. He hasn't been here a day, thought Vimes, and already he's wearing the desert like a pair of sandals.

“…er… bingeley-bingeley beep?”

“Is that your demon diary?” said Angua.

Vimes rolled his eyes. “Yes. Although it seems to be talking about someone else.”

“…er… three pee em,” the demon muttered slowly, “…day not filled in… Check Wall Defences…”

“See? It thinks I'm in Ankh-Morpork! It cost Sybil three hundred dollars and it can't even keep track of where I am.”

He flicked his cigar butt away and stood up.

“I'd better get down there,” he said. “After all, I am the boss.”

He slithered his way down the dune and strolled towards Carrot, who salaamed to him.

“A salute would do, captain, thanks all the same.”

“Sorry, sir. I think I got a bit carried away.”

“Why've you made them strip off?”

“Makes them a bit of a laughing stock when they return, sir. A blow to their pride.” He leaned closer and whispered, “I've let their commander keep his clothes on, though. It doesn't do to show up the officers.”

“Really?” said Vimes.

“And some want to join us, sir. There's Goriffs lad and a few others. They were just dragooned into the army yesterday. They don't even know why they're fighting. So I said they could.”

Vimes took the captain aside. “Er… I don't remember suggesting that any of the prisoners joined us,” he said quietly.

“Well, sir… I thought, what with our army approaching, and since quite a lot of these lads are from various corners of the empire and don't like the Klatchians any more than we do, I thought that a flying column of guerrilla fighters—”

“We aren't soldiers!”

“Er, I thought we were soldiers—”

“Yes, yes, all right. In a way… but really we're coppers, like we've always been. We don't kill people unless—”

Ahmed? Everyone's slightly on edge when he's around, he worries people, he gets information from all over the place, he seems to go where he pleases, and he's always around when there's trouble– Damn damn damn…

He ran through the crowd until he reached Jabbar, who was watching Carrot with the usual puzzled smile that Carrot caused in innocent bystanders.

“Tree dace,” said Vimes. “Three days. That's seventy-two hours!”

“Yes, offendi?” said Jabbar. It was the voice of someone who recognized dawn, noon and sunset, and just let everything in between happen whenever it liked.

“So why's he called 71-hour Ahmed? What's so special about the extra hour?”

Jabbar grinned nervously.

“Did he do something after seventy-one hours?” said Vimes.

Jabbar folded his arms. “I will not say.”

“He told you to keep us here?”

“Yes.”

“But not to kill us.”

“Oh, I would not kill my friend Sir Sam Mule—”

“And don't give me all that eyeball rubbish,” said Vimes. “He wanted time to get somewhere and do something, right?”

“I will not say.”

“You don't need to,” said Vimes. “Because we are leaving. And if you kill us… well, probably you can. But 71-hour Ahmed would not like that, I expect.”

Jabbar looked like a man making a difficult decision.

“He will be coming back!” he said. “Tomorrow! No problem!”

“I'm not waiting! And I don't think he wants me killed, Jabbar. He wants me alive. Carrot?”

Carrot hurried over. “Yes, sir?”

Vimes was aware that Jabbar was staring at him in horror.

“We've lost Ahmed,” he said. “Even Angua can't pick up his trail with the sand blowing all over the place. We've got no place here. We're not needed here.”

“But we are, sir!” Carrot burst out. “We could help the desert tribes—”

“Oh, you want to stay and fight?” said Vimes. “Against the Klatchians?”

“Against the bad Klatchians, sir.”

“Ah, well, that's the trick, isn't it? When one of them comes screaming at you waving a sword, how do you spot his moral character? Well, you can stay if you like and fight for the good name of Ankh-Morpork. It should be a pretty short fight. But I'm off. Jenkins probably hasn't got afloat again. OK, Jabbar?”

The D'reg was staring at the desert sand between his feet.

“You know where he is now, don't you?” Vimes prompted.

“Yes.”

“Tell me.”

“No. I swore to him.”

“But D'regs are oath-breakers. Everyone knows that.”

Jabbar gave Vimes a grin. “Oh, oaths. Stupid things. I gave him my word.”

“He won't break it, sir,” said Carrot. “D'regs are very particular about things like that. It's only when they swear on gods and things that they'll ever break an oath.”

“I will not tell you where he is,” said Jabbar. “But…” he grinned again, but there was no humour in it, “how brave are you, Mr Vimes?”

“Stop complaining, Nobby.”

“I'm not complaining. I'm just sayin' these trousers are a bit draughty, that's all I'm saying.”

“They look good on you, though.”

“And what're these tin bowls supposed to be doing?”

“They're supposed to be protecting the bits you haven't got, Nobby.”

“The way this breeze is blowing, I could do with some to protect the bits I have.”

“Just try and act ladylike, will you, Nobby?”

Which would be hard, Sergeant Colon had to admit. The lady for whom the clothes had been made had been quite tall and somewhat full-figured, whereas Nobby without his armour could have hidden behind a short stick if you attached a toast rack to it about two-thirds of the way up. He looked like a gauzy accordion with a lot of jewellery. In theory, the costume would have been quite revealing, if Corporal Nobbs was something you wished to see revealed, but there were so many billows and folds now that all one could reliably say was that he was in there somewhere. He was leading the donkey, which seemed to like him. Animals tended to like Nobby. He didn't smell wrong.

“And them boots don't work,” Sergeant Colon went on.

“Why not? You kept yours on.”

“Yeah, but I'm not supposed to be a flower of the desert, right? A moon of someone's delight shouldn't kick up sparks when she walks, am I right?”

“They belonged to my gran, I ain't leaving 'em around for anyone to nick, and I ain't mooning for anyone's delight,” said Nobby sulkily.

Lord Vetinari strode on ahead. The streets were already filling up. Al-Khali liked to get the business of the day started in the cool of dawn, before full day flamethrowered the landscape. No one paid the newcomers any attention, although a few people did turn round to watch Corporal Nobbs. Goats and chickens ambled out of the way as they passed.

“Watch out for people trying to sell you dirty postcards, Nobby,” said Colon. “My uncle was here once and he said some bloke tried to sell him a pack of dirty postcards for five dollars. Disgusted, he was.”

“Yeah, 'cos you can get 'em in the Shades for two dollars,” said Nobby.

“That's what he said. And they were Ankh-Morpork ones. Trying to flog us our own dirty postcards? I call that disgusting, frankly.”

“Good morning, sultan!” said a cheerful and somehow familiar voice. “New in town, are we?”

All three of them turned to a figure that had magically appeared from the mouth of an alleyway.

“Indeed, yes,” said the Patrician.

“I could see you were! Everyone is, these days. And it is your lucky day, shah! I am here to help, right? You want something, I got it!”

Sergeant Colon had been staring at the newcomer. He said, in a faraway voice, “Your name's going to be something like… Al-jibla or something, right?”

“I think that's not what she meant,” said Bana. To a chorus of giggles, she leaned down and whispered in Nobby's ear.

His expression did not change but it did seem to solidify.

“Oh, that,” he said.

There were some worlds of experience which Nobby had only contemplated on a map, but he knew what she was talking about. Of course he'd patrolled certain parts of the Shades in his time – the ones where young ladies tended to hang around without very much to do, and probably catching cold too – but those areas of police work that in other places might be of interest to a Vice Squad now tended to be looked after by the Guild of Seamstresses themselves. People who neglected to obey the… no, not the law as such, call them the unwritten rules… as laid down by Mrs Palm and her committee of very experienced ladies15 attracted the attention of the Agony Aunts, Dotsie and Sadie, and might or might not be seen again. Even Mr Vimes approved of the arrangement. It didn't cause paperwork.

“Oh, yeah,” said Nobby, still staring at some inner screen.

Of course, he knew what…

“Oh, that,” he mumbled. “Well, I've seen a thing or two,” he added. Largely on postcards, he had to admit.

