Doesn't he ever sleep? thought Vimes. Doesn't the bloody man ever get his head down? Isn't there a room somewhere with a black dressing gown hanging on the door?
He knocked on the door of the Oblong Office.
'Ah, captain,' said the Patrician, looking up from his paperwork. 'You were commendably quick.'
'Was I?'
'You got my message?' said Lord Vetinari.
'No, sir. I've been … occupied.'
'Indeed. And what could occupy you?'
'Someone has killed Mr Hammerhock, sir. A big man in the dwarf community. He's been … shot with something, some kind of siege weapon or something, and dumped in the river. We've just fished him out. I was on the way to tell his wife. I think he lives in Treacle Street. And then I thought, since I was passing …'
'This is very unfortunate.'
'Certainly it was for Mr Hammerhock,' said Vimes.
The Patrician leaned back and stared at Vimes.
'Tell me,' he said, 'how was he killed?'
'I don't know. I've never seen anything like it … there was just a great big hole. But I'm going to find out what it was.'
'Hmm. Did I mention that Dr Cruces came to see me this morning?'
'No, sir.'
'He was very … concerned.'
'Yes, sir.'
'I think you upset him.'
'Sir?'
The Patrician seemed to be reaching a decision. His chair thumped forward.
'Captain Vimes—'
'Sir?'
'I know that you are retiring the day after tomorrow and feel, therefore, a little … restless. But while you are captain of the Night Watch I am asking you to follow two very specific instructions …'
'Sir?'
'You will cease any investigations connected with this theft from the Assassins' Guild. Do you understand? It is entirely Guild business.'
'Sir.' Vimes kept his face carefully immobile.
'I'm choosing to believe that the unspoken word in that sentence was a yes, captain.'
'Sir.'
'And that one, too. As for the matter of the unfortunate Mr Hammerhock … The body was discovered just a short while ago?'
'Yes, sir.'
'Then it's out of your jurisdiction, captain.'
'What? Sir?'
'The Day Watch can deal with it.'
'But we've never bothered with that hours-of-daylight jurisdiction stuff!'
'Nevertheless, in the current circumstances I shall instruct Captain Quirke to take over the investigation, if it turns out that one is necessary.'
If one is necessary. If people don't end up with half their
chest gone by accident. Meteorite strike, perhaps, thought Vimes.
He took a deep breath and leaned on the Patrician's desk.
'Mayonnaise Quirke couldn't find his arse with an atlas! And he's got no idea about how to talk to dwarfs! He calls them gritsuckers! My men found the body! It's my jurisdiction!'
The Patrician glanced at Vimes' hands. Vimes removed them from the desk as if it had suddenly grown red-hot.
'Night Watch. That's what you are, captain. Your writ runs in the hours of darkness.'
'It's dwarfs we're talking about! If we don't get it right, they'll take the law into their own hands! That usually means chopping the head off the nearest troll! And you'll put Quirke on this?'
'I've given you an order, captain.'
'But—'
'You may go.'
'You can't—'
'I said you may go, Captain Vimes!'
'Sir.'
Vimes saluted. Then he turned about, and marched out of the room. He closed the door carefully, so that there was barely a click.
The Patrician heard him thump the wall outside. Vimes wasn't aware, but there were a number of barely perceptible dents in the wall outside the Oblong Office, their depths corresponding to his emotional state at the time.
By the sound of it, this one would need the services of a plasterer.
Lord Vetinari permitted himself a smile, although there was no humour in it.
The city operated. It was a self-regulating college of Guilds linked by the inexorable laws of mutual self-interest, and it worked. On average. By and large. Overall. Normally.
The last thing you needed was some Watchman blundering around upsetting things, like a loose … a loose … a loose siege catapult.
Normally.
Vimes seemed in a suitable emotional state. Wit…
