The fog was rising fast. All morning it had hung around in alleys and cellars. Now it was moving back in for the night. It came out of the ground and up from the river and down from the sky, a clinging yellowish stinging blanket, the river Ankh in droplet form. It found its way through cracks and, against all common sense, managed to survive in lighted rooms, filling the air with an eye-watering haze and making the candles crackle. Outdoors, every figure loomed, every shape was a menace . . .
In a drab alley off a drab street Angua stopped, squared her shoulders, and pushed open a door.
The atmosphere in the long, low, dark room altered as she stepped inside. A moment of time rang like a glass bowl, and then there was a sense of relaxation. People turned back in their seats.
Well, they were seated. It was quite likely they were people.
Cheery moved closer to Angua. 'What's this place called?' she whispered.
'It hasn't really got a name,' said Angua, 'but sometimes we call it Biers.'
'It didn't look like an inn outside. How did you find it?'
'You don't. You . . . gravitate to it.'
Cheery looked around nervously. She wasn't sure where they were, apart from somewhere in the cattle-market district, somewhere up a maze of alleys.
Angua walked to the bar.
A deeper shadow appeared out of the gloom. 'Hello, Angua,' it said, in a deep, rolling voice. 'Fruit juice, is it?'
'Yes. Chilled.'
'And what about the dwarf?'
'She'll have him raw,' said a voice somewhere in the gloom. There was a ripple of laughter in the dark. Some of it sounded altogether too strange to Cheery. She couldn't imagine it issuing from normal lips. ‘I’ll have a fruit juice, too,' she quavered.
Angua glanced at the dwarf. She felt oddly grateful that the remark from the darkness seemed to have gone entirely over the small bullet head. She unhooked her badge and with care and deliberation laid it down on the counter. It went perlink. Then Angua leaned forward and showed the iconograph to the barman.
If it was a man. Cheery wasn't sure yet. A sign over the bar said 'Don't you ever change'.
'You know everything that's going on, Igor,' Angua said. Two old men got killed yesterday. And a load of clay got stolen from Igneous the troll recently. Did you ever hear about that?'
'What's that to you?'
'Killing old men is against the law,' said Angua. 'Of course, a lot of things are against the law, so we're very busy in the Watch. We like to be busy about important things. Otherwise we have to be busy about unimportant things. Are you hearing me?'
The shadow considered this. 'Go and take a seat,' it said. 'I'll bring your drinks.'
Angua led the way to a table in an alcove. The clientele lost interest in them. A buzz of conversation resumed.
'What is this place?' Cheery whispered.
'It's ... a place where people can be themselves,' said Angua slowly. 'People who . . . have to be a little careful at other times. You know?'
'No.'
Angua sighed. 'Vampires, zombies, bogeymen, ghouls, oh my. The und—' She corrected herself. 'The differently alive,' she said. 'People who have to spend most of their time being very careful, not frightening people, fitting in. That's how it works here. Fit in, get a job, don't worry people, and you probably won't find a crowd outside with pitchforks and flaming torches. But sometimes it's good to go where everybody knows your shape.'
Now that Cheery's eyes had grown accustomed to the low light she could make out the variety of shapes on the benches. Some of them were a lot bigger than human. Some had pointy ears and long muzzles.
'Who's that girl?' she said. 'She looks . . . normal.'
'That's Violet. She's a tooth fairy. And next to her is Schleppel the bogeyman.'
In the far corner something sat huddled in a huge overcoat under a high, broad-brimmed pointed hat.
'And him?'
'That's old Man Trouble,' said Angua. 'If you know what's good for you, you don't mind him.'
'Er . . . any werewolves here?'
'One or two,' said Angua.
'I hate werewolves.'
'Oh?'
The oddest customer was sitting by herself, at a small round table. She appeared to be a very old lady, in a shawl and a straw hat with flowers in it. She was staring in front of her with an expression of good-natured aimlessness, and in context looked more frightening than any of the shadowy figures.
'What is she?' Cheery hissed.
'Her? Oh, that's Mrs Gammage.'
'And what does she do?'
'Do? Well, she comes in here most days for a drink and some company. Sometimes we ... they have a singsong. Old songs, that she remembers. She's practically blind. If you mean, is she an undead ... no, she isn't. Not a vampire, a werewolf, a zombie or a bogeyman. Just an old lady.'
A huge shambling hairy thing paused at Mrs Gammage's table and put a glass in front of her.
'Port and lemon. There you goes, Mrs Gammage,' it rumbled.
'Cheers, Charlie!' the old lady cackled. 'How's the plumbing business?'
'Doing fine, love,' said the bogeyman, and vanished into the gloom.
' That was a plumber? said Cheery.
'Of course not. I don't know who Charlie was. He probably died years ago. But she thinks the bogeyman is him, and who's going to tell her different?'
'You mean she doesn't know this place is—'
'Look, she's been coming here ever since the old days when it was the Crown and Axe,' said Angua. 'No one wants to spoil things. Everyone likes Mrs Gammage. They . . . watch out for her. Help her out in little ways.'
'How?'
'Well, I heard that last month someone broke into her hovel and stole some of her stuff. . .'
' That doesn't sound helpful.'
'. . . and it was all returned next day and a couple of thieves were found in the Shades with not a drop of blood left in their bodies.' Angua smiled, and her voice took on a mocking edge. 'You know, you get told a lot of bad things about the undead, but you never hear about the marvellous work they do in the community.'
Igor the barman appeared. He looked more or less human, apart from the hair on the back of his hands and the single unbifurcated eyebrow across his forehead. He tossed a couple of mats on the table and put their drinks down.
'You're probably wishing this was a dwarf bar,' said Angua. She lifted her beermat carefully and glanced at the underside.
Cheery looked around again. By now, if it had been a dwarf bar, the floor would be sticky with beer, the air would be full of flying quaff, and people would be singing. They'd probably be singing the latest dwarf tune, Gold, Gold, Gold, or one of the old favourites, like Gold, Gold, Gold, or the all-time biggie, Gold, Gold, Gold. In a few minutes, the first axe would have been thrown.
'No,' she said, 'it could never be that bad.'
'Drink up,' said Angua. 'We've got to go and see . . . something.'
A large hairy hand grabbed Angua's wrist. She looked up into a terrifying face, all eyes and mouth and hair.
'Hello, Shlitzen,' she said calmly.
'Hah, I'm hearing where there's a baron who's really unhappy about you,' said Shlitzen, alcohol crystallizing on his breath.
'That's my business, Shlitzen,' said Angua. 'Why don't you just go back behind your door like the good bogeyman that you are?'
'Hah, he's sayin' where you're disgracin' the Old Country—'
'Let go, please,' said Angua. Her skin was white where Shlitzen was gripping her.
Cheery looked from the wrist to the bogeyman's shoulder. Rangy though the creature was, muscles were strung along the arm like beads on a wire.
'Hah, you wearin' a badge,' it sneered. 'What's a good we—?'
Angua moved so fast she was a blur. Her free hand pulled something from her belt and nipped it up and on to Shlitzen's head. He stopped, and stood swaying back and forth gently, making faint moaning sounds. On his head, flopping down around his ears like the knotted hanky of a style-impaired seaside sunbather, was a small square of heavy material.
Angua pushed back her chair and grabbed the beermat. The shadowy figures around the walls were muttering.
'Let's get out of here,' she said. 'Igor, give us half a minute and then you can take the blanket off him. Come on.'
They hurried out. The fog had already turned the sun into a mere suggestion, but it was vivid daylight compared to the gloom in Biers.
'What happened to him?' said Cheery, running to keep up with Angua's stride.
'Existential uncertainty,' Angua said. 'He doesn't know whether he exists or not. It's cruel, I know, but it's the only thing we've found that works against bogeymen. Blue fluffy blanket, for preference. ' She noted Cheery's blank expression. 'Look, bogeymen go away if you put your head under the blankets. Everyone knows that, don't they? So if you put their head under a blanket . . .'
'Oh, I see. Ooo, that's nasty.'
'He'll feel all right in ten minutes.' Angua skimmed the beermat across the alley.
'What was he saying about a baron?'
'I wasn't really listening,' said Angua carefully.
Cheery shivered in the fog, but not just from the cold. 'He sounded like he came from Uberwald, like us. There was a baron who lived near us and he hated people to leave.'
'Yes
'The whole family were werewolves. One of them ate my second cousin.'
Angua's memory spun in a hurry. Old meals came back to haunt her from the time before she'd said, no, this is not the way to live. A dwarf, a dwarf. . . No, she was pretty sure she'd never . . . The family had always made fun of her eating habits . . .
'That's why I can't stand them,' said Cheery. 'Oh, people say they can be tamed but I say, once a wolf, always a wolf. You can't trust them. They're basically evil, aren't they? They could go back to the wild at any moment, I say.'
'Yes. You may be right.'
'And the worst thing is, most of the time they walk around looking just like real people.'
Angua blinked, glad of the twin disguises of the fog and Cheery's unquestioning confidence. 'Come on. We're nearly there.'
'Where?'
'We're going to see someone who's either our murderer or who knows who the murderer is.'
Cheery stopped. 'But you've got only a sword and I haven't even got that!'
'Don't worry, we won't need weapons.'
'Oh, good.'
'They wouldn't be any use.'
'Oh.'

 
Vimes opened his door to see what all the shouting was about down in the office. The corporal manning - or in this case dwarfing - the desk was having trouble.
'Again? How many times have you been killed this week?'
'I was minding my own business!' said the unseen complainer.
'Stacking garlic? You're a vampire, aren't you? I mean, let's see what jobs you have been doing . . . Post sharpener for a fencing firm, sunglasses tester for Argus opticians ... Is it me, or is there some underlying trend here?'
'Excuse me, Commander Vimes?'
Vimes looked round into a smiling face that sought only to do good in the world, even if the world had other things it wanted done.
'Ah . . . Constable Visit, yes,' he said hurriedly. 'At the moment I'm afraid I'm rather busy, and I'm not even sure that I have got an immortal soul, haha, and perhaps you could call again when ..."
'It's about those words you asked me to check,' said Visit reproachfully.
'What words?'
'The ones Father Tubelcek wrote in his own blood? You said to try and find out what they meant?'
'Oh. Yes. Come on into my office.' Vimes relaxed. This wasn't going to be another one of those painful conversations about the state of his soul and the necessity of giving it a wash and brush-up before eternal damnation set in. This was going to be about something important.
'It's ancient Cenotine, sir. It's out of one of their holy books, although of course when I say "holy" it is a fact that they were basically misguided in a . . .'
'Yes, yes, I'm sure,' said Vimes, sitting down. 'Does it by any chance say "Mr X did it, aargh, aargh, aargh"?'
'No, sir. That phrase does not appear anywhere in any known holy book, sir. *
'Ah,'said Vimes.
'Besides, I looked at other documents in the room and the paper does not appear to be in the deceased's handwriting, sir.'
Vimes brightened up. 'Ah-ha! Someone else's? Does it say something like "Take that, you bastard, we've been waiting ages to get you for what you did all those years ago"?'
'No, sir. That phrase also does not appear in any holy book anywhere,' said Constable Visit, and hesitated. 'Except in the Apocrypha to The Vengeful Testament of Offter,' he added conscientiously. ' These words are from the Cenotine Book of Truth,' he sniffed, 'as they called it. It's what their false god . . .'
'Could I just perhaps have the words and leave out the comparative religion?' said Vimes.
'Very well, sir.' Visit looked hurt, but unfolded a piece of paper and sniffed disparagingly. These are some of the rules that their god allegedly gave to the first people after he'd baked them out of clay, sir. Rules like "Thou shall labour fruitfully all the days of your life", sir, and "Thou shalt not kill", and "Thou shalt be humble". That sort of thing.'
'Is that all?' said Vimes.
'Yes, sir,' said Visit.
'They're just religious quotations?'
'Yes, sir.'
'Any idea why it was in his mouth? Poor devil looked like he was having a last cigarette.'
'No, sir.'
'I could understand if it was one of the "smite your enemies" ones,' said Vimes. 'But that's just saying "get on with your work and don't make trouble".'
'Ceno was a rather liberal god, sir. Not big on commandments.'
'Sounds almost decent, as gods go.'
Visit looked disapproving. The Cenotines died through five hundred years of waging some of the bloodiest wars on the continent, sir.'
'Spare the thunderbolts and spoil the congregation, eh?' said Vimes.
'Pardon, sir?'
'Oh, nothing. Well thank you, Constable. I'll, er, see that Captain Carrot is informed and, thank you once again, don't let me keep you from—'
Vimes's desperately accelerating voice was too late to prevent Visit pulling a roll of paper out of his breastplate.
‘I’ve brought you the latest Unadorned Facts magazine, sir, and also this month's Battle Call, which contains many articles that I'm sure will be of interest to you, including Pastor Nasal Pedlers' exhortation to the congregation to rise up and speak to people sincerely through their letterboxes, sir.'
'Er, thank you.'
'I can't help noticing that the pamphlets and magazines I gave you last week are still on your desk where I left them, sir.'
'Oh, yes, well, sorry, you know how it is, the amount of work these days, makes it so hard to find the time to—'
'It's never too soon to contemplate eternal damnation, sir.'
'I think about it all the time, Constable. Thank you.'
Unfair, thought Vimes, when Visit had gone. A note is left at the scene of a crime in my town and does it have the decency to be a death-threat? No.
The last dying scrawl of a man determined to name his murderer? No. It's a bit of religious doggerel. What's the good of Clues that are more mysterious than the mystery?
He scribbled a note on Visit's translation and chucked it into his In Tray.