“It must be wonderful to have so much freedom,” said Bana.

“Er…”

Netal burst out crying again. Her friends fluttered around her.

“I don't see why the men have to go off like this,” said Bana. “My betrothed has gone too.”

There was a cackle from a very old woman sitting by the well. “I can tell you why, dears. Because it's better than growing melons all day. It's better than women.”

“Men think war is better than women?”

“It's always fresh, it's always young, and you can make a good fight last all day.”

“But they get killed!”

“Better to die in battle than in bed, they say” She cracked a toothless grin. “But there are good ways for a man to die in bed, eh, Beti?”

Nobby hoped the glow of his ears wasn't singeing his veil. Suddenly, he felt he'd caught up with his future. Ten damn pence worth of it hit him in the face.

“'scuse me,” he said. “Are any of you Nubilians?”

“What are Nubilians?” said Bana.

“It's a country round here,” said Nobby. He added hopefully, “Isn't it?”

Not a single face suggested that this was so.

Nobby sighed. His hand reached up to his ear for a cigarette end, but it came down again empty.

“I'll tell you this, girls,” he said. “I wish I'd settled for the tendollar version. Don't you just sometimes want to sit down and cry?”

“You look even sadder than Netal,” said Bana. “Isn't there some way we can cheer you up?”

Nobby stared at her for a moment, and then started to sob.

Everyone was staring at Colon, their food halfway to their lips.

“Did I just hear him say that, Faifal? What do I want to be on a camel for? I'm a plumber!”

“He's the clown with the juggler. I think. The poor man is several palms short of an oasis.”

“I mean the bloody things spit and they're a bugger to get up the stairs with your toolbox—”

“Now, come on it's not his fault, let's show a little charity.” The speaker cleared his throat. “Good morning, friend,” he said. “May we invite you to share our couscous?”

Sergeant Colon peered at the bowl, and then dipped in a finger and tasted it.

“Hey, this is semolina! You've got semolina! It's just ordinary semol—” He stopped, and coughed. “Yeah, right. Thanks. Got any strawberry jam?”

The host looked at his friends. They shrugged.

“We know not of this ‘strawberry hjam’ of which you speak,” he said carefully, “We prefer it with lamb.” He offered Colon a long wooden skewer.

“Oh, you gotta have strawberry jam,” said Colon, carried away. “When we were kids we'd stir it in and… and…” He looked at their faces, “O' course, that was back in Ur,” he said.

The men nodded at one another. Suddenly it was all clear.

Colon belched loudly.

From the looks he got from everyone else, he was the only one who'd heard of this common Klatchian custom.

“So,” he said, “where's the army these days? Approximately?”

“Why do you ask, o full-of-gas one?”

“Oh, we thought we could make a bit of cash entertaining the troops,” said Colon. He was immensely proud of this idea. “You know… a smile, a song, a lack of exotic dancing. But that means we got to know where they are, see?”

“Excuse me, fat one, but can you understand what I am saying?”

“Yes, it's very tasty,” Colon hazarded.

“Ah. I thought so. So he's a spy. But whose?”

“Really? Who would be so stupid as to use a joke like this as a spy?”

“Ankh-Morpork?”

“Oh, come on! He's pretending to be an Anhk-Morpork spy, perhaps. But they're cunning over there—”

“You think? A people who make curry out of something called curry powder and you think they're clever?”

“I reckon he's from Muntab. They're always watching us.”

“And pretending to be from Ankh-Morpork?”

“Well, if you were trying to look like a joke Morporkian pretending to be Klatchian wouldn't you look like that?”

“But why'd he pretend to be from there?”

“Ah… politics.”

“Let's call the watch, then.”

“Are you mad? We've been talking to him! They will be… inquisitive.”

“Good point. I know…”

Faifal gave Colon a big grin.

“I did hear the entire army has marched away to En al Sams la Laisa,” he said. “But don't tell anyone.”

“Have they?” Colon glanced at the other men. They were watching him with curiously deadpan expressions.

“Sounds like a massive place, with a name like that,” he said.

“Oh, huge,” said his neighbour. One of the other men made a noise that you might think was a suppressed chuckle.

“It's a long way, is it?”

“No, very close. You're practically on top of it,” said Faifal. He nudged a colleague, whose shoulders were shaking.

“Oh, right. Big army, is it?”

“Could easily be very big, yes.”

“Fine. Fine,” said Colon. “Er… anyone got a pencil? I could've sworn I had one when—”

There was a noise outside the tavern. It was the sound of many women laughing, which is always a disquieting noise to men.16 Customers peered suspiciously through the vines.

Colon and the rest of the crowd looked around an urn at the group by the well. An old lady was rolling on the ground, laughing, and various younger ones were leaning against one another for support.

He heard one of them say, “What did he say again?”

“He said, ‘That's funny, it's never done that when I've tried it!’”

“Yeah, that's true!” cackled the old woman. “It never does!”

“‘That's funny, it's never done that when I've tried it’,” Nobby repeated.

Colon groaned. That was the voice and tone of Corporal Nobbs in storytelling mode, when wood could scorch at ten yards.

“'scuse me,” he muttered, and forced his way through the press to the gateway.

“Have you heard the one about the ki… the sultan who was afraid his wife… one of his wives… would be unfaithful to him while he was away?”

“We haven't heard any stories like these, Beti!” Bana gasped.

“Really? Oh, I've got a thousand and one of 'em. Well, anyway, he went and saw the wise old blacksmith, right, and he said—”

“You can't go round telling stories like that, cor– Beti,” Colon panted as he lumbered to a halt.

Nobby realized that a change had come over the group. Now he was surrounded by women who were in the presence of a man. A known man, he corrected himself.

“That's sexual stereotyping!”

“No, it's not!”

“Yes, it is! You'll be expecting me to break my ankle a lot and scream all the time next! It's my job to prove to you that a woman can be as good as a man!”

“Practically identical in your case, Nobby. You've caught too much sun, that's what it is. You are not female, Nobby!”

Beti sniffed. “That's just the sort of sexist remark I'd expect from you.”

“Well, you're not!”

“It's the principle of the thing.”

“Well, at least we now have transport,” said Lord Vetinari, his tone suggesting that the show was over. “Unfortunately, I had no time to find out where the army is.”

“Ah! I can help you there, sir!” Colon tried to salute, and then made a grab for the carpet again. “I found out by cunning, sir!”

“Really?”

“Yessir! It's at a place called… er… En al Sams la Laisa, sir.”

The carpet drifted onwards for a moment, in silence.

“‘The Place where the Sun Shineth Not’?” said the Patrician.

There was more silence. Colon was trying not to look at anyone.

“Is there a somewhere called Gebra?” said Nobby, sulkily.

“Yes, Be– corporal. There is.”

“They've gone there. Of course, you've only got a woman's word for it.”

“Well done, corporal. We shall head up the coast.”

Lord Vetinari relaxed. In a busy and complex life he'd never met people quite like Nobby and Colon. They talked all the time yet there was something almost… restful about them.

He watched the dusty horizon carefully as the ancient carpet curved around. Under his arm was the metal cylinder Leonard had made for him.

Drastic times required drastic measures.

“Sir?” said Colon, his voice muffled by the carpet.

“Yes, sergeant?”

“I've got to know… How did you… you know… get the donkey down?”

“Persuasion, sergeant.”

“What? Just talking?”

“Yes, sergeant. Persuasion. And, admittedly, a sharp stick.”

“Ah! I knew–”

“The trick of getting donkeys down from minarets,” said the Patrician, as the desert unwound below them, “is always to find that part of the donkey which seriously wishes to get down.”

The wind had settled. The bird up on the cliffs had shut down for the night. All Vimes could hear was the sizzle of the little desert creatures.

Then Ahmed's voice said: “I am genuinely impressed, Sir Samuel.”

