"Oh, dear. Rough day on the job?" Lady Sybil Ramkin Vimes set aside the flame retardant cowl and gloves she wore while feeding her swamp dragons and mucking out their pens each afternoon.
"Nnnrrmmphhh."
"Now, Sam, don't growl! I know that look, and whatever the matter is, I'm sure you will come out on top of it." She gave her husband an affectionate peck on the cheek and helped Vimes remove his armored breastplate and helmet. "Oh, I had a pleasant visit from Lettice Gunthroe this morning . . . ."
"Nrrrahhnnn."
"She and Rosie just got in the most darling pair of little Curly-Maned Slotties, and Lettice considers one of them to have definite championship prospects . . . ."
"Rrrrmmmpphh."
Lady Sybil took a deep breath, rolled up the thick, flame-repelling sleeves of her smock and grabbed her husband by both shoulders.
"Samuel Vimes! I am doing my best to distract you with small talk from something that is obviously bothering you, and you are not even having the husbandly decency to be distracted!"
"Hmm? Uh, sorry, dearest." Vimes allowed his gaze to become focused and they had a lot to focus on. Sybil's smock was of the tight, form-fitting kind, and the sight of her chest heaving in indignation was enough to distract almost any man who wasn't dead, and possibly a few who were. "You were saying . . . ?"
"That's better!" Sybil went from gripping Vimes' shoulders to rubbing them. "Oh, my! You are tense this evening! Has Havelock been giving you a bothersome case again?"
Vimes frowned. He'd known he was going to have to tell her, but he hadn't been looking forward to it.
"Your friend Havelock is my bothersome case." He took her hands in his and pressed his face against one of them. "I'm not quite sure how to tell you this, and you're not to repeat it to anyone, but he might be sort of dead."
Sybil's eyes widened, and only hundreds of years of Ramkin breeding and rearing in the Stiff Upper Lip department kept her jaw from dropping in shock.
"What exactly do you mean, sort of dead? Is he dead or not?"
"Um, yes." Not relinquishing his grip on her hands, he maneuvered them both through a door and into the smallest parlor of their Scoone Avenue mansion. He sat her down on the couch inside, closed the door to the room and settled down beside her with a groan.
"It's like this . . . ."
Someone you can trust is the truest blessing, Vimes knew, and he trusted Sybil more than he trusted the badge he carried, and that badge was practically his soul. He told her everything, from the urgent morning summons from Drumknott, the discovery of Vetinari's unbreathing, possibly poisoned body, the confusion, the uncertainties, and hovering above it all, the inability to figure out what might happen next. Sybil listened to it all with calm Ramkin resolve.
"And he's been taken to the University?"
"Hmph, yeah." That development had been Drumknott's preference, not Vimes's, but Vimes could see the reasoning behind it. The Palace wasn't safe, for all its guards and clerks. Someone had slipped something into Vetinari's mug, and the Watch still didn't know who. Captain Angua, the Watch's own werewolf, had examined the Oblong Office to sniff out any possible clues that the forensic team might miss, and had come up with nothing. Many individuals came and went from that place, but the most recent scents were only of Drumknott and the Patrician himself. Vimes wasn't about to suspect Drumknott for the time being. The entire Palace cook staff and wait staff would have to be interviewed, while allowing as little information about the Patrician's condition to slip out to the public as possible.
"A riot is the very least of it, if word gets around" Vimes muttered. "The Guild leaders'll do their worst, not that half of them haven't been trying that for years. It won't matter whether Vetinari is dead or not – they'll bury him as is and elevate the gods know what to serve in his place. Probably bury Drumknott too for good measure. I've never liked Vetinari, y'know, but of all the madmen and thugs we've had ruling Ankh-Morpork that I've ever known of . . . ."
"He's the least mad and thuggish?" Sybil suggested.
"Well he has been." Vimes frowned. Vetinari's behavior of late had been a bit odd, now that he thought about it. Not anything you could put a finger on exactly, but . . . . There had been that bit of business during the railway journey to Uberwald to get the Low King, er, Queen back to Bonk and to the Scone of Stone in time to foil the graggish coup by that crazy bastard Ardent. Vimes hadn't been fooled by Vetinari's disguised turn as 'Stoker Blake', and if Vimes hadn't been deceived, others had probably spotted the Patrician under that grease and coal patina as well. Moist von Lipwig certainly would've – Vimes wasn't prepared to put anything past that clever rogue. Lipwig had spotted a couple of dwarf spies that had got past the Watch too.
Vimes could understand why Vetinari had done it, with so much at stake on that mission. But if Vetinari was going to disguise himself as a railway stoker, why make himself the most conspicuous one? And Stoker Blake had been conspicuous all right, a bit too good at his job, a bit too much better than all the other stokers on board the train. Vimes knew all about Vetinari's reputation for stealth and subtlety – the man was an Assassin, for crying out loud. So why draw so much attention to his made-up persona? Why try to awe all the other stokers and railway crew by winning little competitions with them? That hadn't been subtle. It wasn't smart, either.
Hell, it wasn't Vetinari.
There had been other small changes that Vimes had observed in the man. Once or twice in the past few weeks Vimes had been summoned to the Palace early in the morning only to find the Patrician fuming because he hadn't been able to solve the crossword puzzle in the Ankh-Morpork Times. That hadn't been typical either. The Lord Vetinari that Vimes – that the whole damn city – knew was a man who could out-cool a glacier. He didn't lose his temper over anything so petty as a newspaper novelty. Why . . . .
"A dollar for your thoughts, dear?" Sybil interrupted her husband's reverie. "It looks like a penny won't be enough."
"Erm, sorry." Might as well ask the question, though. "Does it seem to you as if Vetinari has been acting at all strange lately?"
"Strange in what way? I've known him since we were children, Sam, but I don't see as much of him these days as you do. Nothing that I can recall, but he's always been a bit different."
"Grouchier maybe? More tyrannical than usual?" More of an egotistical son of a bitch?
Sybil must have read his mind. She was alarmingly good at that.
"You know, I wish you boys could just get along nicely with one another." She patted Vimes on the knee. "I realize you and Havelock have your differences once in a while . . . ."
Vimes did his best to keep his face a mask of neutrality.
"But you both want the same thing when it comes right down to it. You both work for the good of this city! And isn't that what's important? You ought to be working together more often. Oh Sam, do stop looking as if you've stuck your head in a freezer!" She patted him again and stood up. "Of course, you can't work together if Havelock doesn't recover, I realize that. But I'm not about to give up hope yet, and you shouldn't either! Now run upstairs and say hello to your son and I'll go find out when dinner is going to be ready."
They emerged to find Willikens, the butler, with neat precision putting away the armor and dragon pen outer-wear they'd discarded. Willikens, in addition to being a gentleman's gentleman, enjoyed the singular distinction of being one of the dirtiest, most lethal street fighters Vimes had ever met. It was a talent Vimes had grown to appreciate more than he could say over the years, especially when trouble had come calling far, far too close to home. Willikens shared Sybil's talent for reading Vimes like a book as well. He didn't ask Vimes if anything was the matter before Vimes headed up for some quality time with Young Sam – he simply gave Vimes a look to indicate he knew.
Damn Vetinari!
How long had it been since the city had nearly blown up like an alchemist's powder keg over a change in the government? Not nearly damn long enough . . . .
[* * * *]
