The chant hadn’t worked. An old lady had given him a penny.
‘Colon, Colon, Colon! Out! Out! Out!’ shouted Reg Shoe happily, waving his placard.
‘That doesn’t sound right, Reg,’ said Nobby. ‘Sounds like surgery.’
He looked at the other placards. Dorfl was holding a large, closely worded text, detailing their grievances in full, with references to Watch procedures and citing a number of philosophical texts. Constable Visit’s sandwich-board, on the other hand, proclaimed: ‘What Profiteth it a Kingdom if the Oxen be Deflated? Riddles 11, v3.’
Somehow, these cogent arguments did not seem to be bringing the city to its knees.
He turned at the sound of a coach pulling up and looked up at a door which had a crest consisting mainly of-a black shield. And above that, looking out of the window, was the face of Lord Vetinari.
‘Ah, none other than Corporal Nobbs,’ said Lord Vetinari.
At this point Nobby would have given quite a lot to be anyone other than Corporal Nobbs.
He wasn’t sure whether, as a striker, he should salute. He saluted anyway, on the basis that a salute was seldom out of place.
‘I gather you have withdrawn your labour,’ Lord Vetinari went on. ‘In your case, I am sure this presented a good deal of difficulty.’
Nobby wasn’t certain about that sentence, but the Patrician seemed quite amiable.
‘Can’t stand by when the security of the city’s concerned, sir,’ he said, oozing affronted loyalty from every unblocked pore.
Lord Vetinari paused long enough for the peaceful, everyday sounds of a city apparently on the brink of catastrophe to filter into Nobby’s consciousness.
‘Well, of course I wouldn’t dream of interfering,’ he said at last. ‘This is Guild business. I’m sure his grace will understand fully when he returns.’ He banged on the side of the coach. ‘Drive on.’
And the coach was gone.
A thought that had been nudging Nobby for some time chose this moment to besiege him once again.
Mister Vimes is going to go spare. He’s going to go mental.
Lord Vetinari sat back in his seat, smiling to himself.
‘Er, did you mean that, sir?’ said the clerk Drumknott, who was sitting opposite.
‘Certainly. Make a note to have the kitchen send them down cocoa and buns around three o’clock. Anonymously, of course. It’s been a crime-free day, Drurnknott. Very unusual. Even the Thieves’ Guild is lying low.’
‘Yes, my lord. I can’t imagine why. When the cat’s away…’
‘Yes, Drumknott, but mice are happily unencumbered by apprehensions of the future. Humans, on the other hand, are. And they know that Vimes is going to be back in a week or so, Drumknott. And Vimes will not be happy. Indeed, he will not. And when a commander of the Watch is unhappy, he tends to spread it around with a big shovel.’
He smiled again. ‘This is the time for sensible men to be honest, Drumknott. I only hope Colon is stupid enough to let it continue.’
The snow fell faster.
‘How beautiful the snow is, sisters …’
Three women sat at the window of their lonely house, looking out at the white Uberwald winter.
‘And how cold the vind is,’ said the second sister.
The third sister, who was the youngest, sighed. ‘Why do we always talk about the weather?’
‘What else is there?’
‘Well, it’s either freezing cold or baking. I mean, that’s it, really.’
‘That is how things are in Mother Uberwald,’ said the oldest sister, slowly and sternly. ‘The vind and the snow and the boiling heat of summer …’
‘You know, I bet if we cut down the cherry orchard we could put in a roller-skating rink-‘
No.
‘How about a conservatory? We could grow pineapples.’
No.
‘If we moved to Bonk we could get a big apartment for the cost of this place-‘
‘This is our home, Irina,’ said the oldest sister. ‘Ah, a home of lost illusions and thwarted hopes …’
‘We could go out dancing and everything.’
‘I remember when we lived in Bonk,’ said the middle sister dreamily. ‘Things vere better then.’
‘Things vere alvays better then,’ said the oldest sister.
The youngest sister sighed and looked out of the window. She gasped. ‘There’s a man running through the cherry orchard!’
‘A man? Vot could he possibly vant?’
The youngest sister strained to see. ‘It looks like he wants … a pair of trousers …’
‘Ah,’ said the middle sister dreamily. ‘Trousers ver better then.’