Vimes took a deep breath. “You know, you really fooled me,” he said. “‘May your loins be full of fruit.’ That was a good one. I really thought you were just—” He stopped. But Ahmed continued:

“—just another camel-driver with a towel on his head? Oh, dear. And you'd been doing so well up to now, Sir Samuel. The Prince was very impressed.”

“Oh, come on. You were all but making suggestive comments about melons. What was I supposed to think?”

“Don't fret, Sir Samuel. I consider it all a compliment. You can turn round. I wouldn't dream of harming you unless you do something… foolish.”

Vimes turned. He could just make out a shape in the afterglow.

“You were admiring this place,” said Ahmed. “Tacticus's men had it built when he tried to conquer Klatch. It's not really a city by today's standards, of course. It was really just making a point. ‘Here we are and here we stay,’ as it were. And then the wind changed.”

“You murdered Snowy Slopes, didn't you?”

“The term is executed. I can show you the confession he signed beforehand.”

“Of his own free will?”

“More or less.”

“What?”

“Let us say, I pointed out to him the alternatives to signing the confession. I was kind enough to leave you the pad. After all, I wanted to keep your interest. And don't look like that, Sir Samuel. I need you.”

“How can you tell how I look?”

“I can guess. The Assassins' Guild had a contract on him in any case. And by a happy chance I am Guild member.”

“You?” Vimes tried to bite down on the word. And then: why not him? Kids got sent a thousand miles to be taught in the Assassins' Guild school…

“Oh, yes. The best years of my life, they tell me. I was in Viper House. Up School! Up School! Right Up School!” He sighed like a prince and spat like a camel driver. “If I shut my eyes I can still recall the taste of that peculiar custard we used to get on Mondays. Dear me, how it all comes back… I remember every soggy street. Does Mr Dibbler still sell his horrible sausages inna bun in Treacle Mine Road?”

“Yes.”

“Still the same old Dibbler, eh?”

“Still the same sausages.”

“Once tasted, never forgotten.”

“True.”

“No, don't move too quickly, Sir Samuel. Otherwise I'm afraid I shall be cutting your own throat. You don't trust me, and I don't trust you.”

“Why did you drag me here?”

“Drag you? I had to sabotage my own ship so you wouldn't lose me!”

“Yes, but… you… knew how I'd react.” Vimes's heart began to sink. Everyone knew how Sam Vimes would react…

“Yes. Would you like a cigarette, Sir Samuel?”

“I thought you sucked those damn cloves.”

“In Ankh-Morpork, yes. Always be a little bit foreign wherever you are, because everyone knows foreigners are a little bit stupid. Besides, these are rather good.”

“Fresh from the desert?”

“Hah! Yes, everyone knows Klatchian cigarettes are made from camel dung.” A match flared, and for a moment Vimes caught a glimpse of the hooked nose as Ahmed lit the cigarette for him. “That is one area where, I regret to say, prejudice has some evidence on its side. No, these are all the way from Sumtri. An island where, it is said, the women have no souls. Personally, I doubt it.”

Vimes could make out a hand, holding the packet. Just for a moment he wondered if he could grab and—

“How is your luck?” said Ahmed.

“Running out, I suspect.”

“Yes. A man should know the length of his luck. Shall I tell you how I know you are a good man, Sir Samuel?” In the light of the rising moon Vimes saw Ahmed produce a cigarette holder, insert one, and light up almost fastidiously.

“Do tell.”

“After the attempt on the Prince's life I suspected everyone. But you suspected only your own people. You couldn't bring yourself to think the Klatchians might have done it. Because that'd line you up with the likes of Sergeant Colon and all the rest of the Klatchian-fags-are-made-of-camel-dung brigade.”

“Whose policeman are you?”

“I draw my pay, let us say, as the wali of Prince Cadram.”

“I shouldn't think he's very happy with you right now, then. You were supposed to be guarding his brother, weren't you?” So was I, Vimes thought. But what the hell…

“Yes. And we thought the same way, Sir Samuel. You thought it was your people, I thought it was mine. The difference is, I was right. Khufurah's death was plotted in Klatch.”

“Oh, really? That's what they wanted the Watch to think—”

“No, Sir Samuel. The important thing is what someone wanted you to think.”

“Really? Well, you've got that wrong. All the stuff with the glass and the sand on the floor, I saw through… that… straight… away…”

His voice faded into silence.

After a while Ahmed said, almost sympathetically, “Yes, you did.”

“Damn.”

“Oh, in some ways you were right. Ossie was paid in dollars, originally. And then, later on, someone broke in, making sure they dumped most of the glass outside, and swapped the money. And distributed the sand. I must say that I thought the sand was going a bit too far, too. No one would be that stupid. But they wanted to make sure it looked like a bungled attempt.”

“Who was it?” said Vimes.

“Oh, a small-time thief. Bob-Bob Hardyoyo. He didn't even know why he was doing it, except that someone was willing to pay him. I commend your city, commander. For enough money, you can find someone to do anything.”

“Someone must have paid him.”

“A man he met in a pub.”

Vimes nodded glumly. It was amazing how many people were prepared to do business with a man they'd met in a pub.

“I can believe that,” he said.

“You see, if even the redoubtable Commander Vimes, who is known even to some senior Klatchian politicians as an unbendingly honest and thorough man, if somewhat lacking in intelligence… if even he protested that it was done by his own people – well, the world is watching. The world would soon find out. Starting a war over a rock? Well… that sort of thing makes countries uneasy. They've all got rocks off their coast. But starting a war because some foreign dog had killed a man on a mission of peace… that, I think, the world would understand.”

“Lacking in intelligence?” said Vimes.

“Oh, don't be too depressed, commander. That business with the fire at the embassy. That was sheer bravery.”

“It was bloody terror!”

“Well, the dividing line is narrow. That was one thing I hadn't expected.”

In the rolling, clicking snooker table of Vimes's mind the black ball hit a pocket.

“You had expected the fire, then?”

“The building should have been almost empty—”

Vimes moved. Ahmed was lifted off his feet and slammed against a pillar, with both of Vimes's hands around his neck.

“That woman was trapped in there!”

“It… was… necessary!” said Ahmed hoarsely. “There… had… to be a… diversion! His… life was… in danger, I had to get him out! I did… not know… about the… woman until too late… I give you my word…”

Through the red veil of anger Vimes became aware of a prickle in the region of his stomach. He glanced down at the knife that had appeared magically in the other man's hand.

“Listen to me…” hissed Ahmed. “Prince Cadram ordered his brother's death… What better way to demonstrate the… perfidy of the sausage-eaters… killing a peace-maker…”

“His own brother? You expect me to believe that?”

“Messages were sent to… the embassy in code…”

“To the old ambassador? I don't believe that!”

Ahmed stood quite still for a moment.

“No, you really don't, do you?” he said. “Be generous, Sir Samuel. Truly treat all men equally. Allow Klatchians the right to be scheming bastards, hmm? In fact the ambassador is just a pompous idiot. Ankh-Morpork has no monopoly on them. But his deputy sees the messages first. He is… a young man of ambition…”

Vimes relaxed his grip. “Him? I thought he was shifty as soon as I saw him!”

“I suspect that you thought he was Klatchian as soon as you saw him, but I take your point.”

“And you could read this code, could you?”

“Oh, come now. Don't you read Vetinari's paperwork upside down when you're standing in front of his desk? Besides, I am Prince Cadram's policeman…”

“So he's your boss, right?”

“Who is your boss, Sir Samuel? When push comes to shove?”

The two men stood locked together. Ahmed's breath wheezed.

Vimes stood back. “These messages… you've got them?”

“Oh, yes. With his seal on them.” Ahmed rubbed his neck.

“Good grief. The originals? I'd have thought they'd be under lock and key.”

“They were. In the embassy. But in the fire many hands were needed to carry important documents to safety. It was a very… useful fire.”

