Commander Vimes, Captain Carrot and Sergeant Detritus made their way down to the docks on the Ankh.
After the whole business with the Gonne, the Patrician had agreed to extending the Watch substantially, and Vimes had given Carrot the job of setting up a special branch of the Watch to patrol the river. But the confusion and chaos that ruled the waterways of Ankh-Morpork had made things very difficult for the would-be law enforcers, and the whole thing had been abandoned in the end. For one thing, there was the whole issue of what type of vessel should be used.
There were rivers, it was said, in which you could bathe and become invulnerable against all sorts of weapons, and there were other waters that supposedly gave eternal life to anyone who drank from its source1. The Ankh was closer to sea; none of the above.
The Ankh's alluvial soil only passed for water because it was in the riverbed and moving slightly faster than the surrounding countryside. It was hard to negotiate at the best of times, and when it had got as far as Ankh-Morpork, those times were long gone.
It had been felt that the River Watch needed a craft that had to be fairly small and quick, as well as sturdy and easily manoeuvrable, something which seemed utterly impossible to combine in one boat. They had experimented with all sorts of different types; various rowboats and dinghies had been tried and found wanting.
Vimes had given up on the whole idea when Captain Carrot had been approached by that haggardly-looking wizard type a couple of weeks ago.
What was his name again? Vimes thought for a second. Rinse-bin? Mince-thin? Something like that, anyway. Carrot apparently knew the man at any rate, and the fellow had given the Watch a substantial donation.
No less than three sturdy boxes (filled with gold, Vimes assumed) had been delivered to the Yard, and that had resulted in three sturdy riverboats - miniature versions of the type that was used on the river Vieux, if he had understood things correctly. Unlike their larger counterparts they were both speedy and easy to steer, though, and now they already had a River Watch that was beginning to build up a reputation that made them feared by the less law-abiding elements stirring the muddy waters of the Ankh2. Vimes was a little hazy on the details, but he was sure that he had seen a memo about it somewhere.
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A barge filled with nervously whinnying horses rocked precariously as he passed, its owner struggling to calm the animals while at the same time cursing the rowing-madams who were laughing at his ordeal.
It struck Vimes, as it so often did, that it was a whole different world down here, on the river. Great ships of all kinds, from all over the Disc, lay at anchor here. They looked like strange beasts with their sails furled, and between them there was always a multitude of smaller boats, punts and cockles scurrying back and forth, carrying every conceivable commodity known to civilisation, and quite a few others, as well.
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They reached a large pier near the main river gates, and Carrot stepped confidently onto it and started walking towards a barrel-chested man that stood halfway out its length.
"That's the man I've been telling you about in my reports, Mister Vimes," he called over his shoulder.
Vimes didn't answer. He knew that he should spend more time taking care of the paperwork that amassed in his office, and he knew damned well that Carrot thought so to, but the innocent in which Carrot always assumed that Vimes had in fact read it all was irreproachable. Vimes was almost sure he did it on purpose. Almost.
He looked instead at the man they were approaching. He looked like the kind of character that learnt to climb riggings before he learnt to walk. He was broad-faced and tanned like leather, a man to which indoors was something that happened to other, less fortunate people. He stood with his legs far apart, as if he didn't quite trust the ground not to move underneath him, and when he spoke it was with a sneer.
"Mah name is Captain Roger Bates, and yew will hah-dress me as either 'Captain' or 'Captain Bates'," the man said, before they had had chance to introduce themselves. "Ah have been a-workin' on de rivah all mah life; started aht as a cabin-boy on one ah dem Vee-uh rivah-boats."
"Well, Captain," Carrot smiled, "I don't think you have to convince anyone here of that."
The captain took the hint, and when he spoke up again he had lost most of the accent.
"Yeah, well," the captain continued, "It ain't easy making a career on the river. Being a cabin boy isn't much fun, I can tell you. Whenever one of them fat, rich bastards wanted something they would call for me."
The captain shook his head sadly.
