She could change at will at any time. That's what people forgot about werewolves. But they remembered the important thing. Full moonlight was the irresistible trigger: the lunar rays reached down into the centre of her morphic memory and flipped all the switches, whether she wanted them switched or not. Full moon was only a couple of days away. And the delicious smell of the penned animals and the blood from the slaughterhouses was chiming against her strict vegetarianism. The clash was bringing on her PLT.
She glared at the shadowy building in front of her. 'I think we'll go round the back,' she said. 'And you can knock.'
'Me? They won't take any notice of me!' said Cheery.
'You show them your badge and tell them you're the Watch.'
'They'll ignore me! They'll laugh at me!'
'You're going to have to do it sooner or later. Go on.'
The door was opened by a stout man in a bloody apron. He was shocked to have his belt grabbed by one dwarf hand, while another dwarf hand was thrust in front of his face, holding a badge, and a dwarf voice in the region of his navel said, 'We're the Watch, right? Oh, yes! And if you don't let us in we'll have your guts for starters!'
'Good try,' murmured Angua. She lifted Cheery out of the way and smiled brightly at the butcher.
'Mr Sock? We'd like to speak to an employee of yours. Mr Dorfl.'
The man hadn't quite got over Cheery, but he managed to rally. 'Mr Dorfl? What's he done now?'
'We'd just like to talk to him. May we come in?'
Mr Sock looked at Cheery, who was trembling with nerves and excitement. 'I have a choice?' he said.
'Let's say — you have a kind of choice,' said Angua.
She tried to close her nostrils against the beguiling miasma of blood. There was even a sausage factory on the premises. It used all the bits of animals no one would ever otherwise eat, or even recognize. The odours of the abattoir turned her human stomach but, deep inside, part of her sat up and drooled and begged at the mingling smells of pork and beef and lamb and mutton and …
'Rat?' she said, sniffing. 'I didn't know you supplied the dwarf market, Mr Sock.'
Mr Sock was suddenly a man who wished to be seen to be cooperative.
'Dorfl! Come here right now!'
There was the sound of footsteps and a figure emerged from behind a rack of beef carcases.
Some people had a thing about the undead. Angua knew Commander Vimes was uneasy in their presence, although he was getting better these days. People always needed someone to feel superior to. The living hated the undead, and the undead loathed — she felt her fists clench — the unalive.
The golem called Dorfl lurched a little because one leg was slightly shorter than the other. It didn't wear any clothes because there was nothing whatsoever to conceal, and so she could see the mottling on it where fresh clay had been added over the years. There was so much patching that she wondered how old it could be. Originally, some attempt had been made to depict human musculature, but the repairs had nearly obscured these. The thing looked like the kind of pots Igneous despised, the ones made by people who thought that because it was hand-made it was supposed to look as if it was hand-made, and that thumbprints baked in the clay were a sign of integrity.
That was it. The thing looked hand-made. Of course, over the years it had mostly made itself, one repair at a time. Its triangular eyes glowed faintly. There were no pupils, just the dark red glow of a banked fire.
It was holding a long, heavy cleaver. Cheery's stare gravitated to this and remained fixed on it in terrified fascination. The other hand grasped a piece of string, on the end of which was a large, hairy and very smelly goat.
'What are you doing, Dorfl?'
The golem nodded towards the goat.
'Feeding the yudasgoat?'
Dorfl nodded again.
'Have you got something to do, Mr Sock?' said Angua.
'No, I've.'
'You have got something to do, Mr Sock,' said Angua emphatically.
'Ah. Er? Yes. Er? Yes. Okay. I'll just go and see to the offal boilers …'
As the butcher walked away he stopped to wave a finger under the place where Dorfl's nose would be if the golem had had a nose.
'If you've been causing trouble …' he began.
'I expect those boilers could really do with attention,' said Angua sharply.
He hurried off.
There was silence in the yard, although the sounds of the city drifted in over the walls. From the other side of the slaughterhouse there was the occasional bleat of a worried sheep. Dorfl stood stock-still, holding his cleaver and looking down at the ground.
'Is it a troll made to look like a human?' whispered Cheery. 'Look at those eyes!'
'It's not a troll,' said Angua. 'It's a golem. A man of clay. It's a machine.'
'It looks like a human!'
'That's because it's a machine made for looking like a human.'