“A death warrant for his own brother… well, you can't argue against that in court…”

“What court? The king is the law.” Ahmed sat down. “We are not like you. You kill kings.”

“The word is ‘execute’. And we only did it once, and that was a long time ago,” said Vimes. “Is that why you brought me here? Why all this drama? You could have come to see me in Ankh-Morpork!”

“You are a suspicious man, commander. Would you have believed me? Besides, I had to get Prince Khufurah out of there, before he, ahah, ‘died of his wounds’.”

“Where's the Prince now?”

“Close. And safe. He is safer in the desert than he would ever be in Ankh-Morpork, I can assure you.”

“And well?”

“Getting better. He is being looked after by an old lady whom I trust.”

“Your mother?”

“Ye gods, no! My mother is a D'reg! She'd be terribly offended if I trusted her. She'd say she hadn't brought me up right.”

He saw Vimes's expression this time. “You think I am an educated barbarian?”

“Let's just say I'd have given Snowy Slopes a running start.”

“Really? Look around you, Sir Samuel. Your… beat… is a city you can walk across in half an hour. Mine is two million square miles of desert and mountain. My companions are a sword and a camel and, frankly, neither are good conversationalists, believe me. Oh, the towns and cities have their guards, of a sort. They are uncomplicated thinkers. But it is my job to go into the waste places and chase bandits and murderers, five hundred miles from anyone who would be on my side, so I must inspire dread and strike the first blow because I will not have a chance to strike a second one. I am an honest man of a sort, I think. I survive. I survived seven years in an Ankh-Morpork public school patronized by the sons of gentlemen. Compared to that, life among the D'regs holds no terrors, I assure you. And I administer justice swiftly and inexpensively.”

“I heard about how you got your name…”

Ahmed shrugged. “The man had poisoned the water. The only well for twenty miles. That killed five men, seven women, thirteen children and thirty-one camels. And some of them were very valuable camels, mark you. I had evidence from the man who sold him the poison and a trustworthy witness who had seen him near the well on the fateful night. Once I had testimony from his servant, why wait even an hour?”

“Sometimes we have trials,” said Vimes brightly.

“Yes. Your Lord Vetinari decides. Well, five hundred miles from anywhere the law is me.” Ahmed waved a hand. “Oh, no doubt the man would suggest there were mitigating circumstances, that he had an unhappy childhood or was driven by Compulsive Well-Poisoning Disorder. But I have a compulsion to behead cowardly murderers.”

Vimes gave up. The man had a point. The man had a whole sword.

“Different strokes for different folks,” he said.

“I find the one at shoulder height generally suffices,” said Ahmed. “Don't grimace, it was a joke. I knew the Prince was plotting and I thought: this is not right. Had he killed some Ankh-Morpork lord, that would just be politics. But this… I thought, why do I chase stupid people into the mountains when I am part of a big crime? The Prince wants to unite the whole of Klatch. Personally, I like the little tribes and countries, even their little wars. But I don't mind if they fight Ankh-Morpork because they want to, or because of your horrible personal habits, or your unthinking arrogance… there's a lot of reasons for fighting Ankh-Morpork. A lie isn't one of them.”

“I know what you mean,” said Vimes.

“But what can I do alone? Arrest my Prince? I am his policeman, as you are Vetinari's.”

“No. I'm an officer of the law.”

“All I know is, there must be a policeman, even for kings.”

Vimes looked pensively at the moonlit desert.

Somewhere out there was the Ankh-Morpork army, what there was of it. And somewhere waiting was the Klatchian army. And thousands of men who might have quite liked one another had they met socially would thunder towards one another and start killing, and after that first rush you had all the excuses you needed to do it again and again…

He remembered listening, when he was a kid, to old men in his street talking about war. There hadn't been many wars in his time. The city states of the Sto Plains mainly tried to bankrupt one another, or the Assassins' Guild sorted everything out on a one-to-one basis. Most of the time people just bickered, and while that was pretty annoying it was a lot better than having a sword stuck in your liver.

What he remembered most, among the descriptions of puddles filled with blood and the flying limbs, was the time one old man said, “An' if your foot caught in something, it was always best not to look and see what it was, if'n you wanted to hold on to your dinner.” He'd never explained what he meant. The other old men seemed to know. Anyway, nothing could have been worse than the explanations Vimes thought of for himself. And he remembered that the three old men who spent most of their days sitting on a bench in the sun had, between them, five arms, five eyes, four and a half legs and two and three-quarter faces. And seventeen ears (Crazy Winston would bring out his collection for a good boy who looked suitably frightened).

“He wants to start a war…” Vimes had to open his mouth because otherwise there was no room to get his head around such a crazy idea. This man who everyone said was honest, noble and good wanted a war.

“Oh, certainly,” said Ahmed. “Nothing unites people like a good war.”

How could you deal with someone who thought like that? Vimes asked himself. A mere murderer, well, you had a whole range of options. He could deal with a mere murderer. You had criminals and you had policemen, and there was a sort of see-saw there which balanced out in some strange way. But if you took a man who'd sit down and decide to start a war, what in the name of seven hells could you balance him with? You'd need a policeman the size of a country.

You couldn't blame the soldiers. They'd just joined up to be pointed in the right direction.

Something clicked against the fallen pillar. Vimes glanced down and pulled the baton out of his pocket. It glinted in the moonlight

What damn good was something like this? All it really meant was that he was allowed to chase the little criminals, who did the little crimes. There was nothing he could do about the crimes that were so big you couldn't even see them. You lived in them. So… safer to stick to the little crimes, Sam Vimes.

“ALL RIGHT, MY SONS! LET 'EM HAVE IT RIGHT UP THE JOGRAPHY!”

Figures bounded over the fallen pillars.

There was a metallic whirr as Ahmed unsheathed his sword.

Vimes saw a halberd coming towards him – an Ankh-Morpork halberd! – and street reaction took over. He didn't waste time sneering at someone stupid enough to use a pike on a foot soldier. He dodged the blade, caught the shaft, and pulled it so hard that its owner stumbled right into his upswinging boot.

Then he jerked away, struggling to untangle his sword from the unfamiliar robes. He ducked another shadowy figure's wild slice and managed to make an elbow connect with something painful.

As he rose he looked into the face of a man with an upraised sword—

–there was a silken sound—

–and the man swayed backwards, his head looking surprised as it fell away from the body.

Vimes dragged his headdress off.

“I'm from Ankh-Morpork, you stupid sods!”

A huge figure rose in front of him, a sword in each hand.

“I'LL CUT YER TONKER OFF'F YER YER GREASY—Oh, is that you, Sir Samuel?”

“Huh? Willikins?”

“Indeed, sir.” The butler straightened up.

“Willikins?”

“Do excuse me one moment, sir KNOCK IT OFF YOU MOTHERLOVIN SONS OF BITCHES I had no apprehension of your presence, sir.”

“This one's fightin' back, sarge!”

Ahmed had his back to a pillar. A man already lay at his feet. Three others were trying to get close enough to the wali while staying away from the whirling wall he was creating with his sword.

“Ahmed! These are on our side!” Vimes yelled.

“Oh, really? Pardon me.”

Ahmed lowered his sword and removed the cigarette holder from his mouth. He nodded at one of the soldiers who had been trying to attack him and said, “Good morning to you.”

“'ere, are you one of ours, too?”

“No, I'm one of—”

“He's with me,” Vimes snapped. “How come you're here, Willikins? Sergeant Willikins, I see.”

“We were on patrol, sir, and were attacked by some Klatchian gentlemen. After the ensuing unpleasantness—”

“—you should've seen 'im, sir. 'e bit one bastard's nose right orf!” a soldier supplied.

“It is true that I endeavoured to uphold the good name of Ankh-Morpork, sir. Anyway, after we—”

“—and one bloke, sarge, stabbed 'im right in the—”

“Please, Private Bourke, I am apprising Sir Samuel of events,” said Willikins.