 
Too late, Angua remembered why she avoided the slaughterhouse district at this time of the month.
She could change at will at any time. That's what people forgot about werewolves. But they remembered the important thing. Full moonlight was the irresistible trigger: the lunar rays reached down into the centre of her morphic memory and flipped all the switches, whether she wanted them switched or not. Full moon was only a couple of days away. And the delicious smell of the penned animals and the blood from the slaughterhouses was chiming against her strict vegetarianism. The clash was bringing on her PLT.
She glared at the shadowy building in front of her. 'I think we'll go round the back,' she said. 'And you can knock.'
'Me? They won't take any notice of me!' said Cheery.
'You show them your badge and tell them you're the Watch.'
They'll ignore me! They'll laugh at me!'
'You're going to have to do it sooner or later. Go on.'
The door was opened by a stout man in a bloody apron. He was shocked to have his belt grabbed by one dwarf hand, while another dwarf hand was thrust in front of his face, holding a badge, and a dwarf voice in the region of his navel said, 'We're the Watch, right? Oh, yes! And if you don't let us in we'll have your guts for starters!'
'Good try,' murmured Angua. She lifted Cheery out of the way and smiled brightly at the butcher.
'Mr Sock? We'd like to speak to an employee of yours. Mr Dorfl.'
The man hadn't quite got over Cheery, but he managed to rally. 'Mr Dorfl? What's he done now?'
'We'd just like to talk to him. May we come in?'
Mr Sock looked at Cheery, who was trembling with nerves and excitement. 'I have a choice?' he said.
'Let's say - you have a kind of choice,' said Angua.
She tried to close her nostrils against the beguiling miasma of blood. There was even a sausage factory on the premises. It used all the bits of animals no one would ever otherwise eat, or even recognize. The odours of the abattoir turned her human stomach but, deep inside, part of her sat up and drooled and begged at the mingling smells of pork and beef and lamb and mutton and . . .
'Rat?' she said, sniffing. 'I didn't know you supplied the dwarf market, Mr Sock.'
Mr Sock was suddenly a man who wished to be seen to be cooperative.
'Dorfl! Come here right now!'
There was the sound of footsteps and a figure emerged from behind a rack of beef carcases.
Some people had a thing about the undead. Angua knew Commander Vimes was uneasy in their presence, although he was getting better these days. People always needed someone to feel superior to. The living hated the undead, and the undead loathed – she felt her fists clench – the unalive.
The golem called Dorfl lurched a little because one leg was slightly shorter than the other. It didn't wear any clothes because there was nothing whatsoever to conceal, and so she could see the mottling on it where fresh clay had been added over the years. There was so much patching that she wondered how old it could be. Originally, some attempt had been made to depict human musculature, but the repairs had nearly obscured these. The thing looked like the kind of pots Igneous despised, the ones made by people who thought that because it was hand-made it was supposed to look as if it was hand-made, and that thumbprints baked in the clay were a sign of integrity.
That was it. The thing looked hand-made. Of course, over the years it had mostly made itself, one repair at a time. Its triangular eyes glowed faintly. There were no pupils, just the dark red glow of a banked fire.
It was holding a long, heavy cleaver. Cheery's stare gravitated to this and remained fixed on it in terrified fascination. The other hand grasped a piece of string, on the end of which was a large, hairy and very smelly goat.
'What are you doing, Dorfl?'
The golem nodded towards the goat.
'Feeding the yudasgoat?'
Dorfl nodded again.
'Have you got something to do, Mr Sock?' said Angua.
'No, I've
'You have got something to do, Mr Sock,' said Angua emphatically.
'Ah. Er? Yes. Er? Yes. Okay. I'll just go and see to the offal boilers . . .'
As the butcher walked away he stopped to wave a finger under the place where Dorfl's nose would be if the golem had had a nose.
Tf you've been causing trouble . . .' he began.
'I expect those boilers could really do with attention,' said Angua sharply.
He hurried off.
There was silence in the yard, although the sounds of the city drifted in over the walls. From the other side of the slaughterhouse there was the occasional bleat of a worried sheep. Dorfl stood stock-still, holding his cleaver and looking down at the ground.
'Is it a troll made to look like a human?' whispered Cheery. 'Look at those eyesl'
'It's not a troll,' said Angua. 'It's a golem. A man of clay. It's a machine.'
'It looks like a human!'
'That's because it's a machine made for looking like a human.'
She walked around behind the thing. 'I'm going to read your chem, Dorfl,' she said.
The golem let go of the goat and raised the cleaver and brought it down sharply on to a chopping block beside Cheery, making the dwarf leap sideways. Then it pulled around a slate that was slung over its shoulder on a piece of string, unhooked the pencil, and wrote:
YES.
When Angua put her hand up, Cheery realized that there was a thin line across the golem's forehead. To her horror, the entire top of the head flipped up. Angua, quite unperturbed, reached inside. Her hand came out holding a yellowing scroll.
The golem froze. The eyes faded.
Angua unrolled the paper. 'Some kind of holy writing,' she said. 'It always is. Some old dead religion.'
'You've killed it?'
'No. You can't take away what isn't there.' She put the scroll back and closed the head with a click.
The golem came alive again, the glow returning to its eyes.
Cheery had been holding her breath. It came out in a rush. 'What did you do?' she managed.
'Tell her, Dorfl,' said Angua.
The golem's thick fingers were a blur as the pencil scratched across the slate.
I AM A GOLEM. I WAS MADEW OF CLAY. MY LIFE IS IN THE WORDS. BY MEANS OF WORDS OF PURPOSE IN MY HEAD I ACQUIRE LIFE. MY LIFE IS TO WORK. I OBEY ALL COMMANDS. I TAKE NO REST.
'What words of purpose?'
RELEVANT TEXTS THAT ME THE FOCUS OF BELIEF. GOLEM MUST WORK. GOLEM MUST HAVE A MASTER.
The goat lay down beside the golem and started to chew cud.
'There have been two murders, ' said Angua. 'I'm pretty certain a golem did one and probably both. Can you tell us anything, Dorfl?'
'Sorry, look,' said Cheery. 'Are you telling me this . . . thing is powered by words? I mean ... is it telling me it's powered by words?'
'Why not? Words do have power. Everyone knows that,' said Angua. There are more golems around than you might think. They're out of fashion now, but they last. They can work underwater, or in total darkness, or knee-deep in poison. For years. They don't need rest or feeding. They...'
'But that's slavery!' said Cheery.
'Of course it isn't. You might as well enslave a doorknob. Have you got anything to tell me, Dorfl?'
Cheery kept looking at the cleaver in the block. Words like length and heavy and sharp were filling her head more snugly than any words could have filled the clay skull of the golem.
Dorfl said nothing.
'How long have you been working here, Dorfl?'
NOW THREE HUNDRED DAYS ALREADY.
'And you have time off?'
TO MAKE A HOLLOW LAUGHING. WHAT WOULD I DO WITH TIME OFF?
'I mean, you're not always in the slaughterhouse?'
SOMETIMES I MAKE DELIVERIES.
'And meet other golems? Now listen, Dorfl, I know you things keep in touch somehow. And, if a golem is killing real people, I wouldn't give a busted teacup for your chances. Folk will be along here straight away with flaming torches. And sledgehammers. You get my drift?'
The golem shrugged.
THEY CANNOT TAKE AWAY DOES NOT EXIST, it wrote.
Angua threw up her hands. ‘I’m trying to be civilized,' she said. 'I could confiscate you right now. The charge would be Being Obstructive When It's Been a Long Day and I've Had Enough. Do you know Father Tubelcek?'
THE OLD PRIEST WHO LIVES ON THE BRIDGE.
'How come you know him?'
I MADE DELIVERIES THERE.
'He's been murdered. Where were you when he was killed?'
IN THE SLAUGTERHOUSE.
'How do you know?'
Dorfl hesitated a moment. Then the next words were written very slowly, as if they had come from a long way away after a great deal of thought.
BECAUSE IT IS SOMETHING THAT MUST HAVE HAPPENED NOT LONG AGO, BECAUSE YOU ARE EXCITED.FOR THE LAST THEREE DAYS I HAVE BEEN WORKING HERE.
'All the time?'
YES.
'Twenty-four hours a day?'
YES. MEN AND TROLLS HERE ON EVERY SHIFT, THEY WILL TELL YOU. DURING THE DAY I MUST SLAUGHTER, DRESS, QUARTER, JOINT AND BONE, AND AT NIGHT WITHOUT REST I MUST MAKE SAUSAGES AND BOIL UP THE LIVERS, HEARTS, TRIPES, KIDNEYS AND CAITTERLINGS.
That's awful,' said Cheery.
The pencil blurred briefly.
CLOSE.
Dorfl turned his head slowly to look at Angua and wrote:
DO YOU NEED ME FURTHER?
'If we do, we know where to find you.'
I AM SORRY ABOUT THE OLD MAN.
'Good. Come on, Cheery.'
They felt the golem's eyes on them as they left the yard.
'It was lying,' said Cheery.
'Why do you say that?'
'It looked as if it was lying.'
'You're probably right,' said Angua. 'But you can see the size of the place. I bet we wouldn't be able to prove it'd stepped out for half an hour. I think I'll suggest that we put it under what Commander Vimes calls special surveillance.'
'What, like . . . plain clothes?'
'Something like that,' said Angua carefully.
'Funny to see a pet goat in a slaughterhouse, I thought,' said Cheery, as they walked on through the fog.
'What? Oh, you mean the yudasgoat,' said Angua. 'Most slaughterhouses have one. It's not a pet. I suppose you could call it an employee.'
'Employee? What kind of job could it possibly do?'
'Hah. Walk into the slaughterhouse every day. That's its job. Look, you've got a pen full of frightened animals, right? And they're milling around and leaderless . . . and there's this ramp into this building, looks very scary . . . and, hey, there's this goat, it's not scared, and so the flock follows it and' - Angua made a throat-slitting noise - 'only the goat walks out.'
'That's horrible!'
'I suppose it makes sense from the goat's point of view. At least it does walk out,' said Angua.
'How did you know about this?'
'Oh, you pick up all sorts of odds and ends of stuff in the Watch.'
'I've got a lot to learn, I can see,' said Cheery. 'I never thought you had to carry bits of blanket, for a start!'
'It's special equipment if you're dealing with the undead.'
'Well, I knew about garlic and vampires. Anything holy works on vampires. What else works on werewolves?'
'Sorry?' said Angua, who was still thinking about the golem.
'I've got a silver mail vest which I promised my family I'd wear, but is anything else good for werewolves?'
'A gin and tonic's always welcome,' said Angua distantly.
'Angua?'
'Hmm? Yes? What?'
'Someone told me there was a werewolf in the Watchl I can't believe that!'
Angua stopped and stared down at her.
'I mean, sooner or later the wolf comes through,' said Cheery. 'I'm surprised Commander Vimes allows it.'
'There is a werewolf in the Watch, yes,' said Angua.
^'I knew there was something odd about Constable Visit.'
Angua's jaw dropped.
'He always looks hungry,' said Cheery. 'And he's got that odd smile all the time. I know a werewolf when I see one.'
'He does look a bit hungry, that's true,' said Angua. She couldn't think of anything else to say.
'Well, I'm going to be keeping my distance!'
'Fine,' said Angua.
'Angua . . .'
'Yes?'
'Why do you wear your badge on a collar round your neck?'
'What? Oh. Well... so it's always handy. You know. In any circumstances.'
'Do I need to do that?'
'I shouldn't think so.'

 
Mr Sock jumped. 'Dorfl, you damn stupid lump! Never sneak up behind a man on the bacon slicer! I've told you that before! Try to make some noise when you move, damn you!' The golem held up its slate, which said:
TONIGHT I CANNOT WORK.
'What's this? The bacon slicer never asks for time off!'
IT IS A HOLY DAY.
Sock looked at the red eyes. Old Fishbine had said something about this, hadn't he, when he'd sold Dorfl? Something like: 'Sometimes it'll go off for a few hours because it's a holy day. It's the words in its head. If it doesn't go and trot off to its temple or whatever it is, the words'll stop working, don't ask me why. There's no point in stopping it.'
Five hundred and thirty dollars the thing had cost. He'd thought it was a bargain - and it was a bargain, no doubt about that. The damned thing only ever stopped working when it had run out of things to do. Sometimes not even then, according to the stories. You heard about golems flooding out houses because no one told them to stop carrying water from the well, or washing the dishes until the plates were thin as paper. Stupid things. But useful if you kept your eye on them.
And yet... and yet... he could see why no one seemed to keep them for long. It was the way the damned two-handed engine just stood there, taking it all in and putting it ... where? And never complained. Or spoke at all.
A man could get worried about a bargain like that, and feel mightily relieved when he was writing out a receipt for the new owner.
'Seems to me there's been a lot of holy days lately,' Sock said.
SOME TIMES ARE MORE HOLY THAN OTHERS.
But they couldn't skive off, could they? Work was what a golem did.
'I don't know how we're going to manage . . .' Sock began.
IT IS A HOLY DAY.
'Oh, all right. You can have time off tomorrow.'
TONIGHT. HOLY DAY STARTS AT SUNSET.
'Be back quickly, then,' said Sock, weakly. 'Or I'll— You be back quickly, d'you hear?'
That was another thing. You couldn't threaten the creatures. You certainly couldn't withhold their pay, because they didn't get any. You couldn't frighten them. Fishbine had said that a weaver over Nap Hill way had ordered his golem to smash itself to bits with a hammer - and it had.
YES. I HEAR.