She walked around behind the thing. 'I'm going to read your chem, Dorfl,' she said.
The golem let go of the goat and raised the cleaver and brought it down sharply on to a chopping block beside Cheery, making the dwarf leap sideways. Then it pulled around a slate that was slung over its shoulder on a piece of string, unhooked the pencil, and wrote:
YES.
When Angua put her hand up, Cheery realized that there was a thin line across the golem's forehead. To her horror, the entire top of the head flipped up. Angua, quite unperturbed, reached inside. Her hand came out holding a yellowing scroll.
The golem froze. The eyes faded.
Angua unrolled the paper. 'Some kind of holy writing,' she said. 'It always is. Some old dead religion.'
'You've killed it?'
'No. You can't take away what isn't there.' She put the scroll back and closed the head with a click.
The golem came alive again, the glow returning to its eyes.
Cheery had been holding her breath. It came out in a rush. 'What did you do?' she managed.
'Tell her, Dorfl,' said Angua.
The golem's thick fingers were a blur as the pencil scratched across the slate.
I AM A GOLEM. I WAS MADEW OF CLAY. MY LIFE IS IN THE WORDS. BY MEANS OF WORDS OF PURPOSE IN MY HEAD I ACQUIRE LIFE. MY LIFE IS TO WORK. I OBEY ALL COMMANDS. I TAKE NO REST.
'What words of purpose?'
RELEVANT TEXTS THAT ME THE FOCUS OF BELIEF. GOLEM MUST WORK. GOLEM MUST HAVE A MASTER.
The goat lay down beside the golem and started to chew cud.
'There have been two murders,' said Angua. 'I'm pretty certain a golem did one and probably both. Can you tell us anything, Dorfl?'
'Sorry, look,' said Cheery. 'Are you telling me this … thing is powered by words? I mean … is it telling me it's powered by words?'
'Why not? Words do have power. Everyone knows that,' said Angua. There are more golems around than you might think. They're out of fashion now, but they last. They can work underwater, or in total darkness, or knee-deep in poison. For years. They don't need rest or feeding. They…'
'But that's slavery!' said Cheery.
'Of course it isn't. You might as well enslave a doorknob. Have you got anything to tell me, Dorfl?'
Cheery kept looking at the cleaver in the block. Words like length and heavy and sharp were filling her head more snugly than any words could have filled the clay skull of the golem.
Dorfl said nothing.
'How long have you been working here, Dorfl?'
NOW THREE HUNDRED DAYS ALREADY.
'And you have time off?'
TO MAKE A HOLLOW LAUGHING. WHAT WOULD I DO WITH TIME OFF?
'I mean, you're not always in the slaughterhouse?'
SOMETIMES I MAKE DELIVERIES.
'And meet other golems? Now listen, Dorfl, I know you things keep in touch somehow. And, if a golem is killing real people, I wouldn't give a busted teacup for your chances. Folk will be along here straight away with flaming torches. And sledgehammers. You get my drift?'
The golem
shrugged.
THEY CANNOT TAKE AWAY DOES NOT EXIST, it wrote.
Angua threw up her hands. 'I'm trying to be civilized,' she said. 'I could confiscate you right now. The charge would be Being Obstructive When It's Been a Long Day and I've Had Enough. Do you know Father Tubelcek?'
THE OLD PRIEST WHO LIVES ON THE BRIDGE.
'How come you know him?'
I MADE DELIVERIES THERE.
'He's been murdered. Where were you when he was killed?'
IN THE SLAUGHTERHOUSE.
'How do you know?'
Dorfl hesitated a moment. Then the next words were written very slowly, as if they had come from a long way away after a great deal of thought.
BECAUSE IT IS SOMETHING THAT MUST HAVE HAPPENED NOT LONG AGO, BECAUSE YOU ARE EXCITED. FOR THE LAST THREE DAYS I HAVE BEEN WORKING HERE.
'All the time?'
YES.
'Twenty-four hours a day?'
YES. MEN AND TROLLS HERE ON EVERY SHIFT, THEY WILL TELL YOU. DURING THE DAY I MUST SLAUGHTER, DRESS, QUARTER, JOINT AND BONE, AND AT NIGHT WITHOUT REST I MUST MAKE SAUSAGES AND BOIL UP THE LIVERS, HEARTS, TRIPES, KIDNEYS AND CHITTERLINGS.