“Sarge ort to get a medal, sir!”

“Those few of us who survived tried to get back, sir, but we had to conceal ourselves from other patrols and were just considering lying up until dawn in this edifice when we espied you and this gentleman here.”

Ahmed was watching him with his mouth open.

“How many were in this Klatchian patrol, sergeant?” he said.

“Nineteen men, sir.”

“That's a very precise count, in this light.”

“I was able to enumerate them subsequently, sir.”

“You mean they were all killed?”

“Yes, sir,” said Willikins calmly. “However, we ourselves lost five men, sir. Not including Privates Hobbley and Webb, sir, who regrettably seem to have passed away as a result of this unfortunate misunderstanding. With your permission, sir, I will remove them.”

“Poor devils,” said Vimes, aware that it was not enough but that nothing else would be, either.

“The fortunes of war, sir. Private Hobbley, Ginger to his friends, was nineteen and lived in Ettercap Street, where until recently he made bootlaces.” Willikins took the dead man's arms and pulled. “He was courting a young lady called Grace, a picture of whom he was kind enough to show me last night. A maid at Lady Venturi's, I was given to understand. If you would be good enough to pass me his head, sir, I will get on with things SMUDGER WHO TOLD YOU TO SIT DOWN GET ON YORE FEET RIGHT NOW GET OUT YORE SHOVEL TAKE OFF YORE HELMET SHOW SOME RESPECT GET DIGGINGHA!”

A cloud of smoke rolled past Vimes's ear.

“I know what you are thinking,” said Ahmed. “But this is war, Sir Samuel. Wake up and smell the blood.”

“But… one minute they're alive—”

“Your friend here knows how it works. You don't.”

“He's a butler!”

“So? It's kill or be killed, even for butlers. You're not a natural warrior, Sir Samuel.”

Vimes thrust the baton in his face.

“I'm not a natural killer! See this? See what it says? I'm supposed to keep the peace, I am! If I kill people to do it, I'm reading the wrong manual!”

Willikins appeared silently, hefting the other corpse. “I was not privileged to know much about this young man,” he said, as he carried him behind a rock. “We called him Spider, sir,” he went on, straightening up. “He played the harmonica rather badly and spoke longingly of home. Will you be taking tea, sir? Private Smith is having a brew-up. Er…” The butler coughed politely.

“Yes, Willikins?”

“I hardly like to broach the subject, sir…”

“Broach it, man!”

“Do you have such a thing as a biscuit about you, sir? I hesitate to provide tea without biscuits, but we have not eaten for two days.”

“But you were on patrol!”

“Forage party, sir.” Willikins looked embarrassed.

Vimes was bewildered. “You mean Rust didn't even wait to take on food?”

“Oh, yes, sir. But as it transpired—”

“We knew there was somethin' wrong when the mutton barrels started to explode,” muttered Private Bourke. “The biscuits was pretty lively too. Turned out bloody Rust'd bought a lot of stuff even a rag'ead wouldn't eat—”

“And we eat anything,” said 71-hour Ahmed solemnly.

“PRIVATE BOURKE YOU ORRIBLE MAN SPEAKIN OF YORE COMMANDIN OFFICER LIKE THAT YOU WILL BE ON A CHARGE I apologize, sir, but we are feeling a little faint.”

“Long time between noses, eh?” said 71-hour Ahmed.

“Ahahaha, sir,” said Willikins.

Vimes sighed. “Willikins… when you've finished, I want you and your men to come with me.”

“Very good, sir.”

Vimes nodded at Ahmed.

“And you too,” he said. “Push has come to shove.”

The hot wind flapped the banners. The sunlight sparkled off the spears. Lord Rust surveyed his army and found that it was good. But small.

He leaned towards his adjutant.

“Let us not forget, though, that even General Tacticus was outnumbered ten to one when he took the Pass of Al-Ibi,” he said.

“Yes, sir. Although I believe his men were all mounted on elephants, sir,” said Lieutenant Hornett. “And had been well provisioned,” he added meaningfully.

“Possibly, possibly. But then Lord Pinwoe's cavalry once charged the full might of the Pseudopolitan army and are renowned in song and story.”

“But they were all killed, sir!”

“Yes, yes, but it was a famous charge, nevertheless. And every child knows, do they not, the story of the mere one hundred Ephebians who defeated the entire Tsortean army? A total victory, hey? Hey?”

“Yes, sir,” said the adjutant glumly.

“Oh, you admit it?”

“Yes, sir. Of course, some commentators believe the earthquake helped.”

“At least you will admit that the Seven Heroes of Hergen beat the Big-Footed People although outnumbered by a hundred to one?”

“Yes, sir. That was a nursery story, sir. It never really happened.”

“Are you calling my nurse a liar, boy?”

“No, sir,” said Lieutenant Hornett hurriedly.

“Then you'll concede that Baron Mimbledrone single-handedly beat the armies of the Plum Pudding Country and ate their Sultana?”

“I envy him, sir.” The lieutenant looked at the lines again. The men were very hungry, although Rust would probably have called them sleek. Things would have been even worse if it hadn't been for the fortuitous shower of boiled lobsters on the way over. “Er… you don't think, sir, since we have a little time in hand, we should look to the disposition of the men, sir?”

“They look well disposed to me. Plucky men, eager to be at the fray!”

“Yes, sir. I meant… more… well… positioned, sir.”

“Nothing wrong with 'em, man. Beautifully lined up! Hey? A wall of steel poised to thrust at the black heart of the Klatchian aggressor!”

“Yes, sir. But – and I realize this is a remote chance, sir – it might be that while we're thrusting at the heart of the Klatchian aggressor—”

“—black heart—” Rust corrected him.

“—black heart of the Klatchian aggressor, sir, the arms of the Klatchian aggressor, those companies there and there, sir, will sweep around in the classic pincer movement.”

“The thrusting wall of steel served us magnificently in the second war with Quirm!”

“We lost that one, sir.”

“But it was a damn close-run thing!”

“We still lost, sir.”

“What did you do as a civilian, lieutenant?”

“I was a surveyor, sir, and I can read Klatchian. That's why you made me an officer.”

“So you don't know how to fight?”

“Only how to count, sir.”

“Pah! Show a little courage, man. Although I'll wager you won't need to. No stomach for a battle, Johnny Klatchian. Once he tastes our steel, he'll be off!”

“I certainly hear what you say, sir,” said the adjutant, who had been surveying the Klatchian lines and had formed his own opinion about the matter.

His opinion was this: the main force of the Klatchian army had, in recent years, been fighting everyone. That suggested, to his uncomplicated mind, that by now the surviving soldiers were the ones who were in the habit of being alive at the end of battles. And were also very experienced at facing all kinds of enemies. The stupid ones were dead.

The current Ankh-Morpork army, on the other hand, had never faced an enemy at all, although day-to-day experience of living in the city might count for something there, at least in the rougher areas. He believed, along with General Tacticus, that courage, bravery and the indomitable human spirit were fine things which nevertheless tended to take second place to the combination of courage, bravery, the indomitable human spirit and a six-to-one superiority of numbers.

It had all sounded straightforward in Ankh-Morpork, he thought. We were going to sail into Klatch and be in Al-Khali by teatime, drinking sherbet with pliant young women in the Rhoxi. The Klatchians would take one look at our weapons and run away.

Well, the Klatchians had taken a good look this morning. So far they hadn't run. They appeared to be sniggering a lot.

Vimes rolled his eyes. It worked… but how did it work?

He'd heard plenty of good speakers, and Captain Carrot was not among them. He hesitated, lost the thread, repeated himself and in general made a mess of the whole thing.

And yet…

And yet…

He watched the faces that were watching Carrot. There were the D'regs, and some of the Klatchians who had stayed behind, and Willikins and his reduced company. They were listening.

