Snuff

by Terry Pratchett

  Vimes cleared his throat and said gloomily, “I don’t suppose you have any muesli, do you?” After all, Sybil was only twenty minutes away.

  The steward looked puzzled. “Well, yes, we would have the ingredients, of course, but I didn’t peg you as a rabbit food man?”

  Vimes thought about Sybil again. “Well, perhaps today my little nose is twitching.”

  Luxurious though the cabin was, roomy it was not. Vimes managed to shave with a razor donated by the steward, “with the compliments of the captain, commander,” and a thoughtfully placed basin, soap, flannel and minute towel, which at least helped him to deal with the form of ablution his old mother had called “washing the bits that showed.” He paid attention to them, nevertheless, taking some pains in the knowledge that this little wooden world would evaporate very soon and he would be back in the world of Sam Vimes, husband and father. Periodically, however, as he made himself respectable, he turned back to himself in the shaving mirror and said, “Fred Colon!”

  The luxury cabin had turned out to be wonderful to sleep in, although so small that in reality it would only be suitable for a fastidious corpse. But eventually, when every part of Vimes he could reach had been decently, if erratically, scrubbed and the steward had brought him a hermit-sized portion of fruits and nuts and grains, he looked around to see what he might have left behind and saw a face in the shaving mirror. It was his own, although it must be said the phenomenon is not unusual in shaving mirrors. The Vimes in the mirror said, You know he doesn’t just want to kill you. That wouldn’t be good enough for a bastard like that, not by a long way. He wants to destroy you and will try everything until he does.

  “I know,” said Vimes, and added, “You’re not a demon, are you?”

  “Absolutely not,” said his mirror image. “I might be made up of your subconscious mind and a momentary case of muesli poisoning occasioned by a fermenting raisin. Watch where you walk, commander. Watch everywhere.” And then it was gone.

  Vimes stepped away from the mirror and turned around slowly. It must have been my face, he said to himself, otherwise it would have been the other way round, wouldn’t it?

  He walked down the gangway into reality and what turned out to be Corporal Nobby Nobbs, beyond whom reality does not get much more real.

  “Good to see you, Mr. Vimes! My word, you’re looking fit! Your holiday must be doing you a lot of good. Got any bags?” This was asked in the absolute certainty that Vimes would have no bags, but a show of willing is always worth a try.

  “Is everything all right?” said Vimes, ignoring this.

  Nobby scratched his nose and a bit fell off. Oh yes, thought Vimes, I’m back, all right!

  “Well, the usual stuff that happens is happening, but we’re on top of it. Could I draw your attention to the hill over there? They were very careful not to harm the trees, and Lady Sybil herself promised a lingering death to anyone who upset the goblins.”

  Mystified, Vimes scanned the skyline and saw Hangman’s Hill. “Hells bells! It’s a clacks tower, it’s a bloody clacks tower! Sybil will go totally librarian about it!”

  “As a matter of fact, Mr. Vimes, Lady Sybil was all for it by the time she’d read all of Captain Carrot’s note. He said this was no time for you to be out of touch. You know that, sir, very persuasive officer, which is how come he got the clacks company to rush up here toot sweet with a temporary tower. Worked all night, so they did, and got it lined up on the Grand Trunk sweet as a nut!”

  This time Nobby picked his nose, briefly inspected the contents for interest or value, then flicked them away and went on, “Only one thing, sir, the Ankh-Morpork Times wants to interview you about how you are a great hero what saved someone’s wonderful fanny—”

  There was a pause while they waited for Feeney to stop choking with laughter and get his breath back and then Vimes said, “Corporal Nobby Nobbs, this here is Chief Constable Upshot. I call him chief constable because he’s the only law in these parts, that is until now. This is his patch, and so you will respect it, okay? Who else came with you from the Smoke?”

  “Sergeant Detritus, Mr. Vimes, but he’s up at the Hall, guarding her ladyship and Young Sam with delicate surreptition.”

  A part of Vimes had unknowingly been holding its breath. Detritus and Willikins? Together they could face an army. He shook himself. “But not Fred Colon?”

