Chapter 4: Here's trouble!
Other people in Ankh-Morpork hadn't gone to bed yet. Adora Belle Dearheart, freshly returned from a golem-saving field trip to Rham Nitz, sat at the dinner table opposite Moist von Lipwig and was onto her fourth cigarette. Her fiancé's account of recent events had so far completely failed to impress her. Now her eyebrows rose slightly and the corners of her mouth curled, though not in an encouraging way.
"So you're helping Vetinari?"
"Yes."
"Why?" She stubbed out her cigarette and lit another one.
"Because..." He hesitated. "Because I need him. He challenges me. You know what I'm like when I've got no challenge. I'm starting to do dangerous things."
"What, like walking into The Cavern with an "I Rock" badge, you mean?"
"That kind of thing, yes."
Adora Belle smoked in silence for a minute or so. Moist patted Mr Fusspot's head. The little dog yelped.
"But if you were the Patrician," said Adora Belle, "surely that would be challenge enough?"
"Spike, I don't want to be Patrician."
"And there was me thinking you stood for office last year!"
"That was a good challenge. But if I'd won, I'd have been out of the city and on my way to Borogravia before the Times brought out their first special edition."
"Really?"
She looked at him intensely, delicate wisps of smoke curling around her face.
"Really."
Adora Belle stopped her incessant smoking for a whole thirty-five seconds and treated Moist to her fully-fledged stare.
"You didn't tell me," she said eventually.
"No. I didn't need to. It didn't happen."
"But it might have."
In the silence, the sound of Adora Belle's smouldering cigarette was clearly audible. It's never a good sign in a relationship when it gets quite so quiet.
"I'd have sent you a letter," said Moist at last. "You could have joined me."
"And leave the Golem Trust? Forget it!"
"Well, we're even then, I suppose."
She laughed, a sudden sharp expulsion of air that sounded about as cheerful as the rattling of spoons in a drawer.
"Yes, I suppose we are," she said. "Shall we have dinner now? I'm starving."
~oOoOo~
He had worried needlessly. Not that he had worried all that much in the first place, because it was quite likely that Angelina would believe him. Miss Dixie Voom's loyalty was the fruit of a very innocent event some years ago, when he had decreed that a guild of exotic dancers would have to be lead by an exotic dancer rather than a man who owned a night club. He wasn't sure, though, whether Angelina would accept this as the truth or whether she would mark it as a likely story. Before he had made up his mind how to word his reply, however, his thoughts were interrupted by the rather endearing sound of a genteel snore.
He looked down at Angelina's face and saw that she had fallen asleep. Now he was worried.
~oOoOo~
The following morning Commander Vimes arrived, as usual, at the Watch House early enough to see the night shift coming off duty. He exchanged a few words with Sergeant Angua and then walked up to the shift rota, which was pinned up on the wall.
"When Greenaway comes in," he said to the duty officer, Constable Ping, "send him straight up to my office."
"Of course, sir. Is he in trouble, sir?"
"We're watchmen, Ping. We're all of us in trouble, all the time. But yes, Greenaway might be in a bit more trouble just now."
He ascended the stair and settled at his desk. After an hour of semi-virtuous attempts to clear the backlog of paperwork, during which he decided never to allow A. to go on holiday again, a knock on the door announced Lance-constable Greenaway. The young man walked in with what Vimes considered to be an almost insolent degree of nonchalance.
"Good morning, sir."
"Is it?" replied Vimes. "Doesn't seem all that good to me. Not when I find that my own staff are taking orders from third parties and follow them in blatant defiance of the law. But let me make this quite clear, lance-constable Greenaway. You are an officer of the Law and you are bound by the law, regardless of what Vetinari says. There will be no dodgy business and no split loyalties in the Watch while I am commander. Your behaviour has been outrageous."
Greenaway's lean face seemed to grow even longer. He opened his eyes wide in worried puzzlement.
"I don't understand, sir. What behaviour do you mean?"
"Do you see nothing wrong with the fact that you broke into Mr Slant's office and stole the paperwork about the Vetinaris?"
"But I didn't," said Greenaway.
Vimes stubbed out his cigar.
"What do you mean, you didn't? Vetinari told you to break into Slant's office and get the documents, and he had all the papers last night."
"With all due respect, Commander Vimes, Lord Vetinari told me not to break into Mr Slant's office. And I also had the impression that you wouldn't approve of such a scheme. So I didn't."
"So how did Vetinari get hold of the documents then?"
"Rufus Drumknott went and told Mr Slant that Lord Downey required them. Didn't you hear Lord Vetinari say that he'd got the papers from Mr Drumknott?"
At this, Commander Vimes snorted.
"And you expect me to believe that Slant just handed them over?"
"Yes, sir. What reason would he have to disbelieve Mr Drumknott?"
