The Fifth Elephant

by Terry Pratchett

  “We’d better get on, sir,” said Carrot, from the ladder.

  They’d been killed. They’d been sent racing off into the dark with monsters at their heels, and then some blank-faced peasants who’d done nothing to help had come in here and picked over the little things they’d left behind…

  Damn it! Vimes growled and swept everything into the box and dragged it over to the ladder.

  “We’ll drop this lot off at the embassy,” he said. “I’m not leaving any here for scavengers. Don’t think about arguing with me.”

  “Wouldn’t dream of it, sir. Wouldn’t dream of it.”

  Vimes paused.

  “Carrot? That wolf and Angua…” He stopped. How the hell did you continue a sentence like that?

  “They’re old friends, sir.”

  “They are?”

  There was nothing but the usual completely open honesty anywhere in Carrot’s expression.

  “Oh…we…that’s good, then…” Vimes finished.

  A minute later, they were on their way again. Angua was running as a wolf far ahead of the sleigh, alongside Gavin. Gaspode had curled up under the blankets.

  And here I am again, thought Vimes, racing the sunset. Heaven knows why…I’m in the company of a werewolf and a wolf that looks worse, and sitting in a sleigh drawn by wolves which I can’t steer. Try looking that one up in the manual.

  He dozed among the blankets, half-open eyes watching the disk of the sun flickering between pine trees.

  How could you steal the Scone from its cave?

  He’d said there were dozens of ways and there were, but they were all risky. They all depended too much on luck and sleepy guards. And this didn’t feel like a crime that was going to rely on luck. It had to work.

  The Scone wasn’t important. It was important that the dwarfs ended in disarray—no king, violent arguments and fighting in the dark. And it would stay dark in Uberwald, too. And it seemed to be important that the king was blamed…after all, he was the one who’d lost the Scone…

  Whatever the plan was, it had to be done quickly. Well, the clacks would have been useful. What had Wolfgang said? “Those clever men in Ankh-Morpork”? Not dwarfs, but men.

  Rubber Sonky, floating in his vat…

  You dipped in a wooden hand, and out of the vat you got a glove…hand in glove…

  It wasn’t where you’ve got it, it’s where people think it is. That’s what matters. That’s the magic.

  He remembered the very first thought he’d had, when he saw Cheery staring at the floor of the Scone’s cave, and the little policemen in Vimes’s head started to clamor.

  “What, sir?” said Carrot.

  “Hmm?” Vimes forced his eyes open.

  “You just shouted, sir.”

  “What did I shout?”

  “You shouted ‘The bloody thing was never bloody stolen!,’ sir.”

  “The bastards! I knew I nearly had it! It all fits together if you don’t think like a dwarf! Let’s make sure Sybil is all right and then, Captain, we’re going to—”

  “Prod buttock, sir?”

  “Right!”

  “Only one thing, sir…”

  “What?”

  “You are an escaped criminal, aren’t you?”

  For a moment there was only the sound of the runners skimming over the snow

  “We-ell,” said Vimes, “this isn’t Ankh-Morpork, I know. Everyone keeps telling me. But, Captain, wherever you are, wherever you go, watchmen are always watchmen.”

  A solitary light burned in the window. Captain Colon sat by the candle, staring at nothing.

  Regulations called for the Watch House to be manned at all hours, and that’s what he was doing.

  The floorboards in the room below creaked into a new position. For many months now they’d been walked on around the clock, because the main office never had fewer than half a dozen people in it. Chairs, too, accustomed to being warmed continuously by a relay of bottoms, groaned gently as they cooled.

  There was only one thought buzzing around Fred Colon’s head now.

  Mr. Vimes is going to go completely bursar. He’s going to go totally Librarian-poo.

  His hand went down to the desk and came back automatically, while he looked straight ahead.

  There was the crunch of a sugar lump being eaten.

  Snow was falling again. The watchman that Vimes had named Colonesque was leaning in his box by the hubward gate of Bonk. He’d perfected the art, and it was an art form, of going to sleep upright with his eyes open. It was one of the things you learned, on endless nights.