 
In a way, it didn't matter who they were. In fact, their anonymity was part of the whole business. They thought themselves part of the march of history, the tide of progress and the wave of the future. They were men who felt that The Time Had Come. Regimes can survive barbarian hordes, crazed terrorists and hooded secret societies, but they're in real trouble when prosperous and anonymous men sit around a big table and think thoughts like that. One said, 'At least it's clean this way. No blood.' 'And it would be for the good of the city, of course.'
They nodded gravely. No one needed to say that what was good for them was good for Ankh-Morpork.
'And he won't die?'
'Apparently he can be kept merely ... unwell. The dosage can be varied, I'm told.'
'Good. I'd rather have him unwell than dead. I wouldn't trust Vetinari to stay in a grave.'
'I've heard that he once said he'd prefer to be cremated, as a matter of fact.'
'Then I just hope they scatter the ashes really widely, that's all.'
'What about the Watch?'
'What about it?'
^'Ah.'

 
Lord Vetinari opened his eyes. Against all rationality, his hair ached.
He concentrated, and a blur by the bed focused into the shape of Samuel Vimes.
'Ah, Vimes,' he said weakly.
'How are you feeling, sir?'
'Truly dreadful. Who was that little man with the incredibly bandy legs?'
'That was Doughnut Jimmy, sir. He used to be a jockey on a very fat horse.'
'A racehorse?'
'Apparently, sir '
'A fat racehorse? Surely that could never win a race?'
'I don't believe it ever did, sir. But Jimmy made a lot of money by not winning races.'
'Ah. He gave me milk and some sort of sticky potion.' Vetinari concentrated. 'I was heartily sick.'
'So I understand, sir.'
'Funny phrase, that. Heartily sick. I wonder why it's a cliche? Sounds . . . jolly. Rather cheerful, really.'
'Yes, sir.'
'Feel like I've got a bad dose of 'flu, Vimes. Head not working properly.'
'Really, sir?'
The Patrician thought for a while. There was obviously something else on his mind. 'Why did he still smell of horses, Vimes?' he said at last.
'He's a horse doctor, sir. A damn good one. I heard last month he treated Dire Fortune and it didn't fall over until the last furlong.'
'Doesn't sound helpful, Vimes.'
'Oh, I don't know, sir. The horse had dropped dead coming up to the starting line.'
'Ah. I see. Well, well, well. What a nasty suspicious mind you have, Vimes.'
'Thank you, sir.'
The Patrician raised himself on his elbows. 'Should toenails throb, Vimes?'
'Couldn't say, sir.'
*Now, I think I should like to read for a while. Life goes on, eh?'
Vimes went to the window. There was a nightmarish figure crouched on the edge of the balcony outside, staring into the thickening fog.
'Everything all right, Constable Downspout?'
'Eff, fir,' said the apparition.
‘I’ll shut the window now. The fog is coming in.'
'Fight oo are, fir.'
Vimes closed the window, trapping a few tendrils which gradually faded away. 'What was that?' said Lord Vetinari. 'Constable Downspout's a gargoyle, sir. He's no good on parade and bloody useless on the street, but when it conies to staying in one place, sir, you can't beat him. He's world champion at not moving. If you want the winner of the 100 Metres Standing Still, that's him. He spent three days on a roof in the rain when we caught the Park Lane Knobbler. Nothing'll get past him. And there's Corporal Gimletsson patrolling the corridor and Constable Glodsnephew on the floor below and Constables Flint and Moraine in the rooms on either side of you, and Sergeant Detritus will be around constantly so that if anyone nods off he'll kick arse, sir, and you'll know when he does that 'cos the poor bugger'll come right through the wall.'
'Well done, Vimes. Am I right in thinking that all my guards are non-human? They all seem to be dwarfs and trolls.' 'Safest way, sir.'
'You've thought of everything, Vimes.' 'Hope so, sir.'
'Thank you, Vimes.' Vetinari sat up and took a mass of papers off the bedside table. 'And now, don't let me detain you.' Vimes's mouth dropped open. Vetinari looked up. 'Was there anything else, Commander?'
'Well ... I suppose not, sir. I suppose I'd just better run along, eh?'
'If you wouldn't mind. And I'm sure a lot of paperwork has accumulated in my office, so if you'd send someone to fetch it, I would be obliged.'
Vimes shut the door behind him, a little harder than necessary. Gods, it made him livid, the way Vetinari turned him on and off like a switch - and had as much natural gratitude as an alligator. The Patrician relied on Vimes doing his job, knew he'd do his job, and that was the extent of his thought on the matter. Well, one day, Vimes would . . . would . . .
. . . would bloody well do his job, of course, because he didn't know how to do anything else. But realizing that made it all the worse.
Outside the palace the fog was thick and yellow. Vimes nodded to the guards on the door, and looked out at the clinging, swirling clouds.
It was almost a straight line to the Watch House in Pseudopolis Yard. And the fog had brought early night to the city. Not many people were on the streets; they stayed indoors, barring the windows against the damp shreds that seemed to leak in everywhere.
Yes . . . empty streets, a chilly night, dampness in the air ...
Only one thing was needed to make it perfect. He sent the sedan men on home and walked back to one of the guards. 'You're Constable Lucker, aren't you?'
'Yessir, Sir Samuel.'
'What size boots do you take?'
Lucker looked panicky.'What, sir?'
'It's a simple question, man!'
'Seven and a halfs, sir.'
'From old Plugger in New Cobblers? The cheap ones?'
'Yessir!'
'Can't have a man guarding the palace in cardboard boots!' said Vimes, with mock cheerfulness. 'Off with them, Constable. You can have mine. They've still got wyvern - well, whatever it is wyverns do - on them, but they'll fit you. Don't stand there with your mouth open. Give me your boots, man. You can keep mine.' Vimes added: 'I've got lots.'
The constable watched in frightened astonishment as Vimes pulled on the cheap pair and stood upright, stamping a few times with his eyes shut. 'Ah,' he said. 'I'm in front of the palace, right?'
'Er ... yes, sir. You've just come out of it, sir. It's this big building here.'
'Ah,' said Vimes brightly, 'but I'd know I was here, even if I hadn't!'
'Er . . .'
'It's the flagstones,' said Vimes. 'They're an unusual size and slightly dished in the middle. Hadn't you noticed? Your feet, lad! That's what you'll have to learn to think with!'
The bemused constable watched him disappear into the fog, stamping happily.

 
Corporal the Right Honourable the Earl of Ankh Nobby Nobbs pushed open the Watch-House door and staggered inside.
Sergeant Colon looked up from the desk, and gasped. 'You okay, Nobby?' he said, hurrying around to support the swaying figure. 'It's terrible, Fred. Terrible!' 'Here, take a seat. You're all pale.'
'I've been elevated, Fred!' moaned Nobby.
'Nasty! Did you see who did it?'
Nobby wordlessly handed him the scroll Dragon King of Arms had pressed into his hand, and flopped back. He took a tiny length of home-made cigarette from behind his ear and lit it with a shaking hand. 'I dunno, I'm sure,' he said. 'You do your best, you keep your head down, you don't make any trouble, and then something like this happens to you.'
Colon read the scroll slowly, his lips moving when he came to difficult words like 'and' and 'the'. 'Nobby, you've read this? It says you're a lord!'
'The old man said they'd have to do a lot of checking up but he thought it was pretty clear what with the ring and all. Fred, what am I gonna do?'
'Sit back and eat off ermine plates, I should think!'
That's just it, Fred. There's no money. No big house. No land. Not a brass farthing!'
'What, nothing?'
'Not a dried pea, Fred.'
'I thought all the upper crust had pots of money.'
'Well, I'm the crust on its uppers, Fred. I don't know anything about lording! I don't want to have to wear posh clothes and go to hunt balls and all that stuff.'
Sergeant Colon sat down beside him. 'You never suspected you'd got any posh connections?'
'Well . . . my cousin Vincent once got done for indecently assaulting the Duchess of Quirm's housemaid . . .'
'Chambermaid or scullery maid?'
'Scullery maid, I think.'
'Probably doesn't count, then. Does anyone else know about this?'
'Well, she did, and she went and told . . . '
'I mean about your lordshipping. '
'Only Mr Vimes.'
'Well, there you are,' said Sergeant Colon, handing him back the scroll. 'You don't have to tell anyone. Then you don't have to go around wearing golden trousers, and you needn't hunt balls unless you've lost 'em. You just sit there, and I'll fetch you a cup of tea, how about that? We'll see it through, don't you worry. '
'You're a toff, Fred.'
'That makes two of us, m'lord!' Colon waggled his eyebrows. 'Get it? Get it?'
'Don't, Fred,' said Nobby wearily.
The Watch-House door opened.
Fog poured in like smoke. In the midst of it were two red eyes. The parting shreds revealed the massive figure of a golem.
'Umpk,' said Sergeant Colon.
The golem held up its slate:
I HAVE COME TO YOU.
'Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I've, er, yeah, I can see that,' said Colon.
Dorfl turned the slate around. The other side read:
I GIVE MYSELF UP FOR MURDER. IT WAS I WHO KILLED THE OLD PRIEST. THE CASE IS SOLVED.
Colon, once his lips had stopped moving, scurried behind the suddenly very flimsy defences of his desk and scrabbled through the papers there.
'You keep it covered, Nobby,' he said, 'Make sure it don't run off.'
'Why's it going to run off?' said Nobby.
Sergeant Colon found a relatively clean piece of paper.
'Well, well, well, I, well, I guess I'd better . . . What's your name?'
The golem wrote:
DORFL.

 
By the time he was on the Brass Bridge (medium-sized cobbles of the rounded sort they called 'cat heads', quite a few missing) Vimes was already beginning to wonder if he'd done the right thing.
Autumn fogs were always thick, but he'd never known it this bad. The pall muffled the sounds of the city and turned the brightest lights into dim glows, even though in theory the sun hadn't set yet.
He walked along by the parapet. A squat, glistening shape loomed in the fog. It was one of the wooden hippos, some distant ancestor of Roderick or Keith. There were four on either side, all looking out towards the sea.
Vimes had walked past them thousands of times. They were old friends. He'd often stood in the lee of one on chilly nights, when he was looking for somewhere out of trouble.
That's what it used to be like, wasn't it? It hardly seemed that long ago. Just a handful of them in the Watch, staying out of trouble. And then Carrot had arrived, and suddenly the narrow circuit of their lives had opened up, and there were nearly thirty men (oh, including trolls and dwarfs and miscellaneous) in the Watch now, and they didn't skulk around keeping out of trouble, they went looking for trouble, and they found it everywhere they looked. Funny, that. As Vetinari had pointed out in that way of his, the more policemen you had, the more crimes seemed to be committed. But the Watch was back and out there on the streets, and if they weren't actually as good as Detritus at kicking arse they were definitely prodding buttock.
He lit a match on a hippo's toenail and cupped his hand around it to shield his cigar from the damp.
These murders, now. No one would care if the Watch didn't care. Two old men, murdered on the same day. Nothing stolen . . . He corrected himself: nothing apparently stolen. Of course, the thing about things that were stolen was that the bloody things weren't there. They almost certainly hadn't been fooling around with other people's wives. They probably couldn't remember what fooling around was. One spent his time among old religious books; the other, for gods' sakes, was an authority on the aggressive uses of baking.
People would probably say they had lived blameless lives.
But Vimes was a policeman. No one lived a completely blameless life. It might be just possible, by lying very still in a cellar somewhere, to get through a day without committing a crime. But only just. And, even then, you were probably guilty of loitering.
Anyway, Angua seemed to have taken this case personally. She always had a soft spot for the underdog.
So did Vimes. You had to. Not because they were pure or noble, because they weren't. You had to be on the side of underdogs because they weren't overdogs.
Everyone in this city looked after themselves. That's what the guilds were for. People banded together against other people. The guild looked after you from the cradle to the grave or, in the case of the Assassins, to other people's graves. They even maintained the law, or at least they had done, after a fashion. Thieving without a licence was punishable by death for the first offence.[11] The Thieves' Guild saw to that. The arrangement sounded unreal, but it worked.
It worked like a machine. That was fine except for the occasional people who got crushed in the wheels.
The damp cobbles felt reassuringly real under his soles.
Gods, he'd missed this. He'd patrolled alone in the old days. When there was just him, and the stones glistened around 3am, it all seemed to make sense somehow—
He stopped.
Around him, the world became a crystal of horror, the special horror that has nothing to do with fangs or ichor or ghosts but has everything to do with the familiar becoming unfamiliar.
Something fundamental was wrong.
It took a few dreadful seconds for his mind to supply the details of what his subconscious had noticed. There had been five statues along the parapet on this side.
But there should have been four.
He turned very slowly and walked back to the last one. It was a hippo, all right.
So was the next one. There was graffiti on it. Nothing supernatural had 'Zaz Ys A Wonker' scrawled on it.
It seemed to him that it didn't take quite so long to get to the next one, and when he looked at it ...
Two red points of light flared in the fog above him.
Something big and dark leapt down, knocked him to the ground and disappeared into the gloom.
Vimes struggled to his feet, shook his head and set off after it. No thought was involved. It is the ancient instinct of terriers and policemen to chase anything that runs away.
As he ran he felt automatically for his bell, which would summon other Watchmen, but the Commander of the Watch didn't carry a bell. Commanders of the Watch were on their own.

