‘Right! That’s how good it is!’
‘It looks… very nice,’ said Sam weakly.
‘You’ll have to excuse the lanceconstable, Mr Dibbler,’ said Vimes. The poor lad was brought up not to eat stew that winks at him.’
He sat down with his bowl and his back against the wall and looked up at the barricade. People had been busy. In truth, there wasn’t much else to do. The one here, from side to side of Heroes Street, was fourteen feet high and even had a crude
-302-
walkway. It looked businesslike.
He leaned back and shut his eyes.
There was a hesitant slurping sound beside him as young Sam tried the stew, and then: ‘Is it going to come down to fighting, sarge?’
‘Yes,’ said Vimes, without opening his eyes.
‘Like, really fighting?’
‘Yep.’
‘But won’t there be some talking first?’
‘Nope,’ said Vimes, trying to make himself comfortable.
‘Maybe some talking afterwards.’
‘Seems the wrong way round!’
‘Yes, lad, but it’s a tried and tested method.’
There was no further comment. Slowly, with the sounds of the street in his ears, Vimes slid into sleep.
Major Mountjoy-Standfast knew what would happen if he
sent a message to the palace. ‘What do I do now, sir?’ was not something his lordship wanted to hear. It was not the sort of question a major was supposed to ask, given that the original orders had been very clear. Barricades were to be torn down, rebels were to be repelled. Grasp the nettle firmly and all that.
He had, as a child, grasped nettles firmly, and had sometimes had a hand the size of a small pig.
There were deserters behind the barricade. Deserters! How did that happen?
It was a huge barricade, it was lined with armed men, there were deserters on it, and he had his orders. It was all clear.
If only they’d, well, rebel. He’d sent Trooper Gabitass down there again, and by his account it seemed very peaceful. Normal city life appeared to be going on behind the barricade, which was more than you could say for the chaos outside it. If they’d
-303-
fired on Gabitass, or thrown things, that would have made it so much easier. Instead they were acting… well… decently. That was no way for enemies of the state to behave!
An enemy of the state was in front of the major now. Gabitass had not come back emptyhanded.
‘Caught it sneakin’ after me,’ he said. To the captive he said,
‘Been behind the barricade, haven’t we, my lad!’
‘Can it speak?’ said the major, staring at the thing.
‘There’s no need to be like that,’ said Nobby Nobbs.
‘It’s a street urchin, sir,’ said the trooper.
The major stared at all he could see of the prisoner, which was an oversized helmet and a nose.
‘Get it something to stand on, will you, captain?’ he said, and waited while a stool was found. It did not, all things considered, improve matters. It just gave rise to questions.
‘It’s got a Watch badge, trooper. Is it some kind of mascot?’
‘Carved it meself out of soap,’ said Nobby. ‘So I can be a copper.’
‘Why?’ said the major. There was something about the
apparition that, despite the urgency, called for a kind of horrified yet fascinated study.
‘But I’in thinking of going for a soldier if I grow up,’ Nobby went on, giving the major a happy grin. ‘Much better pickin’s, the way things are going.’
‘I’in afraid you’re not tall enough,’ said the major quickly.
‘Don’t see why not, the enemy reaches all the way to the ground,’ said Nobby. ‘Anyway, people’re lyin’ down when you get their boots off. Ol’ Sconner, he says the money’s in teeth and earrings but I say every man’s bound to have a pair of boots, right? Whereas there’s a lot of bad teeth around these days and the falseteeth makers always demand a decent set-‘
-304-
‘Do you mean to tell me that you want to join the army just to loot the battlefields?’ said the major, completely shocked. ‘A little… lad like you?’
‘Once when ol’ Sconner was sober for two days together he made me a little set of soldiers,’ said Nobby. ‘An’ they had these little boots that you could-‘
‘Shut up,’ said the major.
‘take off, and tiny tiny little wooden teeth that you could-‘
‘Will you shut up!’ said the major. ‘Have you no interest in honour? Glory? Love of city?’
