The Fifth Elephant d-24

by Terry Pratchett

  There were others in the elevator as it rumbled downwards. Mostly they were diplomats that Vimes didn't recognize, but there was also, now, in a roped-off corner, a quartet of dwarf musicians playing pleasant yet slightly annoying music that ate its way into Vimes's head as the interminable descent went on.

  When the doors opened he heard Sybil gasp.

  'I thought you said it was like a starry night down here, Sam!'

  'Er, they've certainly turned the wick up...'

  Candles by the thousand burned in brackets all around the walls of the huge cavern, but it was the chandeliers that caught the eye. There were scores of them, each at least four storeys high. Vimes, always ready to look for the wires behind the smoke and mirrors, made out the dwarfs working inside the gantries and the baskets of fresh candles being lowered through holes in the ceiling. If the Fifth Elephant wasn't a myth, at least one whole toe must be being burned tonight.

  'Your grace!' Dee was advancing through the crowds.

  'Ah, Ideas Taster,' said Vimes as the dwarf approached, 'do allow me to introduce you to the Duchess of Ankh... Lady Sybil.'

  'Uh... er... yes... indeed... so delighted to make your acquaintance,' Dee murmured, caught off guard by the charm offensive. 'But, er...'

  Sybil had picked up the code. Vimes loathed the word 'Duchess', so if he was using it then he wanted her to out-dutch everyone. She enveloped Dee's pointy head in delighted Duchessness.

  'Mister Dee, Sam has told me so much about you!' she trilled. 'I understand you're quite the right-hand man—'

  '—dwarf—' hissed Vimes.

  '—dwarf to his majesty! Please, you must tell me how you have achieved such a delightful lighting effect here!'

  'Er, lots of candles,' Dee muttered, glaring at Vimes.

  'I think Dee wishes to discuss some political matters with me, dear,' said Vimes smoothly, putting his hand on the dwarf's shoulder. 'If you'll just take the others down, I'll join you shortly, I'm sure.' And he knew that no power in the world was going to prevent Sybil sweeping on down to the reception. That woman could sweep. Things stayed swept after she'd gone past.

  'You brought a troll, you brought a troll!' muttered Dee.

  'And he's an Ankh-Morpork citizen, remember,' said Vimes. 'Covered by diplomatic immunity and a rather bad suit.'

  'Even so—'

  'There is no "even so",' said Vimes.

  'We are at war with the trolls!'

  'Well, that's what diplomacy is all about, isn't it?' said Vimes. 'A way to stop being at war? Anyway, I understand it's been going on for five hundred years, so obviously no one is trying very hard.'

  'There will be complaints at the very highest level!'

  Vimes sighed. 'More?' he said.

  'Some are saying Ankh-Morpork is deliberately flaunting its wickedness before the King!'

  'The King?' said Vimes pleasantly. 'He's not exactly King yet, is he? Not until the coronation, which involves a certain... object...'

  'Yes, but of course that is a mere formality.'

  Vimes moved closer. 'But it isn't, is it?' he said quietly. 'It is the thing and the whole of the thing. Without the magic, there is no king. Just someone like you, unaccountably giving orders.'

  'Someone called Vimes teaches me about royalty?' said Dee miserably.

  'And without the thing, all the bets are off,' said Vimes. 'There will be a war. Explosions underground.'

  There was a tinny little sound as he took out his watch and opened it. 'My word, it's midnight,' he said.

  'Follow me,' Dee muttered.

  'Am I being taken to see something?' said Vimes.

  'No, your excellency. You are being taken to see where something is not.'

  'Ah. Then I want to bring Corporal Littlebottom.'

  'That? Absolutely not! That would be a desecration of—'

  'No, it wouldn't,' said Vimes. 'And the reason is, she won't come with us because we're not going, are we? You're certainly not taking the representative of a potentially hostile power into your confidence and revealing that your house of cards is missing a card on the bottom layer, are you? Of course not. We are not having this conversation. For the next hour or so we'll be nibbling titbits in this room. I haven't even just said this, and you didn't hear me. But Corporal Littlebottom is the best scene-of-crime officer I've got, and so I want her to come along with us.'