It was a kind of magic. He told people they were good chaps, and they knew they weren't good chaps, but the way he told it made them believe it for a while. Here was someone who thought you were a noble and worthy person, and somehow it would be unthinkable to disappoint them. It was a mirror of a speech, reflecting back to you what you wanted to hear. And he meant it all.

Even so, men occasionally glanced up at Vimes and Ahmed and he could see them thinking, in their separate ways, “It must be all right if they're in on it.” That, he was ashamed to realize, was one of the advantages of armies. People looked to other people for orders.

“This is a trick?” said Ahmed.

“No. He doesn't know any tricks like that,” said Angua. “He really doesn't. Uh-oh…”

There was a scuffle in the ranks.

Carrot strode forward and reached down, bringing up Private Bourke and a D'reg, each man held by the collar in one big fist.

“What's going on, you two?”

“He called me the brother of a pig, sir!”

“Liar! You called me a greasy dishcloth-head!”

Carrot shook his head. “And you were both doing so well, too,” he said sadly. “There really is no call for this. Now I want you, Hashel, and you, Vincent, to shake hands, right? And apologize, yes? We've all had a rather trying time, but I know you're both fine fellows underneath it all—”

Vimes heard Ahmed murmur, “Oh, well, now it's all over…”

“—so if you'll just shake hands we'd say no more about it.”

Vimes glanced at 71-hour Ahmed. The man was wearing a sort of waxen grin.

The two scufflers very gingerly touched hands, as if they were expecting a spark to leap the gap.

“And now you, Vincent, apologize to Mr Hashel…”

There was a reluctant “'ry”.

“And we're sorry for what?” Carrot prompted.

“…sorry for calling him a greasy dishcloth-head…”

“Well said. And you, Hashel, apologize to Private Bourke.”

The D'reg's eyes scurried around their sockets, looking to find a way out that would allow their body to come too. Then he gave up.

“'ry…”

“For…?”

“'ry for calling him a brother of a pig…”

Carrot lowered both men.

“Good! I'm sure you'll get along splendidly once you get to know each other—”

“I didn't just see that, did I?” said Ahmed. “I didn't just see him talk like a little schoolteacher to Hashel who, I happen to know, once hit a man so hard his nose ended up in one of his ears?”

“Yes, you did,” said Angua. “And now watch them.”

When the rest of the men turned their attention back to Carrot the scufflers looked at one another, as unfortunates who had both been through the same baptism of fiery embarrassment.

Private Bourke gingerly offered Hashel a cigarette.

“It only works around him,” said Angua. “But it does work.”

Let it go on working, Vimes prayed.

Carrot walked over to a kneeling camel and climbed into the saddle.

“That's ‘Evil Brother-in-Law of a Jackal’,” said Ahmed. “Jabbar's camel! It bites everyone who ride it!”

“Yes, but this is Carrot.”

“It even bites Jabbar!”

“And you notice how he knew how to get on a camel?” said Vimes. “How he wears the robes? He's fitting in. The boy was raised in a dwarf mine. It took him about a month to know my own damn city better than I do.”

The camel rose. Now the flag, Vimes thought, give him the flag. When you go to war, there's got to be a flag.

On cue, Constable Shoe passed up the spear with the tightly rolled cloth around it. The constable looked proud. He'd stitched the thing in conditions of great secrecy half an hour before. One thing about a zombie, you always knew someone who had a needle and thread.

But don't unfurl it, Vimes thought. Don't let them see it. It's enough for them to know they're marching under a flag.

Carrot brandished the spear.

“And I promise you this,” he shouted, “if we succeed, noone will remember. And if we fail, no one will forget!”

Probably one of the worst rallying cries, Vimes thought, since General Pidley's famous “Let's all get our throats cut, boys!” but it got a huge cheer. And once again he speculated that there was magic going on at some bone-deep level. People followed Carrot out of curiosity.

“All right, you've got an army, I suppose,” said Ahmed. “And now?”

“I'm a policeman. So are you. There's going to be a crime. Saddle up, Ahmed.”

Ahmed salaamed. “I am happy to be led by a white officer, offendi.”

“I didn't mean—”

“Have you ever ridden a camel before, Sir Samuel?”

“No!”

“Ah?” Ahmed smiled faintly. “Then just give it a prod to get started. And when you want to stop, hit it very hard with the stick and shout ‘Huthuthut!’”

“You hit it with a stick to make it stop?”

“Is there any other way?” said 71-hour Ahmed.

His camel looked at Vimes, and then spat in his eye.

Prince Cadram and his generals surveyed the distant enemy, from horseback. The various Klatchian armies were drawn up in front of Gebra. Compared to them, the Ankh-Morpork regiments looked like a group of tourists who had missed their coach.

“Is that all?” he said.

“Yes, sire,” said General Ashal. “But, you see, they believe that fortune favours the brave.”

“That is a reason to field such a contemptible little army?”

“Ah, sire, but they believe that we will turn and run as soon as we taste some cold steel.”

The Prince looked back at the distant banners. “Why?”

“I couldn't say, sire. It appears to be an item of faith.”

“Strange.” The Prince nodded to one of his bodyguards. “Fetch me some cold steel.”

After some hurried discussion a sword was handed up very gingerly, handle first. The prince peered at it, and then licked it with theatrical care. The watching soldiers laughed.

“No,” he said at last. “No, I have to say that I don't feel the least apprehensive. Is this as cold as steel gets?”

“Lord Rust was probably being metaphorical, sire.”

“Ah. He is the sort who would be. Well, let us go forward and meet him. We must be civilized, after all.”

He urged his horse forward. The generals fell in behind him.

The prince leaned down towards General Ashal again.

“And why are we going out to meet him before battle commences?”

“It's a… it's a goodwill gesture, sire. Warriors honouring one another.”

“But the man's a complete incompetent!”

“Indeed, sire.”

“And we're about to set thousands of our countrymen against one another, aren't we?”

“Indeed, sire.”

“So what does the maniac want to do? Tell me there's no hard feelings?”

“Broadly speaking, sire… yes. I understand the motto of his old school was ‘It matters not that you won or lost, but that you took part.’”

The Prince's lips moved as he tried this out once or twice. Finally he said: “And, knowing this, people still take orders from him?”

“It would seem so, sire.”

Prince Cadram shook his head. We can learn from Ankh-Morpork, his father had said. Sometimes we can learn what not to do. And so he'd set out to learn.

First he'd learned that Ankh-Morpork had once ruled quite a slice of Klatch. He'd visited the ruins of one of its colonies. And so he'd found out the name of the man who had been audacious enough to do this, and had got agents in Ankh-Morpork to find out as much about him as possible.

General Tactitus, he'd been called. And Prince Cadram had read a lot and remembered everything, and “tactics” had been very, very useful in the widening of the empire. Of course, this had its own drawbacks. You had a border, and across the border came bandits. So you sent a force to quell the bandits, and in order to stamp them out you had to take over their country, and soon you had another restless little vassal state to rule. And now that had a border, over which came, sure as sunrise, a fresh lot of raiders. So your new tax–paying subjects were demanding protection from their brother raiders, neglecting to pay their taxes, and doing a little light banditry on the side. And so once again you stretched your forces, whether you wanted to or not…

He sighed. For the serious empire-builder there was no such thing as a final frontier. There was only another problem. If only people would understand…

Nor was there such a thing as a game of war. General Tacticus knew that. Learn about your opposite number, yes, and respect his abilities if he had them, certainly. But never pretend that afterwards you were going to meet up for a drink and charge-by-charge replay.

“He could well be insane, sire,” the general went on.

“Oh, good.”

“However, I'm told that he recently referred to Klatchians as the finest soldiers in the world, sire.”

“Really?”

“He added ‘when led by white officers’, sire.”

“Oh?”

“And we are offering him breakfast, sire. It would be most impolite of him to refuse.”