  “No, Mr. Vimes, as I understand it we were on our way when the second clacks came through, but I reckon that he’ll be here pretty soon.”

  “Gentlemen, I’m going home,” said Vimes, “but, Mr. Feeney, how soon will another boat go down to Quirm?”

  Feeney beamed. “You’re in luck, commander. The Roberta E. Biscuit will be going tomorrow morning! Just the job for what I think you might want. Big and slow, but you won’t mind that, because there’s gambling and entertainment. Lots of tourists on it, but don’t you worry, sir, your name is big on the river already. Trust me! Say the word and the captain of the Biscuit will make certain that there’s a king-size, I mean, sorry, commander-size stateroom for you, how about that?”

  Vimes opened his mouth to ask, is it expensive? And shut it again with the embarrassed realization that the Ramkin fortune could almost certainly buy every vessel on Old Treachery.

  Feeney, like the good copper he was becoming, noticed that slight moment of hesitation and said, “Your money won’t be good on the river, commander, believe me. The savior of the Fanny won’t have to buy his own cigars or a stateroom anywhere along Old Treachery!”

  Nobby Nobbs was almost bent double with laughter and managed to choke out, “The Fanny!”

  Vimes sighed. “Nobby, her name was Francesca, Fanny for short. Understand?” It didn’t work with some people; it only just did with Vimes. “And, Nobby, I want you to wait here, and as soon as Fred’s coach arrives you’re in charge of getting him up to the goblin cave on the hill, okay?”

  “Yes, Mr. Vimes,” said Nobby, looking at his boots.

  “And, Nobby, if you see a goblin who stinks like a latrine and glows slightly blue, well, that’s a fellow copper and don’t you forget it.”

  Sybil was halfway down the lane as Vimes quickly walked up it, and Young Sam was running ahead and cannoned into his father’s legs, throwing his arms around them as best he could.

  “Dad! I know how to milk a goat, Dad! You have to pull its tits, Dad, they’re all wiggly!” Vimes’s expression did not change as Young Sam went on. “And I’m learning to make cheese! And I have some badger poo now, and some weasel poo, too!”

  “My word, you have been busy,” said Vimes. “Who told you the word ‘tits,’ lad?”

  Young Sam beamed. “That was Willy the cowherd, Dad.”

  Vimes nodded. “I’ll have a little talk to you about that later, Sam, but first I think I’ll have a word with Willy the cowherd.” He lifted up Young Sam, ignoring a twinge in his back. “I hope that washing your hands played a part in these adventures?”

  “I take care of that,” said Lady Sybil, catching up. “Honestly, Sam, I let you out of my sight for hardly any time at all and here you are a hero, again! Really! Honestly, the whole river is talking about it! Fights on a riverboat? Maritime chases? Oh dear me, I don’t know where to put my face, so if you would be so kind as to let our child down carefully I’ll press said face mightily to yours!”

  When Vimes surfaced for breath he growled, “It is a real bloody clacks tower, isn’t it, yes? And now The Times have got hold of all this they’ll make out I’m some kind of hero, the damn fools!”

  With the suction released, Lady Sybil said, “No, Sam—well maybe a little of that, but you would be amazed at how fast news travels along the river. Apparently you were standing on the wheelhouse roof of the Wonderful Fanny fighting with a murderer, and he shot a crossbow at you and it bounced off! I’m told there’s going to be a large artist’s impression in tomorrow’s paper! Once again, I won’t know where to put my face!” And then Sybil couldn’t contain herself anymore and
burst out laughing. “Frankly, Sam, you may have anything you want for dinner tonight.”

  Vimes leaned over and whispered, causing his wife to slap his hand and say, “Later, perhaps!”

  At this point, somewhat emboldened, Vimes said, “I couldn’t help noticing that the bridge is severely damaged?”

  Sybil nodded. “Oh, yes dear, a terrible storm, wasn’t it? It took away the entire central arch and all of the three disgraces.* “I remember them from my childhood. My mother used to put her hand over my eyes when we crossed the bridge and so I took a keen interest in them, especially as one was scratching her bottom.” Her smile brightened. “But don’t worry, Sam, naked ladies are not difficult to come by.”