"Anyway, no one in my family ever made it higher than Master, and that would have been my fate, too, if I had stayed on the Vieux. I didn't much like that prospect, so as soon as I could I upped my anchor and here I am."
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Mister Vimes shook hands with the captain, and then he, Carrot and Detritus looked down on the boat that was moored to the pier. It was about thirty feet long and didn't have any mast or rigging at all, and there seemed to be no oars around, either. Apart from that Vimes thought it looked like any ordinary little boat, with one noticeable difference. It looked as if it had been trying to mate with an oversized lawn mower, and the two of them had somehow got stuck together.
The man beside him, obviously sensing Vimes' unspoken question, smiled reassuringly.
"It's basically done with something we call belt drive," the skipper said, beaming with pride.
Vimes just nodded slowly, encouragingly.
"It's an amazingly simple principle, of course, and one that we have used for a long time in my country," the captain enthused. "On the riverboats, what we do is we have a conveyor-belt set up below deck. That powers the paddlewheel via a drive shaft and propels the boat. Real simple. The problem is the input-output ratio, really."
Vimes' unspoken question got an exclamation mark added to it.
"You see, we traditionally use trolls on the conveyor-belt, which works fine when you have such a big ship as the riverboats, but here that's just not possible. A boat of this size would sink before you got anywhere near the power needed."
"Besides," he added, conspiratorially, "it ain't the same here as on the Vieux. We have to have more flexibility for the patrol boats. The trolls can't handle it if you giv'em more directions than forwards, backwards and halt - and even then we had some pretty nasty accidents, let me tell you!"
There was a slow, inexorable and above all meaningful sound as Detritus reached out and grabbed one of the big deep sea anchors that lay on the pier. Looking very intently at the captain he started to bend the thing.
"Trolls ain't stupid," he said, reflectively. "It are only a question of bad con-duct-ivity. Troll brains over-heat and trolls stop working," he added as an explanation.
The captain looked at the anchor as if mesmerised by the ease with which Detritus was wringing the protesting metal.
"Dese days I have a special helmet dat helps I keep my cool and so dere are hardly no bad con-duct at all," he finished, and placed the now completely deformed anchor in front of the captain.
It was bent into the unmistakable shape of a person, the arms and palms of the anchor forming its legs and feet, and the stocks turned into arms. The statue was smartly saluting the captain, its right arm bent so that it was holding the anchor ring upright, thus forming the statue's head. Detritus casually flicked the ring with a finger, and the statue's head fell forward as if beheaded.
"De real important thing are not to lose your head."
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"Good point, Sergeant Detritus," said Vimes in the ensuing stillness. "Now why don't we just all go aboard and captain Bates here can give us a demonstration of his vessel - right, captain?"
Captain Bates looked as if he would happily agree to do anything but continue arguing with the watchmen, so he undid the moorings and then quickly got into position behind the steering wheel, while the rest of the group clambered aboard as best they could.
"You'd better hold on tight now," he called out to the three watchmen that had assembled on the aft deck. Then he pushed a lever next to the wheel, and the boat shot out from the pier, the paddlewheel shovelling away.
The boat moved steadily up-river, as if by magic. Captain Bates steered the ship effortlessly between barges and rowboats while the watchmen were enjoying themselves, looking at the city from this unaccustomed point of view. The waters were untroubled, and for the moment so were they.
"So if it's not trolls you're using, then how does it work?" Vimes called.
The captain, reluctant to say anything in case he aggravated the roc— the large sergeant again, just locked the wheel and went over to a trap door in the aft and opened it, giving the Watch a good view of what was going on below deck.
"Hmm," said Vimes after a moment. "Quite clever, actually."
Below them on a short conveyor-belt was a sturdy-looking chest, trundling away. Even from almost right above, they could see the hundreds of little legs trundling away at great speed.
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1That sort of water is generally not for sail, by the (water)way. Sorry.
2 And whose members were becoming equally renowned for their shirts, which were always clean and impeccably ironed – a rare thing in Ankh-Morpork and something that had surprised Vimes when he heard about it.