The hurrying pack stopped in a chilly blue valley when the howling filled the air. Angua loped back to the sledge, lifted out her bag of clothes with her jaws, glanced at Carrot and disappeared among the drifts. A few moments later she walked back again, doing up her shirt.
‘Wolfgang’s got some .poor devil playing the game,’ she said. ‘I’m going to put a stop to it. It
was bad enough that Father kept the tradition going, but at least he played fair. Wolfgang cheats. They never win.’
‘Is this the game you told me about?’
‘That’s right. But Father played by the rules. If the runner was bright and nimble he got four hundred crowns and Father had him to dinner at the castle.’
‘If he lost, then your father had him for dinner out in the woods.’
‘Thank you for reminding me.’
‘I was trying not to be nice.’
‘You may have an undiscovered natural talent,’ said Angua. ‘But no one had to run, is my point. I won’t apologize. I’ve been a copper in AnkhMorpork, remember. City motto: You May Not Get Killed.’
‘Actually, it’s-‘
‘Carrot! I know. And our family motto is Homo Homini Lupus. “A man is a wolf to other men”! How stupid. Do you think they mean that men are shy and retiring and loyal and kill only to eat? Of course not! They mean that men act like men towards other men, and the worse they are the more they think they’d really like being wolves! Humans hate werewolves because they see the wolf in us, but wolves hate us because they see the human inside – and I don’t blame them!’
Vimes veered away from the farmhouse and sprinted towards the nearby barn. There had to be something in there. Even a couple of sacks would do. The chafing qualities of frozen
underwear can be seriously underestimated.
He’d been running for half an hour. Well, for twenty-five minutes, really. The other five had been spent limping, wheezing, clutching at his chest and wondering how you knew if you were having a heart attack.
The inside of the barn was … barn-like. There were stacks of hay, dusty farm implements … and a couple of threadbare sacks hanging on a nail. He snatched one, gratefully.
Behind him the door creaked open. He spun round, clutching the sack to him, and saw three very sombrely dressed women watching him carefully. One of them was holding a kitchen knife in a trembling hand,
‘Have you come here to ravish us?’ she said.
‘Madam! I’m being pursued by werewolves!’
The three looked at one another. To Vimes the sack suddenly seemed far too small.
‘Er, vill that take you all day?’ said one of the women.
Vimes held the sack more tightly. ‘Ladies! Please! I need trousers!’
‘Ve can see that.’
‘And a weapon, and boots if you’ve got them! Please?’
They went into another huddle.
‘We have the gloomy and purposeless trousers of Uncle Vanya,’ said one, doubtfully.
‘He seldom wore them,’ said another.
‘And I have an axe in my linen cupboard,’ said the youngest. She looked guiltily at the other two. ‘Look, just in case I ever needed it, all right? I wasn’t going to chop anything down.’
‘I would be so grateful,’ said Vimes. He took in the good but old clothes, the faded gentility, and played the only card in his hand. ‘I am His Grace the Duke of Ankh, although I appreciate this fact is not evident at the-‘
There was a three-fold sigh.
‘AnkhMorpork!’
‘You haf a magnificent opera house and many fine galleries.’
‘Such vonderful avenues!’
‘A veritable heaven of culture and sophistication and unattached men of quality!’
‘Er, I said AnkhMorpork,’ said Vimes. ‘With an A and an M.’
‘Ve have always dreamed of going there.’
‘I’ll have three coach tickets sent along immediately I get home,’ said Vimes, his mind’s ear hearing the crunch of speeding paws over snow. ‘But, dear ladies, if you could fetch me those things-‘
They hurried away, but the youngest lingered by the door.
‘Do you have long cold winters in AnkhMorpork?’ she said.
‘Just muck and slush, usually.’
‘Any cherry orchards?’
‘I don’t think we have any, I’m afraid.’
She punched the air. ‘Yesss!’
A few minutes later Vimes was alone in the barn, wearing a pair of ancient black trousers that he’d tied at the waist with rope, and holding an axe that was surprisingly sharp.
He had five minutes, perhaps. Wolves probably didn’t stop to worry about heart attacks.