 
In Vimes's squalid office Captain Carrot stared at a piece of paper:

 
Repairs to Guttering, Watch House, Pseudopolis Yard. New downpipe, 35° Micklewhite bend, four right-angled trusses, labour and making good. $16.35p.

 
There were more like them, including Constable Downspout's pigeon bill. He knew Sergeant Colon objected to the idea of a policeman being paid in pigeons, but Constable Downspout was a gargoyle and gargoyles had no concept of money. But they knew a pigeon when they ate it.
Still, things were improving. When Carrot had arrived the entire Watch's petty cash had been kept on a shelf in a tin marked 'Stronginthearm's Armour Polish for Gleaming Cohorts' and, if money was needed for anything, all you had had to do was go and find Nobby and force him to give it back.
Then there was the letter from a resident in Park Lane, one of the most select addresses in the city:

 
Commander Vimes,
The Night Watch patrol in this street appears to be made up entirely of dwarfs. I have nothing against dwarfs amongst their own kind, at least they are not trolls, but one hears stories and I have daughters in the house. I demand that this situation is remedied instantly otherwise I shall have no option but to take up the matter with Lord Vetinari, who is a personal friend.
I am, sir, your obt. servant,
Joshua H. Catterail

 
This was police work, was it? He wondered if Mr Vimes were trying to tell him something. There were other letters. The Community Co-ordinator of Equal Heights for Dwarfs was demanding that dwarfs in the Watch be allowed to carry an axe rather than the traditional sword, and should be sent to investigate only those crimes committed by tall people. The Thieves' Guild was complaining that Commander Vimes had said publicly that most thefts were committed by thieves.
You'd need the wisdom of King Isiahdanu to tackle them, and these were only today's letters.
He picked up the next one and read: 'Translation of text found in Fr. Tubelcek's mouth. Why? SV.'
Carrot dutifully read the translation.
'In his mouth? Someone tried to put words in his mouth?' said Carrot, to the silent room.
He shivered, but not because of the cold that came from fear. Vimes's office was always cold. Vimes was an outdoors person. Fog was dancing in the open window, little fingers of it drifting in the light.
The next paper down the heap was a copy of Cheery's iconograph. Carrot stared at the two blurred red eyes.
'Captain Carrot?'
He half-turned his head, but kept looking at the picture. 'Yes, Fred?'
'We've got the murderer! We've got 'im!'
'Is he a golem?'
'How did you know that?'

 
The tincture of night began to suffuse the soup of the afternoon.
Lord Vetinari considered the sentence, and found it good. He liked 'tincture' particularly. Tincture. Tincture. It was a distinguished word, and pleasantly countered by the flatness of 'soup'. The soup of the afternoon. Yes. In which may well be found the croutons of teatime.
He was aware that he was a little light-headed. He'd never have thought a sentence like that in a normal frame of mind.
In the fog outside the window, just visible by the candlelight, he saw the crouching shape of Constable Downspout.
A gargoyle, eh? He'd wondered why the Watch was indented for five pigeons a week on its wages bill. A gargoyle in the Watch, whose job it was to watch. That would be Captain Carrot's idea.
Lord Vetinari got up carefully from the bed and closed the shutters. He walked slowly to his writing table, pulled his journal out of its drawer, then tugged out a wad of manuscript and unstoppered the ink bottle.
Now then, where had he got to?
Chapter Eight, he read unsteadily, The Rites of Man.
Ah, yes . . .
'Concerning Truth,' he wrote, 'that which May be Spoken as Events Dictate, but should be Heard on Every Ocasfion . . .'
He wondered how he could work 'soup of the afternoon' into the treatise, or at least 'tincture of night'.
The pen scratched across the paper.
Unheeded on the floor lay the tray that had contained a bowl of nourishing gruel, concerning which he had resolved to have strong words with the cook when he felt better. It had been tasted by three tasters, including Sergeant Detritus, who was unlikely to be poisoned by anything that worked on humans or even by most things that worked on trolls . . . but probably by most things that worked on trolls.
The door was locked. Occasionally he could hear the reassuring creak of Detritus on his rounds. Outside the window, the fog condensed on Constable Downspout.
Vetinari dipped the pen in the ink and started a new page. Every so often he consulted the leather-bound journal, licking his fingers delicately to turn the thin pages.
Tendrils of fog slipped in around the shutters and brushed against the wall until they were frightened away by the candlelight.

 
Vimes pounded through the fog after the fleeing figure. It wasn't quite so fast as him, despite the twinges in his legs and one or two warning stabs from his left knee, but whenever he came close to it some muffled pedestrian got in the way, or a cart pulled out of a cross-street.[12]
His soles told him that they'd gone right down Broad Way and had turned left into Nonesuch Street (small square paving stones). The fog was even thicker here, trapped between the trees of the park.
But Vimes was triumphant. You've missed your turning if you're heading for the Shades, my lad! There's only the Ankh Bridge now and there'll be a guard on that—
His feet told him something else. They said: 'Wet leaves, that's Nonesuch Street in the autumn. Small square paving stones with occasional treacherous drifts of wet leaves.'
They said it too late.
Vimes landed on his chin in the gutter, staggered upright, fell over again as the rest of the universe spun past, got up, tottered a few steps in the wrong direction, fell over again and decided to accept the majority vote for a while.

 
Dorfl was standing quietly in the station office, heavy arms folded across its chest. In front of the golem was the crossbow belonging to Sergeant Detritus, which had been converted from an ancient siege weapon. It fired a six-foot long iron arrow. Nobby sat behind it, his finger on the trigger.
Tut it away, Nobby! You can't fire that in here!' said Carrot. 'You know we never find where the arrows stop!'
'We wrestled a confession out of it,' said Sergeant Colon, hopping up and down. 'It kept on admitting it but we got it to confess in the end! And we've got these other crimes we'd like taken into consideration. '
Dorfl held up its slate.
I AM GUILTY.
Something fell out of its hand.
It was short, and white. A piece of matchstick, by the look of it. Carrot picked it up and stared at it. Then he looked at the list Colon had drawn up. It was quite long, and consisted of every unsolved crime in the city for the past couple of months.
'It's confessed to all these?'
'Not yet,' said Nobby.
'We haven't read 'em all out yet,' said Colon.
Dorfl wrote:
I DID EVERYTHING.
'Hey!' said Colon. 'Mr Vimes is going to be really pleased with us!'
Carrot walked up to the golem. There was a faint orange glow in its eyes.
'Did you kill Father Tubelcek?' he said.
YES.
'See?' said Sergeant Colon. 'You can't argue with that.'
'Why did you do it?' said Carrot.
No reply.
'And Mr Hopkinson at the Bread Museum?'
YES.
'You beat him to death with an iron bar?' said Carrot.
YES.
'Hang on,' said Colon, 'I thought you said he was . . . ?'
'Leave it, Fred,' said Carrot.' Why did you kill the old man, Dorfl?'
No reply.
'Does there have to be a reason? You can't trust golems, my dad always used to say/ said Colon. 'Turn on you soon as look at you, he said.'
'Have they ever killed anyone?' said Carrot.
'Not for want of thinking about it,' said Colon darkly. 'My dad said he had to work with one once and it used to look at him all the time. He'd turn around and there it would be ... looking at him.'
Dorfl sat staring straight in front.
'Shine a candle in its eyes!' said Nobby,
Carrot pulled a chair across the floor and straddled it, facing Dorfl. He absent-mindedly twirled the broken match between his fingers.
'I know you didn't kill Mr Hopkinson and I don't think you killed Father Tubelcek,' he said. 'I think he was dying when you found him. I think you tried to save him, Dorfl. In fact, I'm pretty sure I can prove it if I can see your chem—'
The light from the golem's flaring eyes filled the room. He stepped forward, fists upraised.
Nobby fired the crossbow.
Dorfl snatched the long bolt out of the air. There was the sound of screaming metal and the bolt became a thin bar of red-hot iron with a bulge piled up around the golem's grip.
But Carrot was behind the golem, flipping open its head. As the golem turned, raising the iron bar like a club, the fire died in its eyes.
'Got it,' said Carrot, holding up a yellowed scroll.

 
At the end of Nonesuch Street was a gibbet, where wrongdoers - or, at least, people found guilty of wrongdoing - had been hung to twist gently in the wind as examples of just retribution and, as the elements took their toll, basic anatomy as well.
Once, parties of children were brought there by their parents to learn by dreadful example of the snares and perils that await the criminal, the outlaw and those who happen to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, and they would see the terrible wreckage creaking on its chain and listen to the stern imprecations and then usually (this being Ankh-Morpork) would say 'Wow! Brilliant!' and use the corpse as a swing.
These days the city had more private and efficient ways of dealing with those it found surplus to requirements, but for the sake of tradition the gibbet's incumbent was a quite realistic wooden body. The occasional stupid raven would have a peck at the eyeballs even now, and end up with a much shorter beak.
Vimes tottered up to it, fighting for breath.
The quarry could have gone anywhere by now. Such daylight as had been filtering through the fog had given up.
Vimes stood beside the gibbet, which creaked.
It had been built to creak. What's the good of a public display of retribution, it had been argued, if it didn't creak ominously? In richer times an elderly man had been employed to operate the creak by means of a length of string, but now there was a clockwork mechanism that needed to be wound up only once a month.
Condensation dripped off the artificial corpse.
'Blow this for a lark,' muttered Vimes, and tried to head back the way he came.
After ten seconds of blundering, he tripped over something.
It was a wooden corpse, hurled into the gutter.
When he got back to the gibbet, the empty chain was swinging gently, jingling in the fog.

 
Sergeant Colon tapped the golem's chest. It went donk.
'Like a flowerpot,' said Nobby. 'How can they move around when they're like a pot, eh? They ought to keep cracking all the time.'
'They're daft, too,' said Colon. 'I heard there was one over in Quirm who was made to dig a trench and they forgot about it and they only remembered it when there was all this water 'cos it had dug all the way to the river . . .'
Carrot unrolled the chem on the table, and laid beside it the paper that had been put in Father Tubelcek's mouth.
'It's dead, is it?' said Sergeant Colon.
'It's harmless,' said Carrot, looking from one piece of paper to the other.
'Right. I've got a sledgehammer round the back somewhere, I'll just . . .'
'No,' said Carrot.
'You saw the way it was acting!'
'I don't think it could actually have hit me. I think it just wanted to scare us.'
'It worked!'
'Look at these, Fred.'
Sergeant Colon glanced at the desk. 'Foreign writing,' he said, in a voice which suggested that it was nothing like as good as decent home writing, and probably smelled of garlic.
'Anything strike you about them?'
'Well . . . they looks the same,' Sergeant Colon conceded,
'This yellowing one is DorfFs chem. The other one is from Father Tubelcek,' said Carrot. 'Letter for letter the same.'
'Why's that?'
'I think Dorfl wrote these words and put them in old Tubelcek's mouth after the poor man died,' said Carrot slowly, still looking from one piece of paper to the other.
'Urgh, yuk,' said Nobby. 'That's mucky, that is . . .'
'No, you don't understand,' said Carrot. 'I mean he wrote them because they were the only ones he knew that worked . . .'
'Worked how?'
'Well. . . you know the kiss of life?' said Carrot. 'I mean first aid? I know you know, Nobby. You came with me when they had that course at the YMPA.'
'I only went 'cos you said you got a free cup of tea and a biscuit,' said Nobby sulkily. 'Anyway, the dummy ran away when it was my turn.'
'It's the same with life-saving, too,' said Carrot. 'We want people to breathe, so we try to make sure they've got some air in them . . .'
They all turned to look at the golem.
'But golems don't breathe,' said Colon.
'No, a golem knows only one thing that keeps you alive,' said Carrot. 'It's the words in your head.' They all turned back to look at the words.
They all turned to look at the statue that was Dorfl.
'It's gone all cold in here,' Nobby quavered. 'I def nitly felt a aura flick'rin' in the air just then! It was like someone . . .'
'What's going on?' said Vimes, shaking the damp off his cloak.
'. . . openin' the door,' said Nobby.