  Vimes took comfort from her smile, and a tiny treacherous suspicion bubbled up once more. He thought he had stamped it down, but the damn thing kept coming back. And so he cleared his throat and said, “Sybil, you did discuss plans for my holiday with Vetinari, didn’t you?”

  Sybil looked surprised. “Why yes, dear, of course. After all, he is technically your superior. Only technically, of course. I had a word with him on the subject at some charity do or other. I can’t remember which right now as there’re always so many. But there wasn’t any difficulty. He said that it was high time you took a decent rest from your valiant activities!”

  Vimes was wise enough not to utter the words that entered his mouth, and instead said, carefully, “Er, so he didn’t actually suggest that you came down to the Shires?”

  “To be honest, Sam, it was quite some time ago, but we both have your best interests at heart, as you surely know. We generally discussed the matter and that’s it, really.”

  Vimes left it at that. He would never know for sure. And anyway, the ball had dropped.

  Later, Samuel Vimes, all of him, had a bath in the huge bathroom with his nose only just above the surface and came out feeling exactly the same man as before but at least a lot cleaner. The affidavits were in the strongroom, and when the Ramkins design a strongroom, it’s not a room that you’ll get into in a hurry: first you needed a combination, which opened a smaller but nevertheless dangerously efficient safe, simply to remove a key which then had to be inserted in locks hidden in three separate clocks in the Hall and each key triggered a clockwork timing mechanism. Sybil told him that she had fond memories of her grandfather running split-arse, as the old man called it, down the main hall to get the key into the last lock before the clock controlling the first lock had run down and certainly before the guillotines dropped. What we have we keep, Vimes had thought as he tried it out. Well, they definitely meant it. Now, he dressed in clothes that didn’t smell of fish. What next?

  It was nice to have a walk with Young Sam again. Dad self-consciously out for a walk with his lad, yes? That was the picture. Regrettably, this picture included a distant prospect of Sergeant Detritus, who was merging with the landscape, a feat that a troll officer can achieve by simply removing his armor and sticking a geranium behind his ear, whereupon he becomes, being of a rocky and stony persuasion, pretty much part of the landscape without even trying. Usually the troll officers wore super-sized versions of the standard-issue armor, because a lot of the power of a copper consists in looking like a copper.* Safety considerations didn’t matter; there were plenty of weapons which, if handled with skill, could go through steel armor, but all they would do to a naked troll was make him angry.

  Right now Detritus was failing to maintain a low profile. He was a bodyguard, that was the truth of it, and he was also carrying his Peacemaker which could, as it were, do what it said on the box. Some weapons are called a Saturday Night Special; Detritus’s multi-arrow crossbow would last you all week. And somewhere, where Vimes couldn’t see him, which meant that nobody else could either, there was Willikins. There was your picture: Dad taking his lad for a walk in the presence of enough firepower to kill a platoon. Sybil had insisted, and that was that. Vimes himself being in danger was one thing, and Sybil had accepted that right from the start, but Young Sam? Never!

  As they strolled up Hangman’s Hill to see the new clacks tower, Vimes told himself that Stratford would not use a bow. A bow was for expediency, but a killer…now a killer would want to be up close, where he could see. Stratford had killed the goblin girl and had gone on killing her long after she was dead. He was a boy who liked his fun. He would want Vimes to know who was killing him. Vimes, Vimes realized, knew killers too well for his own peace of mind.

  As they arrived on the hill they were met by a grinning Nobby, who saluted with a variation on the theme of smartness, but with some embarrassment, because he was not alone. A young goblin woman was sitting next to him. Nobby hastily tried to shoo her away and she, apparently with reluctance, retired to a minimum safe distance, still looking adoringly at the corporal.

  Despite everything, Vimes tried to suppress the urge to smile, and managed to turn it into a stiff look.

  “Fraternizing with the natives, are you, Nobby?”

  Young Sam wandered over to the goblin girl and took hold of her hand, which was something he tended to do to any female that he met for the first time, a habit which his father considered would quite possibly open doors for him in later life. The girl tried gently to pull her hand away, but Young Sam was a ferocious holder.