“What a good idea. Have we got an adequate supply of sheeps' eyes?”

“I took the liberty of telling the cooks to save some up for this very eventuality, sire.”

“Then we must see he gets them. After all, he will be our honoured guest. Well, let us do this thing properly. Please try to look as if you hate the taste of cold steel.”

The Klatchians had set up an open-sided tent on the sand between the two armies. In the welcome shade a low table had been laid. Lord Rust and his company were already waiting, and had been for more than half an hour.

They stood up and bowed awkwardly as Prince Cadram entered. Around the tent the Klatchian and Ankh-Morpork honour guards eyed one another suspiciously, every man trying to get the drop on the others.

“Tell me… Do any of you gentlemen speak Klatchian?” said Prince Cadram, after the lengthy introductions.

Lord Rust's grin stayed fixed. “Hornett?” he hissed.

“I'm not quite certain what he said, sir,” said the lieutenant nervously.

“I thought you knew Klatchian!”

“I can read it, sir. That's not the same…”

“Oh, don't worry,” said the Prince. “As we say in Klatch, this clown's in charge of an army?”

Around the tent, the Klatchian generals suddenly went poker-faced.

“Hornett?”

“Er… something about… to own, to control… er…”

Cadram smiled at Lord Rust. “I'm not entirely familiar with this custom,” he said. “You often meet your enemies before battle?”

“It is considered honourable,” said Lord Rust. “I believe that on the night before the famous Battle of Pseudopolis officers from both sides attended a ball at Lady Selachii's, for example.”

The Prince glanced questioningly at General Ashal, who nodded.

“Really? Obviously we have so much to learn. As the poet Mosheda says, I can't believe this man.”

He had always wondered how Old Stoneface had felt, that frosty morning when he picked up the axe that had no legal blessing because the King wouldn't recognize a court even if a jury could be found, that frosty morning when he prepared to sever what people thought was a link between men and deity

“…beep… Things To Do Today Today Today: Die…”

The sensation flowed into his veins like fresh warm blood. It was the feeling that you got when the law ran out, and you looked into a mocking face on the other side of it and you decided that you couldn't go on living if you did not step over the line and do one clean thing—

There was shouting outside. He blinked away the sweat.

“Ah… Commander Vimes…” said a voice somewhere back over the border.

He kept his aching gaze sighted along the bow. “Yes?”

A hand darted down and grabbed the arrow out of its groove. Vimes blinked. His finger automatically squeezed the trigger. The string slammed back with a thunk. And the look on the Prince's face, he knew, would keep him warm on cold nights, if there were ever cold nights again.

He'd heard them all die. But they weren't dead. And yet the damn thing had sounded so… accurate…

Lord Vetinari dropped the arrow fastidiously, like a society lady who has had to handle something sticky.

“Well done, Vimes. I see you've got the donkey up the minaret. Good morning, gentlemen.” He gave the company a happy smile. “I see I am not too late.”

“Vetinari?” said Rust, seeming to wake up. “What are you doing here? This is a battlefield—”

“I wonder.” The Patrician gave him a very brief smile of his very own. “Outside there seem to be a lot of men sitting around. Many of them seem to be having what I believe is known in military parlance as a brew-up. And Captain Carrot is organizing a football match.”

“He's what?” said Vimes, lowering the bow. Suddenly the world had to be real again. If Carrot was doing something as dumb as that, things were normal.

“Quite a large number of fouls so far, I'm afraid. But I wouldn't call it a battlefield.”

“Who's winning?”

“Ankh-Morpork, I believe. By two hacked shins and a broken nose.”

For the first time in ages Vimes felt a little pang of patriotism. Everything else in life was in the privy, but when it came to gouging and kicking he knew which side he was on.

“Besides,” Vetinari went on, “I believe quite a large number of people are technically under arrest. And clearly a state of war is not, in practical fact, in being. It is merely a state of football. Therefore, I believe, I am, shall we say… back. Excuse me, sire, but this won't take a moment.”

He held up a metal cylinder and began to unscrew the end.

For some reason Vimes felt inclined to take a few steps away from it. “What's that?”

“I thought this might become necessary,” said Vetinari. “It took some preparation, but I am certain it will work. I hope they're readable. We did our best to keep the damp off them.”

A thick roll of paper dropped out onto the floor.

“Commander, have you nothing you should be doing?” he added. “Refereeing, perhaps?”

Vimes picked up the roll and read the first few lines.

“Whereas… heretofore, etc, etc… City of Ankh-Morpork… Surrender?”

“What?” said Rust and the Prince together.

“Yes, surrender,” said Vetinari cheerfully. “A little piece of paper and it's all over. I think you'll find it all in order.”

“You can't—” Rust began.

“You can't—” said the Prince.

“Unconditionally?” said General Ashal sharply.

“Yes, I think so,” said Vetinari. “We give up all claim to Leshp in favour of Klatch, we withdraw all troops from Klatch and our citizens from the island, and as for reparations… shall we say a quarter of a million dollars? Plus various favourable trade arrangements, most-favoured-nation status and so on and so on. It's all here. Feel free to read it at your leisure.”

He passed the document over the head of the Prince and into the hands of the general, who flicked through the pages.

“But we haven't got–” Vimes began. Perhaps I did get killed, he thought. I'm on the other side, or someone hit me very hard on the head and this is all some kind of mirage—

“It's a forgery!” snapped the Prince. “It's a trick!”

“Well, sire, this man certainly does appear to be Lord Vetinari and these do seem to be the official seals of Ankh-Morpork,” said the general. “‘Whereas… whereby… without prejudice… ratification within four days… way of trade’… yes, this does, I have to say, look genuine.”

“I won't accept it!”

“I see, sire. It does, though, appear to cover all the points which in your speech last week you—”

“I certainly wouldn't accept it!” Rust shouted. He waved a finger under Vetinari's nose. “You'll be banished for this!”

But we haven't got that money, Vimes repeated, but this time to himself. We're a very rich city, but we haven't got any actual money. The wealth of Ankh-Morpork is in its people, we're told. And you couldn't remove it with big pliers.

He felt the wind change.

And Vetinari watching him.

And there was something about General Ashal. A certain hunger…

“I agree with Rust,” he said. “This is dragging the good name of Ankh-Morpork in the mud.” To his mild surprise he managed to say that without smiling.

“We lose nothing, sire,” General Ashal insisted. “They withdraw from Klatch and Leshp—”

“Damned if we will!” screamed Lord Rust.

“Right! And have everyone know we've been beaten?” said Vimes. “Outwitted?”

He looked at the Prince, whose gaze was hunting from man to man, but occasionally staring at nothing, as if he was watching some inner vision.

“A quarter of a million is not enough,” the Prince said.

Lord Vetinari shrugged. “We can discuss it.”

“There is much that I need to buy.”

“Things of a sharp metallic nature, no doubt,” said Vetinari. “Of course, if we are talking about goods rather than money, there is room for… flexibility…”

And now we're going to arm him too, Vimes thought.

“You'll be out of the city in a week!” Rust screamed.

Vimes thought the general smiled briefly. Ankh-Morpork without Vetinari… ruled by people like Rust. His future was looking bright indeed.

“The surrender will need to be ratified and formally witnessed, however,” said Ashal.

“May I suggest Ankh-Morpork?” said Lord Vetinari.

“No. On neutral territory, of course,” said the general.

“But where, between Ankh-Morpork and Klatch, is there such a thing?” said Vetinari.

“I suppose… there is Leshp,” said the general thoughtfully.

“What a good idea,” said the Patrician. “That would not have occurred to me.”

“The place is ours anyway!” snapped the Prince.

“Will be, sire. Will be,” said the general soothingly. “We will take possession. Quite legally. While the world watches.”

“And that's it? What about my arrest?” said Vimes. “I'm not going to—”

“These are matters of state,” said Vetinari. “And there are… diplomatic considerations. I am afraid the good ordering of international affairs cannot hinge upon your concerns over the doings of one man.”

