Terry Pratchett: Feet of Clay

There had been a time, and it seemed like only yesterday, when the Watch House had been almost empty. There'd be old Sergeant Colon dozing in his chair, and Corporal Nobbs's washing drying in front of the stove. And then suddenly it had all changed...

Sergeant Colon was waiting for him with a clipboard. 'Got the reports from the other Watch Houses, sir,' he said, trotting along beside Vimes.

'Anything special?'

'Bin a bit of an odd murder, sir. Down in one of them old houses on Misbegot Bridge. Some old priest. Dunno much about it. The patrol just said it ought to be looked at.'

'Who found him?'

'Constable Visit sir.'

'Oh, gods.'

'Yessir.'

‘I'll try to get along there this morning. Anything else?'

'Corporal Nobbs is sick, sir,'

'Oh, I know that.'

'I mean off sick, sir.'

'Not his granny's funeral this time?'

'Nossir.'

'How many's he had this year, by the way?'

'Seven, sir.'

'Very odd family, the Nobbses.'

'Yessir.'

'Fred, you don't have to keep calling me sir .'

'Got comp'ny, sir,' said the sergeant, glancing meaningfully towards a bench in the main office. 'Come for that alchemy job.'

A dwarf smiled nervously at Vimes.

'All right,' said Vimes. ‘I'll see him in my office.' He reached into his coat and took out the assassin's money pouch. 'Put it in the Widows and Orphans Fund, will you, Fred?'

'Right. Oh, well done, sir. Any more windfalls like this and we'll soon be able to afford some more widows.'

Sergeant Colon went back to his desk, surreptitiously opened his drawer and pulled out the book he was reading. It was called Animal Husbandry. He'd been a bit worried about the title - you heard stories about strange folk in the country — but it turned out to be nothing more than a book about how cattle and pigs and sheep should breed.

Now he was wondering where to get a book that taught them how to read.

Upstairs, Vimes pushed open his office door carefully. The Assassins' Guild played to rules. You could say that about the bastards. It was terribly bad form to kill a bystander. Apart from anything else, you wouldn't get paid. So traps in his office were out of the question, because too many people were in and out of it every day. Even so, it paid to be careful. Vimes was good at making the kind of rich enemies who could afford to employ assassins. The assassins had to be lucky only once, but Vimes had to be lucky all the time.

He slipped into the room and glanced out of the window. He liked to work with it open, even in cold weather. He liked to hear the sounds of the city. But anyone trying to climb up or down to it would run into everything in the way of loose tiles, shifting handholds and treacherous drainpipes that Vimes's ingenuity could contrive. And Vimes had installed spiked railings down below. They were nice and ornamental but they were, above all, spiky.

So far, Vimes was winning.

There was a tentative knock at the door.

It had issued from the knuckles of the dwarf applicant. Vimes ushered him into the office, shut the door, and sat down at his desk.

'So,' he said. 'You're an alchemist. Acid stains on your hands and no eyebrows.'

'That's right, sir.'

'Not usual to find a dwarf in that line of work. You people always seem to toil in your uncle's foundry or something.'

You people, the dwarf noted. 'Can't get the hang of metal,' he said.

'A dwarf who can't get the hang of metal? That must be unique.'

'Pretty rare, sir. But I was quite good at alchemy.'

'Guild member?'

'Not any more, sir.'

'Oh? How did you leave the guild?' 'Through the roof, sir. But I'm pretty certain I know what I did wrong.'

Vimes leaned back. The alchemists are always blowing things up. I never heard of them getting sacked for it.'

'That's because no one's ever blown up the Guild Council, sir.' 'What, all of it?'

'Most of it, sir. All the easily detachable bits, at least.'

Vimes found he was automatically opening the bottom drawer of his desk. He pushed it shut again and, instead, shuffled the papers in front of him. 'What's your name, lad?'

The dwarf swallowed. This was clearly the bit he'd been dreading. 'Littlebottom, sir.' Vimes didn't even look up. 'Ah, yes. It says here. That means you're from the Uberwald mountain area, yes?'

'Why... yes, sir,' said Littlebottom, mildly surprised. Humans generally couldn't distinguish between dwarf clans.

'Our Constable Angua comes from there,' said Vimes. 'Now... it says here your first name is... can't read Fred's handwriting... er...'

There was nothing for it. 'Cheery, sir,' said Cheery Littlebottom.

'Cheery, eh? Good to see the old naming traditions kept up. Cheery Littlebottom. Fine.'

Littlebottom watched carefully. Not the faintest glimmer of amusement had crossed Vimes's face.

'Yes, sir. Cheery Littlebottom,' he said. And there still wasn't as much as an extra wrinkle there. 'My father was Jolly. Jolly Littlebottom,' he added, as one might prod at a bad tooth to see when the pain will come.

'Really?'

'And... his father was Beaky Littlebottom.'

Not a trace, not a smidgeon of a grin twitched anywhere. Vimes merely pushed the paper aside.

'Well, we work for a living here, Littlebottom.'

'Yes, sir.'

'We don't blow things up, Littlebottom.'

'No, sir. I don't blow everything up, sir, Somejust melts.'

Vimes drummed his fingers on the desk. 'Know anything about dead bodies?'

'They were only mildly concussed, sir.'

Vimes sighed. 'Listen. I know about how to be a copper. Itxs mainly walking and talking. But there's lots of things I don't know. You find the scene of a crime and there's some grey powder on the floor. What is it? I don't know. But you fellows know how to mix things up in bowls and can find out. And maybe the dead person doesn't seem to have a mark on them. Were they poisoned? It seems we need someone who knows what colour a liver is supposed to be. I want someone who can look at the ashtray and tell me what kind of cigars I smoke.'

'Pantweed's Slim Panatellas,' said Littlebottom automatically.

'Good gods!'

'You've left the packet on the table, sir.'

Vimes looked down. 'All right,' he said. 'So sometimes it's an easy answer. But sometimes it isn't. Sometimes we don't even know if it was the right question.'

He stood up. 'I can't say I like dwarfs much, Littlebottom. But I don't like trolls or humans either, so I suppose that's okay. Well, you're the only applicant. Thirty dollars a month, five dollars living-out allowance, I expect you to work to the job not the clock, there's some mythical creature called overtime , only no one's even seen its footprints, if troll officers call you a gritsucker they're out, and if you call them rocks you're out, we're just one big family and, when you've been to a few domestic disputes, Littlebottom, I can assure you that you'll see the resemblance, we work as a team and we're pretty much making it up as we go along, and half the time we're not even certain what the law is, so it can get interesting, technically you'll rank as a corporal, only don't go giving orders to real policemen, you're on a month's trial, we'll give you some training just as soon as there's time, now, find an iconograph and meet me on Misbegot Bridge in... damn... better make it an hour. I've got to see about this blasted coat of arms. Still, dead bodies seldom get deader. Sergeant Detritus!'

There was a series of creaks as something heavy moved along the corridor outside and a troll opened the door.

'Yessir?'

'This is Corporal Littlebottom. Corporal Cheery Littlebottom, whose father was Jolly Littlebottom.

Give him his badge, swear him in, show him where everything is. Very good, Corporal?'

'I shall try to be a credit to the uniform, sir,' said Littlebottom.