  'You've made your point, your excellency. Graphically, as always. Fetch her, then.'

  Vimes found Cheery standing back to back, or at least back to knees, with Detritus. They were surrounded by a ring of the curious. Whenever Detritus raised his hand to sip his drink the nearby dwarfs jumped back hurriedly.

  'Where are we going, sir?'

  'Nowhere.'

  'Ah. That sort of place.'

  'But things are looking up,' said Vimes. 'Dee has discovered a new pronoun, even if he does spit it.'

  'Sam!' said Lady Sybil, advancing through the throng, 'they're going to perform Bloodaxe and Ironhammer! Isn't that wonderful?'

  'Er...'

  'It's an opera, sir,' Cheery whispered. 'Part of the Koboldean Cycle. It's history. Every dwarf knows it by heart. It's about how we got laws, and kings... and the Scone, sir.'

  'I sang the part of Ironhammer when we did it at finishing school,' said Lady Sybil. 'Not the full five-week version, of course. It'll be marvellous to see it done here. It's really one of the great romances of history.'

  'Romances?' said Vimes. 'Like... a love story?'

  'Yes. Of course.'

  'Bloodaxe and Ironhammer were both... er... weren't both...' Vimes began.

  'They were both dwarfs, sir,' said Cheery.

  'Ah. Of course.' Vimes gave up. All dwarfs were dwarfs. If you tried to understand their world from a human point of view it all went wrong. 'Do, er, enjoy it, dear. I've got to... The King wants me to... I'll just be somewhere else for a while. Politics...'

  He hurried away, with Cheery trailing behind him.

  Dee led the way through dark tunnels. When the opera began it was a whisper far away, like the sea in an ancient shell.

  Eventually they stopped at the edge of a canal, its waters lapping at the darkness. A small boat was tethered there, with a waiting guard. Dee urged them into it.

  'It is important that you understand what you are seeing, your grace,' said Dee.

  'Practically nothing,' said Vimes. 'And I thought I had good night vision.'

  There was a clink in the gloom, and then a lamp was lit. The guard was punting the boat under an arch and into a small lake. Apart from the tunnel entrance, the walls rose up sheer.

  'Are we at the bottom of a well?' said Vimes.

  'That is quite a good way of describing it.' Dee fished under his seat. He produced a curved metal horn and blew one note which echoed up the rock walls.

  After a few seconds another note floated down from the top. There was a clanking, as of heavy, ancient chains.

  'This is quite a short lift compared to some up in the mountains,' said Dee, as an iron plate ground across the entrance, sealing it. 'There's one half a mile high that will take a string of barges.'

  Water boiled beside the boat. Vimes saw the walls begin to sink.

  'This is the only way to the Scone,' said Dee behind him.

  Now the boat was rocking in the bubbling water and the walls were blurred.

  'Water is diverted into reservoirs up near the peaks. Then it is simply a matter of opening and closing sluices, you see?'

  'Yes,' mumbled Vimes, experiencing vertigo and seasickness in one tight green package.

  The walls slowed. The boat stopped shaking. The water lifted them smoothly over the lip of the well and into a little channel, where there was a dock.

  'Any guards below?' Vimes managed, stepping out on to the blessedly solid stone.

  'There are usually four,' said Dee. 'For tonight I... arranged matters. The guards understand. No one is proud of this. I must tell you, I disapprove most strongly of this enterprise.' />
  Vimes looked around the new cave. A couple of dwarfs were standing on a lip of stone that overlooked what was now a placid pool. By the look of it, they were the ones who operated the machinery.

  'Shall we proceed?' said the dwarf.

  There was a passage leading off the cave, which rapidly narrowed. Vimes had to bend almost double along one length. At one point metal plates clanked under his feet, and he felt them shift slightly. Then he was standing almost upright again, passing under another arch, and there...

  Either the dwarfs had cut into a huge geode or they had with great care lined this small cave with quartz crystals until every surface reflected the light of the two small candles that stood on pillars in the middle of the sandy floor. The effect dazzled even Vimes after the darkness of the tunnels.

  'Behold,' said Dee gloomily, 'where the Scone should be.'