 
It was ten minutes later.
Sergeant Colon and Nobby had gone off-duty, to everyone's relief. Colon in particular had great difficulty with the idea that you went on investigating after someone had confessed. It outraged his training and experience. You got a confession and there it ended. You didn't go around disbelieving people. You disbelieved people only when they said they were innocent. Only guilty people were trustworthy. Anything else struck at the whole basis of policing.
'White clay,' said Carrot. 'It was white clay we found. And practically unbaked. Dorfl's made of dark terracotta, and rock-hard.'
The last thing the old priest saw was a golem,' said Vimes.
'Dorfl, I'm sure,' said Carrot. 'But that's not the same as saying Dorfl was the murderer. I think he turned up as the man was dying, that's all.'
'Oh? Why?'
'I'm. . . not sure yet. But I've seen Dorfl around. He's always seemed a very gentle person.'
'It works in a slaughterhouse!'
'Maybe that's not a bad place for a gentle person to work, sir,' said Carrot. 'Anyway, I've checked up all the records I can find and I don't think a golem has ever attacked anyone. Or committed any kind of crime.'
'Oh, come on,' said Vimes. 'Everyone knows . . .' He stopped as his cynical ears heard his incredulous voice. 'What, never?
'Oh, people are always saying that they know someone who had a friend whose grandfather heard of one killing someone, and that's about as real as it gets, sir. Golems aren't allowed to hurt people. It's in their words.'
They give me the willies, I know that,' said Vimes.
They give everyone the willies, sir.'
'You hear lots of stories about them doing stupid things like making a thousand teapots or digging a hole five miles deep,' said Vimes.
'Yes, but that's not exactly criminal activity, is it, sir? That's just ordinary rebellion.'
'What do you mean, "rebellion"?'
'Dumbly obeying orders, sir. You know . . . someone shouts at it "Go and make teapots", so it does. Can't be blamed for obeying orders, sir. No one told them how many. No one wants them to think, so they get their own back by not thinking.'
They rebel by working"?'
'It's just a thought, sir. It'd make more sense to a golem, I expect.'
Automatically, they turned again to look at the silent shape of the golem.
'Can it hear us?' said Vimes.
'I don't think so, sir.'
This business with the words . . . ?'
'Er ... I think they think a dead human is just someone who's lost his chem. I don't think they understand how we work, sir.'
Them and me both, Captain.'
Vimes stared at the hollow eyes. The top of Dorfl's head was still open so that light shone down through the sockets. Vimes had seen many horrible things on the street, but the silent golem was somehow worse. You could too easily imagine the eyes flaring and the thing standing up and striding forward, fists flailing like sledgehammers. It was more than just his imagination. It seemed to be built into the things. A potentiality, biding its time.
That's why we all hate 'em, he thought. Those expressionless eyes watch us, those bigfaces turn to follow us, and doesn't it just look as if they're making notes and taking names? If you heard that one had bashed in someone's head over in Quirm or somewhere, wouldn't you just love to believe it?
A voice inside, a voice which generally came to him only in the quiet hours of the night or, in the old days, half-way down a whisky bottle, added: Given how we use them, maybe we're scared because we know we deserve it . . .
No... there's nothing behind those eyes. There's just clay and magic words.
Vimes shrugged. 'I chased a golem earlier,' he said. 'It was standing on the Brass Bridge. Damn thing. Look, we've got a confession and the eyeball evidence. If you can't come up with anything better than a ... a feeling, then we'll have to—'
To what, sir?' said Carrot. There isn't anything more we could do to him. He's dead now.'
'Inanimate, you mean.'
'Yes, sir. If you want to put it that way.'
'If Dorfl didn't kill the old men, who did?'
'Don't know, sir. But I think Dorfl does. Maybe he was following the murderer.'
'Could it have been ordered to protect someone?'
'Maybe, sir. Or he decided to.'
'You'll be telling me it's got emotions next. Where's Angua gone?'
'She thought she'd check a few things, sir,' said Carrot. 'I was . . . puzzled about this, sir. It was in his hand. 'He held the object up.
'A piece of matchstick?'
'Golems don't smoke and they don't use fire, sir. It's just. . . odd that he should have the thing, sir.'
'Oh,' said Vimes, sarcastically. 'A Clue.'

 
Dorfl's trail was the word on the street. The mixed smells of the slaughterhouse filled Angua's nostrils.
The journey zigzagged, but with a certain directional tendency. It was as if the golem had laid a ruler across the town and taken every road and alley that went in the right direction.
She came to a short blind alley. There were some warehouse gates at the end. She sniffed. There were plenty of other smells, too. Dough. Paint, Grease. Pine resin. Sharp, loud, fresh scents. She sniffed again. Cloth? Wool?
There was a confusion of footprints in the dirt. Large footprints.
The small part of Angua that always walked on two legs saw that the footprints coming out were on top of the footprints going in. She snuffled around. Up to twelve creatures, each with their own very distinctive smell - the smell of merchandise rather than living creatures - had all very recently gone down the stairwell. And all twelve had come back up.
She went down the steps and was met by an impenetrable barrier.
A door.
Paws were no good at doorknobs.
She peered over the top of the steps. There was no one around. Only the fog hung between the buildings.
She concentrated and changed, leaned against the wall for a moment until the world stopped spinning, and tried the door.
There was a large cellar beyond. Even with a werewolf s eyesight there wasn't much to see.
She had to stay human. She thought better when she was human. Unfortunately, here and now, as a human, the thought occupying her mind in no small measure was that she was naked. Anyone finding a naked woman in their cellar would be bound to ask questions. They might not even bother with questions, even ones like 'Please?' Angua could certainly deal with that situation, but she preferred not to have to. It was so difficult explaining away the shape of the wounds.
No time to waste, then.
The walls were covered in writing. Big letters, small letters, but all in that neat script which the golems used. There were phrases in chalk and paint and charcoal, and in some cases simply cut into the stone itself. They reached from floor to ceiling, criss-crossing one another over and over again so often that it was almost impossible to make out what any of them were meant to say. Here and there a word or two stood out in the jumble of letters:
...SHALT NOT...WHAT HE DOES IS NOT...RAGE AT THE CREATOR ...WOE UNTO THE MASTERLESS...WORDS IN THE...CLAY OF OUR...LET MY...BRING US TO FRE...
The dust in the middle of the floor was scuffed, as if a number of people had been milling around. She crouched down and rubbed the dirt, occasionally sniffing her finger. Smells. They were industrial smells. She hardly needed special senses to detect them. A golem didn't smell of anything except clay and whatever it was it was working with at the time . . .
And . . . something rolled under her fingers. It was a length of wood, only a couple of inches long. A matchstick, without a head.
A few minutes' investigation found another ten, lying here and there as if they'd been idly dropped.
There was also half a stick, tossed away some distance from the others.
Her night vision was fading. But sense of smell lasted much longer. Smells were strong on the sticks - the same cocktail of odours that had trailed into this damp room. But the slaughterhouse smell she'd come to associate with Dorfl was on only the broken piece.
She sat back on her haunches and looked at the little heap of wood. Twelve people (twelve people in messy jobs) had come here. They hadn't stayed long. They'd had a ... a discussion: the writing on the wall. They'd done something involving eleven matches (just the wooden part - they hadn't been dipped to get the head. Maybe the pine-smelling golem worked in a match factory?) plus one broken match.
Then they'd all left and gone their separate ways.
Dorfl's way had taken him straight to the main Watch House to give himself up.
Why?
She sniffed at the piece of broken match again. There was no doubt about that cocktail of blood and meat smells.
Dorfl had given himself up for murder . . .
She stared at the writing on the wall, and shivered.

 
'Cheers, Fred,' said Nobby, raising his pint.
'We can put the money back in the Tea Club tomorrow. No one'll miss it,' said Sergeant Colon. 'Anyway, this comes under the heading of an emergency.'
Corporal Nobbs looked despondently into his glass. People often did this in the Mended Drum, when the immediate thirst had been slaked and for the first time they could take a good look at what they were drinking.
'What am I going to do?' he moaned. 'If you're a nob you got to wear coronets and long robes and that. Got to cost a mint, that kind of stuff. And there's stuffyou've got to do.' He took another long swig. ' 'S called knobless obleeje.'
'Nobblyesse obligay,' corrected Colon. 'Yeah. Means you got to keep your end up in society.
Giving money to charities. Being kind to the poor. Passing your ole clothes to your gardener when there's still some good wear left in 'em. I know about that. My uncle was butler to ole Lady Selachii.'
'Ain't got a gardener,' said Nobby gloomily. 'Ain't got a garden. Ain't got 'ny ole clothes except what I'm wearin'.' He took another swig. 'She gave her ole clothes to the gardener, did she?'
Colon nodded. 'Yeah. We were always a bit puzzled about that gardener.' He caught the barman's eye. 'Two more pints of Winkles, Ron.' He glanced at Nobby. His old friend looked more dejected than he'd ever seen him. They'd have to see this thing through together. 'Better make that two for Nobby, too,' he added.
'Cheers, Fred.'
Sergeant Colon's eyebrows raised as one pint was emptied almost in one go. Nobby put the mug down a little unsteadily.
'Wouldn't be so bad if there was a pot of cash,' Nobby said, picking up the other mug. 'I thought you couldn't be a nob without bein' a rich bugger. I thought they gave you a big wad with one hand and banged the crown on your head with the other. Don't make sense, bein' nobby and poor. S'worst of both wurble.' He drained the mug and banged it down. 'Common 'n' rich, yeah, that I could hurble.'
The barman leaned over to Sergeant Colon. 'What's up with the corporal? He's a half-pint man. That's eight pints he's had.'
Fred Colon leaned closer and spoke out of the corner of his mouth. 'Keep it to yourself, Ron, but it's because he's a peer.'
'Is that a fact? I'll go and put down some fresh sawdust.'

 
In the Watch House, Sam Vimes prodded the matches. He didn't ask Angua if she were sure. Angua could smell if it was Wednesday.
'So who were the others?' he said. 'Other golems?'
'It's hard to tell from the tracks,' said Angua, 'But I think so. I'd have followed them, but I thought I ought to come right back here.'
'What makes you think they were golems?'
'The footprints. And golems have no smell,' she said. 'They pick up the smells associated with whatever they're doing. That's all they smell of. . .' She thought of the wall of words. 'And they had a long debate,' she said. 'A golem argument. In writing. It got pretty heated, I think.'
She thought about the wall again. 'Some of them got quite emphatic,' she added, remembering the size of some of the lettering. 'If they were human, they'd have been shouting . . .'
Vimes stared gloomily at the matches laid out before him. Eleven bits of wood, and a twelfth broken in two. You didn't need to be any kind of genius to see what had been going on. 'They drew lots,' he said. 'And Dorfl lost.'
He sighed. 'This is getting worse,' he said. 'Does anyone know how many golems there are in the city?'
'No,' said Carrot. 'Hard to find out. No one's made any for centuries, but they don't wear out.'
'No one makes them?'
'It's banned, sir. The priests are pretty hot on that, sir. They say it's making life, and that's something only gods are supposed to do. But they put up with the ones that are still around because, well, they're so useful. Some are walled up or in treadmills or at the bottom of shafts. Doing messy tasks, you know, in places where it's dangerous to go. They do all the really mucky jobs. I suppose there could be hundreds . . .'
'Hundreds?' said Vimes. 'And now they meet secretly and make plots? Good grief! Right. We ought to destroy the lot of them.'
'Why?'
'You like the idea of them having secrets? I mean, good grief, trolls and dwarfs, fine, even the undead are alive in a way, even if it is a bloody awful way' -Vimes caught Angua's eye and went on — 'for the most part. But these things? They'rejust things that do work. It's like having a bunch of shovels meeting for a chat!'
'Er . . . there was something else, sir,' said Angua slowly.
'In the cellar?'
'Yes. Er ... but it's hard to explain. It was a ... feeling.'
Vimes shrugged non-committally. He'd learned not to scoff at Angua's feelings. She always knew where Carrot was, for one thing. If she were in the Watch House you could tell if he were coming up the street by the way she turned to look at the door.
'Yes?'
'Like . . . deep grief, sir. Terrible, terrible sadness. Er.'
Vimes nodded, and pinched the bridge of his nose. It seemed to have been a long day and it was far from over yet.
He really, really needed a drink. The world was distorted enough as it was. When you saw it through the bottom of a glass, it all came back into focus.
'Have you had anything to eat today, sir?' said Angua.
'I had a bit of breakfast,' muttered Vimes.
'You know that word Sergeant Colon uses?'
'What? "Manky"?'
'That's how you look. If you're staying here at least let's have some coffee and send out for figgins.'
Vimes hesitated at that. He'd always imagined that manky was how your mouth felt after three days on a regurgitated diet. It was horrible to think that you could look like that.
Angua reached for the old coffee tin that represented the Watch's tea kitty. It was surprisingly easy to lift.
'Hey? There should be at least twenty-five dollars in here,' she said. 'Nobby collected it only yesterday . . .'
She turned the tin upside-down. A very small dog-end dropped out.
'Not even an IOU?' said Carrot despondently. 'An IOU? This is Nobby we're talking about.' 'Oh. Of course.'