"Mr Drumknott went and told a deliberate lie?"
"In a good cause, yes."
Vimes leaned forward on his desk and scrutinized Greenaway's innocent features.
"Is that how you think of it? 'A good cause'? Getting Vetinari back into power is 'a good cause'?"
Greenaway shrugged.
"Sir, I assumed that's what you thought, too. After all, he's even staying in your house."
"The man staying at my house is the man who employed me for longer than you've been alive, promoted me numerous times, asked me to be the best man at his wedding, and, I want to make this perfectly clear, is not the Patrician of this city!" Vimes retorted.
"I'm sorry, sir. I thought it went without saying that you were in favour of his return to power. I beg your pardon if I misunderstood the situation."
Somewhat deflated, Vimes leaned back in his chair and rubbed his chin. Greenaway was fidgeting with something in his pocket. Unlike Captain Carrot, he had no concept of standing to attention in front of his superiors, and he had not been in the Watch for long enough to acquire such a notion by either osmosis or the more direct means of a mild reproach from Captain Carrot. Suddenly his attention seemed to be drawn to the object he was fingering. He pulled out a small glass bottle.
"What do I do with this, sir? Constable Visit and I found a box of these dumped into the river. I thought we might have to keep the bottle as evidence or something."
"Put it on the desk," said Vimes, grateful for the change of subject. "And remember in the future that the Watch has more important things to deal with than littering."
"Yes, sir, I will."
"On you go then," said Vimes, moderately satisfied with having found some reason, albeit minor, to reproach Greenaway. The young man placed the bottle on a space at the edge of Vimes's desk where the piles of papers where infinitesimally smaller and in less danger of sliding to the floor. Then he walked out and noiselessly closed the door behind him.
~oOoOo~
In the editors' office of the Ankh-Morpork Times, Sacharissa Cripslock was flicking through her notebook. She furrowed her brow.
"Something strange is going on with the river," she said. "I've had several people reporting that they saw what looked like a giant hand trying to reach out from the water."
"We don't do that kind of sensationalist journalism," replied William de Worde. He was struggling to find the appropriate wording for an article on Lord Downey's decision not to reopen the sewage works. Somehow various unsavory puns kept creeping into his brain. He'd worked in journalism for too long.
"But what if it's true?"
"Well, put it on the miscellaneous page then, so that people know we're not taking it too seriously. Any other odd news?"
"There's a rumour going round that Vetinari is back in the city," said Sacharissa.
William looked up from his desk. "That could be a tricky thing even for Vetinari to accomplish, given that he fell over the edge of the world."
" 'The Times reported,' " said Goldy, who had just wandered in with a wad of proofs. 1)
"Do you know anything about the source of this rumour?"
"It's a rumour, William. Someone claims to have seen Lady Vetinari standing outside a bakery shop. And apparently a lot of carriages have arrived at the Vimes mansion over the last few days."
"I can't see what that would have to do with Vetinari. Surely Lady Sybil can receive guests without us suspecting her of hiding a defunct tyrant under her roof?"
"As I said, it's just a rumour. Shall I put it into miscellaneous?"
"No. We're not starting to print rumours. Thanks, Goldy, just put these here."
Goldy placed the proofs onto William's desk and left the office. In the print room, the thunder of three printing presses shook the floor. A dozen or so dwarves and a couple of humans were involved in a variety of arcane activities that Goldy Jorgensson understood perfectly well, but the narrator doesn't and therefore refrains from describing in closer detail.
Behind her box of types stood Lucky Haettenschweiler, a traditional looking dwarf who, in spite of the unfortunate matter of gender, still made Goldy's heart beat faster. The previous year, after long hesitation, Goldy had decided to make a move, only to find that Lucky Haettenschweiler was not what a dwarf looks for in a husband. It was a tragic, but not unheard of occurrence in dwarf circles.
When Goldy approached her own place, Lucky looked up from her work and smiled.
"Just another half hour," she said casually. "Shall we go for a stroll in the park afterwards?"
"Sure," said Goldy, attempting to make her voice sound indifferent. She found it trying, to say the least, that Lucky sought her friendship when it was so abundantly clear that there could never be more than friendship. However, she didn't have the heart to say no to any of Lucky's little invitations, and so they had gone for numerous walks over the last few months. They'd even visited the Dwarf Bread Museum. But today it would be the park. Twenty minutes after the end of their shift they sat on a bench under a big lime tree and watched the Sideways Ducks 2) paddling around in the pond.
"Goldy?" said Lucky after a while.
"Yes?"
"I want to talk to you about something. It's not easy. I'm trying to find the right words. Please listen to me until I'm finished. You and I, we've spent a lot of time together recently. We have a lot in common and we enjoy each other's company. I have … I have developed some deep feelings for you, Goldy, and I believe you feel the same about me. I would like us to consider if we have a future together. What do you think?"