  A female voice by his ear said, “Now, there are two ways this could go.”

  His position didn’t change. He continued to stare straight ahead.

  “You haven’t seen anything. That’s the truth, isn’t it? Just nod.”

  He nodded, once.

  “Good man. You didn’t hear me arrive, did you? Just nod.”

  Nod.

  “So you won’t know when I’ve gone, am I right? Just nod.”

  Nod.

  “You don’t want any trouble. Just nod.”

  Nod.

  “They don’t pay you enough for this. Just nod.”

  This time the nod was quite emphatic.

  “You get more than your fair share of night watches as it is, anyway.”

  Colonesque’s jaw dropped. Whoever was standing in the shadows was clearly reading his mind.

  “Good man. You just stand here, then, and make sure no one steals the gate…”

  Colonesque took care to continue to stare straight ahead. He heard the thud and creak of the gate being opened and closed.

  It occurred to him that the speaker had not in fact mentioned what the other way was, and he was quite relieved about that.

  “What was the other way?” said Vimes, as they hurried through the snow.

  “We’d go and look for another way in,” said Angua.

  There were few people on the streets, which were whitening with the new snow again except where wisps of steam escaped from the occasional grating. In Uberwald, it seemed, sunset made its own curfew. This was just as well, because Gavin was growling continuously under his breath.

  Carrot came back from the next corner.

  “There’s dwarfs on guard all around the embassy,” he said. “They don’t look open to negotiation, sir.”

  Vimes looked down. They were standing on a grating.

  Captain Tantony of the Bonk Watch was not happy with this duty.

  He’d been at the opera last night, and later on he’d thought he saw things happening in a way which, the burgermaster had instructed him, hadn’t happened. Of course, the thing to do was obey orders. You were safe if you obeyed orders. Everyone in the Watch knew that. But these didn’t feel like safe orders.

  He’d heard they did things differently in Ankh-Morpork. Milord Vimes would arrest anyone, they said.

  Tantony had set up a desk in the embassy’s hall, so that he could keep an eye on the main doors. He’d taken some pains to position his men around the inside of building; he didn’t trust the dwarfs on guard outside. They’d said they’d gotten orders to kill Vimes on sight, and that didn’t make any sense. There had to be some sort of a trial, didn’t there?

  There was a faint noise from upstairs. He stood up carefully and reached for his crossbow.

  “Corporal Svetlz?”

  There was another little sound.

  Tantony went to the bottom of the stairs.

  Vimes appeared at the top of them. There was blood on his shirt, and crusted on the side of his face. To the captain’s horror, he began to walk down the steps.

  “I will shoot you!”

  “That’s the order, is it?” said Vimes.

  “Yes! Stop there!”

  “But I’m going to be shot anyway, there’s no point in stopping, is there?” said Vimes.

  “I don’t think you’re the kind to do that, Captain. You’ve got a brain.” Vimes steadied himsel
f on the banister rail. “Shouldn’t you have called for the rest of the guards by now, by the way?”

  “I tell you to stop!”

  “You know who I am. If you’re going to fire that damn thing, do it now. But first, I suggest it would be a really good career move to tug the bellpull over there. What’s the worst that would happen? You’ve still got the bow pointed at me. There’s something you really ought to know.”

  Tantony gave him a suspicious look, but took a few steps sideways and tugged the rope.

  Igor stepped out from behind a pillar.

  “Yeth, marthter?”

  “Tell this young man where he is, will you?”

  “He’th in Ankh-Morpork, marthter,” said Igor calmly.

  “See?” said Vimes. “And don’t glare at Igor like that. I missed it when he welcomed me here, but it’s true. This is an embassy, my son,” he went on, walking forward again, “and that means it’s officially on the soil of the home country. Welcome to Ankh-Morpork. There’s thousands of Uberwald people living in our city. You don’t want to go starting a war, do you?”

  “But…but…they said…my orders…you are a criminal!”