 
It had gone very quiet in the Mended Drum. Happy Hour had been passed with no more than a minor fight. Now everyone was watching Unhappy Hour.
There was a forest of mugs in front of Nobby.
'I mean, I mean, what's it worth whenallsaidan-done?' he said.
'You could flog it,' said Ron.
'Good point,' said Sergeant Colon. 'There's plenty o' rich folks who'd give a sack of cash for a title. I mean folks that's already got the big house and that. They'd give anything to be as nobby as you, Nobby.'
The ninth pint stopped half-way to Nobby's lips.
'Could be worth thousands of dollars,' said Ron encouragingly.
'At the very least,' said Colon. They'd fight over it.'
'You play your cards right and you could retire on something like that,' said Ron.
The mug remained stationary. Various expressions fought their way around the lumps and excrescences of Nobby's face, suggesting the terrible battle within,
'Oh, they would, would they?' he said at last.
Sergeant Colon tilted unsteadily away. There was an edge in Nobby's voice he hadn't heard before.
Then you could be rich and common just like you said,' said Ron, who did not have quite the same eye for mental weather changes. 'Posh folks'd be falling over themselves for it.'
'Sell m' birthright for a spot of massage, is that it?' said Nobby.
'It's "a pot of message",' said Sergeant Colon.
'It's "a mess of pottage",' said a bystander, anxious not to break the flow.
'Hah! Well, I'll tell you,' said Nobby, swaying, 'there's some things that can't be sole. Hah! Hah! Who streak my prurse streals trasph, right?'
'Yeah, it's the trashiest looking purse I ever saw,' said a voice.
'—what is a mess of pottage, anyway?'
"Cos . . . what good'd a lot of moneneney do me, hey?'
The clientele looked puzzled. This seemed to be a question on the lines of 'Alcohol, is it nice?', or 'Hard work, do you want to do it?'.
'—what's messy about it, then?'
'We - ell,' said a brave soul, uncertainly, 'you could use it to buy a big house, lots of grub and. . . drink and . . . women and that.'
That's wha' it takes to make a man happppeyey, is it?' said Nobby, glassy-eyed.
His fellow-drinkers just stared. This was a metaphysical maze,
'Well, I'll tell you," said Nobby, the swaying now so regular that he looked like an inverted pendulum, 'all that stuffs nothing, nothing. I tell you, compared to pride inna man's linneneage . . . cage.'
'Linneneageeage?' said Sergeant Colon. 'Ancescestors and that,' said Nobby. "T means I've got ancescestors and that, which's more'n you lot've got!'
Sergeant Colon choked on his pint. 'Everyone's got ancestors,' said the barman calmly. 'Otherwise they wouldn't be here.'
Nobby gave him a glassy stare and tried unsuccessfully to focus. 'Right!' he said, eventually. 'Right! Only . . . only I've got more of 'em, d'y'see? The blood of bloody kings is in these veins, am I right?' Temporarily,' said a voice. There was laughter, but it had an anticipatory ring to it that Colon had learned to respect and fear. It reminded him of two things: (1) he had got only six weeks to retirement, and (2) it had been quite a long time since he'd been to the lavatory.
Nobby delved into his pocket and pulled out a battered scroll. 'Y'see this?' he said, unrolling it with difficulty on the bar. 'Y'see it? I've got a right to arm bears, me. See here? It says "Earl", right? That's me. You could, you could, you could have my head up over the door.' 'Could be,' said the barman, eyeing the crowd. 'I mean, y'could change t'name o' this place, call it the Earl of Ankh, and I'd come in and drink here reg'lar, whaddya say?' said Nobby. 'News gets around an earl drinks here, business will go right up. And I wouldn't'n't'n't chargeyouapenny, how-aboutit? People'd say, dat's a high-class pub, is that, Lord de Nobbes drinks there, that's a place with a bit of tone.'
Someone grabbed Nobby by the throat. Colon didn't recognize the grabber. He was just one of the scarred, ill shaven regulars whose function it was, around about this time of an evening, to start opening bottles with his teeth or, if the evening was going really well, with somebody else's teeth.
'So we ain't good enough for you, is that what you're saying?' the man demanded.
Nobby waved his scroll. His mouth opened to frame words like - Sergeant Colon just knew -'Unhand me, you low-born oaf.'
With tremendous presence of mind and absence of any kind of common sense, Sergeant Colon said: 'His lordship wants everyone to have a drink with him!'

 
Compared to the Mended Drum, the Bucket in Gleam Street was an oasis of frigid calm. The Watch had adopted it as their own, as a silent temple to the art of getting drunk. It wasn't that it sold particularly good beer, because it didn't. But it did serve it quickly, and quietly, and gave credit. It was one place where Watchmen didn't have to see things or be disturbed. No one could sink alcohol in silence like a Watchman who'd just come off duty after eight hours on the street. It was as much protection as his helmet and breastplate. The world didn't hurt so much.
And Mr Cheese the owner was a good listener. He listened to things like 'Make that a double' and 'Keep them coming'. He also said the right things, like 'Credit? Certainly, officer'. Watchmen paid their tab or got a lecture from Captain Carrot.
Vimes sat gloomily behind a glass of lemonade. He wanted one drink, and understood precisely why he wasn't going to have one. One drink ended up arriving in a dozen glasses. But knowing this didn't make it any better.
Most of the day shift were in here now, plus one or two men who were on their day off.
Scummy as the place was, he liked it here. With the buzz of other people around him, he didn't seem to get in the way of his own thoughts.
One reason that Mr Cheese had allowed his pub to become practically the city's fifth Watch House was the protection this offered. Watchmen were quiet drinkers, on the whole. They just went from vertical to horizontal with the minimum amount of fuss, without starting any major fights, and without damaging the fixtures overmuch. And no one ever tried to rob him. Watchmen got really intense about having their drinking disturbed.
And he was therefore surprised when the door was flung open and three men rushed in, flourishing crossbows.
'Don't nobody move! Anyone moves and they're dead!'
The robbers stopped at the bar. To their own surprise their arrival didn't seem to have caused much of a stir.
'Oh, for heaven's sake, will someone shut that door?' growled Vimes. A Watchman near the door did so.
'And bolt it,' Vimes added.
The three thieves looked around. As their eyes grew accustomed to the gloom, they received a general impression of armourality, with strong overtones of helmetness. But none of it was moving. It was all watching them.
'You boys new in town?' said Mr Cheese, buffing a glass.
The boldest of the three waved his bow under the barman's nose. 'All the money right now!' he screamed. 'Otherwise,' he said, to the room in general, 'you've got a dead barman.'
'Plenty of other bars in town, boyo,' said a voice.
Mr Cheese didn't look up from the glass he was polishing. 'I know that was you, Constable Thighbiter,' he said calmly. There's two dollars and thirty pence on your slate, thank you very much.'
The thieves drew closer together. Bars shouldn't act like this. And they fancied they could hear the faint sliding noises of assorted weapons being drawn from various sheaths.
'Haven't I seen you before?' said Carrot.
'Oh gods, it's him,' moaned one of the men. The bread-thrower!'
'I thought Mr Ironcrust was taking you to the Thieves' Guild,' Carrot went on.
There was a bit of an argument about taxes . . .'
'Don't tell him!'
Carrot tapped his head. The tax forms!' he said. 'I expect Mr Ironcrust is worried I've forgotten about them!'
The thieves were now so close together they looked like a fat six-armed man with a very large bill for hats.
'Er ... Watchmen aren't allowed to kill people, right?' said one of them.
'Not while we're on duty,' said Vimes.
The boldest of the three moved suddenly, grabbed Angua and pulled her upright. 'We walk out of here unharmed or the girl gets it, all right?' he snarled.
Someone sniggered.
'I hope you're not going to kill anyone,' said Carrot.
That's up to us!'
'Sorry, was I talking to you?' said Carrot.
'Don't worry, I'll be fine,' said Angua. She looked around to make sure Cheery wasn't there, and then sighed. 'Come on, gentlemen, let's get it over with.'
'Don't play with your food!' said a voice from the crowd.
There were one or two giggles until Carrot turned in his seat, whereupon everyone was suddenly intensely interested in their drinks.
'It's okay,' said Angua quietly.
Aware that something was out of kilter, but not quite sure what it was, the thieves edged back to the door. No one moved as they unbolted it and, still holding Angua, stepped out into the fog, shutting the door behind them.
'Hadn't we better help?' said a constable who was new to the Watch.
They don't deserve help,' said Vimes.
There was a clank of armour and then a long, deep growl, right outside in the street.
And a scream. Ancl then another scream. And a third scream, modulated with 'NONONOnonononononoNO! . . . aarghaargh aargh!' Something heavy hit the door.
Vimes turned back to Carrot. 'You and Constable Angua,' he said. 'You ... er ... get along all right?'
'Fine, sir/ said Carrot.
'Some people might think that, er, there might be, er, problems . . .'
There was a thud, and then a faint bubbling noise.
'We work around them, sir,' said Carrot, raising his voice slightly.
'I heard that her father's not very happy about her working here . . .'
They don't have much law up in Uberwald, sir. They think it's for weak societies. The baron's not a very civic-minded man.'
'He's pretty bloodthirsty, from what I've heard.'
'She wants to stay in the Watch, sir. She likes meeting people.'
From outside came another gurgle. Fingernails scrabbled at a windowpane. Then their owner disappeared abruptly from view.
'Well, it's not for me to judge,' said Vimes.
'No, sir.'
After a few moments of silence the door opened, slowly. Angua walked in, adjusting her clothes, and sat down. All the Watchmen in the room suddenly took a second course of advanced beer-study.
'Er ..." Carrot began.
'Flesh wounds,' said Angua. 'But one of them did shoot one of the others in the leg by accident.'
‘I think you'd better put it in your report as "self-inflicted wounds while resisting arrest",' said Vimes.
'Yes, sir,' said Angua.
'Not all of them,' said Carrot.
'They tried to rob our bar and take a wer—Angua hostage,' said Vimes.
'Oh, I see what you mean, sir,' said Carrot. 'Self-inflicted. Yes. Of course.'

 
It had gone quiet in the Mended Drum. This was because it is usually very hard to be both loud and unconscious.
Sergeant Colon was impressed at his own cleverness. Throwing a punch could stop a fight, of course, but in this case it had a quarter of rum, gin and sixteen chopped lemons floating in it.
Some people were still upright, however. They were the serious drinkers, who drank as if there was no tomorrow and rather hoped this would be the case.
Fred Colon had reached the convivial drunk stage. He turned to the man beside him. ' 'S good here, isn't it,' he managed.
'What'm I gonna tell me wife, that's what I want to know . . .' moaned the man.
'Dunno. Say you've bin bin bin working late,' said Colon. 'An' suck a peppermint before you goes home, that usually works—'
'Working late? Hah! I've bin given the sack! Me! A craftsman! Fifteen years at Spadger and Williams, right, and then they go bust 'cos of Carry undercutting 'em and I get a job at Carry's and, bang, I'm out of a job there, too! "Surplus to requirements"! Bloody golems! Forcing real people out of a job! What they wanna work for? They got no mouth to feed, hah. But the damn thing goes at it so fast you can't see its bloody arms movin'!'
'Shame.'
'Smash 'em up, that's what I say. I mean, we had a golem at S an' W's but ole Zhlob just used to plod along, y'know, not buzz away like a blue-arsed fly. You wanna watch it, mate, they'll have yourjob next.'
'Stoneface wouldn't stand fr it,' said Colon, undulating gently.
'Any chance of a job with you lot, then?'
'Dunno,' said Colon. The man seemed to have become two men. 'What's it you do?'
Tm a Wick-Dipper and End-Teaser, mate,' they said.
'I can see that's a useful trade.'
'Here you go, Fred,' said the barman, tapping him on the shoulder and putting a piece of paper in front of him. Colon watched with interest as figures danced back and forth. He tried to focus on the one at the bottom, but it was too big to take in.
'What's this, then?
'His imperial lordship's bar bill,' said the barman.
'Don't be daft, no one can drink that much . . . 'm not payin'!'
'I'm including breakages, mind you.'
'Yeah? Like what?'
The barman pulled a heavy hickory stick from its hiding place under the bar. 'Arms? Legs? Suit yourself,' he said.
'Oh, come on, Ron, you've known me for years!' 'Yes, Fred, you've always been a good customer, so what I'll do is, I'll let you shut your eyes first.' 'But that's all the money I've got!' The barman grinned. 'Lucky one for you, eh?'

 
Cheery Littlebottom leaned against the corridor wall outside her privy and wheezed.
It was something alchemists learned to do early in their career. As her tutors had said, there were two signs of a good alchemist: the Athletic and the Intellectual. A good alchemist of the first sort was someone who could leap over the bench and be on the far side of a safely thick wall in three seconds, and a good alchemist of the second sort was someone who knew exactly when to do this.
The equipment didn't help. She scrounged what she could from the guild, but a real alchemical laboratory should be full of the kind of glassware that looked as if it were produced during the Guild of Glassblowers All-Comers Hiccuping Contest. A proper alchemist did not have to run tests using as her beaker a mug with a picture of a teddy-bear on it, which Corporal Nobbs was probably going to be very upset about when he found it missing.
When she judged that the fumes had cleared she ventured back into her tiny room.
That was another thing. Her books on alchemy were marvellous objects, every page a work of the engraver's art, but they nowhere contained instructions like 'Be sure to open a window'. They did have instructions like 'Adde Aqua Quirmis to the Zinc untile Rising Gas Yse Vigorously Evolved', but never added 'Don't Doe Thys Atte Home' or even 'And Say Fare-thee-Welle to Thy Eyebrows'.
Anyway . . .
The glassware remained innocent of the brown-black sheen that, according to The Compound of Alchemic, would indicate arsenic in the sample. She'd tried every type of food and drink she could find in the palace pantries, and pressed into service every bottle and jar she could discover in the Watch House.
She tried one more time with what said on the packet it was Sample #2. Looked like a smear of cheese. Cheese? The various fumes thronging around her head were making her slow. She must have taken some cheese samples. She was pretty sure Sample #17 had been some Lancre Blue Vein, which had reacted vigorously with the acid, blown a small hole in the ceiling and covered half the work-bench with a dark green substance that was setting like tar.
She tested this one anyway.
A few minutes later she was scrabbling furiously through her notebook. The first sample she'd taken from the pantry (one portion of duck pate) was down here as Sample #3. What about #1 and #2? No, #1 had been the white clay from Misbegot Bridge, so what had been #2?
She found it.
But that couldn't be right!
She looked up at the glass tube. Metallic arsenic grinned back at her.
She'd retained a bit of the sample. She could test again, but . . . perhaps it would be better to tell someone . . .
She hurried along to the main office, where a troll was on duty. 'Where's Commander Vimes?'
The troll grinned. 'In der Gleam . . . Little-bottom. '
'Thank you.'
The troll turned back to address a worried-looking monk in a brown cassock. 'And?' he said.
'Best if he tells it himself,' said the monk. 'I only work on the next bench.' He put a small jar of dust on the desk. It had a bow tie around it.
'I want to complain most emphatically,' said the dust, in a shrill little voice. 'I was working there only five minutes and then splash. It's going to take days to get back into shape!'
'Working where?' said the troll.
'Nonesuch Ecclesiastical Supplies,' said the worried monk, helpfully.
'Holy water section,' said the vampire.