"But … you're a female," whispered Goldy.
"I did say we have a lot in common."
Lucky glanced at her, then turned her head and stared at the ducks.
"Besides, who's to know?" she said eventually.
Goldy held her breath. In a split second, she saw it all: their comfortable home, forging bread together, cooking rat vindaloo, sitting by the fireside in the evenings. It was a picture so completely charming that she sighed inadvertently, even though of course there was the issue of – goodness, it didn't bear thinking about.
"But your family," she said at last. "They would know."
Lucky shook her head. "They're all dead. Long ago."
"But we'd be living a lie," said Goldy.
Lucky looked her straight in the eye and held her gaze.
"And do you think we'd be the first?"
Goldy's eyes widened.
"You mean … it has happened before?"
"Lots of times, I'm sure," replied Lucky. "I once read that possibly even Bloodaxe and Ironhammer –"
"No!" exclaimed Goldy. "It can't be!"
"And why not? Nobody knows, Goldy." She looked at her urgently. "Nobody would know," she added in an imploring whisper.
"But what if someone found out?"
Lucky sighed.
"Goldy, if you say 'but' once more, I'll give up. Go on, break our hearts. If you believe it is so important what people might possibly think in the extremely unlikely event that they ever find out, then I can't help it. But I think that is stupid. I love you. You love me. We're both dwarves. Who's to stop us from being happy together?"
In the pond, two ducks had collided with each other in their awkward sideways motion. Their indignant quacking filled the pause in the conversation for a while, but eventually an answer had to be given. Goldy took a deep breath.
"Well…" she said.
1) This was an uncharacteristically devious comment for a dwarf to make, and the credibility of this passage can only be maintained if the narrator reveals that Tvoolia had prepped Goldy with this remark.
2) The Morporkian Sideways Duck is a sad example of evolution in a magically polluted urban environment.It is not unusual for urbanized ducks to remain in cities during those months when their rural counterparts would be flocking toward warmer climates. The muggy warmth of certain cities even during cold months combined with the consistent food supply from the city's residents often causes the ducks to reevaluate the benefits of an exhausting bi-yearly migration. But the ambient magical radiation of Ankh Morpork has resulted in a strange amplification of this behavior. The Sideways Duck now never leaves the city for any reason, and is frightened of the prospect of ever doing so. Since moving forward or backward in any direction might bring them too close to the city walls, the ducks reason that if they only moved sideways, they would never have to risk accidentally leaving their urban environment. This just goes to show how a strong magical field can affect the mind of an animal without raising its intelligence in any way.
~oOoOo~
"Read me a story, Aunty Lina," demanded Young Sam. They had been playing with the bricks, but their elaborate tower had just collapsed. Angelina got up and found that sitting on her feet had not been a good move. She hobbled over to the bookcase with clenched teeth and after some deliberation chose a volume. They sat down in the cosy chair, the little boy snuggled up against her shoulder.
"All right then, Sam, this is a book about the legends and histories of Ankh-Morpork from ancient times to the present day. I'm going to read you a story about Good King Shul." 3)
"Who's that?"
"He was the first king of Ankh-Morpork and the most famous, because he was kind and wise and fabulously rich and he always did the right thing."
"My Daddy always does the right thing."
"I'm sure he does, and as far as I know he is also fabulously rich. Shall we begin with the story now?"
She opened the book and read:
In those days it so happened there were two young men who both wanted to marry the same maiden. The virgin was decorous and virtuous and asked her father which of her two suitors she should accept, but before he could make a decision, he was struck by lightning and died. The maiden was distraught and grieved for a year and a day over her father, but when the period of mourning was completed, the two young men applied for her hand again. In her despair, the maiden turned to the king and asked for his advice. – This is rather silly of the maiden, Sam, because she should make her own choices. What chance does she have to be happy with either of these men, if she cannot make up her mind about them? She should have thought a bit harder. Anyway, let's read on. – King Shul called both men in front of his throne and asked them why they wanted to marry the maiden.
"I love her dearly," said the first. "Her hair is like the spray of a silvery waterfall, her hips are like rosebuds and her ears like delicate ornaments of mother-of-pearl."
"Very well," said the king, "Though I am sure you meant to say her lips and not her hips. Now, let us hear the other man's plea."
"I love her deeply and truly," said the second. "Her eyes are like gleaming embers of coal, her neck is like a tower on a distant hill top and her cheeks are like rosy peaches."
The king nodded. "I have heard both your pleas now. Go back to your homes and return tomorrow to hear my judgement."
On the evening of the same day, the king disguised himself in the garb of a travelling toothpick seller and went to the house of the maiden. When he came through the gate, he beheld a young man who was pruning the rose bushes. The king greeted the gardener and spoke thus:
"What can you tell me of the maiden who lives in this house?"