  “The word is accused, Captain. We don’t kill people in Ankh-Morpork just because they’re accused. Well, not on purpose. And not because someone tells us to.”

  Vimes took the crossbow out of his unresisting hands, and fired it into the ceiling.

  “Now send your men away,” he said.

  “I’m in Ankh-Morpork?” said the captain.

  Even in his current state, Vimes thought he recognized the harmonics.

  “That’s right,” he said, putting an arm around him. “A city which, incidentally, always has a job in the Watch for a young man of ability—”

  Tantony’s body stiffened. He pushed Vimes’s arm away.

  “You insult me, milord. This is my country!”

  “Ah.” Vimes was aware of Carrot and Angua watching from the landing.

  “But…I will not see it dishonored, either,” said the captain. “This isn’t right. I saw what happened last night. You swept up the king and your troll caught the chandelier! And then they said you’d tried to kill the king and you’d killed dwarfs when you escaped…”

  “Are you in charge of the Watch here?”

  “No. That’s the job of the burgermaster.”

  “And who gives him his orders?”

  “Everyone,” said Tantony bitterly. Vimes nodded. Been there, he thought. Been there, done that, bought the doublet…

  “Are you going to stop me taking my people out of here?”

  “How can you do that? The dwarfs surround us!”

  “We’re going to use…diplomatic channels. Just show me where everyone is, and we’ll be off. If it’s any help, I can hit you over the head and tie you up…”

  “That will not be required. The dwarf and the troll are in the cellar. Her Ladyship is…I assume she’s wherever the baron took her…”

  Vimes felt the little trickle of superheated ice down his spine.

  “Took her?” he said hoarsely.

  “Well…yes.” Tantony stepped back from Vimes’s expression. “She knew the baroness, sir! She said they were old friends! She said they could sort it all out! And then…” Tantony’s voice became a mumble, seared into silence by the look on Vimes’s face.

  When Vimes spoke, it was in a monotone as threatening as a spear.

  “You are standing there in your shiny breastplate and your silly helmet and your sword without a single notch in the blade and your stupid trousers and you are telling me that you let my wife be taken away by werewolves?”

  Tantony took a step backward.

  “It was the baron—”

  “And you don’t argue with barons. Right. You don’t argue with anyone. Do you know what? I’m ashamed, ashamed to think that something like you is called a watchman. Now give me those keys.”

  The man had gone red.

  “You’ve obeyed many orders,” said Vimes. “Don’t…even…think…about…disobeying…that…one.”

  Carrot reached the bottom of the stairs and put a hand on his shoulder.

  “Steady, Mister Vimes.”

  Tantony looked from one to the other and made a life decision.

  “I hope you…find your lady, milord.” He produced a bunch of keys and handed them over. “I really do.”

  Vimes, still fighting for breath, wordlessly passed the keys to Carrot.

  “Let them out,” he said.

  “Are you going to the werewolves’ castle?” Tantony panted.

  “Yes.”

  “You won’t stand a chance, milord. They do as they please.”

  “Then they’ve got to be stopped.”

  “You can’t. The old one understood the rules, but Wolfgang…he doesn’t obey anything!”

  “All the more reason to stop him, then. Ah, Detritus.” The troll saluted. “You’ve got your bow, I see. Treated you well, did they?”

  “Dey called me a ficko troll,” said Detritus, darkly. “One of dem kicked me inna rocks.”

  “Was it this one?”

  “No.”

  “But he is their captain,” said Vimes, stepping away from Tantony. “Sergeant, I order you: Shoot him down.”

  In one movement the troll had the crossbow balanced on his shoulder and was sighting along the massive package of arrows. Tantony went pale.

  “Well, go on,” said Vimes. “It was an order, Sergeant.”

  Detritus lowered the bow.

  “I ain’t dat fick, sir.”

  “I gave you an order!”

  “Den you can do wid that order what Boulder der Lintel did wid his bag of gravel, sir! Wid respect, o’course.”

  Vimes walked across and patted the shaking Tantony on his shoulder.