  A round flat stone, midway between the candles and only a few inches high, clearly held nothing.

  Behind it water bubbled up in a natural basin and split into two streams that flowed around the stone and disappeared again into another stone funnel.

  'All right,' said Vimes. 'Tell me everything.'

  'It was reported missing three days ago,' said Dee. 'Dozy Longfinger found it gone when he went in to replace the candles.'

  'And his job is...'

  'Captain of the Candles.'

  Ah.

  'It's a very responsible position.'

  'I've seen the chandeliers. And how often does he go in there?'

  'He went in there every day.'

  'Went?'

  'He no longer holds the position.'

  'Because he's a prime suspect?' said Vimes.

  'Because he's dead.'

  'And how did that happen?' said Vimes, slowly and deliberately.

  'He... took his own life. We're certain of this because we had to break down the door of his cave. He'd been Captain of the Candles for sixty years. I think he couldn't bear the thought of suspicion falling on him.'

  'To me he does sound a likely suspect.'

  'He did not steal the Scone. We know that much.'

  'But the robes you people wear could hide practically anything. Was he searched?'

  'Certainly not! But... I'll demonstrate,' said Dee. He walked off along the narrow, metalfloored corridor. 'Can you see me, your excellency?'

  'Yes, of course.'

  The floor rattled as Dee came back. 'Now this time I'll carry something... Your helmet, if you please? Just for the demonstration.'

  Vimes handed it to him. The Ideas Taster walked back down the corridor. When he was halfway a gong boomed and two metal grilles dropped down out of the ceiling. A few seconds after that guards appeared at the far grille, peering in suspiciously.

  Dee said a few words to them. The faces vanished. After a while the grilles rose slowly.

  'The mechanism is complex and quite old, but we keep it in good working order,' he said, handing Vimes his helmet. 'If you weigh more going out than going in, the guards will want to know why. It's unavoidable, it is still accurate to within a few ounces, and does not violate privacy. The only way to beat it would be to fly. Can thieves fly, your excellency?'

  'Depends on which sort,' said Vimes absently. 'Who else goes in there?'

  'Once every six days the chamber is inspected by myself and two guards. The last inspection was five days ago.'

  'Does anyone else go in there?' said Vimes. He noticed that Cheery had picked up a handful of the off-white sand that formed the floor of the Scone Cave and was letting it run between her fingers.

  'Not lately. When the new king is crowned, of course, the Scone will often be brought forth for ceremonial purposes.'

  'Do you only get that white sand in here?'

  'Yes. Is that important?'

  Vimes saw Cheery nod. 'I'm not... sure,' he said. 'Tell me, what intrinsic value has the Scone?'

  'Intrinsic? It's priceless!'

  'I know it's valuable as a symbol, but what is its value in itself?'

  'Priceless!'

  'I'm trying to work out why a thief might want to steal it,' said Vimes, as patiently as he could.

  Cheery had lifted up the flat round stone and was looking underneath it. Vimes pursed his lips.

  'What is... she doing?' said Dee. The pronoun dripped with distaste.

  'Corporal Littlebottom is looking for clues,' said Vimes. 'They are what we call signs, which may help us. It's a skill.'

  'Would this letter speed your search?' said Dee. 'It has writing on it. That is what we call... signs, which may help you.'

  Vimes looked at the proffered paper. It was brown and quite stiff, and covered in runes.

  'I, er, can't read those,' he said.

  'It's a skill,' said Dee solemnly.

  'I can, sir,' said Cheery. 'Allow me?'

  She took the paper and read it. 'Er, it appears to be a ransom note, sir. From... the Sons of Agi Hammerthief. They say they have the Scone and will... They say they'll destroy it, sir.'

  'Where's the money?' said Vimes.

  'They say Rhys must renounce all claim to be Low King,' said Dee. 'There are no other conditions. The note turned up on my desk. But everyone puts paperwork on my desk these days.'

  'Who are the Sons of Agi Hammerthief?' said Vimes, looking at Dee. 'And why didn't you tell me about this before?'

  'We don't know. It's just a made-up name. Some malcontents, we assume. And I was told you would ask me questions.'