The gardener said, "She is as virtuous as she is beautiful, though her beauty counts for little. It is the gentleness of her manner and the kindness of her heart that endear her to every creature, be it man, woman or beast. Every day she comes into the garden and greets me with her soft voice. She looks at all the plants and caresses them with her tender hands. To see her walk on the path makes my heart sing."
"Do you love her then?" asked the king.
The gardener cast down his eyes and said, "I would not dare to love so high above my station."
The next morning the two young men appeared in front of the king again.
"Hearken to my judgement," said King Shul. "Neither of you shall marry the maiden. Apart from the fact that you are both appalling poets, I have come to see that you do not love this woman nor even know anything about her heart. Go home and try to improve your insipid selves."
And to the maiden he spoke thus: "Marry the young man who tends to your gardens, for he truly loves you."
And so the maiden and the gardener married and happiness bloomed in their house like an everlasting flower and they had many children, three times five.
Angelina closed the book.
"Well," she said, more to herself than to Young Sam, "that is certainly strange. Three times five? What's that supposed to mean? Five girls, five boys and five what? Or is it possible that the author couldn't count to fifteen?"
"Why did they all want to marry her?" asked Young Sam.
"Because she was a nice lady."
"My mummy is a nice lady. I want to marry her."
"I'm sure you do, Sam, I'm sure you do," said Angelina and decided to leave it at that.
3) It is left to the imagination of the reader whether or not this choice of story constituted a deliberate rebellion on Angelina's part against the idiosyncrasies of her host.
~oOoOo~
Later in the afternoon Vetinari came into the drawing room, but found only Sybil seated by the window with an obscure item of knitting.
"Where is Angelina?"
"She went upstairs to have a nap."
Vetinari raised the eyebrow.
"I cannot help noticing that she seems uncommonly tired these days."
Sybil put her knitting aside and gave him a serious look.
"Havelock, I believe your wife has something to tell you, and I shall be most displeased with you if I'll get the impression that you are anything but supportive."
Vetinari drew breath sharply. He sat down, leaning on his cane, and frowned.
"I believe I know what you mean. Are you sure about this?"
"Constant tiredness, always close to tears, frequent visits to the bathroom? I know what I am talking about, Havelock. I have asked Mrs Content to come round tomorrow, but I am pretty certain I know what she will say."
"And how is Angelina taking it?"
Sybil picked up her knitting again and absentmindedly began to unravel it.
"She is beside herself, poor lamb. She thinks that you are going to be angry."
Vetinari sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose.
"I shall go and speak to her," he said and left the room.
He found Angelina huddled up in bed and sobbing. She pulled the blanket over her head when she saw him coming in. Vetinari sat down on the edge of the bed, conscious that this was beginning to be a repetitive pattern in their relationship, but relieved at least to have identified a plausible cause. He drew the blanket away from her face.
"So," he said, "it would appear that be Trobi rubber is not without failings."
Angelina turned her head aside and glanced towards the window.
"I didn't do it on purpose," she whispered and clutched at the bedclothes.
Vetinari began to laugh. She looked at him and wrinkled her nose in a frown.
"What's funny about that?"
He reached out and stroked her cheek, his shoulders still shaking.
"I couldn't even begin to explain," he said. 4) "Don't fret, my dear. It wouldn't be the Scorpion Pit for you, even if I still had the use of it. Let's assume it was an accident."
"But what will we do now?"
"What is there to do? We'll have to give your friend Tvoolia an order for three dozen white romper suits or whatever it is one needs in these circumstances. I'm sure she'll be delighted to give you advice from her superior experience. And I believe there are certain breathing exercises you'll need to practice, though maybe not until a bit closer to the time."
Angelina's eyes grew wide and round.
"You mean I can have this baby?"
"Angelina!" He was surprised how hurt he felt by her remark. Surely she knew him better? "Angelina, I would never have chosen this scenario, but since it seems to have chosen us, I will adapt to it with dignity. I am amazed that you would think otherwise."
The expression of her face was painfully clearly one of huge relief. She flung her arms around him.
"Thank you, Havelock. I love you. I love you so much!"
"Steady now," he said, embarrassed by so much affection. "It won't be easy. There will be rather a lot of difficulties."
"Oh, I'm sure you'll be able to arrange things just perfectly."
"Have you such boundless trust in me?"
"Yes."
"Well, it would appear then that I have no choice than to be exceptionally efficient."
"You will be," she murmured into his ear. "You know you always are."
4) Angelina had, of course, shown herself to be a reasonably nifty needlewoman, but it would have been fantastic to imagine that she would put a needle to such devious use. Nevertheless, the image arose in Vetinari's mind and triggered a bout of hilarity that would have been worthy of a be Trobi woman.