 
'You've found arsenic?' said Vimes.
'Yes, sir. Lots. The sample's full of it. But ..."
'Well?'
Cheery looked at her feet. 'I tried my process again with a test sample, sir, and I'm sure I'm doing it right . . .'
'Good. What was it in?'
'That's just it, sir. It wasn't in anything from the palace. Because I'd got a bit confused and tested the stuffl found under Father Tubelcek's fingernails, sir.'
'What?
There was grease under his nails, sir, and I thought maybe it could've come from whoever attacked him. Off an apron or something . . . I've still got some left if you want a second opinion, sir. I wouldn't blame you.'
'Why would the old man be handling poison?' said Carrot.
'I thought he might have scratched the murderer,' said Cheery. 'You know ... put up a fight . . .'
'With the Arsenic Monster?' said Angua.
'Oh, gods,' said Vimes. 'What time is it?'
'Bingely bingely beep bong!'
'Oh, damn
'It's nine of the clock,' said the organizer, poking its head out of Vimes's pocket. ' "I was unhappy because I had no shoes until I met a man with no feet." '
The Watchmen exchanged glances.
'What?' said Vimes, very carefully.
'People like it if I occasionally come up with a little aphorism or inspiring Thought For The Day,' said the imp.
'So how did you meet this man with no feet?' said Vimes.
'I didn't actually meet him,' said the imp. 'It was a general metaphorical statement.'
'Well, that's it, then,' said Vimes. 'If you'd met him you could have asked him if he had any boots he didn't have any use for.'
There was a squeak as he pushed the imp back into its box.
'There's more, sir,' said Cheery.
'Go on,' said Vimes wearily.
'And I had a careful look at the clay we found at the murder scene,' said Cheery. 'Igneous said it had a lot of grog in it - old powdered pottery. Well... I chipped a bit off Dorfl to compare and I can't be sure but I got the iconograph demon to paint really small details and ... I think there's some clay just like his in there. He's got a lot of iron oxide in his clay.'
Vimes sighed. All around them people were drinking alcohol. One drink would make it all so clear.
'Any of you know what any of this means?' he said.
Carrot and Angua shook their heads.
'Is it supposed to make sense if we know how all the pieces fit together?' Vimes demanded, raising his voice.
'Like pieces of a jigsaw, sir?' Cheery ventured.
'Yes!' said Vimes, so loudly that the room went quiet. 'Now all we need is the corner bit with the piece of sky and the leaves and it'll all be one big picture?'
'It's been a long day for all of us, sir,' said Carrot.
Vimes sagged. 'Okay,' he said. Tomorrow... I want you, Carrot, to check on the golems in the city. If they're up to something I want to know what it is. And you, Littlebottom . . . you look everywhere in the old man's house for more arsenic. I wish I could believe that you'll find any.'

 
Angua had volunteered to walk Littlebottom back to her lodgings. The dwarf was surprised that the men let her do this. After all, it'd mean that Angua would then have to walk on home by herself.
'Aren't you afraid?' Cheery said as they ambled through the damp clouds of fog.
'Nope.'
'But I imagine muggers and cut-throats would be out in a fog like this. And you said you lived in the Shades.'
'Oh, yes. But I haven't been bothered lately.'
'Ah, perhaps they're frightened of the uniform?'
'Possibly,' said Angua.
'Probably they've learned respect.'
'You may be right.'
'Er ... excuse me ... but are you and Captain Carrot . . . ?'
Angua waited politely.
'. . . Er . . .'
'Oh, yes,' said Angua, taking pity. 'We're er. But I stay at Mrs Cake's boarding house because you need your own space in a city like this.' And an understanding landlady sympathetic to those with special needs, she added to herself. Like doorhandles that a paw could operate, and a window left open on moonlit nights. 'You've got to have somewhere where you can be yourself. Anyway, the Watch House smells of socks.'
'I'm staying with my Uncle Armstrangler,' said Cheery. 'It's not very nice there. People talk about mining most of the time.'
'Don't you?'
'There's not a lot you can say about mining. "I mine in my mine and what's mine is mine," ' said Cheery in a singsong voice. 'And then they go on about gold which, frankly, is a lot duller than people think.'
'I thought dwarfs loved gold,' said Angua.
They just say that to get it into bed.'
'Are you sure you're a dwarf? Sorry. That was a joke.'
'There must be more interesting things. Hair. Clothes. People.'
'Good grief. You mean girl talk?
'I don't know, I've never talked girl talk before,' said Cheery. 'Dwarfs just talk.'
'It's like that in the Watch, too,' said Angua. 'You can be any sex you like provided you act male. There's no men and women in the Watch, just a bunch of lads. You'll soon learn the language. Basically it's how much beer you supped last night, how strong the curry was you had afterwards, and where you were sick. Just think egotesticle. You'll soon get the hang of it. And you'll have to be prepared for sexually explicit jokes in the Watch House.'
Cheery blushed.
'Mind you, that seems to have ended now,' said Angua.
'Why? Did you complain?'
'No, after I joined in it all seemed to stop/ said Angua, 'And, you know, they didn't laugh? Not even when I did the hand gestures too? I thought that was unfair. Mind you, some of them were quite small gestures.'
'There's no help for it, I'll have to move out,' sighed Cheery. 'I feel all... wrong.'
Angua looked down at the little figure trudging along beside her. She recognized the symptoms. Everyone needed their own space, just like Angua did, and sometimes that space was inside their heads. And she liked Cheery, oddly enough. Possibly it was because of her earnestness. Or the fact that she was the only person apart from Carrot who didn't look slightly frightened when they talked to her. And that was because she didn't know. Angua wanted to preserve that ignorance as a small precious thing, but she could tell when someone needed a little change in their lives.
'We're going quite close to Elm Street,' she said, carefully. 'Just, er, drop in for a while. I've got some stuff you could borrow . . .'
I won't be needing it, she told herself. When I go, I won't be able to carry much.

 
Constable Downspout watched the fog. Watching was, after staying in one place, the thing he did best. But he was also good at keeping quite still. Not making any noise whatsoever was another of his best features. When it came to doing absolutely nothing at all he was among the finest. But it was keeping completely motionless in one place that was his forte. If there were a roll-call for the world's champion non-movers, he wouldn't even turn up.
Now, chin on his hands, he watched the fog.
The clouds had settled somewhat so that up here, six storeys above the streets, it was possible to believe you were on a beach at the edge of a cold, moonlit sea. The occasional tall tower or steeple rose out of the clouds, but all sounds were muffled and pulled in on themselves. Midnight came and went.
Constable Downspout watched, and thought about pigeons.
Constable Downspout had very few desires in life, and almost all of them involved pigeons.

 
A group of figures lurched, staggered or in one case rolled through the fog like the Four Horsemen of a small Apocalypse. One had a duck on his head, and because he was almost entirely sane except for this one strange particular he was known as the Duck Man. One coughed and expectorated repeatedly, and hence was called Coffin Henry. One, a legless man on a small wheeled trolley, was for no apparent reason called Arnold Sideways. And the fourth, for some very good reasons indeed, was Foul Ole Ron.
Ron had a small greyish-brown, torn-eared terrier on the end of a string, although in truth it would be hard for an observer to know exactly who was leading whom and who, when push came to shove, would be the one to fold at the knees if the other one shouted 'Sit!' Because, although trained canines as aids for those bereft of sight, and even of hearing, have frequently been used throughout the universe, Foul Ole Ron was the first person ever to own a Thinking-Brain Dog.
The beggars, led by the dog, were heading for the dark arch of Misbegot Bridge, which they called Home. At least, one of them called it 'Home'; the others respectively called it 'Haaawrk haaawrk HRRaawrk ptui!', 'Heheheh! Whoops!' and 'Buggrit, millennium hand and shrimp!'
As they stumbled along the riverside they passed a can from hand to hand, drinking appreciatively and occasionally belching.
The dog stopped. The beggars shunted to a halt behind it.
A figure came towards them along the riverside.
'Ye gods!'
'Ptui!'
'Whoops!'
'Buggrit?'
The beggars flung themselves against the wall as the pale figure lurched past. It was clutching at its head as if trying to lift itself off the ground by its ears, and then occasionally banging its head against nearby buildings.
While they watched, it pulled a metal mooring post out of the cobbles and started to hit itself over the head. Eventually the cast iron shattered.
The figure dropped the stub, flung back its head, opened a mouth from which red light spilled, and roared like a bull in distress. Then it staggered on into the darkness.
'There's that golem again,' said the Duck Man. 'The white one.'
'Heheh, I gets heads like that myself, some mornings,' said Arnold Sideways.
'I knows about golems,' said Coffin Henry, spitting expertly and hitting a beetle climbing the wall twenty feet away. 'They ain't s'posed to have a voice.'
'Buggrit/ said Foul Ole Ron. 'Dang the twigger f r'a bang at the fusel, and shrimp, 'cos the worm's on the other boot! See if he don't.'
'He meant it's the same one we saw the other day,' said the dog. 'After that ole priest got topped.'
'Do you think we should tell someone?' said the Duck Man.
The dog shook its head. 'Nah,' it said. 'We got a cushy number down here, no sense in spoiling it.'
The five of them staggered on into the damp shadows.
'I hate bloody golems, takin' our jobs . . .'
'We ain't got jobs.'
'See what I mean?'
'What's for supper?'
'Mud and ole boots. HRRaawrk ptui!'
'Millennium hand and shrimp, I sez.'
'’m glad I've got a voice. I can speak up for meself.'
'It's time you fed your duck.'
'What duck?'

 
The fog glowed and sizzled around Five and Seven Yard. Flames roared up and all but set the thick clouds alight. Spitting liquid iron cooled in its moulds. Hammers rang out around the workshops. The ironmasters didn't work by the clock, but by the more demanding physics of molten metal. Even though it was nearly midnight, Stronginthearm's Iron Founders, Beaters and General Forging was still bustling.
There were many Stronginthearms in Ankh-Morpork. It was a very common dwarf name. That had been a major consideration for Thomas Smith when he'd adopted it by official deed poll. The scowling dwarf holding a hammer which adorned his sign was a mere figment of the signpainter's imagination. People thought 'dwarfmade' was better, and Thomas Smith had decided not to argue.
The Committee for Equal Heights had objected but things had mired somewhat because, firstly, most of the actual Committee was human, since dwarfs were generally too busy to worry about that sort of thing,[13] and in any case their position hinged on pointing out that Mr Stronginthearm né Smith was too tall, which was clearly a sizeist discrimination and technically illegal under the Committee's own rules.
In the meantime Thomas had let his beard grow, wore an iron helmet if he thought anyone official was around, and put up his prices by twenty pence on the dollar.
The drop hammers thumped, all in a row, powered by the big ox treadmill. There were swords to beat out and panels to be shaped. Sparks erupted.
Stronginthearm took off his helmet (the Committee had been around again) ancl wiped the inside.
'Dibbuk? Where the hell are you?'
A sensation of filled space made him turn. The foundry's golem was standing a few inches behind him, the forge light glowing on his dark red clay.
'I told you not to do that, didn't I?' Stronginthearm shouted above the din.
The golem held up its slate.
YES.
'You've gone and done all your holy day stuff? You were away too long!'
SORROW.
'Well, now you're back with us, go and take over on Number Three hammer and send Mr Vincent up to my office, right?'
YES.
Stronginthearm climbed the stairs to his office. He turned at the top to look back across the red-lit foundry floor. He saw Dibbuk walk over to the hammer and hold up a slate for the foreman. He saw Vincent the foreman walk away. He saw Dibbuk take the sword-blank that was being shaped and hold it in place for a few blows, then hurl it aside.
Stronginthearm hurried back down the steps.
When he was half-way down Dibbuk had laid his head on the anvil.
When Stronginthearm reached the bottom the hammer struck for the first time.
When he was half-way across the ash-crusted floor, other workers scurrying after him, the hammer struck for the second time.
As he reached Dibbuk the hammer struck for the third time.
The glow faded in the golem's eyes. A crack appeared across the impassive face.
The hammer went back up for the fourth time—
'Duck!' screamed Stronginthearm—
—and then there was nothing but pottery.
When the thunder had died away, the foundry master got to his feet and brushed himself off. Dust and wreckage were strewn across the floor. The hammer had jumped its bearings and was lying by the anvil in a heap of golem shards.
Stronginthearm gingerly picked up a piece of a foot, tossed it aside, and then reached down again and pulled a slate out of the wreckage.
He read:

 
THE OLD MEN HELPED US!
THOU SHALT NOT KILL!
CLAY OF MY CLAY!
SHAME.
SORROW.

 
His foreman looked over Stronginthearm's shoulder. 'What did it go and do that for?'
'How should I know?' snapped Stronginthearm.
'I mean, it brought the tea round this afternoon as normal as anything. Then it went off for a coupla hours, and now this . . .'
Stronginthearm shrugged. A golem was a golem and that was all there was to it, but the recollection of that bland face positioning itself under the giant hammer had shaken him.
'I heard the other day the sawmill in Dimwell Street wouldn't mind selling the one it's got,' said the foreman. 'It sawed up a mahogany trunk into matchsticks, or something. You want I should go and have a word?'
Stronginthearm looked at the slate again.
Dibbuk had never been very wordy. He'd carry red-hot iron, hammer sword-blanks with his fists, clean out clinkers from a smelter still too hot for a man to touch . . . and never say a word. Of course, he couldn't say any words, but Dibbuk had always given the impression that there were none he'd particularly wanted to say in any case. He just worked. These were the most words he'd ever written at any one time.
They spoke to Stronginthearm of black distress, and a mind that would have been screaming if it could only have uttered a sound. Which was daft! The things couldn't commit suicide.
'Boss?' said the foreman. 'I said, you want me to get another one?'
Stronginthearm skimmed the slate away and, with a feeling of relief, watched it shatter against the wall. 'No,' he said. 'Just clear this thing up. And get the bloody hammer fixed.'