'That's awful,' said Cheery.
The pencil blurred briefly.
CLOSE.
Dorfl turned his head slowly to look at Angua and wrote:
DO YOU NEED ME FURTHER?
'If we do, we know where to find you.'
I AM SORRY ABOUT THE OLD MAN.
'Good. Come on, Cheery.'
They felt the golem's eyes on them as they left the yard.
'It was lying,' said Cheery.
'Why do you say that?'
'It looked as if it was lying.'
'You're probably right,' said Angua. 'But you can see the size of the place. I bet we wouldn't be able to prove it'd stepped out for half an hour. I think I'll suggest that we put it under what Commander Vimes calls special surveillance.'
'What, like … plain clothes?'
'Something like that,' said Angua carefully.
'Funny to see a pet goat in a slaughterhouse, I thought,' said Cheery, as they walked on through the fog.
'What? Oh, you mean the yudasgoat,' said Angua. 'Most slaughterhouses have one. It's not a pet. I suppose you could call it an employee.'
'Employee? What kind of job could it possibly do?'
'Hah. Walk into the slaughterhouse every day. That's its job. Look, you've got a pen full of frightened animals, right? And they're milling around and leaderless … and there's this ramp into this building, looks very scary … and, hey, there's this goat, it's not scared, and so the flock follows it and' — Angua made a throat-slitting noise — 'only the goat walks out.'
'That's horrible!'
'I suppose it makes sense from the goat's point of view. At least it does walk out,' said Angua.
'How did you know about this?'
'Oh, you pick up all sorts of odds and ends of stuff in the Watch.'
'I've got a lot to learn, I can see,' said Cheery. 'I never thought you had to carry bits of blanket, for a start!'
'It's special equipment if you're dealing with the undead.'
'Well, I knew about garlic and vampires. Anything holy works on vampires. What else works on werewolves?'
'Sorry?' said Angua, who was still thinking about the golem.
'I've got a silver mail vest which I promised my family I'd wear, but is anything else good for werewolves?'
'A gin and tonic's always welcome,' said Angua distantly.
'Angua?'
'Hmm? Yes? What?'
'Someone told me there was a werewolf in the Watch! I can't believe that!'
Angua stopped and stared down at her.
'I mean, sooner or later the wolf comes through,' said Cheery. 'I'm surprised Commander Vimes allows it.'
'There is a werewolf in the Watch, yes,' said Angua.
'I knew there was something odd about Constable Visit.'
Angua's jaw dropped.
'He always looks hungry,' said Cheery. 'And he's got that odd smile all the time. I know a werewolf when I see one.'
'He does look a bit hungry, that's true,' said Angua. She couldn't think of anything else to say.
'Well, I'm going to be keeping my distance!'
'Fine,' said Angua.
'Angua …'
'Yes?'
'Why do you wear your badge on a collar round your neck?'
'What? Oh. Well… so it's always handy. You know. In any circumstances.'
'Do I need to do that?'
'I shouldn't think so.'
Mr Sock jumped. 'Dorfl, you damn stupid lump! Never sneak up behind a man on the bacon slicer! I've told you that before! Try to make some noise when you move, damn you!' The golem held up its slate, which said:
TONIGHT I CANNOT WORK.
'What's this? The bacon slicer never asks for time off!'
IT IS A HOLY DAY.
Sock looked at the red eyes. Old Fishbine had said something about this, hadn't he, when he'd sold Dorfl? Something like: 'Sometimes it'll go off for a few hours because it's a holy day. It's the words in its head. If it doesn't go and trot off to its temple or whatever it is, the words'll stop working, don't ask me why. There's no point in stopping it.'
Five hundred and thirty dollars the thing had cost. He'd thought it was a bargain — and it was a bargain, no doubt about that. The damned thing only ever stopped working when it had run out of things to do. Sometimes not even then, according to the stories. You heard about golems flooding out houses because no one told them to stop carrying water from the well, or washing the dishes until the plates were thin as paper. Stupid things. But useful if you kept your eye on them.
And yet… and yet… he could see why no one seemed to keep them for long. It was the way the damned two-handed engine just stood there, taking it all in and putting it … where? And never complained. Or spoke at all.
A man could get worried about a bargain like that, and feel mightily relieved when he was writing out a receipt for the new owner.
'Seems to me there's been a lot of holy days lately,' Sock said.