  “Just making a point,” he said.

  “However,” said Detritus, “if you can find der man dat kicked me inna rocks, I should be happy to get him a flick around der earhole. I know which one it was. He’s der one walkin’ wid der limp.”

  Lady Sybil drank her wine carefully. It didn’t taste very nice. In fact, quite a lot of things weren’t very nice.

  She wasn’t a good cook. She’d never been taught proper cookery; at her school it had always been assumed that other people would be doing the cookery and that in any case it would be for fifty people using at least four types of fork. Such dishes as she had mastered were dainty things on doilies.

  But she cooked for Sam because she vaguely felt that a wife ought to and, besides, he was an eater who entirely matched her kitchen skills. He liked burnt sausages and fried eggs that went boing when you tried to stick a fork in them. If you gave him caviar, he’d want it in batter. He was an easy man to feed, if you always kept some lard in the house.

  But the food here tasted as though it had been cooked by someone who had never even tried before. She’d seen the kitchens, when Serafine had given her the little tour, and they’d just about do for a cottage. The game larders, on the other hand, were the size of barns. She’d never seen so many dead things hanging up.

  It was just that she was certain that venison shouldn’t be served boiled, with potatoes that were crunchy. If they were potatoes, of course. Potatoes weren’t usually gray. Even Sam, who liked the black lumpy bits you got in some mashed potatoes, would have commented. But Sybil had been brought up properly; if you can’t find something nice to say about the food, find something to be nice about.

  “These are…really very interesting plates,” she said, dutifully. “Er…are you sure there’s been no more news?” She tried to avoid watching the baron. He was ignoring Sybil and his wife and was prodding the meat around on his plate as if he’d forgotten what a knife and fork were for.

  “Wolfgang and his friends are still out searching,” said Serafine. “But this is terrible weather for a man to be on the run.”

  “He is not on the run!” snapped Sybil. “Sam is not guilty of anything!”

  “Of
course, of course. All the evidence is circumstantial. Of course,” said the baroness soothingly. “Now, I suggest that as soon as they have the passes clear, you and the, er, the staff get back to the safety of Ankh-Morpork before the real winter hits. We know the country, my dear. If your husband is alive, we can soon do something about it.”

  “I will not have him shamed like this! You saw him save the king!”

  “I’m sure he did, Sybil. I’m afraid I was talking to my husband at the time, but I don’t disbelieve you for a minute. Er…is it true that he killed all those men in the Wilinus Pass?”

  “What? But…they were bandits!” At the other end of the table the baron had picked up a lump of meat and was trying to tear it apart with his teeth.

  “Well, of course. Yes. Of course.”

  Sybil pinched the bridge of her nose. Most of her would not have considered Sam Vimes guilty of murder, actual murder, even on the evidence of three gods and a message written on the sky. But…stories did get back to her, in a roundabout way. Sam got wound up about things. Sometimes he unwound all at once. There’d been that…bad business with that little girl and those men over at Dolly Sisters, and when Sam had broken in to the men’s lodging he found one of them had stolen one of her shoes, and she’d heard Detritus say that if he hadn’t been there only Sam would have walked out of the room alive…

  She shook her head.

  “I really would like a bath,” she said. There was a clatter from the other end of the table.

  “Dear, you will have to eat your dinner in the Changing room,” said the baroness, without looking around. She flashed Lady Sybil a brief, brittle smile. “We do not, in fact, have a…have such a, a device in the castle.” A thought occurred to her. “We use the hot springs. So much more hygienic.”

  “Out in the forest?”

  “Oh, it’s quite close. And a quick run around in the snow really tones up the body.”

  “I think perhaps I shall have a lie-down instead,” said Lady Sybil, firmly. “But thank you all the same.”

  She made her way to the musty bedroom, fuming in a ladylike way.

  She couldn’t bring herself to like Serafine, and this was shocking, because Lady Sybil even liked Nobby Nobbs, and that took breeding. But the werewolf scraped across her nerves like a file. She remembered that she’d never liked her at school, either.