am occasionally capable of governing this city for minutes at a time without seeking your advice and guidance.’
*
‘My mum’s uncle was a sailor,’ said Nobby. ‘But after the big plague he got press-ganged. Bunch of farmers got him drunk, he woke up next morning tied to a plough.’
*
Sergeant Colon had had a broad education. He’d been to the School of My Dad Always Said, the College of It Stands to Reason, and was now a postgraduate student at the University of What Some Bloke In the Pub Told Me.
*
Technically they were all in uniform, too, except that mostly they weren’t wearing the same uniform as anyone else. Everyone had just been sent down to the armoury to collect whatever fitted, and the result was a walking historical exhibit: Funny-Shaped Helmets Through the Ages.
*
‘Dad?’
‘Yes, lad?’
‘Who was Mr Hong?’
‘How should I know?’
‘Only, when we was all heading back for the boats one of the other men said, “We all know what happened to Mr Hong when he opened the Three Jolly Luck Take-Away Fish Bar on the site of the old fish-god temple in Dagon Street on the night of the full moon, don’t we … ?” Well, I don’t know.’
‘Ah …’ Solid Jackson hesitated. Still, Les was a big lad now …
‘He … closed up and left in a bit of a hurry, lad. So quick he had to leave some things behind.’
‘Like what?’
‘If you must know … half an ear-hole and one kidney’
*
A few moments later Sergeant Colon walked carefully down to the main office. He toyed with some paper for a while and then said:
‘You don’t mind what people call you, do you, Nobby?’
‘I’d be minding the whole time if I minded that, sarge,’ said Corporal Nobbs cheerfully.
‘Right. Right! And I don’t mind what people call me, neither’ Colon scratched his head. ‘Don’t make sense, really. I reckon Sir Sam is missing too much sleep.’
‘He’s a very busy man, Fred.’
‘Trying to do everything, that’s his trouble. And … Nobby?’
‘Yes?’
‘It’s Sergeant Colon, thanks.’
*
There was sherry. There was always sherry at these occasions. Sam Vimes had heard they made sherry by letting wine go rotten. He couldn’t see the point of sherry.
*
Vimes stood up. ‘You know what I always say’ he said.
Carrot removed his helmet and polished it with his sleeve. Yes, sir.
“Everyone’s guilty of something, especially the ones that aren’t,” sir’
‘No, not that one …’
‘Er … “Always take into consideration the fact that you might be dead wrong,” sir?’
‘No, nor that one either’
‘Er … “How come Nobby ever got a job as a watchman?”, sir? You say that a lot.’
‘No! I meant “Always act stupid,” Carrot.’
‘Ah, right, sir. From now on I shall remember that you always said that, sir’
*
‘Colon and Nobbs are investigating this?’ said the Patrician. ‘Really?’
‘Yes, sir’
‘If I were to ask you why, you’d pretend not to understand?’
Vimes let his forehead wrinkle in honest perplexity. ‘Sir?’
‘If you say “Sir?” again in that stupid voice, Vimes, I swear there will be trouble.’
‘They’re good men, sir’
‘However, some people might consider them to be unimaginative, stolid and … how can I put this? … possessed of an inbuilt disposition to accept the first explanation that presents itself and then bunk off somewhere for a quiet smoke? A certain lack of imagination? An ability to get out of their depth on a wet pavement?’
*
Vetinari peered at a small heap of bent and twisted metal.
‘What was it, Leonard?’ he said.
‘An experimental device for turning chemical energy into rotary motion,’ said Leonard. ‘The problem, you see, is getting the little pellets of black powder into the combustion chamber at exactly the right speed and one at a time. If two ignite together, well, what we have is the external combustion engine.’
‘And, er, what would be the purpose of it?’ said the Patrician.
‘I believe it could replace the horse,’ said Leonard proudly.
They looked at the stricken thing.
‘One of the advantages of horses that people often point out,’ said Vetinari, after some thought, ‘is that they very seldom explode.’
*
Leonard’s incredible brain sizzled away alarmingly, an overloaded chip pan on the Stove of Life. It was impossible to know what he would think of next, because he was constantly reprogrammed by the whole universe. The sight of a waterfall or a soaring bird would send him spinning down some new path of practical speculation that invariably ended in a heap of wire and springs and a cry of ‘I think I know what I did wrong.’ He’d been a member of most of the craft guilds