SOME TIMES ARE MORE HOLY THAN OTHERS.
But they couldn't skive off, could they? Work was what a golem did.
'I don't know how we're going to manage …' Sock began.
IT IS A HOLY DAY.
'Oh, all right. You can have time off tomorrow.'
TONIGHT. HOLY DAY STARTS AT SUNSET.
'Be back quickly, then,' said Sock, weakly. 'Or I'll— You be back quickly, d'you hear?'
That was another thing. You couldn't threaten the creatures. You certainly couldn't withhold their pay, because they didn't get any. You couldn't frighten them. Fishbine had said that a weaver over Nap Hill way had ordered his golem to smash itself to bits with a hammer — and it had.
YES. I HEAR.
In a way, it didn't matter who they were. In fact, their anonymity was part of the whole business. They thought themselves part of the march of history, the tide of progress and the wave of the future. They were men who felt that The Time Had Come. Regimes can survive barbarian hordes, crazed terrorists and hooded secret societies, but they're in real trouble when prosperous and anonymous men sit around a big table and think thoughts like that. One said, 'At least it's clean this way. No blood.'
'And it would be for the good of the city, of course.'
They nodded gravely. No one needed to say that what was good for them was good for Ankh-Morpork.
'And he won't die?'
'Apparently he can be kept merely … unwell. The dosage can be varied, I'm told.'
'Good. I'd rather have him unwell than dead. I wouldn't trust Vetinari to stay in a grave.'
'I've heard that he once said he'd prefer to be cremated, as a matter of fact.'
'Then I just hope they scatter the ashes really widely, that's all.'
'What about the Watch?'
'What about it?'
'Ah.'
Lord Vetinari opened his
eyes. Against all rationality, his hair ached.
He concentrated, and a blur by the bed focused into the shape of Samuel Vimes.
'Ah, Vimes,' he said weakly.
'How are you feeling, sir?'
'Truly dreadful. Who was that little man with the incredibly bandy legs?'
'That was Doughnut Jimmy, sir. He used to be a jockey on a very fat horse.'
'A racehorse?'
'Apparently, sir '
'A fat racehorse? Surely that could never win a race?'
'I don't believe it ever did, sir. But Jimmy made a lot of money by not winning races.'
'Ah. He gave me milk and some sort of sticky potion.' Vetinari concentrated. 'I was heartily sick.'
'So I understand, sir.'
'Funny phrase, that. Heartily sick. I wonder why it's a cliche? Sounds … jolly. Rather cheerful, really.'
'Yes, sir.'
'Feel like I've got a bad dose of flu, Vimes. Head not working properly.'
'Really, sir?'
The Patrician thought for a while. There was obviously something else on his mind. 'Why did he still smell of horses, Vimes?' he said at last.
'He's a horse doctor, sir. A damn good one. I heard last month he treated Dire Fortune and it didn't fall over until the last furlong.'
'Doesn't sound helpful, Vimes.'
'Oh, I don't know, sir. The horse had dropped dead coming up to the starting line.'
'Ah. I see. Well, well, well. What a nasty suspicious mind you have, Vimes.'
'Thank you, sir.'
The Patrician raised himself on his elbows. 'Should toenails throb, Vimes?'
'Couldn't say, sir.'
'Now, I think I should like to read for a while. Life goes on, eh?'
Vimes went to the window. There was a nightmarish figure crouched on the edge of the balcony outside, staring into the thickening fog.
'Everything all right, Constable Downspout?'
'Eff, fir,' said the apparition.
‘I’ll shut the window now. The fog is coming in.'
'Fight oo are, fir.'
Vimes closed the window, trapping a few tendrils which gradually faded away. 'What was that?' said Lord Vetinari. 'Constable Downspout's a gargoyle, sir. He's no good on parade and bloody useless on the street, but when it conies to staying in one place, sir, you can't beat him. He's world champion at not moving. If you want the winner of the 100 Metres Standing Still, that's him. He spent three days on a roof in the rain when we caught the Park Lane Knobbler. Nothing'll get past him. And there's Corporal Gimletsson patrolling the corridor and Constable Glodsnephew on the floor below and Constables Flint and Moraine in the rooms on either side of you, and Sergeant Detritus will be around constantly so that if anyone nods off he'll kick arse, sir, and you'll know when he does that 'cos the poor bugger'll come right through the wall.'
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