 
Sergeant Colon, after some considerable effort, managed to get his head higher than the gutter.
'You - you all right, Corporal Lord de Nobbes?' he mumbled.
'Dunno, Fred. Whose face is this?'
'’S mine, Nobby.'
Thank gods for that, I thought it was me . . .'
Colon fell back. 'We're lyin' in the gutter, Nobby,' he moaned. 'Ooo.'
'We're all lyin' in the gutter, Fred. But some of us're lookin' at the stars
'Well, I'm lookin' at your face, Nobby. Stars'd be a lot better, believe you me. C'mon . . .'
With several false starts they both managed to get upright, mainly by pulling themselves up one another.
'Where're're're we, Nobby?'
'’m sure we left the Drum,. . . 've I got a sheet over m'head?'
'It's the fog, Nobby.'
'What about these legs down here?'
'I reckon them's your legs, Nobby. I've got mine.'
'Right. Right. Ooo ... I reckon I drunk a lot, Sarge.'
'Drunk as a lord, eh?'
Nobby reached gingerly up to his helmet. Someone had put a paper coronet around it. His questing hand found a dog-end behind his ear.
It was that unpleasant hour of the drinking day when, after a few hours' quality gutter-time, you're beginning to feel the retribution of sobriety while still being drunk enough to make it worse.
'How'd we get here, Sarge?'
Colon started to scratch his head and stopped because of the noise.
'I reckon . . .' he said, winnowing the frazzled shreds of his short-term memory, 'I... reckon. . . seems to me there was something about stormin' the palace and demandin' your birthright. . .'
Nobby choked and spat out the cigarette. 'We didn't do that, did we?'
'You was shouting we ought to do it . . .'
'Oh, gods . . .' moaned Nobby.
'But I reckon you threw up around that time.'
'That's a relief, anyway.'
'Well... it was all over Grabber Hoskins. But he tripped over someone before he could get us.'
Colon suddenly patted his pockets. 'And I've still got the tea money,' he said. Another cloud of memory scudded across the sunshine of oblivion. 'Well. . . three pennies of it. . .'
The urgency of this got through to Nobby. Thruppence?'
'Yeah, well . . . after you started orderin' all them expensive drinks for the whole bar . . . well, you din't have no money and it was either me payin' for them or . . .' Colon moved his finger across his throat and went: 'Kssssh!'
'You tellin' me we paid for Happy Hour in the Drum?'
'Not so much Happy Hour,' said Colon miserably. 'More sort of Ecstatic One-Hundred-and-Fifty Minutes. I didn't even know you could buy gin in pints.'
Nobby tried to focus on the fog. 'No one can drink gin by the pint, Sarge.'
'That's what I kept sayin', and would you listen?'
Nobby sniffed. 'We're close to the river,' he said. 'Let's try to get . . .’
Something roared, very close by. It was long and low, like a foghorn in serious distress. It was the sound you might hear from a cattleyard on a nervous night, and it went on and on, and then stopped so abruptly it caught the silence unawares.
'. . . far away from that as we can,' said Nobby. The sound had done the work of an ice-cold shower and about two pints of black coffee.
Colon spun around. He desperately needed something that would do the work of a laundry. 'Where did it come from?' he said.
'It was . . . over there, wasn't it?'
'I thought it was that way!'
In the fog, all directions were the same.
'I think . . .' said Colon, slowly, 'that we ort to go and make a report about this as soon as possible.'
'Right,' said Nobby. 'Which way?'
'Let's just run, eh?'

 
Constable Downspout's huge pointy ears quivered as the noise boomed over the city. He turned his head carefully, triangulating for height, direction and distance. And then he remembered it.

 
The cry was heard in the Watch House, but muffled by the fog.
It entered the open head of the golem Dorfl and bounced around inside, echoing down, down among the small cracks in the clay until, at the very edge of perception, little grains danced together.
The sightless sockets stared at the wall. No one heard the cry that came back from the dead skull, because there was no mouth to utter it and not even a mind to guide it, but it screamed out into the night:
CLAY OF MY CLAY, THOU SHALT NOT KILL! THOU SHALT NOT DIE!

 
Samuel Vimes dreamed about Clues.
He had a jaundiced view of Clues. He instinctively distrusted them. They got in the way.
And he distrusted the kind of person who'd take one look at another man and say in a lordly voice to his companion, 'Ah, my dear sir, I can tell you nothing except that he is a left-handed stonemason who has spent some years in the merchant navy and has recently fallen on hard times,' and then unroll a lot of supercilious commentary about calluses and stance and the state of a man's boots, when exactly the same comments could apply to a man who was wearing his old clothes because he'd been doing a spot of home bricklaying for a new barbecue pit, and had been tattooed once when he was drunk and seventeen[14] and in fact got seasick on a wet pavement. What arrogance! What an insult to the rich and chaotic variety of the human experience!
It was the same with more static evidence. The footprints in the flowerbed were probably in the real world left by the window-cleaner. The scream in the night was quite likely a man getting out of bed and stepping sharply on an upturned hairbrush.
The real world was far too real to leave neat little hints. It was full of too many things. It wasn't by eliminating the impossible that you got at the truth, however improbable; it was by the much harder process of eliminating the possibilities. You worked away, patiently asking questions and looking hard at things. You walked and talked, and in your heart you just hoped like hell that some bugger's nerve'd crack and he'd give himself up.
The events of the day clanged together in Vimes's head. Golems tramped like sad shadows. Father Tubelcek waved at him and then his head exploded, showering Vimes in words. Mr Hopkinson lay dead in his own oven, a slice of dwarf bread in his mouth. And the golems marched on, silently. There was Dorfl, dragging its foot, its head open for the words to fly in and out of, like a swarm of bees. And in the middle of it all Arsenic danced, a spiky little green man, crackling and gibbering.
At one point he thought one of the golems screamed.
After that, the dream faded, a bit at a time.
Golems. Oven. Words. Priest. Dorfl. Golems marching, the thudding of their feet making the whole dream pulsate ...
Vimes opened his eyes.
Beside him, Lady Sybil said.'Wsfgl,' and turned over.
Someone was hammering at the front door. Still muzzy, head swimming, Vimes pulled himself up on his elbows and said, to the night-time world in general, 'What sort of a time do you call this?'
'Bingeley bingeley beep!' said a cheerful voice from the direction of Vimes's dressing-table.
'Oh, please
'Twenty-nine minutes and thirty-one seconds past five ay-emm. A Penny Saved is a Penny Earned. Would you like me to present your schedule for today? While I am doing this, why not take some time to fill out your registration card?'
'What? What? What're you talking about?'
The knocking continued.
Vimes fell out of bed and groped in the dark for the matches. He finally got a candle alight and half-ran, half-staggered down the long.stairs and into the hall.
The knocker turned out to be Constable Visit.
'It's Lord Vetinari, sir! It's worse this time!'
'Has anyone sent for Doughnut Jimmy?'
'Yessir!'
At this time of day the fog was fighting a rearguard action against the dawn, and made the whole world look as though it were inside a ping-pong ball.
'I poked my head in as soon as I came on shift and he was out like a light, sir!'
'How did you know he wasn't asleep?'
'On the floor, sir, with all his clothes on?'
A couple of Watchmen had put the Patrician on his bed by the time Vimes arrived, slightly out of breath and with his knees aching. Gods, he thought as he struggled up the stairs, it's not like the old truncheon-and-bell days. You wouldn't think twice about running half-way across the city, coppers and criminals locked in hot pursuit.
With a mixture of pride and shame he added: And none of the buggers ever caught me, either.
The Patrician was still breathing, but his face was waxy and he looked as though death might be an improvement.
Vimes's gaze roamed the room. There was a familiar haze in the air.
'Who opened the window?' he demanded.
'I did, sir,' said Visit. 'Just before I went to get you. He looked as though he needed some fresh air
'It'd be fresher if you left the window shut,' said Vimes. 'Okay, I want everyone, I mean everyone, who was in this place overnight rounded up and down in the hall in two minutes. And someone fetch Corporal Littlebottom. And tell Captain Carrot.'
I'm worried and confused, he thought. So the first rule in the book is to spread it around.
He prowled about the room. It didn't take much intelligence to see that Vetinari had got up and moved over to his writing-desk, where by the look of it he had worked for some time. The candle had burned right down. An inkwell had been overturned, presumably when he'd slipped off the chair. Vimes dipped a finger in the ink and sniffed it. Then he reached for the quill pen beside it, hesitated, took out his dagger, and lifted the long feather gingerly. There seemed to be no cunning little barbs on it, but he put it carefully on one side for Littlebottom to examine later.
He glanced down at the paper Vetinari had been working on.
To his surprise it wasn't writing at all, but a careful drawing. It showed a striding figure, except that the figure was not one person at all but made up of thousands of smaller figures. The effect was like one of the wicker men built by some of the more outlandish tribes near the Hub, when they annually celebrated the great cycle of Nature and their reverence for life by piling as much of it as possible in a great heap and setting fire to it. The composite man was wearing a crown. Vimes pushed the sheet of paper aside and returned his attention to the desk. He brushed the surface carefully for any suspicious splinters. He crouched down and examined the underside.
The light was growing outside. Vimes went into both the rooms alongside and made sure their drapes were open, then went back into Vetinari's room, closed the curtains and the doors, and sidled along the walls looking for any tell-tale speck of light that might indicate a small hole.
Where could you stop? Splinters in the floor? Blowpipes through the keyhole?
He opened the curtains again.
Vetinari had been on the mend yesterday. And now he looked worse. Someone had got to him in the night. How? Slow poison was the devil of a thing. You had to find a way of giving it to the victim every day.
No, you didn't . . . What was elegant was finding a way of getting him to administer it to himself every day.
Vimes rummaged through the paperwork. Vetinari had obviously felt well enough to get up and walk over here, but here was where he had collapsed.
You couldn't poison a splinter or a nail because he wouldn't keep on nicking himself. . .
There was a book half-buried in the papers, but it had a lot of bookmarks in it, mostly torn bits of old letters.
What did he do every day?
Vimes opened the book. Every page was covered with handwritten symbols.
You have to get a poison like arsenic into the body. It isn't enough to touch it. Or is it? Is there a kind of arsenic you can pick up through the skin?
No one was getting in. Vimes was almost certain of that.
The food and drink were probably all right, but he'd get Detritus to go and have another one of his little talks with the cooks in any case.
Something he breathed? How could you keep that up day after day without arousing suspicion somewhere? Anyway, you'd have to get your poison into the room.
Something already in the room? Cheery had a different carpet put down and replaced the bed, What else could you do? Strip the paint from the ceiling?
What had Vetinari told Cheery about poisoning? ' You put it where no one will look at all . . .'
Vimes realized he was still staring at the book. There wasn't anything there that he could recognize. It must be a code of some sort. Knowing Vetinari, it wouldn't be crackable by anyone in a normal frame of mind.
Could you poison a book? But ... so what? There were other books. You'd have to know he'd look at this one, continuously. And even then you'd have to get the poison into him. A man might prick his finger once and after that he'd take care.
It sometimes worried Vimes, the way he suspected everything. If you started wondering whether a man could be poisoned by words, you might as well accuse the wallpaper of driving him mad. Mind you, that horrible green colour would drive anyone insane . . .
'Bingely beepy bleep!'
'Oh, no . . .'
'This is your six ay-emm wake-up call! Good morning!! Here are your appointments for today, Insert Name Here!! Ten ay-emm . . .'
'Shut up! Listen, whatever's in my diary for today is definitely not—'
Vimes stopped. He lowered the box.
He went back to the desk. If you assumed one page per day . . .
Lord Vetinari had a very good memory. But everyone wrote things down, didn't they? You couldn't remember every little thing. Wednesday: 3pm, reign of terror; 3.15pm, clean out scorpion pit ...
He held the organizer up to his lips. Take a memo,' he said.
'Hooray! Go right ahead. Don't forget to say "memo" first!!'
'Speak to ... blast . . . Memo: What about Vetinari's journal?'
'Is that it?'
'Yes.'
Someone knocked politely at the door. Vimes opened it carefully. 'Oh, it's you, Littlebottom.'
Vimes blinked. Something wasn't right about the dwarf.
‘I’ll mix up some of Mr Doughnut's jollop right away, sir.' The dwarf looked past Vimes to the bed. 'Ooo ... he doesn't look good, does he ... ?'
'Get someone to move him into a different bedroom,' said Vimes. 'Get the servants to prepare a new room, right?'
'Yes, sir.'
'And, after they've done it, pick a different room at random and move him into it. And change everything, understand? Every stick of furniture, every vase, every rug—'
'Er... yes, sir.'
Vimes hesitated. Now he could put his finger on what had been bothering him for the last twenty seconds.
'Littlebottom
'Sir?'
'You ... er ... you ... on your ears?'
'Earrings, sir,' said Cheery nervously. 'Constable Angua gave them to me.'
'Really? Er ... right ... I didn't think dwarfs wore jewellery, that's all.'
'We're known for rings, sir.'
'Yes, of course.' Rings, yes. No one quite like a dwarf for forging a magical ring. But. . . magical earrings? Oh, well. There were some waters too deep to wade.