  Nobby looked embarrassed. “I ain’t fraternizing with her, Mr. Vimes, she wants to fraternize with me! She come out with the straw basket of little mushrooms and gives them to me, honestly!”

  “Are you sure they aren’t poisonous?”

  Nobby looked blank. “Don’t know, Mr. Vimes. I ate them anyway, very nice, very crunchy, slightly nutty you might say, and Fred’s here now, sir. This young lady”—and to Vimes’s surprise and approval Nobby did not put inverted commas around the word lady—“walked right up to him, took this weird shiny pot thing out of his hand, which was amazing because no one else could get it off of him, and there he was! Just like normal! Although I think we’re going to have to remind him about washing, and crapping only in the privy and so on.”

  Vimes gave up. It was true that every organization had to have its backbone, and therefore it stood to reason that there also would have to be some person who equated to the bits usually destined for dog food. But Nobby was loyal and lucky, and if there is anything that a policeman really needs, it’s luck. Maybe Nobby had got lucky.

  “What are you doing up here, Nobby?” he said. Nobby looked at Vimes as if he were mad, and pointed to the wobbling temporary clacks tower. “Have to check the clacks messages, Mr. Vimes. Actually, young Tony, who is the only one manning it, he sort of types them, and wraps them around a stone and they drops down, which is—” There was a rattle on Nobby’s helmet and he deftly caught a stone wrapped in a strip of paper before it hit the ground. “Which is why I stand just here, Mr. Vimes.” Nobby unrolled the paper and announced, “One double stateroom and one single on the Roberta E. Biscuit, departing at 9 p.m. tomorrow! Lucky you, Mr. Vimes. Clacks! What would we do without it, eh?”

  There was a shout from above: “Stand back, man coming down!” and Vimes saw the whole structure of the clacks tower tremble as the young man carefully lowered himself from one spar to another, testing every one before putting his weight on it. He dropped the last few feet and held out his hand to Vimes. “Pleased to meet you, Sir Samuel! Sorry it’s shaky, but we were still working on it last night. A real rush job! Needs must when Lord Vetinari drives, you might say. We’ll do it properly later if that’s okay by you? I’ve got it lined up on a Grand Trunk tower, and they’ll bounce it to anywhere you want, plus a feed down to a clacks on your house, too. Of course you’ll have to have somebody manning this one to maintain the link, but from what I see that won’t be a problem.” The young man saluted Vimes and added, “Best of luck to you, sir, and now I’m off to have my meal and a wash.”

  There was another clang on the helmet of Nobby Nobbs, and a wad of paper wrapped around a pebble fell at his feet.

  The young clacksman picked i
t up proprietorially and read the message. “Oh, it’s just an acknowledgment of service closure, confirming that I am standing down for a break. My assistant typed it. He didn’t really need to pass it on, but he is a conscientious little bugger and I have never seen such a quick study. Show him how to do something once and that’s enough! Reliable little devil as well. And with those big hands he has no problem with the keyboard.”

  As the man strode off whistling down the hill, Vimes jumped to a conclusion like a grasshopper. “Stinky! Just you come down here, you little perisher!” he yelled.

  “Right here, commander!” The little goblin was already standing almost between Vimes’s boots.

  “You? You! You operating a clacks? Can you read?”

  Stinky held out both large hands. “No, but can look, but can remember! Green man say ‘Stinky, this pointy thing it called A’ and Stinky don’t need telling twice, and he say ‘This one, look like bum, he called B.’ Good fun!” The cracked voice wheedled, but in a way that seemed to Vimes to be full of cynical knowingness. “The goblin is useful, goblin is trustworthy, goblin is helpful? Goblin isn’t dead!”

  And it seemed to Vimes that he was the only one hearing these words. Young Sam had shuffled up to hold Stinky’s hand, but had thought better of it. Under his breath, Sam Vimes said, “What are you, Stinky?”

  “What are you, Sam Vimes?” Stinky grinned. “Hang, Sam Vimes. Hang together or hang separately. Above all, hang on. Hang, Mr. Vimes.”