Once again Vimes felt that the words he was hearing were not the words that were being said.

“I won't—” he began.

“There are larger issues here.”

“But—”

“Sterling work, nevertheless.”

“There are big crimes and little crimes, is that it?” said Vimes.

“Why don't you take some well-earned rest, Sir Samuel? You are,” Vetinari flashed one of his lightning-fast smiles, “a man of action. You deal in swords, and chases, and facts. Now, alas, it is the time for the men of words, who deal in promises and mistrust and opinions. For you the war is over. Enjoy the sunshine. I trust we shall all be returning home shortly. I would like you to stay, Lord Rust…”

“Sport as a substitute for war, eh?” said Vimes. He rootled in the ashes of Nobby's fire and pulled out a half-consumed… well, it helped to think of it as a desert coal.

Carrot gave him a solemn look. “Yes, sir. No one's using weapons. And have you noticed how the Klatchian army is getting smaller? Some of the chiefs from distant parts are taking their men away. They say there's no point in staying if there's not going to be a war. I don't think they really wanted to be here in any case, to tell you the truth. And I don't think it's going to be easy to get them to come back—”

There was shouting behind them. Men were coming out of the tent, arguing. Lord Rust was among them. He looked around, talking to his companions. Then he spotted Vimes and rocketed furiously towards him.

“Vimes!”

Vimes looked up, hand halfway to his cigar.

“We would have won, you know,” growled Rust. “We would have won! But we were betrayed on the brink of success!”

Vimes stared at him.

“And it's your fault, Vimes! We'll be the laughing stock of Klatch! You know the value these people put on face, and we won't have any! Vetinari is finished! And so are you! And so is your stupid, mongrel, cowardly Watch! What do you say to that, Vimes? Eh?”

The watchmen sat like statues, waiting for Vimes to say something. Or even move.

“Eh? Vimes?”

Rust sniffed. “What's that smell?”

Vimes slowly shifted his gaze to his fingers. Smoke was rising. There was a faint sizzling.

He stood up and brought his fingers up in front of Rust's face.

“Take it,” he said.

“That's… just some trick…”

“Take it,” said Vimes.

Mesmerized, Rust licked his fingers and gingerly took the ember. “It doesn't hurt—”

“Yes, it does,” said Vimes.

“In fact it– Aargh!”

Rust jumped back, dropped the ember and sucked his blistered fingers.

“The trick is not to mind that it hurts,” said Vimes. “Now go away.”

“You won't last long,” Rust sneered. “You wait until we're back in the city. You just wait.” He strode off, holding his stricken hand.

Vimes went back and sat down by the fire. After a while he said: “Where's he gone now?”

“Back to the lines, sir. I think he's ordering the men home.”

“Can he see us?”

“No.”

“You sure?”

“There's too many people in the way, sir.”

“You're quite sure?”

“Not unless he can see through camels, sir.”

“Good.” Vimes stuck his fingers in his mouth. Sweat was pouring down his face. “Damn damn damn! Has anyone got any cold water?”

Captain Jenkins had got his ship afloat again. It had taken a lot of digging, and some careful work with balks of timber and the assistance of a Klatchian captain who had decided not to let patriotism stand in the way of profit.

He and his crew were resting on the shore when a greeting rang out from over them.

He squinted into the sun.

“That… that can't be Vimes, can it?”

The crew stared.

“Let's get aboard right now!”

A figure started down the face of the dune. It moved very fast, much faster than a man could run on the shifting sand, and moved in a zig-zag fashion. As it drew nearer, it turned out to be a man standing on a shield.

It slid to a halt a few feet away from the astonished Jenkins.

“Good of you to wait, captain!” said Carrot. “Very many thanks! The others will be down in a minute.”

Jenkins looked back to the top of the dune. There were other, darker figures there now.

“Those are D'regs!” he shouted.

“Oh, yes. Lovely people. Have you met them at all?”

Jenkins stared at Carrot. “Did you win?” he said.

“Oh, yes. On penalties, in the end.”

Green-blue light filtered through the tiny windows of the Boat.

Lord Vetinari pulled the steering levers until he was pretty certain that they were heading towards a suitable ship and said:

“What is it I can smell, Sergeant Colon?”

“It's Bet– It's Nobby, sir,” said Colon, pedalling industriously.

“Corporal Nobbs?”

Nobby almost blushed. “I bought a bottle of scent, sir. For my young lady.”

Lord Vetinari coughed. “What exactly do you mean by ‘your young lady’?” he said.

“Well, for when I get one,” said Nobby.

“Ah.” Even Lord Vetinari sounded relieved.

“On account of I expect I shall now, me having fully explored my sexual nature and now feeling fully comfortable with meself,” said Nobby.

“You feel comfortable with yourself?”

“Yessir!” said Nobby happily.

“And when you find this lucky lady, you will give her this bottle of—”

“'s called ‘Kasbah Nights’, sir.”

“Of course. Very… floral, isn't it?”

“Yessir. That's 'cos of the jasmine and rare ungulants in it, sir.”

“And yet at the same time curiously… penetrative.”

Nobby grinned. “Good value for money, sir. A little goes a long way.”

“Not far enough, possibly?”

But Nobby rusted even irony. “I got it in the same shop that sarge got the hump, sir.”

“Ah… yes.”

There wasn't very much space in the Boat, and most of it was taken up with Sergeant Colon's souvenirs. He'd been allowed a brief shopping expedition “to take home something for the wife, sir, otherwise I'll never hear the last of it”.

“Mrs Colon will like a stuffed camel hump, will she, sergeant?” said the Patrician doubtfully.

“Yessir. She can put things on it, sir.”

“And the set of nested brass tables?”

“To put things on, sir.”

“And the” – there was a clanking – “set of goat bells, ornamental coffee pot, miniature camel saddle and this… strange glass tube with little bands of different coloured sand in it… what are these for?”

“Conversation pieces, sir.”

“You mean people will say things like ‘What are they for?’, do you?”

Sergeant Colon looked pleased with himself.

“See, sir? We're talking about 'em already.”

“Remarkable.”

Sergeant Colon coughed and indicated with a tilt of his head the hunched figure of Leonard, who was sitting in the stern with his head in his hands.

“He's a bit quiet, sir,” he whispered. “Can't seem to get a word out of him.”

“He has a lot on his mind,” said the Patrician.

The watchmen pedalled onwards for a while, but the close confines of the Boat encouraged a confidentiality that would never have been found on land.

“Sorry to hear you're getting the sack, sir,” said Colon.

“Really,” said Lord Vetinari.

“You'd definitely get my vote, if we had elections.”

“Capital.”

“I think people want the thumbscrew of firm government, myself.”

“Good.”

“Your predecessor, Lord Snapcase, now he was mental. But, like I've always said, people know where they stand with Lord Vetinari…”

“Well done.”

“They might not like where they're standing of course…”

Lord Vetinari looked up. They were under a boat now and it seemed to be going in the right direction. He steered the Boat until he heard the thunk of hull hitting hull, and gave the auger a few turns.

“Am I being sacked, sergeant?” he said, sitting back.

“Well, eh, I heard Lord Rust's people say that if you rat… rat…”

“Ratify,” said Lord Vetinari.

“Yeah, if you ratify that surrender next week, they'll get you exiled, sir.”

“A week is a long time in politics, sergeant.”

Colon's face widened in what he thought of as a knowing grin. He tapped the side of his nose.

“Ah, politics,” he said. “Ah, you should've said.”

“Yeah, they'll laugh at the other foot then, eh?” said Nobby.

“Got some secret plan, I'll be bound,” said Colon. “You know where the chicken is all right.”

“I can see there's no fooling such skilled observers of the carnival that is life,” said Lord Vetinari. “Yes, indeed, there is something I intend to do.”