  'But this isn't a real crime any more, is it?' said Vimes. 'This is politics. Why can't the King just renounce all claim, get the Scone back, and then say he had his fingers crossed? If it's done under duress—'

  'We take our ceremonies seriously, your excellency. If Rhys renounces the throne, he cannot change his mind next day. If he allows the Scone to be destroyed, then the kingship has no legitimacy and there will—'

  '—be trouble,' said Vimes. And it'll spread to Ankh-Morpork, he added to himself. At the moment it's only riots.

  'Who'll become King if he abdicates?'

  'Albrecht Albrechtson, as everyone knows.'

  'And that will be trouble, too,' said Vimes. 'Civil war, from what I hear.'

  'The King says,' said Dee quietly, 'that he is minded to step down nevertheless. Better any king than chaos. Dwarfs do not like chaos.'

  'It's going to be chaos either way, though,' said Vimes.

  'There've been rebellions against kings before. Dwarfdom survives. The Crown continues. The lore abides. The Scone remains. There is... a sanity to come back to.'

  Oh, my gods, thought Vimes. Thousands of dwarfs die but that's all right if a lump of rock survives. 'I'm not a policeman here. What can I do?'

  'This hasn't happened!' shrieked Dee, his nerve cracking. 'But everyone knows that foreigners from Ankh-Morpork do not mind their own business!'

  'Ah, you mean... given that you don't want people to know about this... it would look bad if you appeared to be too excited, but you can't be blamed if a stupid flatfoot pokes his nose into things?'

  Dee waved his hands in the air. 'This wasn't my idea!'

  'Look, the security you've got here would disgrace a children's piggybank. I can think of two or three ways of getting the Scone out of here. What about the secret passage into this room?'

  'I know of no secret passage into this room!'

  'Oh, good. At least we've ruled out something. Go and wait by the boat. Corporal Littlebottom and I have to talk about some things.'

  Dee left reluctantly. Vimes waited until the dwarf was visible in the glow of the candles beyond the weighbridge.

  'What a mess,' he said. 'Locked-room mysteries are even worse when they leave the room unlocked.'

  'You're thinking that Dozy might have worn bags of sand under his robes, aren't you, sir?' said Cheery.

  No, thought Vimes, I wasn't. But now I know how a dwarf would solve this.

  'Possibly,' he said aloud. 'Grubby white sand can't be uncommon. You'd add a bit of sa
nd every day, yes? Just enough not to trigger the scales. Finally you've got... How much does the Scone weigh?'

  'About sixteen pounds, sir.'

  'All right. Dump the sand on the floor, shove the Scone under your robes, and... it might just work.'

  'Risky, sir.'

  'But no one thinks anyone is really going to try to steal the Scone. Would you try to tell me that four guards sitting in that little guardhouse on a twelve-hour shift will be alert all the time? That's enough for a hand of poker!'

  'I suppose they rely on the fact that they know when a boat comes up, sir.'

  'Right. Big mistake. And you know what? I bet that when a boat's just gone down that's the time they're least alert. Cheery, if a human could get in here they could get into the Scone Cave. They'd have to be nimble and a good swimmer, but they could do it.'

  'The guards on the gates were pretty keen, sir.'

  'Well, yes. Guards always are, just after a theft. Smart as foxes and sharp as knives, just in case anyone wonders if it was them who dropped off to sleep at the wrong time. I'm a copper, Cheery. I know how dull guarding can be. Especially when you know that no one is ever going to steal what you're guarding.' He scuffed the sand with his boot.

  'They were looking hard at every cart that went in or out this morning. But that was because the Scone had been stolen. It's at times like this you get very official, very efficient and very pointless activity. Don't try to tell me that last week they opened every barrel and prodded every load of hay. Even the stuff coming in? Can you see Dee? Is he looking at me?'

  Cheery peered around Vimes.

  'No, sir.'

  'Good.'

  Vimes walked over to the tunnel, pressed his back against a wall, took a deep breath and walked his legs up the opposite wall. Then he eased his way out over the plates of the weighbridge, inched along with feet and shoulderblades and, wincing at every protest from his knees, eventually dropped down. He walked across to Dee, who was talking to the guards.