‘Dunno. Can you get much for ’em?’ said Nobby.
‘They are priceless!’
‘Oh, well, in that case I’ll stick with the boots, if it’s all the same to you,’ said Nobby. ‘You can sell them for ten pence a pair if you know the right shop-‘
‘Look at Trooper Gabitass there!’ said the major, now quite upset. ‘Twenty years’ service, a fine figure of a soldier! He wouldn’t stoop to stealing the boots of a fallen enemy, would you, trooper?’
‘No, sir! Mug’s game, sir!’ said Trooper Gabitass.*
* And this was true. Don’t bother with the boots, would have been Trooper Gabitass’s advice, had he been inclined to part with it. You need to bribe someone on the baggage carts to build up stock and when all’s said and done you’ll only make a few dollars. Stick to jewellery. It’s portable. Trooper Gabitass had seen too many battlefields up close to use the word ‘glory’
without wincing.
‘Er… yes. Right!’ said the major. ‘You could learn a lot from men like Trooper Gabitass, young man. By the sound of it, your time with the rebels has filled your head with very wrong ideas indeed.’
‘I ain’t a rebel!’ Nobby shouted. ‘Don’t you go calling me a
-305-
rebel, I ain’t a rebel, I’in an Ankh-Morpork lad, I am, and proud of it! Hah, you are wrong, I’ve never been a rebel and you’re cruel to say so! I’in an honest lad, I am!’
Big tears began to run down his cheeks, washing aside the grime to reveal the lower strata of grime beneath.
The major had no experience of this sort of thing. Every available orifice on the little lad’s face seemed to be gushing. He looked for help to Gabitass.
‘You’re a married man, aren’t you, trooper? What are we supposed to do now?’
‘I could give him a clout alongside the ear, sir,’ said Trooper Gabitass.
‘That’s very unfeeling, trooper! Look here, I had a
handkerchief on me somewhere…’
‘Huh, I have my own wiper, thank you very much, I don’t have to be condescended at,’ sniffed Nobby, and pulled one out of his pocket. In fact, he pulled several dozen, including one with the initials C. M.-S. on it. They were tangled together like a conjuror’s flagsofallnations, and dragged with them several purses and half a dozen spoons.
Nobby wiped his face with the first one, and thrust the entire collection back into his pocket. At this point he realized that all the men were staring at him.
‘What? What?’ he said defiantly.
‘Tell us about this man Keel,’ said the major.
‘I don’t know nuffin’,’ said Nobby automatically.
‘Aha, that means you do know something,’ said the major, who was indeed the sort of person who liked this kind of little triumph.
Nobby looked blank. The captain leaned forward to whisper to his superior officer.
‘Er, only under the rules of mathematics, sir,’ he said. ‘Under
-306-
the rules of common grammar, he is merely being emphat-‘
‘Tell us about Keel!’ the major shouted.
‘Tell you what, major, why not leave that sort of thing to the experts?’ said a voice.
The major looked up. Carcer and his men had entered the tent.
The sergeant was grinning again.
‘Got yourself a little prisoner, have you?’ he said, stepping forward to examine Nobby. ‘Reckon you’ve got a ringleader here, yeah. Told you anything, has he? I shouldn’t think so. You need special training to get the best out of lads like this, haha.’
He slipped his hand into his pocket. When it came out, the knuckles were ringed with brass.
‘Now then, lad,’ he said, as the soldiers watched in horror, ‘you know who I am, do you? I’in in the Particulars, me. And I can see two of you. One of them’s a lively lad who’s going to help the proper authorities with their business and the other is a lippy little bugger who’s going to try to be clever. One of these lads has a future, and all his teeth. Now the funny thing about me, it’s a little habit of mine, is that I never ask a question twice. So…
you’re not a criminal, are you?’
Nobby, his eyes huge and fixed on the brass knuckles, shook his head.
‘You just do what you have to to survive, right?’
Nobby nodded.
‘In fact you were probably a decent lad before you fell in with the rebels, I expect. Sang hymns and that.’
Nobby nodded.